Records from Saxon times, about 826 CE, show that the Chalke Valley area was thriving. The village name of
Eblesburna was probably derived from a man called
Ebbel, who may have owned land near the
bourne (stream) – the word
bourne derives from the
Old English "brunna". Ebbesbourne appears in the Latin will of a Dorset woman, Wynflæd, the earliest will of a woman to survive in English history, described as "a small stained sheet of parchment". The detailed terms bequeath to her daughter Æthelflœd an engraved bracelet, a brooch, some named household articles including books, and "the farm at Ebbesbourne with the title deed as a perpetual inheritance... and the men and the livestock on the land there to her too." The will was put on display at the
British Library in late 2018–early 2019. The
Domesday Book of 1086 divided the Chalke Valley into eight manors:
Chelke (Chalke -
Bowerchalke and
Broadchalke),
Eblesborne (Ebbesbourne Wake),
Fifehide (Fifield),
Cumbe (
Coombe Bissett),
Humitone (Homington),
Odestoche (
Odstock),
Stradford (
Stratford Tony and
Bishopstone) and
Trow (roughly
Alvediston and
Tollard Royal). Peter Meers, in his book
Ebbesbourne Wake through the Ages, translates the village's Domesday entry as: Robert holds Eblesborne from Robert. Aluard and Fitheus held it before 1066 as two manors. (TRE = tempore Regis Edwardii, the time of Edward the Confessor, 1042–1066) Taxed for 14 hides. Land for ten ploughs. In lordship ten hides, there six ploughs. Four
slaves (serfs). Eighteen
villeins (villagers). Seven
bordars (smallholders) with four ploughs. Fourteen acres of meadow, pasture fourteen furlongs long, 4 furlongs wide. Woodlands two leagues length and width. Value £12, now £14. Geoffrey de Wak became Lord of the manor in 1204; although his kinship to
Hereward the Wake is unknown, the shield of Hereward can today be seen on the church tower. By 1249 the settlement name was written
Ebbelburn Wak and by 1785
Ebesborne Wake. In the 12th century the wider area was known mainly as the Stowford
Hundred, then later as the Chalke Hundred. It covered the parishes of
Berwick St John, Ebbesbourne Wake,
Fifield Bavant,
Semley,
Tollard Royal and 'Chalke'. The spelling of Ebbesbourne Wake continued to vary. The
Ordnance Survey of 1889 and 1927 used "Ebbesborne Wake", while the 1963 and 1974 maps retained "Ebbesborne" for the parish but gave
Ebbesbourne Wake for the village. Historian Peter Meers notes in
Ebbesbourne Wake through the Ages that the 1926 and 1965 editions of Fowler's
A Dictionary of Modern English Usage call the general spelling of "bourne/borne" inconsistent. Manor Farmhouse is from the 17th century, with rebuilding and additions in the 18th and 19th. A
National School was opened in or before 1846; a schoolroom was built in 1854 and a teacher's house in 1870. The school closed in 1985 due to low pupil numbers. The civil parish of Fifield Bavant was merged into Ebbesbourne Wake parish in 1894. ==Parish church==