County motto: All the people of Somerset
Luxury property for sale in Somerset Best thing: ‘The goodness of the cheese is preferred, without all dispute, it is the best cheese that England affords, if not, that the whole world affords’ (Daniel Defoe on Cheddar)
Local food: R. J. Sheppy & Sons cider; Montgomery cheddar; Pieminister’s Pies; relishes from Bay Tree Food Company
Heroes: John Locke; Roger Bacon; John Cleese; explorer William Dampier (first to circumnavi-gate the world three times); Ernest Bevin
Events: Druids celebrate Beltane on Glastonbury Tor; Frome Cheese Show; Frome Festival Bridgwater Carnival: at Tatworth Candle Auction, the right to use Stowell Mead field is auctioned as a candle burns, the top bidder when the candle dies wins; Hobby Horse Festival, Minehead Inventions: According to local legend, a forgetful milkmaid left a pail of milk in the Cheddar Gorge caves, and, on returning (much) later, she found Cheddar Battle: The Battle of Sedge-moor in 1685, the last pitched battle in England, which brought to a bloody end the rebellion of the Duke of Monmouth against James II
Worst thing: It’s not just the French who like snails—the Mendip Wallfish is a dish of garden snails from Somerset
What they say: ‘And that dark solemn Tor, and all that reach, Of bright-green meadows, laced with silver rills’ (Henry Alford)
Literary wealth: Arthur C. Clarke; Evelyn Waugh; Henry Fielding; Samuel Coleridge lived in Nether Stowey; Wordsworth rented Alfoxton Park; Henry Irving
Wildlife: The Exmoor pony is one of the world’s oldest native horses, thought to have crossed the prehistoric land bridge from North America at the time of sabre-toothed tigers and mammoths
Houses and churches: Cothay Manor is a medieval treasure house; Dunster Castle is like a dream of Camelot; Montacute House is late Elizabethan Renaissance; Tyntesfield; Culbone church, the smallest in England
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From California to Cornwall: How surfing became a cornerstone of Cornish cultureA new exhibition at Cornwall's National Maritime Museum celebrates a century of surf culture and reveals how the country became a global leader in surf innovation and conservation.
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18 magnificent homes for sale from £550k to £20 million, as seen in Country LifeFrom a charming thatched cottage to a 300-acre estate with its own vineyard, here's our pick of places to come to the market via Country Life of late.
