Facts about Chatteris
General Info
Chatteris is a civil parish and one of the four market towns in the Fenland district of Cambridgeshire, England, situated in The Fens between Huntingdon, March and Ely. The town is in the North East Cambridgeshire parliamentary constituency. The parish of Chatteris is large, covering 6,099 hectares, and for much of its history was a raised island in the low-lying wetland of the Fens.
History
During the Medieval period, the town was dominated by Chatteris Abbey, a small Benedictine nunnery dedicated to St Mary, built-in 980 by Eadnoth the Younger for Aelfwyn or Alfwen the niece of King Edgar and one of only eight nunneries mentioned in the Domesday Book. Throughout its existence, the abbey was comparatively poor compared to other foundations, due to a lack of royal patronage and a consequent lack of tithe estates.
To the north of the town runs the Forty Foot Drain, a large river also called Vermuyden’s Drain, after the Dutch engineer whose name is associated with the fen drainage works of the middle of the 17th century. Several of the older buildings of the town show evidence of the Dutch architectural style. Chatteris is a market town and has possessed this designation since 1834, although an earlier market existed in the town, which was discontinued due to poor roads in 1808.
