Abbotsbury railway station

Abbotsbury Abbey, dedicated to Saint Peter, was a Benedictine monastery in the village of Abbotsbury in Dorset, England. The abbey was founded in the 11th century by King Cnut's thegn Orc and his wife Tola, who handsomely endowed the monastery with lands in the area. The abbey prospered and became a local centre of power, controlling eight manor houses and villages. During the later Middle Ages, the abbey suffered much misfortune. In the time of the dissolution of the monasteries, the last abbot surrendered the abbey and the site became the property of Sir Giles Strangways. Today, a small part of the former Abbey estate, including the abbey's remains, and those of the nearby St Catherine's Chapel, are in the guardianship of English Heritage.

St Nicholas' Church is a Church of England church in Abbotsbury, Dorset, England. The earliest parts of the church date to the 14th century origin, with later alterations and extensions over the following centuries, including the construction of the west tower and north chapel in the 15th century. The church underwent restoration in 1807–08, 1885 and 1930.The church's porch contains the effigy of an abbot of Abbotsbury Abbey. It was discovered on the site of the Abbey's church, St Peter's, in 1778, and has been given an approximate date of 1200. The Jacobean pulpit contains two bullet holes stemming from a fight in 1664, during the English Civil War, when Parliamentarians besieged Royalists at the church.St Nicholas' has been Grade I listed since 1956. In 2015, the World War I memorial in the churchyard, dating to around 1920, became Grade II listed.

Abbotsbury is a village and civil parish in the English county of Dorset. The settlement is in the unitary authority of Dorset about 1 mile (1.6 km) inland from the English Channel coast. The village, including Chesil Beach, the swannery and subtropical gardens, is owned by the Ilchester Estate, which owns 61 square kilometres (15,000 acres) of land in Dorset. In the 2011 census the civil parish had a population of 481. The coastline within the parish of Abbotsbury includes a section of 18-mile (29 km) long Chesil Beach that is part of the Jurassic Coast, a World Heritage Site. Abbotsbury is known for its swannery, subtropical gardens and surviving abbey buildings, including St Catherine's Chapel, a 14th-century pilgrimage chapel that stands on a hill between the village and the coast.

Abbotsbury Blind Lane (grid reference SY576856) is a 0.4 hectares (0.99 acres) geological Site of Special Scientific Interest in Dorset, notified in 1986; this area is slightly smaller than when it was first notified in 1977. It is also a Geological Conservation Review (GCR) site.

St Catherine's Chapel is a small chapel situated on a hill above the village of Abbotsbury in Dorset, England. It is dedicated to Saint Catherine. It is now in the guardianship of English Heritage, and became a Grade I listed building in 1956. The chapel is also scheduled together with the field systems and quarries on the hill.The chapel is best seen from the viewpoint on the B3157 Abbotsbury to Bridport road, with Chesil Beach in the background. The medieval strip lynchets etched into the side of the hill are known locally as the Chapel Rings.

The Grey Mare and her Colts is a megalithic chambered long barrow located near Abbotsbury in Dorset, England. It was built during the Early and Middle Neolithic periods (3400-2400 BC). The tomb was partially excavated in the early nineteenth century, and was found to contain human bones and several pottery fragments.

Abbotsbury Swannery is the only managed colony of nesting mute swans in the world. It is situated near the village of Abbotsbury in Dorset, England, 14 kilometres (9 mi) west of Weymouth on a 1-hectare (2-acre) site around the Fleet Lagoon protected from the weather of Lyme Bay by Chesil Beach. The colony can number over 600 swans with around 150 pairs. Written records of the swannery's existence go back to 1393, though it probably existed well before that and is believed to have been set up by Benedictine monks in the eleventh century.

The Hampton Down Stone Circle is a stone circle located near to the village of Portesham in the south-western English county of Dorset. Archaeologists believe that it was likely erected during the Bronze Age. The Hampton Down ring is part of a tradition of stone circle construction that spread throughout much of Britain, Ireland, and Brittany during the Late Neolithic and Early Bronze Age, over a period between 3,300 and 900 BCE. The purpose of such monuments is unknown, although archaeologists speculate that they were likely religious sites, with the stones perhaps having supernatural associations for those who built the circles. However, it has been suggested that the site is not a stone circle at all, but is instead made up of kerbstones from a Bronze Age round barrow. A number of stone circles were built in the area around modern Dorset, typically being constructed from sarsen stone and being smaller than those found elsewhere. The Hampton Down ring was erected on an open downland ridge overlooking the coast. It originally contained either eight or nine sarsen stones and had a diameter of 20 feet (6.5 metres) across with a track leading to it from the north. By 1908 the circle had been shifted east of its original position, with a hedge built across the site, and the number of stones increased to sixteen. By 1964 the number of stones had further increased to twenty-eight. In 1965, Geoffrey J. Wainwright oversaw an archaeological excavation which revealed the circle's original location and dimensions, after which it was reconstructed in its original location with the extraneous stones removed.

Kingston Russell Stone Circle, also known as the Gorwell Circle, is a stone circle located between the villages of Abbotsbury and Littlebredy in the south-western English county of Dorset. Archaeologists believe that it was likely erected during the Bronze Age. The Kingston Russell ring is part of a tradition of stone circle construction that spread throughout much of Britain, Ireland, and Brittany during the Late Neolithic and Early Bronze Age, over a period between 3,300 and 900 BCE. The purpose of such monuments is unknown, although archaeologists speculate that they were likely religious sites, with the stones perhaps having supernatural associations for those who built the circles. A number of these circles were built in the area around modern Dorset, typically being constructed from sarsen stone and being smaller than those found elsewhere. The Kingston Russell ring is the largest of those in Dorset, measuring 24 by 27 metres (79 feet by 89 feet) in diameter and containing eighteen sarsen stones arranged in an oval shape. The site has not been excavated or been subject to in-depth archaeological investigation.

The Abbotsbury Subtropical Gardens is a visitor attraction near the village of Abbotsbury, Dorset, southern England. They are Grade I listed in the National Register of Historic Parks and Gardens.The garden originates in 1765. In the late eighteenth century, the Fox-Strangeways family (the Earls of Ilchester) built a new house on the location; when it was burnt down in 1913, they returned to their family seat at Melbury House, but the walled garden was maintained—it remains in the ownership of the family. Since then, particularly after the contributions of the 4th Earl of Ilchester, the gardens have developed into an 8 hectares (20 acres) site with exotic plants, many of which were newly discovered species when they were first introduced. There are formal and informal gardens, with woodland walks and walled gardens; in addition, the gardens also contain certain "zones" that exhibit plants from different geographical areas.The gardens are in a wooded and sheltered valley, leading down towards the sea at Chesil Beach; this combination produces a microclimate in which more delicate plants than are usually grown in southern England can flourish, and plants that would otherwise need a greenhouses can be grown outside. However, in spite of its location, the plants remain vulnerable to bad winters, and the frost that they can bring; in 1990, violent storms damaged many of the rare specimens, which have since been replaced by younger plants. In 2010, Abbotsbury employed the chainsaw artist Matthew Crabb to carve a 200-year-old oak tree that had fallen after a particularly bad winter. The gardens won the Historic Houses Association/Christie’s Garden of the Year award for 2012, the first time that a subtropical garden has gained the award.

Portesham, sometimes also spelled Portisham, is a village and civil parish in the county of Dorset in southwest England, situated in the Dorset Council administrative area approximately 6 miles (10 km) northwest of Weymouth, 6 miles (10 km) southwest of the county town Dorchester, and 2 miles (3 km) northeast of the Jurassic Coast World Heritage Site at Chesil Beach. The parish is quite large, covering several outlying hamlets and what were once their manors. In the 2011 census it had a population of 685 in 316 households and 342 dwellings.

St Peter's Church is an Anglican church, the parish church in the village of Portesham, Dorset. It is a Grade I listed building. The earliest parts date from the 12th century, and it has suffered comparatively little from restoration.