Portal:Surrey

Old Town Hall, High Street

Reigate (/ˈraɪɡeɪt/ RY-gate) is a town in Surrey, England, around 19 miles (30 km) south of central London. The settlement is recorded in the Domesday Book of 1086 as Cherchefelle, and first appears with its modern name in the 1190s. The earliest archaeological evidence for human activity is from the Paleolithic and Neolithic, and during the Roman period, tile-making took place to the north east of the modern centre.

A motte-and-bailey castle was erected in Reigate in the late 11th or early 12th century. It was originally constructed of timber, but the curtain walls were rebuilt in stone about a century later. An Augustinian priory was founded to the south of the modern town centre in the first half of the 13th century. The priory was closed during the Reformation and was rebuilt as a private residence for William Howard, 1st Baron Howard of Effingham. The castle was abandoned around the same time and fell into disrepair.

During the medieval and early modern periods, Reigate was primarily an agricultural settlement. A weekly market began no later than 1279 and continued until 1895. Key crops included oats, hops and flax, but there is no record of rye being grown in the local area. The economy initially declined in the 18th century, as new turnpike roads allowed cheaper goods made outside the town to become available, undercutting local producers. Following the arrival of the railways in the mid-19th century, Reigate began to expand and the sale of much of the priory estate in 1921 released further land for housebuilding.

Reigate is part of the London commuter belt, and since 1974 it has been one of four towns in the borough of Reigate and Banstead. The borough council is based at the town hall in Castlefield Road, and Surrey County Council has its headquarters at Woodhatch Place. Much of the North Downs, to the north of Reigate, is owned by the National Trust, including Colley Hill, 722 feet (220 m) above ordnance datum (OD) and Reigate Hill 771 feet (235 m) above OD. (Full article...)

Mary Toft (née Denyer; baptised 21 February 1703 – January 1763), also spelled Tofts, was an English woman from Godalming, Surrey, who in 1726 became the subject of considerable controversy when she tricked doctors into believing that she had given birth to rabbits.

In 1726, Toft became pregnant, but following her reported fascination with the sighting of a rabbit, she miscarried. Her claim to have given birth to various animal parts prompted the arrival of John Howard, a local surgeon, who investigated the matter. He delivered several pieces of animal flesh and duly notified other prominent physicians, which brought the case to the attention of Nathaniel St. André, surgeon to the Royal Household of King George I. St. André concluded that Toft's case was genuine but the king also sent surgeon Cyriacus Ahlers, who remained sceptical. By then quite famous, Toft was brought to London where she was studied in detail; under intense scrutiny and producing no more rabbits she confessed to the hoax, which was put upon by her family and was subsequently imprisoned as a fraud.

The resultant public mockery created panic within the medical profession and ruined the careers of several prominent surgeons. The affair was satirised on many occasions, not least by the pictorial satirist and social critic William Hogarth, who was notably critical of the medical profession's gullibility. Toft was eventually released without charge and returned home. The scandal had a lasting effect on public trust in the medical field, contributing to widespread scepticism about the competence and ethics of physicians during that era. (Full article...)

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• ... that the first road tunnel in England, opened in 1823 in Reigate, Surrey, runs under the site of a medieval castle?
• ... that the old town hall in Godalming, Surrey, is nicknamed "The Pepperpot" after its distinctive cupola?

• WikiProject Surrey
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