with a surrounding wall built of sarsen stones, and is dedicated to St Michael and All Angels. The road pattern shows an original circular enclosure, suggesting pagan Celtic origins. Alfred the Great, born in Wantage, was also closely connected with this ancient landmark. It has been a minster since Saxon times and officially known as Lambourn Minster since as early as 1032, and Alfred mentioned it in his will. It was probably Cnut who granted Lambourn Minster to the Dean of St Paul's. Successors to that office held it until 1836. Inside are monuments to the great and the good of the many manors in the parish, including an excellent brass to John Estbury (1508), who founded the almshouses outside, and fine effigies of Sir Thomas Essex and his wife (1558). The almshouses were established by an Act of Parliament in the reign of King Henry VII and confirmed by his son King Henry VIII after the Dissolution of the Monasteries made the original uncertain, as it included a now forbidden chantry. There is an arch with mediaeval carvings of hunting scenes. The church was much restored in the late 19th century, and has a chancel roof designed by G. E. Street. The church also boasts a fine three-manual Henry Willis organ. The clock faces were replaced, and the tower stonework repaired, in 2011. The church is a Grade I listed building. The Anarchy The Empress Matilda bequeathed Lambourn and Chippenham to Hugh de Plucket out of the Royal demesne in 1142 for his aid in The Anarchy of the civil wars against the usurper Stephen of Blois. However, another Breton adventurer, Josce de Dinan and his knights, retreated to Lambourn after he lost Ludlow Castle to Gilbert de Lacey. Maltida's son King Henry II gave him Chipping Lambourn in compensation in 1156. Josce died in 1162 AD and in either case, the Plunket family were in possession of the Manor by the beginning of the 14th century. Queen Elizabeth I The Ditchley portrait of Queen Elizabeth I was painted for Sir Henry Lee of Ditchley to commemorate her visit in 1592. The Queen stands on a map of England with her feet on Oxfordshire and Lambourn is shown (but not named) on the map below her feet, in the downs of Berceria at the head of the River Lambourn which joins the River Kennet at Newbury. Civil War During