East Leake

HISTORY SOCIETY PROJECT. As new housing developments expands the village even further in all directions, the East Leake and District Local History Society has tracked its growth from the Bronze Age to modern times.

Keith Hodgkinson, a member of the Society, says there is archaeological evidence that people have been living on the hillsides round East Leake since the Bronze Age. Like its much smaller twin to the west, the village was probably founded by Angles at some time in the 6th century.

Farming in three large open fields, the Anglians settled near but not on wet land (leche or leke) in the shallow valley of what is now the Kingston Brook.

According to Mr. Hodgkinson, their church, either St Leonard’s or St Helena’s in what is now West Leake, was probably built of wood which was enlarged, in stone, after 1066 when the Norman overlords arrived. Some

Thirty-eight individuals were recorded in the Domesday Book (1086) making a total population of about 200-220 living as landholders under two overlords, the Leakes, based in Staunton Harold, and the de Ferrers symbolised by the three horseshoes that are still used as the village insignia.

Calke Abbey also came to own land and rights, and two 14th century taxation lists show twelve wealthy farmers and new lords of the manor.

This was increasingly an “open village” which soon expanded in a long linear shape along what is now Main Street. Some remaining ridge-and-furrow sections of the original open fields can still be seen on Mill Field to the south and the medieval pinfold can be found on the Green.

Reflecting the steady expansion of Great Leake, the church was gradually enlarged but retained a rector and his rectory in West or Little Leake leaving a series of curates to tend the souls of the larger community.

Over time, the original pattern of ownership changed