Osney: Difference between revisions

|static_image= [[File:OsneyIsland.jpg|240px]]

|static_image_caption= East Street, Osney Island viewed from [[Osney Bridge]]

'''Osney''' or '''Osney Island''' ({{IPAc-en|ˈ|oʊ|z|n|i}}; an earlier spelling of the name is ''Oseney'') is a riverside community in the west of the city of [[Oxford]], [[England]]. In modern times the name is applied to a community also known as '''Osney Town''' astride [[Botley Road]], just west of the city's main [[Oxford railway station|railway station]], on an island surrounded by the [[River Thames]], [[Osney Ditch]] and another backwater connecting the Thames to Osney Ditch.

Until the early 20th century the name was applied to the larger island of [[Oxford Castle]] and New Osney (between [[Castle Mill Stream]] and the main stream of the Thames) on which [[Osney Abbey]] and [[Osney Mill]] were established during the Middle Ages. The place plays a minor but significant role in ''[[The Miller's Tale]]'' in [[Chaucer]]'s ''[[The Canterbury Tales]]''.<ref>[http://www.canterburytales.org/canterbury_tales.html Canterbury Tales] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101120094955/http://canterburytales.org/canterbury_tales.html |date=20 November 2010 }} Miller's Tale, Chapter 4, line 88.</ref>

The name "Osney" is Old English, and means either "Osa's Island"<ref>{{cite book|last=Marriott |first = Paul| title= Oxford Street Names Explained| year=1977| isbn = 0-9505730-1-9}}</ref> or "island in the Ouse": Ouzen Ait beingis a [[elision|base form]] and Ouse beingis an [[Old English]] word for a (large) river.<ref>Hibbert, C. (ed) (1988) ''Encyclopedia of Oxford'' Macmillan {{ISBN |0-333-48614-5}}, s.v. ''Osney''</ref> or "Osa's Island".<ref>{{cite book|last=Marriott |first = Paul| title= Oxford Street Names Explained| year=1977| isbn = 0-9505730-1-9}}</ref> Until the early twentieth century the name was applied to the island formed by two streams of the River Thames immediately west of the centre of Oxford, [[Castle Mill Stream]] and the stream which is now the main channel of the river.<ref>[http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=22807#s17 VCH vol.4 ''Outlying parts of the liberty'']</ref> To the north the island is bounded by a short channel between the River Thames and the Castle Mill Stream, the [[Sheepwash Channel]], which separates it from [[Fiddler's Island]].<ref name="canalplan">{{cite web| url=http://canalplan.org.uk/waterway/edm8 | title=River Thames (Sheepwash Channel) | website=www.canalplan.org.uk | location=UK | accessdateaccess-date=15 September 2012 }}</ref> which separates it from [[Fiddler's Island]] and [[Cripley Meadow|Cripley]].

Until the beginning of the 19th century, only the side of the island east of St Thomas's Church was developed. In the nineteenth century the island changed significantly. The [[Great Western Railway]] built its line across the island from north to south in 1850, with new bridges [[Osney Rail Bridge|across the Thames]] at the south end of the island, and across the Sheepwash Channel to the north. A new [[Oxford railway station|railway station]] was opened on the island two years later. In 1851 the [[Buckinghamshire Railway]] opened its line from the north across Sheepwash Channel to its [[Oxford Rewley Road railway station|Rewley Road station]] next to the GWR station. To house railway workers Osney Town was laid out in 1851 by George P. Hester, on an island west of Osney leased by Hester from Christ Church.

In the 1860s New Osney was developed around [[Mill Street, Oxford|Mill Street]], south of [[Botley Road]] between the railway and the river. The Cripley estate, north of Botley Road, was laid out in 1878.<ref>[http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=22805 VCH vol. 4 ''Modern Oxford: Development of the city'']</ref> [[Osney Cemetery]] was opened in 1848 in the south of the island.

The name Osney is today usually applied to Osney Town. Most of Osney's two hundred-odd households live in 19th -century terraced cottages built on Hester's original grid. A minority of buildings are less than 50 years old, all on Bridge and West Streets, as well as a few significantly larger houses scattered throughout.

The island presently has two [[public househouses]]s, The Punter and The HollybushHolly Bush. A [[Working Men's Club and Institute Union]] affiliate, the West Oxford Democrats Club has premises. Osney is part of the Oxfordshire County Council [[wards of the United Kingdom|ward]] of Jericho and Osney (as currently named, wards being periodically redefined to avoid [[malapportionment]]).

From 1961 an [[industrial estate]], named '''Osney Mead''' in 1966, was developed on meadowland between Osney and [[Bulstake Stream]], to the east of [[Ferry Hinksey Road]].<ref>{{cite book|author1=Ann Spokes Symonds|author2=Nigel Morgan|year=2010|title=The Origins of Oxford Street Names|isbn=978-1-899536-99-3|page=166}}</ref> The estate was initially intended to relocate badly sited existing local businesses.<ref>''[http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=22805#s4 Modern Oxford: Economic History after 1918]'', Volume 4, [[Victoria County History]].</ref> Organisations based there include publishers [[Alden Mowbray]], [[Holywell Press]], and [[Oxford Community Church]], the latterlast occupying a building on the estate formerly used by [[Oxford Instruments]]. [[Bodleian Libraries]] and the [[Department of Engineering Science, University of Oxford]] occupy buildings at the southeastern end of Osney Mead.

Newspaper House was designed by [[Arup Associates]] with mostly [[open plan]] ''[[Office landscape|Bürolandschaft]]'' offices and built 1970–72.<ref>Sherwood & Pevsner, 1974, pages 334-335</ref> It is the Oxfordshire headquarters of [[Newsquest]] which publishes local [[tabloid (newspaper format)|tabloid]] newspapers, including the weekly ''[[The Oxford Times]]'' and the daily ''[[Oxford Mail]]''.