Lympsham

Lympsham is a village and civil parish six miles west of Axbridge, close to the River Axe. It is about six miles south-east of Weston-super-Mare, which has its own page: Weston-super-Mare. The parish includes the hamlet of Wick, and since 1 April 2023 the village has come under Somerset Council. Before that it was part of Sedgemoor district.

The village is first recorded in the 1086 Domesday Survey. Its name has an uncertain origin: one suggestion links it to Old English words meaning a suitable home, though a personal name plus ham, meaning village or estate, seems more likely. Drainage improvements were probably made in the Saxon period. In 1129 the Abbot of Glastonbury Abbey recorded that corn was growing here on land that had previously been classified as worthless.

The Church of St Christopher dates from the 15th century and is Grade I listed, the exceptional-interest category. It was heavily restored in the 19th century by Rev A. J. Stephenson and his son J. H. Stephenson.

Other buildings include Wick Farmhouse, from the mid-18th century, and a former Methodist chapel that is now a private dwelling. Sir William Comer Petheram (1835-1922), a judge in India, is among the village’s notable people.