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abitmuch · Posted: Fri Jun 20, 2008 8:50 am Post subject: Fiddler's Lane, Quemerford

Does anyone know why its called this? Its not on any map, and theres no sign but i've been told the lane just over the bridge before the post office is called this.
Did a famous fiddler live there once? Or is everyone down there on the fiddle?

serious answers please!

Geddi · Posted: Fri Jun 20, 2008 11:09 am Post subject:

abitmuch: I've actually no idea why Fiddler's Lane is so called, but there is also a Juggler's Lane which runs from Cherhill up to Yatesbury. I also have no idea why that is so named.

I am wondering if there is another lane closer by which is called: Clown's Lane?

Perhaps it's old drove roads / by-ways from whence travelling circi used to come to town? Just an idea.
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Chepfer · Posted: Fri Jun 20, 2008 11:30 am Post subject:

Fiddlers lane actuallt continues through the new housing estate on the opposite side of the road and eventually comes out at the nasty bend near blacklands crossroads.

Fiddlers lane, may have something to do with the "traditional Gypsies" that have always used the turning area on the bend as a stopping point on there journey.

This may sound totally bazzar but there was an old traveller there about a month ago, in a traditional caravan. He was stood outside his van , fiddle in hand, playing a wonderfull tune as i drove past with my son !!!!!!!!

Perhaps ..... just perhaps ...... in the past when gypsies have stopped there, it was a local thing to go and see the fiddle being played there by the gypsies !.

This lane was in fact the original road that went over the hill to devizes !!!.

Geddi · Posted: Fri Jun 20, 2008 11:43 am Post subject:

Chepfer: there are more than 100 stories of that corner up by Blackland Crossroad (yes, there are no 'Ss' in the name. My mum lived on the Crossroad for years, and I with her for a while. The names Blackland comes from Nigel's Land, who used to own it.

Anyway, I used to walk the lane past where Dalgety one stood and up to the Blackland bend. There are quite a few travellers who pass by this way, as I have said already in other places. They have well likely been coming this way for longer than most local people have been local, certainly longer than I. 4 or 500 years is how long some of the Rom families go back in this country. Others have just begun to travel this or a few generations back. Good luck to em all I say. Let em enjoy their fiddles and all they do. If things get much rougher in England, there'll be a lot more people joining them. I may return to that lifestyle myself one day, though I can't play a fiddle, so I'll have to be a juggler instead! smiling

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Local lass · Calnetalk Oracle Joined: 05 Jun 2007 Posts: 2899 Status:

never heard of fiddlers lane Cool

abitmuch · Posted: Mon Jun 23, 2008 3:40 pm Post subject:

thank you for your informative replies.