turnpike
in 1770 that heavy wheeled vehicles were able to enter it. Before this
the inhabitants had to rely on packhorse transport, and the population
remained fairly static over the centuries.

Giggleswick was a Norse settlement, the wick or village of Gikel, while
the neighbouring town of Settle was Anglian. The Anglians came first into
what was previously British Territory, followed by the Norsemen or Vikings,
but the even distribution of old English and Norse place names suggests
that there was peaceful coexistence between them. In Alfred's reign the
area became part of the Danelaw. Craven, as this part of Yorkshire is know,
is described in the Domesday Book, when it appears to have been an independent
district not yet incorporated into the county of Yorkshire. The four northern
counties were not mentioned at all, and Craven must have lainat the extreme
north of William I's realm.

Astride the boundary between Giggleswick and Clapham, its western neighbour,
lies the farmhouse known as Armitstead. There was originally a hamlet here,
but all that remains of it is the farm together with outbuildings containing
various remains of previous houses. The name Armitstead comes from Hermitstead,
the dwelling of the hermit, the sound Er having undergone a change in pronunciation
as in Derby and clerk, and Armitage which was originally Hermitage. The
Armitstead family took its name from the hamlet, and there was a branch
of the family still living there in the seventeenth century.

Earliest Reference

I have read that the first reference to the family is in the hundred
rolls of 1273 where the name of Robert Armitstead appears, but the first
one I have found so far appears in the