ATTERLEY MANOR

Identity: confirmed — The registry record and its associated Much Wenlock archive references identify Atterley Manor in the Atterley area of Much Wenlock, Shropshire. Historical county and local sources place Atterley as a distinct township south-east of Much Wenlock and record manorial jurisdiction and landownership there. The evidence is consistent with the exact Atterley Manor record, not the separate general Manor of Much Wenlock.
Representative point: 52.57762, -2.52723
Basis: supported_manorial_centre — Atterley Farm, within the historic Atterley township, is the best locatable surviving named manorial/agricultural centre found. The evidence does not establish that the present farmhouse is the historic manor house, so this is a supported locality-centre point rather than a documented manor-house coordinate.
Point confidence: low
Boundary status: representative_point_only
Boundary period: Primarily documented from the 19th-century township descriptions, with earlier manorial context from medieval sources
Boundary confidence: none
Boundary basis: Historical sources describe Atterley together with Walton as a township or combined territorial unit of approximately 903–905 acres, and identify a lord of the manor and principal landowner. However, no accessible manor map, survey, rental map, enclosure map, tithe map, or other source was found that supplies or permits a defensible perimeter specifically for Atterley Manor. The 903–905-acre township area therefore cannot safely be converted into a polygon, and the modern civil-parish boundary must not be substituted.
Sources:
- The National Archives Discovery: Atterley Manor, F244224: https://discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk/details/c/F244224 — Registry record supplied for Atterley Manor in Much Wenlock, Shropshire, with authority GB/NNAF/M220417.
- Eyton's Antiquities of Shropshire, Volume III, Much Wenlock: https://www.melocki.org.uk/eyton/Vol03.html — Identifies Atterley among the constituent vills associated with the historic Wenlock estate and explains that these components were later separated from the central manor, supporting the distinction between Atterley and the broader Manor of Much Wenlock.
- History, Gazetteer, and Directory of Shropshire, Much Wenlock townships: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/00/Medical_Heritage_Library_%28IA_b24858821%29.pdf — Describes Atterley as a township in Much Wenlock parish and states that Atterley and Walton conjointly contained about 905 acres.
- Kelly's Directory, Much Wenlock: https://leicester.contentdm.oclc.org/digital/api/collection/p16445coll4/id/301313/download — Describes Walton and Atterley as forming a township of about 900 acres and records that Lord Forester was lord of the manor and sole landowner.
- Atterley Farm, Much Wenlock map reference: https://mapcarta.com/N4086331199 — Provides the locatable coordinate 52.57762, -2.52723 for Atterley Farm, the best surviving named centre in the documented Atterley locality.
- Atterley Farm photograph and coordinates: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Atterley_Farm_(geograph_3186593).jpg — Independent geograph-derived coordinate evidence places Atterley Farm at approximately 52.57725, -2.52814, corroborating the representative locality used above.
Warnings / uncertainty:
- The representative point is not proven to be the historic manor house; it is a low-confidence supported centre for the Atterley manorial locality.
- The historical 903–905 acres refers to the combined Atterley and Walton township description, not necessarily an independently surveyed polygon of Atterley Manor.
- Atterley was also listed as one component of the much larger medieval Wenlock estate; that broader Domesday estate should not be used as the boundary of this exact Atterley Manor record.
- No defensible historical manor boundary polygon was located, so no boundary coordinates are supplied.