St Ives, Cambridgeshire

Coordinates: 52°20′04″N 0°04′34″W / 52.334362°N 0.076147°W / 52.334362; -0.076147

St Ives is a market town and civil parish in Cambridgeshire, England. St. Ives lies approximately 5 miles (8 km) east of Huntingdon and 12 miles (19 km) north-west of the city of Cambridge. St Ives is situated within Huntingdonshire which is a non-metropolitan district of Cambridgeshire as well as being a historic county of England.

History

Previously called Slepe, its name was changed to St Ives after the body, claimed to be that of a Persian bishop, of Saint Ivo (not to be confused with Ivo of Kermartin), was found buried in the town in about 1001/2. For the past 1,000 years it has been home to some of the biggest markets in the country, and in the thirteenth century it was an important entrepôt, and remains an important market in East Anglia.

Built on the banks of the wide River Great Ouse between Huntingdon and Ely, St Ives has a famous chapel on its bridge. In the Anglo-Saxon era, St Ives's position on the river Great Ouse was strategic, as it controlled the last natural crossing point or ford on the river, 80 kilometres (50 mi) from the sea. The flint reef in the bed of the river at this point gave rise to a ford, which then provided the foundations for the celebrated bridge.

St Ives

St Ives may refer to:

Places

Saints

Other uses

St. Ives (TV series)

St. Ives was a television mini-series broadcast in 1955. Based on the novel of the same name, it aired on the BBC for a total of six 30-minute episodes. Cast included William Russell, Noelle Middleton, and Francis Matthews. The most notable aspect of the production is that, unlike many BBC series of the era, the episodes still exist. Later BBC television versions of the story aired in 1960 and 1967, but are believed to have been wiped.

References

External links

St. Ives (novel)

St. Ives: Being The Adventures of a French Prisoner in England (1897) is an unfinished novel by Robert Louis Stevenson. It was completed in 1898 by Arthur Quiller-Couch.

The book plot concerns the adventures of the dashing Viscomte Anne de Keroual de St. Ives, a Napoleonic soldier enlisted as a private under the name Champdivers, after his capture by the British. The book is available on Project Gutenberg in both it's incomplete and complete form (for the story as completed by Arthur Quiller-Couch look for "The Works of Robert Louis Stevensen volume twenty.").

Film adaptations

The 1949 film The Secret of St. Ives and the 1998 film St. Ives, also known as All For Love, were based on the novel. A television mini-series based on the novel was broadcast on the BBC in 1955.

For the movie the character may have been changed to a Captain, and his first name changed to Jacque, as there seems to be confusion on these points.

External links

Huntingdonshire

Huntingdonshire (/ˈhʌntɪŋdənʃə/ or /ˈhʌntɪŋdənʃɪər/; abbreviated Hunts) is a non-metropolitan district of Cambridgeshire, as well as a historic county of England. Its council is based in Huntingdon and the district also includes the towns of St Ives, Godmanchester, St Neots and Ramsey.

History

The area corresponding to modern Huntingdonshire was first delimited in Anglo-Saxon times, and the modern boundaries have remained largely unchanged since the 10th century, though it lost its county status in 1974.

Status

In 1889, under the Local Government Act 1888 Huntingdonshire became an administrative county, with the new County Council taking over administrative functions from the Quarter Sessions. The area in the north of the county forming part of the municipal borough of Peterborough became instead part of the Soke of Peterborough administrative county, in Northamptonshire.

In 1965, under a recommendation of the Local Government Commission for England, it was merged with the Soke of Peterborough to form Huntingdon and Peterborough - the Lieutenancy county was also merged. Also at this time St Neots expanded westward over the river into Eaton Ford and Eaton Socon in Bedfordshire.

Huntingdonshire (UK Parliament constituency)

Huntingdonshire was a Parliamentary constituency covering the county of Huntingdonshire in England. It was represented in the House of Commons of England until 1707, then in the House of Commons of Great Britain from 1707 to 1800, and then in the House of Commons the Parliament of the United Kingdom from 1801 to 1885. It returned two Knights of the Shire (apart from 1654 to 1659, when it returned three); when elections were contested, the bloc vote system was used.

Under the Redistribution of Seats Act 1885, it was divided between the new single-seat county divisions of Huntingdon and Ramsey with effect from the 1885 general election.

In 1918, Huntingdon and Ramsey were re-united and the constituency was reconstituted, returning a single Member of Parliament (MP). After minor boundary changes for the 1983 general election, the modified constituency was renamed as Huntingdon. Its MP at the time, John Major, continued to represent it.

Boundaries

1918-1974: The administrative county of Huntingdonshire.