Tetsworth

Tetsworth is a village and civil parish about south of Thame in Oxfordshire. Its Parish Council is made up of six elected Councillors. The estimated population in 2018 was 752 persons. According to the Council (in late 2019), business included the Zioxi educational furniture plant, the Swan antiques centre and some nearby equestrian and agricultural enterprises. The village no longer had a post office or many retail operations, but retained its "church, primary school, village hall, sports on the village green, and village pub and restaurant". History At the time of the Domesday Book in 1086 Tetsworth did not exist as a separate manor. One summary of the village history states that Tetsworth lands were included in the Bishop of Lincoln's Thame manor of 60 hides". In the 12th century, benefactors gave land in the area to the Cistercian Thame Abbey and these lands were brought together as an estate under the abbey's control. Records indicate that during 1209–12 "Peter Talemasch and Robert Danvers were returned as joint lords of Tetsworth", of lands not owned by the abbey. By about 1225 the abbey held 20 virgates of land at Tetsworth, initially called the Grange but from 1365 called a manor. In 1316 Simon Danvers and the Abbot of Thame were the joint lords of Tetsworth. In 1539 Thame Abbey was suppressed under the Dissolution of the Monasteries and surrendered all its properties to the Crown. In 1542 the Crown granted the manor of Thame to Robert King, Bishop of Oxford. In 1547 King leased Thame to Sir John Williams but the lease was terminated, and in 1558 or 1560 the Diocese sold Tetsworth to a "number of London residents". By 1589 the Crown held the manor again and was in the process of selling it to Christopher Petty of Tetsworth and his son Charnell. Tetsworth remained in the Petty family until Christopher's great-grandson, also called Christopher, inherited it in 1674. He was described as a man of "unthriftiness, folly, and extravagance" who dissipated his family fortune, sold parts of the estate in 1680 and the whole of the remaining manor to Thomas Phillips of Ickford in 1683. Thomas's grandson Henry Phillips sold Tetsworth to Willoughby Bertie, 4th Earl of Abingdon, in 1756. Montagu Bertie, 5th Earl of Abingdon, sold the manor again in 1810. In 1810, the manor was "apparently" sold to the Rev.