Hallaton: A Leicestershire village that was once a town

Hallaton is only a village, but it once had markets and the status of a town. I suppose in the end it could not compete with the medieval economic behemoth that was Market Harborough.

And it has a High Street (not a Main Street like most Leicestershire villages), which retains a distinctly urban feel. The sad thing is that today it does not have a single shop on it.

Still, look on the bright side: Hallaton still has a castle, a recently discovered medieval chapel that was devoted to an obscure saint who had a cult here, was the scene of the discovery of an Iron Age horde, a museum, a conical market cross and is the site every Easter Monday of a traditional bottle kicking match (a form of folk football) and hare pie scrambling - more details of most of these on the Council for British Archaeology site.

If the incomers of The Notswolds are to perish in a folk-horror reckoning, it may well be here. Meanwhile, these are some pictures of the village I took yesterday.