Descriptive Gazetteer Entry for SELSEY

SELSEY, a village and a parish in Westhampnett district, Sussex. The village stands on a peninsula, ½ a milefrom the sea, 6½ S W of Bognor r. station, and 8 S of Chichester; is traditionally said to have been once in the centre of the peninsula; was known to the Saxons as Selsea or Seloesea; took that name from two words signifying " Seal's Island; " was early and long a town of considerable consequence; acquired a monastery about 680, founded by King Ædelwalch; became in 711 the seat of a bishopric, which was removed in 1075 to Chichester; gave the title of Baron to the family of Peachey; consists now of 3 streets, one of them inhabited chieflyby fishermen; and has a post-office under Chichester. The parish consists of the peninsula; is connected with the main land only by an isthmus, between the head of Pagham harbour and the sea; and comprises 3, 494 acres of land, and 820 of water. Real property, £5, 424. Pop., 900. Houses, 191. About half of the peninsula is believed to have been swept away since the Saxon times. All the surface is a dead level, on the London clay formation, with a rich soil, but interspersed with deep marshes. The coast also is all low; terminates in a headland, called Selsey Bill; and is flanked there by a dangerous circle of shoals. A sea-tract on the S E bears the name of the Park; was a park of the Bishops, stocked with deer, solate as the time of Henry VIII.; and is now an anchorage-ground, with from 1 to 3 fathoms water. The site of the ancient cathedral also is now covered by the sea. The living is a rectory and a vicarage in the diocese of Chichester. Value, £759.* Patron, the Bishop of Chichester. The church stood about 2 miles N E of the village, but is now at its entrance. Nicholls, the ecclesiastical writer who died in 1712, was rector.


(John Marius Wilson, Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales (1870-72))

Linked entities:
Feature Description: "a village and a parish"   (ADL Feature Type: "populated places")
Administrative units: Selsey CP/AP       Westhampnett RegD/PLU       Sussex AncC
Place names: SELOESEA     |     SELSEA     |     SELSEY
Place: Selsey

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