Burford

Extract from Discovering Wychwood by Charles Keighley

10 km (7 miles) west of Witney at crossing of A40 and A361. One of the best-known Cotswold towns, just south of the Windrush, and hence just outside the Norman royal Forest. Essentially still a small medieval town, with a range of fourteenth-to-sixteenth-century houses and numerous inns remaining.

The church of St John the Baptist is a large and complicated building, with a Norman core and surrounding chapels, which was remodelled in the 15th century. A memorial to Henry VIII's surgeon Edmund Harman interestingly includes American Indians. The churchyard was the scene of England's Tiananmen Square - in 1649 Cromwell had three mutinous Levellers shot and buried there.

As well as the High Street, Witney Street and Sheep Street contain many handsome houses and inns. Golf course. East and west of the town centre are small blocks of woodland. The wet grasslands and marsh of the river valley provide particularly notable bird habitats.

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