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William White's History, Gazetteer, and Directory of Norfolk 1845

GENERAL HISTORY AND DESCRIPTION OF THE
COUNTY OF NORFOLK

(Page 13)

Description of the County

[Transcription copyright © Pat Newby]

NORFOLK, the most eastern division of England, is an extensive maritime county, comprising 412,664 inhabitants, and about 1,300,000 acres of land, divided into thirty-three Hundreds, and about 740 Parishes, - including the City of Norwich, which forms, with its precincts, a Town and County of itself. Compared with the other counties of England, it ranks the fourth in territorial extent, and the eighth in population.

It is celebrated for the diversity and high cultivation of its soil; for the abundance and excellence of its agricultural productions; for its crape, bombasin, and other manufactures of silk and worsted; for its herring and mackerel fisheries; and for its numerous antiquities, market towns, villages and parishes; but in some cases. two or three of the latter are united either ecclesiastically, or for the support of the poor.

It lies between 52 deg. 17 min. and 52 deg. 56 min. North Latitude, and 1 min. and 1 deg. 45 min. East Longitude from the meridian of Greenwich; - being of an oval figure, extending about 70 miles from east to west, and 42 miles in the broadest parts from north to south. It is about 180 miles in circumference, and the northern half of it is bounded by the German Ocean and the Great Estuary, called The Wash; whilst its southern side is divided from Suffolk by the Waveney and Little Ouse rivers; and from Cambridgeshire, chiefly by the Great Ouse, Welney, and Nene, - the latter of which, as well as the Great Ouse, falls into the Metaris Æstuarium, or The Wash, which divides Norfolk from Lincolnshire. Thus surrounded by marine and river boundaries, Norfolk may be considered almost an island.

Though it is generally considered a champaign district, the surface in many places, rises in bold undulations, and sinks into picturesque vales, especially in the centre of the county, and on the coast, which is nearly 90 miles in extent from Yarmouth to Lynn, and has near Cromer and Hunstanton lofty perpendicular cliffs.

A large portion of the southern side of the county is in flat but well cultivated marshes; and in the western and some other parts are extensive tracts of light sandy land, rising boldly from the marshes and fens, which are now well drained, and many of them highly productive. Though nearly 200,000 acres of commons and sandy heaths have been enclosed during the last 70 years, there are still in different parts of the county, extensive open sheep walks, and rabbit warrens, in some places much improved by thriving plantations.


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See also White's History, Gazetteer, and Directory of Norfolk 1845.

Copyright © Pat Newby.
November 2006