| Nottington |
| Known locally as Gulliver's Tree
Nottington is in the Hundred of Culvardestre and it wa well known for
its spa to which people would come all the way from Weymouth to 'take
the waters' as it was said that they were able to cure 'eruptive
complaints, scofula and loss of appetite', scofula being a form of
tuberculosis affecting the lymph nodes, especially of the neck that is
most common in children and normally spread by unpasteurized milk from
infected cows, it is also known as struma. The spa was originally a
spring found in a field by the roadside as far back as 1660. The
popularity of this spa was attributable to George III who with his Queen
visited the spring in June 1791. As the crowds grew the Octagonal House
was built over the spring in 1830. This had two storeys and looks more
like a folly than anything else and it still survives today but as a
private residence. The curing
effect of the waters were discovered by a local shepherd who when he
drove his flock along Nottington Lane they would stop to drink from the
spring and he noticed that they seem to recover quicker from scab
disease than the sheep that did not come this way.
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