Bampton is a small town, parish and former manor in Devon, England close to the south-eastern corner of Exmoor and on the River Batherm, a tributary of the River Exe. It is about 10 km north of Tiverton. Bampton is a major part of the electoral ward of Clare and Shuttern. The ward population at the 2011 Census was 3,412.HistoryPre-NormanThe history of Bampton is thought to have started with a Roman fort, but later Saxon remains are most easily seen. Some hedges conform to the Saxon furrow measure of 625 feet (the later furlong) and traces of Saxon strip farming can be seen to the north-east of the later castle. The circular churchyard is also Saxon in origin.NormanThe 11th-century Norman Bampton Castle, built on earlier Saxon fortifications, and of which only the much reduced motte survives, was the seat of the feudal barony of Bampton.Bampton now has nearly 100 listed buildings including the Grade 1 listed church, dedicated to Saint Michael & All Angels, whose tower dates from the 13th century. Parts of the former vicarage are said to date from the middle of the 15th century; and the Exeter Inn on the edge of the town was originally a farmhouse built in 1495. The town was caught up in the civil war between King Stephen and the Empress Matilda, when Stephen's troops took the town in 1136. The later Civil War reached Bampton in 1645, when Royalists from Tiverton Castle burnt the town, so that few buildings earlier than the 17th century survive.
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