CASTLE-COMBE, a parish (formerly a market
town) in the hundred. of CHIPPENHAM, county of
WILTS, 6 miles (N.W. by W.) from Chippenham,
containing 635 inhabitants. The living is a rectory,
in" the archdeaconry of Wilts, and diocese of Salisbury,
rated in the king's books at £9, and in the patronage
of H. Scroop, Esq. The'church, dedicated to
St. Andrew, appears to be of very ancient date; it consists
of 'a nave, north and' south aisles, and a chancel,
with a.tower at the west end about eighty feet high,
supported by angular buttresses with pinnacles. Castle-
Combe is a considerable village, and was anciently, celebrated
for a' castle built in the early part of the. thirteenth
century, by Walter de Dunstanville,- son-in-law
of Reginald, Earl of Cornwall, which was 'dismantled
before the close of the fourteenth: it stood on a hill
north of the village, where the remains of its intrenchments
are still discernible. A market was obtained for
this place by Bartholomew, Lord Badlesmere, one of its
ancient possessors; it has been discontinued, but the
market cross remains in the centre of the village.