With its glorious abbey and historic architecture this former Saxon capital could even be a little too perfect
What’s going for it? Sherborne may be small, but what it lacks in girth it makes up for in history. This place is spilling over with stories. Back in 800 or so it was A Big Deal, a megalopolis of Saxon Wessex, with a cathedral and everything (in 1075 the cathedral was demoted to an abbey – still there, still luscious). This was the front line in the unification of England, holding back the invading Danes from the east. Alfred the Great’s brothers are buried in the Abbey. And we haven’t even got to the second millennium yet. (Don’t get me going on Sir Walter Raleigh’s two castles. One is never enough, I find.) These days Sherborne’s a quieter affair, up at the top of Dorset, a little off the beaten track now that the A303 to the north saps the traffic from the A30. It’s quite content, though, a prosperous place where Fired Earth does a roaring trade. It has its past for company, materialised in its glorious, ochre architecture. When old age looks this good, who’s want youth?
The case against… A little dull. A little perfect. One can have enough shops selling beige country casuals.
Continue reading...from Home And Garden | The Guardian http://bit.ly/2DxOFlU
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