1.
Geographic coordinate system
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A geographic coordinate system is a coordinate system used in geography that enables every location on Earth to be specified by a set of numbers, letters or symbols. The coordinates are chosen such that one of the numbers represents a vertical position. A common choice of coordinates is latitude, longitude and elevation, to specify a location on a two-dimensional map requires a map projection. The invention of a coordinate system is generally credited to Eratosthenes of Cyrene. Ptolemy credited him with the adoption of longitude and latitude. Ptolemys 2nd-century Geography used the prime meridian but measured latitude from the equator instead. Mathematical cartography resumed in Europe following Maximus Planudes recovery of Ptolemys text a little before 1300, in 1884, the United States hosted the International Meridian Conference, attended by representatives from twenty-five nations. Twenty-two of them agreed to adopt the longitude of the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, the Dominican Republic voted against the motion, while France and Brazil abstained. France adopted Greenwich Mean Time in place of local determinations by the Paris Observatory in 1911, the latitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle between the equatorial plane and the straight line that passes through that point and through the center of the Earth. Lines joining points of the same latitude trace circles on the surface of Earth called parallels, as they are parallel to the equator, the north pole is 90° N, the south pole is 90° S. The 0° parallel of latitude is designated the equator, the plane of all geographic coordinate systems. The equator divides the globe into Northern and Southern Hemispheres, the longitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle east or west of a reference meridian to another meridian that passes through that point. All meridians are halves of great ellipses, which converge at the north and south poles, the prime meridian determines the proper Eastern and Western Hemispheres, although maps often divide these hemispheres further west in order to keep the Old World on a single side. The antipodal meridian of Greenwich is both 180°W and 180°E, the combination of these two components specifies the position of any location on the surface of Earth, without consideration of altitude or depth. The grid formed by lines of latitude and longitude is known as a graticule, the origin/zero point of this system is located in the Gulf of Guinea about 625 km south of Tema, Ghana. To completely specify a location of a feature on, in, or above Earth. Earth is not a sphere, but a shape approximating a biaxial ellipsoid. It is nearly spherical, but has an equatorial bulge making the radius at the equator about 0. 3% larger than the radius measured through the poles, the shorter axis approximately coincides with the axis of rotation
2.
United Kingdom constituencies
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In local government elections electoral areas are called wards or electoral divisions. Since the advent of universal suffrage, the differences between county and borough constituencies are slight, formerly the franchise differed, and there were also county borough and university constituencies. Borough constituencies are predominantly urban while county constituencies are predominantly rural, otherwise they should be designated as borough constituencies. In Scotland, all House of Commons constituencies are county constituencies except those in the cities of Glasgow, Edinburgh, Aberdeen, the returning officer will typically be a local Councils Chief Executive or Head of Legal Services. The role, however, is separate from these posts, the spending limits for election campaigns are different in the two, the reasoning being that candidates in county constituencies tend to need to travel further. For by-elections to any of these bodies, the limit in all constituencies is £100,000, in the House of Commons of England, each English county elected two knights of the shire while each enfranchised borough elected burgesses. From 1535 each Welsh county and borough was represented, by one knight or burgess, a county borough was the constituency of a county corporate, combining the franchises of both county and borough. Until 1950 there were also university constituencies, which gave graduates an additional representation, similar distinctions applied in the Irish House of Commons, while the non-university elected members of the Parliament of Scotland were called Shire Commissioners and Burgh Commissioners. After the Acts of Union 1707, Scottish burghs were grouped into districts of burghs in the Parliament of Great Britain, after the Acts of Union 1800, smaller Irish boroughs were disenfranchised, while most others returned only one MP to the United Kingdom Parliament. The Reform Act 1832 reduced the number of parliamentary boroughs by eliminating the rotten boroughs and it also divided larger counties into two two-seat divisions, the boundaries of which were defined in the Parliamentary Boundaries Act 1832, and gave seven counties a third member. Constituency names are geographic, and should reflect the main population centre contained in the constituency. Compass points are used to distinguish constituencies from each other when a suitable label cannot be found. This is the reason for the difference in naming between, for example, North Shropshire and Reading West, in the 2005 United Kingdom general election, the House of Commons had 646 constituencies covering the whole of the United Kingdom. This rose to 650 in the 2010 election, each constituency elects one Member of Parliament by the first-past-the-post system of election. The House of Commons is one of the two chambers of the bicameral Parliament of the United Kingdom, the other being the House of Lords, eleven additional members are elected from Greater London as a whole to produce a form or degree of mixed-member proportional representation. Constituency names and boundaries remain now as they were for the first general election of the assembly, the assembly is part of the Greater London Authority and general elections of the assembly are held at the same time as election of the mayor of London. There are 18 Northern Ireland Assembly Constituencies, four borough and 14 county constituencies elsewhere, each elects six MLAs to the 108 member NI Assembly by means of the single transferable vote system. Assembly Constituency boundaries are identical to their House of Commons equivalents, the constituencies below are not used for the election of members to the 11 district councils
3.
House of Commons of the United Kingdom
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The House of Commons of the United Kingdom is the lower house of the countrys parliament. Like the upper house, the House of Lords, it meets in the Palace of Westminster, officially, the full name of the house is, The Honourable the Commons of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland in Parliament assembled. The House is a body consisting of 650 members known as Members of Parliament. Members are elected to represent constituencies by first-past-the-post and hold their seats until Parliament is dissolved, under the Parliament Act 1911, the Lords power to reject legislation was reduced to a delaying power. The Government is primarily responsible to the House of Commons and the prime minister stays in office only as long as he or she retains the support of a majority of its members. Although it does not formally elect the prime minister, the position of the parties in the House of Commons is of overriding importance, by convention, the prime minister is answerable to, and must maintain the support of, the House of Commons. Since 1963, by convention, the minister is always a member of the House of Commons. The Commons may indicate its lack of support for the Government by rejecting a motion of confidence or by passing a motion of no confidence, confidence and no confidence motions are sometimes phrased explicitly, for instance, That this House has no confidence in Her Majestys Government. Many other motions were considered confidence issues, even though not explicitly phrased as such, in particular, important bills that form a part of the Governments agenda were formerly considered matters of confidence, as is the annual Budget. Parliament normally sits for a term of five years. Subject to that limit, the minister could formerly choose the timing of the dissolution of parliament. By this second mechanism, the government of the United Kingdom can change without a general election. In such circumstances there may not even have been a party leadership election, as the new leader may be chosen by acclaim. A prime minister may resign if he or she is not defeated at the polls. In such a case, the premiership goes to whoever can command a majority in the House of Commons, in practice this is usually the new leader of the outgoing prime ministers party. Until 1965, the Conservative Party had no mechanism for electing a new leader, when Anthony Eden resigned as PM in 1957 without recommending a successor and it fell to the Queen to appoint Harold Macmillan as the new prime minister, after taking the advice of ministers. By convention, all ministers must be members of the House of Commons or of the House of Lords, a handful have been appointed who were outside Parliament, but in most cases they then entered Parliament either in a by-election or by receiving a peerage. Since 1902, all ministers have been members of the Commons
4.
Wiltshire
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Wiltshire is a county in South West England with an area of 3,485 km2. It is landlocked and borders the counties of Dorset, Somerset, the county town was originally Wilton, after which the county is named, but Wiltshire Council is now based in the new county town of Trowbridge. Wiltshire is characterised by its high downland and wide valleys, Salisbury Plain is noted for being the location of the Stonehenge and Avebury stone circles and other ancient landmarks, and as a training area for the British Army. The city of Salisbury is notable for its mediaeval cathedral, important country houses open to the public include Longleat, near Warminster, and the National Trusts Stourhead, near Mere. The county, in the 9th century written as Wiltunscir, later Wiltonshire, is named after the county town of Wilton. Wiltshire is notable for its pre-Roman archaeology, the Mesolithic, Neolithic and Bronze Age people that occupied southern Britain built settlements on the hills and downland that cover Wiltshire. Stonehenge and Avebury are perhaps the most famous Neolithic sites in the UK, in the 6th and 7th centuries Wiltshire was at the western edge of Saxon Britain, as Cranborne Chase and the Somerset Levels prevented the advance to the west. The Battle of Bedwyn was fought in 675 between Escuin, a West Saxon nobleman who had seized the throne of Queen Saxburga, in 878 the Danes invaded the county. Following the Norman Conquest, large areas of the country came into the possession of the crown, at the time of the Domesday Survey the industry of Wiltshire was largely agricultural,390 mills are mentioned, and vineyards at Tollard and Lacock. In the 17th century English Civil War Wiltshire was largely Parliamentarian, the Battle of Roundway Down, a Royalist victory, was fought near Devizes. The Royal Wiltshire Yeomanry currently lives on as Y Squadron, based in Swindon, around 1800 the Kennet and Avon Canal was built through Wiltshire, providing a route for transporting cargoes from Bristol to London until the development of the Great Western Railway. Information on the 261 civil parishes of Wiltshire is available on the Wiltshire Community History website, run by the Libraries and this site includes maps, demographic data, historic and modern pictures and short histories. The local nickname for Wiltshire natives is moonrakers and this originated from a story of smugglers who managed to foil the local Excise men by hiding their alcohol, possibly French brandy in barrels or kegs, in a village pond. The officials took them for simple yokels or mad and left them alone, many villages claim the tale for their own village pond, but the story is most commonly linked with The Crammer in Devizes. Two-thirds of Wiltshire, a rural county, lies on chalk. This chalk is part of a system of chalk downlands throughout eastern and southern England formed by the rocks of the Chalk Group, the largest area of chalk in Wiltshire is Salisbury Plain, which is used mainly for arable agriculture and by the British Army as training ranges. The highest point in the county is the Tan Hill–Milk Hill ridge in the Pewsey Vale, just to the north of Salisbury Plain, the chalk uplands run northeast into West Berkshire in the Marlborough Downs ridge, and southwest into Dorset as Cranborne Chase. Cranborne Chase, which straddles the border, has, like Salisbury Plain, yielded much Stone Age, the Marlborough Downs are part of the North Wessex Downs AONB, a 1,730 km2 conservation area
5.
Ceremonial counties of England
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The ceremonial counties, also referred to as the lieutenancy areas of England, are areas of England to which a Lord Lieutenant is appointed. The Local Government Act 1888 established county councils to assume the functions of Quarter Sessions in the counties. It created new entities called administrative counties, the Act further stipulated that areas that were part of an administrative county would be part of the county for all purposes. The greatest change was the creation of the County of London, which was both an administrative county and a county, it included parts of the historic counties of Middlesex, Kent. Other differences were small and resulted from the constraint that urban sanitary districts were not permitted to straddle county boundaries, apart from Yorkshire, counties that were subdivided nevertheless continued to exist as ceremonial counties. In 1974, administrative counties and county boroughs were abolished, at this time, Lieutenancy was redefined to use the new metropolitan and non-metropolitan counties directly. Following a further rearrangement in 1996, Avon, Cleveland, Hereford and Worcester, Cleveland was partitioned between North Yorkshire and Durham. Hereford and Worcester was divided into the counties of Herefordshire and Worcestershire. Humberside was split between Lincolnshire and a new county of East Riding of Yorkshire. Rutland was restored as a ceremonial county, many county boroughs were re-established as unitary authorities, this involved establishing the area as an administrative county, but usually not as a ceremonial county. Most ceremonial counties are therefore entities comprising local authority areas, as they were from 1889 to 1974, the Association of British Counties, a traditional counties lobbying organisation, has suggested that ceremonial counties be restored to their ancient boundaries, as nearly as practicable. In present-day England, the ceremonial counties correspond to the shrieval counties, the Lieutenancies Act 1997 defines counties for the purposes of lieutenancies in terms of metropolitan and non-metropolitan counties as well as Greater London and the Isles of Scilly. Although the term is not used in the Act, these counties are known as ceremonial counties. gov. uk
6.
Devizes
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Devizes /dᵻˈvaɪzᵻz/ is a market town and civil parish in the heart of Wiltshire, England. Standing on a hill at the east edge of the Vale of Pewsey, Devizes serves as a centre for banks, solicitors and shops and has an open market place where a market is held once a week. It has nearly five hundred listed buildings, some churches, a Town Hall. Its development has grown around the 11th century Norman castle, Devizes Castle was built by Osmund, Bishop of Salisbury in 1080, but the town is not mentioned in the Domesday Book. Because the castle was on the boundaries of the manors of Rowde, Bishops Cannings and Potterne it became known as the castrum ad divisas, on John Speeds map of Wiltshire, the towns name is recorded as The Devyses. The first castle on the site was of the motte and bailey form and was made of wood and earth. A new castle was built in stone by Roger of Salisbury, Devizes received its first charter in 1141 permitting regular markets. The castle changed several times during the civil war between Stephen of Blois and Matilda in the 12th century. The castle held important prisoners, including Robert Curthose, eldest son of William the Conqueror, the town has had churches since the 12th century and today has four Church of England parish churches. During the 12th and 13th centuries, the town of Devizes developed outside the castle with craftsmen, the first known market in Devizes was in 1228. The original market was in the space outside St Mary’s Church, rather than in the current Market Place. The chief products in the 16th and early 17th centuries were wheat, wool and yarn, with cheese, bacon, in 1643, during the English Civil War, Parliamentary forces under Sir William Waller besieged Royalist forces under Sir Ralph Hopton in Devizes. However the siege was lifted by a force from Oxford under Henry Wilmot, 1st Earl of Rochester. Devizes remained under Royalist control until 1645, when Oliver Cromwell attacked and forced the Royalists to surrender, the castle was destroyed in 1648 on the orders of Parliament, a process known as slighting, and today little remains of it. From the 16th century Devizes became known for its textiles, initially white woollen broadcloth but later the manufacture of serge, drugget, felt and cassimere or Zephyr cloth. In the early 18th century Devizes held the largest corn market in the West Country of England and also traded hops, cattle, horses and various types of cloth. Before the Corn Exchange was built in 1857, the trade in wheat and barley was conducted in the open, with sacks piled around the market cross. Todays cross displays the salutary tale of Ruth Pierce, accused of cheating some buyers at the market, The coroner, John Clare, wool merchants were able to build prosperous town houses in St. Johns and Long Street and around the market place
7.
Marlborough, Wiltshire
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Marlborough is a market town and civil parish in the English county of Wiltshire on the Old Bath Road, the old main road from London to Bath. It boasts the second widest high street in Britain, after Stockton-on-Tees, the town is on the River Kennet. The earliest sign of habitation is a 62 feet high prehistoric tumulus in the grounds of Marlborough College. Recent radiocarbon dating has found it to date from about 2400 BC and it is of similar age to the larger Silbury Hill about 5 miles west of the town. Legend has it that the Mound is the site of Merlin. On John Speeds map of Wiltshire, the name is recorded as Marlinges boroe. The towns motto is Ubi nunc sapientis ossa Merlini - Where now are the bones of wise Merlin, more plausibly, the towns name probably derives from the medieval term for chalky ground marl – thus town on chalk. Roman remains and the large Mildenhall Hoard of coins have found two miles to the east of Marlborough, at Mildenhall. A later Saxon settlement grew up around The Green and two river crossings were made at Isbury Lane and Stonebridge Lane. In 1067 William the Conqueror assumed control of the Marlborough area and set about building a motte and bailey castle. This was completed in around 1100, stone was used to strengthen the castle in around 1175. The first written record of Marlborough dates from the Domesday Book in 1087, William also established a mint in Marlborough, which coined the William I and the early William II silver pennies. The coins display the name of the town as Maerlebi or Maerleber and he also established the neighbouring Savernake Forest as a favourite Royal hunting ground and Marlborough castle became a Royal residence. Henry I observed Easter here in 1110, Henry II stayed at Marlborough castle in talks with the King of Scotland. His son, Richard I gave the castle to his brother John, King John was married here and spent time in Marlborough. He also established that weekly markets may be held on Wednesdays and Saturdays, later Henry III was also married here. Henry III held Parliament here, in 1267, when the Statute of Marlborough was passed and this seven-hundred-year-old law states that no-one shall seize his neighbours goods for alleged wrong without permission of the Court. Apart from Charters, it is the oldest statute in English law which has not yet been repealed, the castle fell into disrepair by the end of the 14th century but remained Crown property
8.
Durrington, Wiltshire
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Durrington is a village and civil parish in Wiltshire, England. The village lies about 2 miles north of the town of Amesbury,10 miles north of the city of Salisbury and it is on the eastern part of Salisbury Plain, the largest remaining area of chalk grassland in northwest Europe. The parish includes the hamlet of Hackthorn, on the outskirts of Durrington. Durrington has a history, dating back to the Neolithic era. Two ancient sites lie in the parish, Durrington Walls and Woodhenge, the parish is in the Upper Avon valley, with the River Avon forming its eastern boundary, Durrington village is close to the river. The toponym is derived from the Old English Deor ingtūn, meaning farm or settlement connected with Deor, Deor being a personal name. The villages population of about 5,000 is served by several shops, the area had been occupied since Neolithic times but not necessarily continuously. The parish contains two important Neolithic sites, Durrington Walls and Woodhenge, recent archaeological excavations indicate that the Neolithic inhabitants of the village kept a large number of pigs, with bone evidence suggesting that the pigs were unusually large for the time. This may be because inhabitants fattened them up to them to visitors to nearby Stonehenge. There is little evidence of Saxon occupation, but this may be because buildings and utensils of that time were made of wood, the Domesday Book recorded two estates in 1086, having land for one plough team and with 5 acres of meadow. These two estates may represent the two manors. West End manor was part of the estate of Amesbury until 1120 but East End manor had different origins. At this time each manor was using the field system. The population also increasing and in 1377 there were 139 poll tax payers making Durrington one of the most populous villages in the hundred of Amesbury. In 1390, Durringtons manors had an income of £40 which gradually decreased to £29 8s 6d in 1521. In 1399 the West End manor was given as an endowment of the newly created Winchester College, and they have also provided the name for College Road. In 1405 the Durrington Fire occurred, the cause of which is unknown and it is widely theorised that a lamp falling onto a bale of hay caused it to ignite, or possibly that a house fire got out of control. Whatever the cause, the resulted in the destruction of most of the West End because most of the houses were built in an unusually close proximity to one another
9.
Pewsey
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Pewsey is a large village and civil parish at the centre of the Vale of Pewsey in Wiltshire, about 6 miles south of Marlborough and 80 miles west of London. It is within reach of the M4 motorway and the A303 and is served by Pewsey railway station on the London to Taunton line, in the Tudor era the Manor of Pewsey belonged to the Duchess of Somerset. Several of the houses were built in this era, the timber framed cruck house at Ball Corner, Bridge Cottage on the Avon. In 1764 the founder of the Methodist movement John Wesley preached at Pewseys Church of England parish church, the rector at that time, Joseph Townsend, was responsible for building of the first bridge over the River Avon. The Kennet and Avon Canal reached Pewsey in 1810, of more lasting effect for the village was the arrival of the Great Western Railway in 1862 which allowed fast travel to London and to the West Country. In 1898 Pewsey Carnival was first held, a tradition that flourishes today with a fortnight of events, including The Feaste, a prominent statue of King Alfred the Great, the former Anglo Saxon King of Wessex and a local landowner, stands in the middle of the village. The Pewsey White Horse hill figure is located on a slope of Pewsey Hill about a mile south of the village. It was cut in 1937 and is one of the smaller Wiltshire white horses and it replaces an earlier one which was possibly cut in 1785. An electoral ward in the name exists. The ward starts in the west at Pewsey and stretches east to Easton Royal, the total population of the ward at the 2011 census was 4,649. Pewsey has a secondary school, Pewsey Vale School, an Academy which is a specialist Arts College. It is adjacent to the leisure centre and indoor swimming pool. It has a state Primary Academy, Pewsey Primary School, the OFSTED of 2012 rated it as good with scope to use mathematics more across the school. It has achieved good Key Stage Two SATS results for Wiltshire and it appeared in the 100 Most Improved Schools table for its 2013 results and its 2014 results put it in the top 100 schools nationally. St. Francis School, an independent preparatory school, is just outside the village, the Anglican Church of St John the Baptist is Grade I listed. It was built in the 12th and 13th centuries with many later additions, a Methodist chapel was built in 1873 and became a church in 1932. The Roman Catholic Church of the Holy Family was built in 1964, Pewsey has a Post Office, a petrol station, and a Co-op supermarket. The village has one bar and five pubs
