The 1086 Domesday survey records the settlement of Melmerby, entered under the hundred of Land of Count Alan in Yorkshire.

Other Settlements in Land of Count Alan

The Meaning of the Name

The name Melmerby is of Scandinavian origin. Its final element derives from the Old Norse word bý, a farmstead or village. The first element is most likely a personal name or an early descriptive term, now difficult to recover with certainty. Taken together the name probably meant something close to ‘a farmstead’.

Names of this type are a fingerprint of Scandinavian settlement: they cluster across the old Danelaw, where Norse-speaking settlers renamed or founded villages from the late 9th century onward.

Remarkably, the name has changed little since 1086, when the Domesday scribes wrote it as Melmerby.

Listed Buildings Near Melmerby

Historic England records 19 listed buildings within about a mile of Melmerby. Listing protects structures of special architectural or historic interest, graded I (exceptional), II* (particularly important) and II.

Grade II*

Church of St Mary - 1.13 km

Grade II

The Grange - 0.6 km
Ivy House - 0.65 km
The Old House - 0.8 km
The Old Hall - 0.85 km
Boundary Wall With Gate-piers to Old Hall - 0.85 km
Green End - 0.86 km
North Farmhouse - 1.0 km
Table Tomb Approximately 2 Metres From East End of Church of St Mary - 1.12 km
Overthrow With Lamp Holder Over South Gateway to Church of St Mary - 1.13 km
Gates and Gate Piers, the Rectory - 1.13 km
The Rectory - 1.14 km
Font in Graveyard of Church of St Mary, Against West Wall of South Transept - 1.14 km
Sundial in Graveyard of Church of St Mary, Approximately 6 Metres South of South Door - 1.14 km
Chest Tomb Approximately 5 Metres South of South Door of Church of St Mary - 1.15 km
Overthrow With Lamp Holder Over West Gateway to Church of St Mary - 1.17 km
The Grammar School - 1.26 km
Garage Approximately 2 Metres West of Grammar School - 1.27 km
K6 Telephone Kiosk - 1.27 km

Scheduled Monuments Near Melmerby

Scheduled monuments are nationally important archaeological sites given legal protection. 1 lies within roughly a mile of Melmerby:

Middleton Quernhow Hall - 0.85 km

Melmerby Today

Today Melmerby lies within the administrative area of Harrogate, and the settlement recorded a population of 415 at the 2021 census. Nine and a half centuries separate that figure from the small rural community the Domesday survey recorded here in 1086.

Read more about modern Melmerby on Wikipedia .