A Dictionary of British Place Names contains the entry:
Giggleswick N. Yorks. Ghigeleswic 1086 (DB). "Dwelling or (dairy) farm of a man called Gikel or Gichel". OE or ME pers. name (probably a short form of the biblical name Judichael) + wīc.[3][4]
Close to the station and opposite the Craven Arms Hotel (formerly the Old Station Inn) is the Plague Stone.[5] This has a shallow trough, which in times of plague was filled with vinegar to sterilize the coins that were left by townspeople as payment for food brought from surrounding farms.[6] The stone was moved a short distance from its original site when the Settle bypass was built.
Church of St Alkelda
The parish church is dedicated to St Alkelda, an obscure Anglo-Saxon saint associated with the North Yorkshire town of Middleham. The building dates mostly from the 15th century, but carved stones discovered during the restoration of 1890–1892 showed that a building existed on the site before the Norman Conquest.[7]: p.222 It has been classed by English Heritage as a Grade I listed building.[8] The restoration, carried out by the Lancaster architects Paley, Austin and Paley, included replacing the roof, removing the gallery, rebuilding the vestry, and reseating, replastering and reflooring the church.[9]
Notable people
Richard Whiteley of Channel 4's Countdown was a pupil at Giggleswick School.[10] In his will he left the school £500,000, which was used to build a new theatre named after him.[11]
The film and stage actor Clarence Blakiston (1864–1943) was born in Giggleswick, as was Henry Maudsley, the pioneering British psychiatrist, at a farm outside Giggleswick in 1835.
The Victorian-era actor Sir John Hare was born in the town in 1844.[14]
Professor Sir Nevill Francis Mott, who won the Nobel prize in physics in 1977, was born in Leeds and brought up in Giggleswick.
Television chef Susan Brookes is a former resident of the village, having resided there in the 1980s.[15]
Tourist attractions
Giggleswick is notable amongst rock climbers for a limestone crag, retro-bolted with many sports routes during 2005 and 2006. The crag is opposite Settle Golf Club on the B6480, north of Giggleswick.
^Brandwood, Geoff; Austin, Tim; Hughes, John; Price, James (2012), The Architecture of Sharpe, Paley and Austin, Swindon: English Heritage, p. 238, ISBN978-1-84802-049-8
^ abBarker, Dennis (27 June 2005). "Richard Whiteley". The Guardian. Retrieved 3 May 2017.
^Williams, Michael (2012). "4. The 10:34 from Morecambe – a Brief Encounter with the "secret" train over the Pennines". On the slow train again (Updated ed.). London: Arrow. p. 73. ISBN978-0-09955-285-7.
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