Facts about Dulwich
Dulwich History
The first documented evidence of Dulwich is as a hamlet outside London in 967 AD, granted by King Edgar to one of his thanes Earl Aelfheah. The name of Dulwich has been spelt in various ways, Dilwihs, Dylways, Dullag, and may come from two old English words, Dill, a white flower, and wihs, meaning a damp meadow, giving a meaning of “the meadow where dill grows”. Harold Godwinson owned the land at one point, and after 1066, King William I of England.
In 1538, Henry VIII sold the area to goldsmith Thomas Calton for £609. Calton’s grandson Sir Francis Calton sold the Manor of Dulwich for £4,900 in 1605 to Elizabethan actor and entrepreneur Edward Alleyn. He vested his wealth in a charitable foundation, the College of God’s Gift, established in 1619. The charity’s modern successor, The Dulwich Estate, still owns 1,500 acres in the area, including a number of private roads and a tollgate. As part of the foundation, Alleyn also constructed a school, Christ’s Chapel and almshouses in Dulwich.
General Info
Dulwich is an area of south London, England. The settlement is mostly in the London Borough of Southwark, with parts in the London Borough of Lambeth, and consists of Dulwich Village, East Dulwich, West Dulwich, and the Southwark half of Herne Hill. Dulwich lies in a valley between the neighbouring districts of Camberwell, Crystal Palace, Denmark Hill, Forest Hill, Peckham, Sydenham Hill, and Tulse Hill.
For the last four centuries Dulwich has been centred on the College of God’s Gift, also known as the “Old College”, which owned most of the land in the area today known as the Dulwich Estate. The College, founded with educational and charitable aims, established three large independent schools in the 19th century. In recent decades four large state secondary schools with academy status have opened in the area.
