Falmer is a small village and civil parish in the Lewes District of East Sussex, England, lying between Brighton and Lewes, approximately five miles (8 km) north-east of the former. It is also the site of Brighton & Hove Albion's Falmer Stadium.

Falmer village is divided by the A27 road. North of the dual carriageway are a few houses and a pub, with a footbridge linking to the southern part of the village, where a large pond is encircled by cottages and the parish church, dedicated to St. Laurence. The two halves of the village are also linked by a road bridge just outside this circle of houses. The village pond is home to a population of ducks and geese, and is very likely to account for the name of the village. The village is recorded in the Domesday Book as 'Falemere' which is likely to be Saxon for "fallow mere" and mean a dark pool. and The Keep, are all nearby.

History

Before the Norman conquest of England, the manor of Falmer was held by Wilton Abbey. After the conquest most of it appears to have been given to Gundred, wife of William de Warenne, 1st Earl of Surrey. Charles I granted the manor to Edward Ditchfield in 1628 or 1629 and he sold it to William Craven. At this time its manor extended over . The Cravens lost it because of their support of the King during the English Civil War. have largely been destroyed since the Second World War by modern agricultural methods.

The South Downs Way passes through the parish from the south east to the north west and crosses the A27 at Housedean Farm. Falmer parish sits between Brighton and Hove to its west, St Ann Without parish (and then Lewes) to its east, Kingston parish to its south and the long thin parishes running down the scarp slopes to its north, which include Ditchling, Westmeston, Streat, Plumpton, East Chiltington, St John Without, and Hamsey from northwest to northeast.

South of the A27

To the south of the A27 is the south half of the village, which includes the church and the large village pond. The Falmer Road travels south to Woodingdean and to the sea at Rottingdean. The downland to the east of the road is part of Falmer parish. To the west are the Falmer Stadium and the University of Brighton which is in City of Brighton and Hove.

Falmer Church

thumb|Falmer church and pond

Falmer church is dedicated to St. Laurence. The church was built in 1649. It consists of a west tower, a nave and chancel with a vestry to its north. It has a gallery and organ loft at the west end of the nave. It is particularly special because of the pond just outside it.

Falmer pond

Perhaps what is most special about this village is its large gravel pond, which is a focal point of the village from where the village and parish got its name. Many people come from Brighton and Lewes to enjoy the pond and the green beside it, to picnic here and watch the ducks.

Falmer Court Barn

Behind the church is a manorial thatched barn of fourteen embayments which dates back to the 13th century. It is one of the largest medieval barns in Sussex and was used by the monks of Lewes Priory, who owned the manor, for threshing and storing corn. Falmer barn is a grade II* listed building.

In 2006, the barn, other vernacular farm buildings, and the farmhouse were sold by Brighton and Hove City Council to the tenant farmer, who "promptly sold them on to a property developer." It has been suggested that the name relates to bustard. ‘Bustard’ is an old French name, whereas ‘crane’ is a Saxon name, so it has been speculated that shepherds and ploughmen may have used the latter term in medieval times. The bustard is likely to have lived in the area. One runs alongside the Falmer Road before dropping into the head of the valley. There are scattered clumps of burnet rose along large sections of the earthwork banks of both enclosures.

The fragments of surviving Down pasture have now been fenced back into a restored pasture block and the historical chalk grassland flowers are returning. There is now cowslip, wild orchid, devil's-bit, betony, rampion and chalk milkwort. There are adonis blue butterflies and emperor moth benefiting from the pasture's restoration.

Newmarket Plantation

thumb|Newmarket Plantation as seen from Loose Bottom

The Newmarket Plantation () lies on the eastern edge of Loose Bottom and the parish and west of the South Downs Way. It is a small deciduous woodland of with beech, ash and sycamore and new plantings. There are mown paths circle its interior since the storms of 1987 and is a place of big upturned rootplates, which is home to many wren and robin.

North of the A27

To the north of the A27 is the north half of the village, which is like a quadrant around a small grazed field. The pub is one corner of the quadrant. To the west, just outside of the parish, is the University of Sussex. To the north, north west and north east is special downland, with much history.

Farms

thumb|Stile on the South Downs Way by Housedean Farm

thumb|Balmer hamlet and farm, near Falmer

In Falmer village, at the T-junction between Mill Road and Ridge Road is Park Wall Farm. Running north from Falmer village, half way along Ridge Road and west of Balmer Farm, is the ruins of Ridge Farm (). Now a good place for birdlife, such as yellowhammer, it was the start of the route of the biggest of the mass trespasses that marked the Sussex campaign for the right to roam in 1998–9. Carry on north down Ridge Road and at the end is St Mary's Farm.

Housedean Farm () is east along the A27. It manages part of Balmer Down, was one of the last on these Downs to use an ox team for tillage, only giving up in 1914. Balmer Farm () lies on the site of the Saxon hamlet of Bergemere. Its name comes from the Saxon "the pool by the burh". It was sufficiently important at Domesday to have two slaves, a manorial church, swine pastures in the Weald at Horsted Keynes and Birchgrove, and brookland meadow south of Lewes still called ‘Bormer Brook’. The church has long gone but you can still trace the outlines of the hamlet green under the mess of modern farm clutter. Big blackthorn hedges mark the bounds of the medieval open fields of the hamlet, which drop away southwards from the farmstead (). They went under the evocative names of Lanthorne Laine, Church Laine and Barren Laine. The cemetery yielded up more than twenty funerary urns when it was excavated in 1849. Still now, when one looks down from the Balmer Huff into Buckland Hole one sees a whole valley filled with a pattern of rectangular banks, often topped with gorse or thorn. These are the fossilized fields of the villages. The lineaments are signs of a farmed landscape from two thousand years ago and more and are comparable to the tiny fields in the west of Cornwall or Ireland. Unfortunately, before the area was scheduled, it was intensively farmed and much of the historical evidence has been destroyed.

Also special in areas like this is archaic vegetation, but here, even in the steeper parts of the valley that were not ploughed, modern agribusiness sprays have meant the Down pasture vegetation has been lost and now only the occasional steep lynchet retains a smidgeon of that old flora. Nevertheless, there are still great views of vale of the Lewes Brooks, Kingston Hill and a sliver of Seaford Head cliffs. There are still a scatter of sarsen debris, fossils, yellowed flints that are characteristic of hilltop clay-with-flint, as well as Romano-British pottery to be found in the area and cornfield flowers growing amongst the stones, including common field speedwell, green field speedwell, scarlet pimpernel, knotgrass, field madder and common orache.

Green Broom, Flint Heap and Granny's Belt

Green Broom and Flint Heap () have large, old beeches and fallen giants, but only Green Broom is used extensively as mountain bike track and has some large jumps for those brave enough. The fallen trees have great fungal assemblages. The very rare lion's mane fungus (Hericium erineus) has been found in at least two places as well as dog stinkhorn (Mutinus caninus), bird's nest fungus (Cyathus striatus), yellow stainer (Agaricus xanthodermus), Earth stars (Geastrum triplex), lots of turkey tail (Trametes versicolor), and many others. If one is lucky (or unlucky depending on your disposition) one might even smell the distinctive aroma of the ordinary stinkhorn, Phallus impudicus, After the Romans left, it is thought to have been used as a pagan Saxon temple known as ‘Paeccel's Weoh’. ‘Weoh’ is Saxon for ‘sacred place’, or even ‘temple’. The name was corrupted to Patchway, which became the modern name until recently for the whole Ditchling Road ridge between Upper Lodge Wood and Hollingbury Hill. The area was named in the Saxon charter of 765 AD and the parish boundary is aligned through it.

The next level of government is the district council. The parish of Falmer lies within the Kingston ward of Lewes District Council, which returns a single seat to the council.

East Sussex County Council is the next tier of government, for which Falmer is within the Newhaven and Ouse Valley West division, with responsibility for Education, Libraries, Social Services, Civil Registration, Trading Standards and Transport. Elections for the County Council are held every four years.

Falmer is represented in the UK Parliament by the Lewes constituency. The current serving MP is the Liberal Democrat James MacCleary who won the seat in the 2024 general election.

Sport

Lewes Priory Cricket Club play some home games in Falmer and have Sussex and Brighton universities students and staff as members.

Stadium

To the west of the parish is the site of Falmer Stadium, home of Brighton & Hove Albion F.C. Despite its name and proximity to Falmer, it is actually inside the City of Brighton and Hove boundary. After a lengthy process including a public enquiry, it was approved by the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister in 2005, but Lewes District Council subsequently mounted a legal challenge and overturned the decision on a technicality. The stadium was reapproved by Secretary of State Hazel Blears on 24 July 2007. The 30,500-seater stadium opened in July 2011.

Falmer station

thumb|Falmer Railway Station

Falmer is served by Falmer railway station which lies on the East Coastway line.

References

  • Parish layout in MagicMap