WOTTON HUNDRED 



ABINGER 



ABINGER 



Abinceborne (xi cent.) ; Abinworth, Abyngworth 

 (xiii cent.) ; Abyngeworth (xv cent.). 



Abinger is a parish bounded on the north by West 

 Horsley and Effingham, on the east by Wotton and 

 Ockley, on the south by the county of Sussex, on 

 the west by Ewhurst and Shiere. It is 9 miles from 

 north to south, and varies from i to \ mile from 

 east to west. It contains 7,560 acres. The church is 

 8 miles south-west of Dorking. Abinger, Wotton, 

 and Ockley were formerly much intermixed, but on 

 5 December 1879' a long outlying strip of Ockley 

 between Abinger and Ewhurst, and two smaller 

 portions of Ockley isolated in Abinger, were added to 

 Abinger ; at the same date ' a part of Wotton on the 

 Sussex border was added to Abinger. On 2 5 March 

 1883 * a very small curiously outlying piece of Ock- 

 ham and two very small portions of Cranleigh and 

 Ewhurst, near the eastern slope of Holmbury Hill, 

 were added to Abinger. The northern portion of 

 the parish is on the chalk downs, nearly 700 ft. above 

 the sea. It runs southward over the narrow Upper 

 Green Sand and Gault, and on the western side of Lei th 

 Hill on the Lower Green Sand rises to over 800 ft. 

 on High Ashes Hill. Abinger Church is 550 ft. 

 above the sea, and is the highest old parish church in 

 Surrey, except Tatsfield. The southern part of the 

 parish sinks rapidly down to the Wealden Clay. 

 The streams which rise in the parish flow to the 

 Tillingbourne, which runs from Leith Hill to join the 

 Wey at Shalford, and in the other direction to the 

 head waters of the Arun. The parish is agricultural ; 

 but at Abinger Hammer, on the Tillingbourne, was 



an iron forge. 4 The South Eastern Railway, Redhill 

 and Reading branch, and the road from Dorking to 

 Guildford traverse the northern part of the parish. 



The ancient remains in Abinger, since the extension 

 of the parish in 1879-83, are extensive and interest- 

 ing. Neolithic flints, including a fine axe-head in 

 private possession, have been found about Holmbury 

 Hill. In a field near Abinger Hall a small Roman 

 villa was found in 1877, with some coins of Con- 

 stantine the Great and his family. The remains were 

 left open, and Dr. Darwin used the Roman mosaic floors 

 in situ for observations upon the work of earthworms, 

 aided in his investigation by his niece, Miss Wedgwood 

 of Leith Hill Place. The remains mostly perished 

 from exposure, or were removed, and the remainder 

 is now covered up again. It appeared to be a small 

 country house, of no great pretensions. 



On Holmbury Hill now in Abinger, but m 

 Ockley when the old Surrey histories were written is 

 a considerable earthwork, covering almost exactly 10 

 acres, 857 ft. above the sea. The four sides are 

 nearly opposite the cardinal points. The western, 

 northern, and eastern ditches make nearly three sides 

 of a square, but the southern side follows the irregular 

 contour of the steep slope of the hill. There are 

 double banks and ditches on the north and west, 

 where the ground outside is nearly as high as the in- 

 side, and double, or treble, scarped banks on the 

 south, obscured by diggings for sand. On the east, 

 where the ground falls more rapidly, is a bank and 

 ditch, with a low outside bank to it, but no ditch 

 visible beyond. There is a poor water supply inside. 



1 Loc. Goyt. Bd. Order no. 9951. 

 3 



ABINGER : CROSSWAYS FARM HOUSE 



' By Order no. 9951. * By Order no. 14281. 



I2Q 



4 V.C.H. Surr. ii, 170-1. 



'7 



