Swaffham-Bulbeck (St. Mary)
SWAFFHAM-BULBECK (St. Mary), a parish, in the union of Newmarket, hundred of Staine, county of Cambridge, 6 miles (W. by S.) from Newmarket; containing 806 inhabitants. The parish is partly bounded by the Cam, from which river is a cut called Swaffham Lode, navigable to the village. It is situated about two miles from the Cambridge and Newmarket road, and comprises 4000 acres; the soil is chiefly chalk and marl, and a quarry of chalk-marl is extensively worked for building purposes. The living is a discharged vicarage, valued in the king's books at £16. 10.; net income, £219; patron and appropriator, the Bishop of Ely: the tithes were commuted for land and a money payment in 1798. The church, supposed to have been built in the reign of Edward III., contains 400 sittings. A charity school, established in 1721, is endowed with £20 per annum, and now conducted on the national plan. Here are the remains of a Benedictine nunnery founded before the reign of John, by one of the Bolebecs, and dedicated to St. Mary: at the Dissolution, its revenue was estimated at £46. 18. 10.
Transcribed from A Topographical Dictionary of England, by Samuel Lewis, seventh edition, published 1858.