Wedmore

Wedmore is a large village on raised ground in the Somerset Levels, between the River Axe and the River Brue, and is often called the Isle of Wedmore. It lies about 4 miles (6 km) south of Cheddar, 7 miles west of Wells and 7 miles north-west of Glastonbury. At the 2011 census the parish had 3,318 residents, spread across three main villages (Wedmore, Blackford and Theale) and 17 hamlets.

The Church of St Mary is mostly 15th century, with some 12th and 13th-century work surviving and a tower from around 1400. It is Grade I listed. Wedmore is also tied to the events of 878, when the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle records the Viking leader Guthrum being baptised with Alfred the Great as his godfather. Historians use the term Treaty of Wedmore for this, though no such treaty survives.

South of the village lie Tealham and Tadham Moors, a biological Site of Special Scientific Interest. The River Brue overtops in winter, causing annual flooding there, so check the lanes after heavy rain. In 1799 Hannah More founded a Sunday school in Wedmore, and in the 17th century Dr John Westover ran a mental hospital there that is believed to have been England’s first private lunatic asylum. The village has been twinned with Saint-Médard-de-Guizières in France since 1975.

The towns around it each have a page: Cheddar, Wells and Glastonbury.