The River Thame forms both the southern boundary of the parish and Ickford's part of the county boundary with Oxfordshire. A stream that is a tributary of the Thame bounds the parish to the west and north.
Toponym
The village toponym is derived from Old English meaning "Icca's ford". The Domesday Book of 1086 records it as Iforde.[2] From the 12th to the 14th centuries it evolved through Ycford, Hicford, Hitford, Ikeford and Ickeforde[2] before later reaching its present form.
Towards the end of the 12th century Bartholomew de Ickford was the lower lord of one of Ickford's manors, apparently that belonging to Grestain Abbey.[2] By the time his great-grandson John held the manor in 1302–03, the family carried the surname "atte Water".[2] William atte Water died in 1313, by which time the family held both manors and they seem to have been merged.[2]
Late-16th- or early-17th-century monument in St Nicholas' parish church to the first Thomas Tipping
Members of the Appleton and Ickford families granted lands at Ickford to Godstow Abbey in Oxfordshire and the Priory of St Frideswide, Oxford.[2] In the 14th century the atte Water family gave land to Bisham Priory in Berkshire.[2]Bradwell Priory also claimed the atte Waters had granted it land at Ickford.[2] In the 16th century the Bisham Priory lands passed to Thomas Tipping, who from 1585 held the "manors of Great and Little Ickford".[2] He died in either 1595[3] or 1601[2] and is commemorated by a large monument in the parish church.[2] Thomas's great-grandson Sir Thomas Tipping, who inherited the estate in 1627,[2] was a moderate Parliamentarian in the English Civil War. His son, also Thomas Tipping, inherited the estate in 1693[2] and was created a baronet in 1698. In 1703 he obtained an Act of Parliament that allowed him to sell the estate.[2]
In Little Ickford, Manor Farm or the New Manor House is a timber-framed building with a 16th-century south range and a 17th-century north block and staircase.[3][4] The walls of one of the ground floor rooms in the north block has late-17th-century decorative painting now largely concealed behind early-18th-century panelling.[3][4] The house is a Grade II* listed building.[4]
Parish church
St. Nicholas' chancel, showing 14th-century Decorated Gothic east window with reticulated tracery and 14th-century roofPart of St. Nicholas' north aisle, with lancet windows of different ages and elevationsEarly English Gothic lancet window in St. Nicholas' north aisle with later cusped rere-archWest gallery in St. Nicholas' nave
The Church of England parish church of Saint Nicholas dates from the late 12th or early 13th century.[5] The nave was built in about AD 1210, with a porch in the middle of the south side.[2] Relatively narrow three-bay north and south aisles were added in about 1230, with the south aisle absorbing the original porch and taking the porch's south wall for the limit of its width.[2] The north aisle has one Norman and Early English Gothic 13th-century lancet windows, one of which has a later rere-arch with cusped spandrels, each with a carved rosette.[2][5]
The chancel has two 13th-century lancet windows in its north wall.[2] Near the westerly of these windows is a rectangular recess that may have been a squint.[2] In its south wall are another lancet window and a 13th-century doorway.[2] The Decorated Gothic east window is 14th-century[2] and has reticulated tracery[5] with ogees. The south wall of the chancel has at its east end a window from about 1350 that is said to have been brought from elsewhere, and towards the west end a 15th-century window with a depressed head.[2] Some of the stained glass windows are 20th-century work by Ninian Comper.[3]
In the nave some of the seats are 16th-century and there is a west gallery fronted with 17th-century panelling.[2] The pulpit and its tester are also 17th-century.[2][3]
Restoration work was carried out on the building in 1856, 1875 and 1907.[2] The large stone monument to the first Thomas Tipping used to be in the north aisle, but in 1906 was moved to its present position in the chancel.[2] St. Nicholas' is a Grade I listed building.[6]
The Rising Sun public house is a 17th-century timber-framed building with brick nogging and a thatched roof.[10]
Ickford had a bridge over the River Thame by 1237, when repairs were ordered with oak from Brill Wood.[2] In that century the bridge was variously recorded as Wodebrugge or Widebrugge.[2] County boundary stones set into the present bridge of three stone arches suggest that it was completed in 1685.[2][3] The bridge is a scheduled monument.[11]
The recusant dramatic poet William Joyner lived at Ickford in the 17th century.[2]
The village hall was designed by the architects Dale and Son of Oxford and built in 1946.[12] The building is of five bays separated by arches vaulting from the floor. Its extensive roof and almost all of its walls are hung with wooden shingles,[12] possibly in response to the shortage of many types of building material after the Second World War. The hall was built entirely by a small party of volunteers from the parish:[12] an achievement commemorated by a painting over the fireplace in the hall.
Amenities
Ickford Village Hall4 Bridge Road is a 17th-century thatched cottage whose front was rebuilt in the 18th century.[13] The stone building in the background is the Royal Oak public house, which is no longer trading.The Royal Oak is a 19th-century building with rubblestone gable walls and an ashlar facade. It is not currently trading as a public house.A pair of Shire horses in harness resting outside the Rising Sun in 2004
Ickford Combined School is a communityprimary school for children between four and eleven years old and has about 115 pupils. The school also serves the adjoining parishes of Worminghall and Shabbington. The school was opened in September 1906 and has a sports hall, which was opened in February 2006.[14] There is a pre-school and an After School Club at the school.
Much of the parish is agricultural but being close to Oxford and junction 8A of the M40 Ickford is increasingly a commuter village.[citation needed]
