MAPLESTEAD (LITTLE), a parish in the hundred of HINCKFORD, county of ESSEX, 2 miles (N. by E.) from Halstead, containing 313 inhabitants. The living is a donative, within the jurisdiction of the Commissary of Essex and Herts, concurrently with the Consistorial Court of the Bishop of London, endowed with £200 private benefaction, £600 royal bounty, and £200 parliamentary grant, and in the patronage of Davis, Esq. The church, dedicated to St. John of Jerusalem, is ancient, and remarkable as being one of the few remaining models of the Holy Sepulchre; the east end is semicircular, and it is said once to have had the privilege of sanctuary. Juliana, wife of Fitz-Aldelm de Burgo, in the time of Henry I.t gave the entire parish to the Knights Hospitallers, who had a preceptory here.