The Community of Pegsdon in General

Pegsdon village with Deacon Hill behind April 2015

Landscape

The solid, or underlying, geology of Pegsdon is chalk, though of different kinds. Conveniently the division occurs along the main road to Hitchin. North of this is a type of chalk known as West Melbury Marly Chalk Formation, laid down between 94 and 99 million years ago in the warm, shallow seas of the Cretaceous Period. South of the road the technical description is: Holywell Nodular Chalk Formation and New Pit Chalk Formation (Undifferentiated). This is younger having been laid down between 89 and 99 million years ago, again in the Cretaceous Period.

Most of the village stands at around 260 feet above sea-level. Deacon Hill towers over the village, the top being around 535 feet high.

Name

The name Pegsdon means "valley by a hill". The hill in question would undoubtedly be Deacon Hill. The name has changed through time as can be seen below:

• Pechesdone: 1086;
• Pekesdene: 1114-1297;
• Pekedene: 1205;
• Peckesden: 1227-1287;
• Pikelesdene: 1227;
• Pekelesdene: 1227;
• Pakesden: 1227;
• Pachesdena: 1230;
• Pekesdon: 1240-1302;
• Peckesden: 1287
• Pexden: 1350;
• Pedson: c.1750-1766

Live and Let Live April 2015

Administrative History

Pegsdon was always a hamlet in the ancient parish of Shillington. It remains part of the civil parish today but since 1942 the ecclesiastical parish to which it belongs is the Hertfordshire parish of Hexton.