Milford Hollow is a track or path on the eastern side of Milford Hill. It runs from the top of Milford Hill down to where the bottom of Shady Bower meets Milford Mill Road and Manor Farm Road.
Milford Hollow, Milford
However in the past Milford Hollow, and its continuation Milford Mill Road, were one of the main routes into Salisbury – from Clarendon, Winchester and perhaps even Southampton and the Coast.
The ‘weight of traffic’, to use a modern phrase, is what ‘hollowed’ out Milford Hollow. Over hundreds of years the passage of people, horses, carts and live stock wore away the ground on this route into town 1.
The phenomenon is the derivation of the word ‘holloway’, as in London’s Holloway Road.
The deepest remaining part of the hollow was just below the railway cutting, but it was filled in I think in the 1980s or 1990s.
The hollowing effect is still visible on Milford Hill, where the road is some way below the pavement on the northern side, and at the top end of Queen Manor Road which has steep banks perhaps 15-20 foot high on either side of the road.
Visiting Old Sarum ? For accommodation, see the Hotels in Salisbury page.
Footnotes
- ‘Milford’, Richard Durman, page 37, Hobnob Press, 2007 [↩]
[...] as ‘Milford Hill’ is a continuation of the ‘hollowing’ effect that gives Milford Hollow its [...]
[...] Milford Hollow, Milford [...]
[...] that’s been ‘hollowed out’ of the ground by years and years of traffic, as in Milford Hollow. I don’t know this part of Wilton, so I’m not sure whether there is a [...]