Visit Brightwell-cum-Sotwell – things to do & explore
When you visit Brightwell-cum-Sotwell on a day-trip, weekend away or holiday, Walkfo is the digital tour guide to the hidden history & cultural facts that you can explore in Brightwell-cum-Sotwell. Millions of audio content spots are available when you travel by foot, bike, bus or car around Brightwell-cum-Sotwell through your mobile phone connected to headphones.
Overview of Brightwell-cum-Sotwell history & facts by Walkfo
Planning a visit to Brightwell-cum-Sotwell?
Brightwell-cum-Sotwell is a twin-village and civil parish in the Upper Thames Valley in South Oxfordshire. It lies between Didcot to the west and the historic market town of Wallingford to the east. In 1974 it was transferred from Berkshire to the county of Oxfordshire, and from Wallingford Rural District to the district of South Oxfordshire.
Brightwell-cum-Sotwell history
Brightwell and Sotwell were originally two separate villages, rural settlements whose inhabitants worked the land.
Prehistory
For thousands of years hunter-gatherers of the Thames Valley would have passed this way, stalking wild animals and gathering from the trees that grew on the greensand in this area. This good soil and the abundant water supply may have encouraged Iron Age farmers (1500 BC – AD 50) to settle in this area. The ramparts on Wittenham Clumps provide enduring evidence of Iron Age settlement in the area. Then came the Romans, and there seems little doubt that the road from Dorchester to Silchester passed along what is now the Mere and Mackney Lane.
Medieval times
The first written evidence of a village here comes from the various Saxon charters describing ownership of land in Beorhtanville, Suttanwille and Maccanie. In a charter of 854 Æthelwulf, King of Wessex granted Swithun, Bishop of Winchester, an estate of 30 hides at Brihtanwylle to help the bishop pay the expenses of entertaining distinguished foreign guests. Subsequently, William the Conqueror’s agents recorded in the Domesday Book 70 families and two mills in Brightwell and Sotwell, but where these stood and how they were powered is unknown. Within 50 years of Domesday, Brightwell Castle was involved in the civil war between King Stephen and his cousin Matilda. The exact site of this castle is unknown, but it probably lay within the moated areas of what later contained St Agatha’s/Brightwell manor house in Brightwell or Stonor Hayes manor house in Sotwell.
Early modern times
For the next 800 years Brightwell and Sotwell parishes only occasionally appear in recorded history. For example: 1330 (circa) Thomas de Brayles, later Chancellor of the Irish Exchequer, appointed parish priest. 1500 (circa) Prince Arthur (eldest son of Henry VII) stayed at Sotwell House. 1507 Clerk in Holy Orders murdered in St Agatha’s. 1649 Edward Hyde DD ejected from his living for being a Royalist. 1666 Church collection for victims of the Great Fire of London. 1726 Mrs Frances Riggins leaves a legacy “for bread and ye schooling for ye poor of Slade End”. 1774-1849 Reverend Thomas Wintle. “About 4 o’clock with my neighbours at ye Red Lion where they dined at the expense of ye parish and myself and then set again to mark the boundaries” 1781 King George III rode through the village returning from a stag hunt. 1785 A Sunday school set up by the Reverend Wintle. 1811 Inclosure Act for Brightwell. With the coming of the Industrial Revolution and the Victorian era, the village had some significant philanthropists who worked hard for the good of the villagers: Reverend Marmaduke Thompson – building of Brightwell National School in the village. Reverend John Haldane Stewart – building of the new village school, which is now the village hall. Forming a night school for adult parishioners. Farmer Edward Fairthorne – Reading Room and recreation ground for the villagers. Scholarships for promising boys to go to Wallingford Grammar School. Miss Augusta Fairthorne – endowment of the Free Church.
Modern times
The War Memorial records the loss of villagers in the armed services in the two world wars. In the second half of the 20th century there was significant expansion of the villages and in 1948 the villages of Brightwell and Sotwell were brought together as one civil parish. In 1949 the Greenmere estate was built and later, estates were also built at Kings Orchard, Monks Mead and Datchet Green. There are no immediate plans for any major development, though around 2011 there was some controversy regarding a plan to build some 800 houses between the village and Wallingford. The plan to develop on this area was eventually abandoned, in the face of local pressure, in favour of a new development on the Hithercroft.
You can visit Brightwell-cum-Sotwell, COUNTY/BOROUGH & use Walkfo to discover the best walking places with our free digital tour guide app created especially for Brightwell-cum-Sotwell. Walkfo Brightwell-cum-Sotwell has 300 locations with history, culture & travel facts, that you can explore the same way you can a museum or art gallery with information audio headset. With Walkfo, you can travel by foot, bike or bus throughout Brightwell-cum-Sotwell, being in the moment, without digital distraction and no limitations to a specific walking route – you choose where you want to go, when you want to go and Walkfo Brightwell-cum-Sotwell will keep up.
When you visit Brightwell-cum-Sotwell
When you visit Brightwell-cum-Sotwell, Walkfo is your digital tour guide while exploring by foot, bike or bus. With numerous walks, hikes, tourist locations & travel destinations available in Brightwell-cum-Sotwell, our travel AI guide helps you get the best from your visit to Brightwell-cum-Sotwell & the surrounding areas. Our explore Brightwell-cum-Sotwell app for iPhone & Android, allows you to experience the hidden history, culture and amazing facts throughout Brightwell-cum-Sotwell whilst out walking. The digital tour guide creates interactive audio stories driven by where you walk, so you can exploration Brightwell-cum-Sotwell’s National Heritage sites, tourist attractions, historic locations or city streets freely, without the restrictions of a predefined walk & walk map.
“The Walkfo AI has curated content for millions of locations across the UK, with 0 audio facts in Brightwell-cum-Sotwell alone that form an interactive Brightwell-cum-Sotwell walking map for you to explore.”
Best Brightwell-cum-Sotwell places to visit
Brightwell-cum-Sotwell has hundreds of places to explore by foot, bike or bus. Below are five of Brightwell-cum-Sotwell’s best destinations to visit when exploring the area. We have condensed the information with much more detail available within Walkfo when you visit the destinations.
bVisit Brightwell-cum-Sotwell plaques
Brightwell-cum-Sotwell has 0 plaques as part of nation or local tourist plaque schemes for you to explore when you visit. Plaque schemes such as National Heritage’s “Blue Plaques” provide a visual geo marker to highlight points of interest things, at the places where they happened. Walkfo has researched each plaque to provide additional content when you visit the Brightwell-cum-Sotwell plaques whilst using the app. Experience the hidden history & stories behind each location as the Walkfo local tourist guide app uses GPS to trigger audio close to each Brightwell-cum-Sotwell plaque. Walkfo also offers millions of additional ‘virtual geo plaques’ that are unique to Walkfo, created across the UK (and the world).
When using Walkfo to explore Brightwell-cum-Sotwell, you will hear the full story of each of these plaques.
Experience Brightwell-cum-Sotwell audio walks & tours
Walkfo is a free app that shows you things to do / visit in Brightwell-cum-Sotwell on a map. You can explore the area as you wish, as you would do an art gallery or museum, and when you walk close to those locations, our digital tour guide will tell you history, culture & travel facts about the location in audio form. With headphone connected, you can explore Brightwell-cum-Sotwell freely by foot, bike or bus – with your own personal tour guide in your pocket.
Visiting Brightwell-cum-Sotwell with Walkfo’s things to do interactive map
The “Brightwell-cum-Sotwell things to do map” below is a preview of the places you can visit in Brightwell-cum-Sotwell and surrounding areas with our digital audio tour guide app. Each spot has content for a plaque, a building, a street or general area, providing history, culture or tourism information the you can explore.
| Interactive ‘Explore Brightwell-cum-Sotwell Map’
This Brightwell-cum-Sotwell tourism map shows points of interest within a 4km radius of Brightwell-cum-Sotwell centre | Walkfo App
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Walkfo is free to download & use (for a limited time period), so if you are looking to explore Brightwell-cum-Sotwell, go to your App Store to search for “Walkfo” or follow a links below and install on your mobile phone. Walkfo is designed for use with headphones or AirPods, so you can walk & explore whilst learning about the things around you without digital distraction.
Apple App Store
Google Play Store
Things to do & visit in Brightwell-cum-Sotwell and surrounding areas
Getting to / around Brightwell-cum-Sotwell – transport links, stations, streets & traffic map
Getting around in Brightwell-cum-Sotwell using public transportation may include roads, streets, trains, undergrounds, buses or trams. Walkfo has the following important Brightwell-cum-Sotwell public transport locations with historic / cultural / factual content when you visit:
| Brightwell-cum-Sotwell Notable Public Transport Stations | Brightwell-cum-Sotwell Notable Streets & Roads | |
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Attention local Brightwell-cum-Sotwell historians, tour guides & Brightwell-cum-Sotwell tourism agents
Looking for a way to get more visitors to Brightwell-cum-Sotwell?
Whilst Walkfo has millions audio spots already available, Walkfo Creator allows tourist destinations, attractions & landmarks to create their own unique outdoor audio museums & walks using the simple & easy to use Walkfo Creator. Creating an audio walk for you destination is free* and can be created in under 15 minutes if you have content ready, with Walkfo Creator doing all the hard work generating audio files for geo spot you simply click on a map.
The 100 Amazing Brightwell-cum-Sotwell Places outdoor museum was created using Walkfo Creator (pictured to the left) as a way for people to safely explore the area during Covid-19 times whilst improving the experience of visiting a city when tourism boards use Walkfo to market their destination.
Walkfo is currently looking to partner with websites who offer things-to-do / what’s on events listings to add to our content on our webpages (for example: www.visitBrightwell-cum-Sotwell.com). If you are interested in being a content provider, please contact us to discuss options.
* Walkfo Creator is free to use for a limited number of audio spots within a map with a license fee applicable when more than 20 audio spots within location walk are created.