Leicestershire Places (3) : Melton Mowbray

Melton Mowbray, famous for it's pork pies of course, was already a market town by the time of the Domesday Book and there is evidence of inhabitation in the area from Bronze Age times. The town has certainly existed since Anglo-Saxon times as a pagan cemetery has been found.

By the time of the Domesday Book Melton Mowbray had around two hundred inhabitants with a weekly market (the third oldest market in England) since before 1077CE. Melton Mowbray's impressive parish church of St Mary dates the 13th century though with major additions in the following centuries. It is one of only a handful of parish churches to have a transept flanked by aisles.

These days Melton Mowbray is best known for it's food, especially pork pies and stilton cheese and styles itself as the Rural Capital of Food. The town's railway station is on the Birmingham-Peterborough Line.