At the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford there is an exhibition called ‘King Alfred’s Coins’. It show the recently discovered Watlington Hoard, and a large number of other local artifacts, including some from Abingdon.
You can see the original Abingdon Sword on display at this exhibition – an iron sword fragment and hilt found near Abingdon in 1874. The sword itself dates from around 874.
A reproduction of the Abingdon Sword can be seen at Abingdon County Hall Museum.
The New Year Christian Aid walk was on January 2nd this year, and started from the Peachcroft Christian Centre. The day was sunny, with ice about when it started at 10 a.m.
The sponsored 6.5 mile walk, went up to Boars Hill and returned via Bayworth, stopping at Bayworth Chapel for refreshments. The walk did not clash with the Boundary Walk, as so often happens, and so some people could do both walks.
It was a wet start to the year. Despite the weather a good number of citizens gathered at the Market Place to take part in walking the 1556 Borough Boundary following instructions given in the 1556 Borough Charter.
Watch on youtube as the walk leader, Penny Clover, reads parts of the aforesaid instructions, and the Town Crier congratulates those who finished the two hour walk. He also shows everybody one of the few remaining boundary stones that separate Abingdon from ‘foreign parts’ , and ends by crying ‘‘God save Abingdon on Thames! God save the Queen!‘ ‘
My Latin is not very good, but it looks like the monk on the roundabout, near Fairacres and Tesco, is wishing us all a Happy New Year in MMXVII.