Letcombe Regis
Letcombe Regis is a village and civil parish in the Vale of [White Horse]. It was part of Berkshire until the 1974 boundary changes transferred the Vale of White Horse to Oxfordshire. The village is on Letcombe Brook at the foot of the Berkshire Downs escarpment about southwest of the market town of Wantage. The 2011 Census recorded the parish population as 578.
History
The parish includes Segsbury Camp, an Iron Age hill fort on the crest of the Downs just over a mile south of the village. The Domesday Book of 1086 records Letcombe Regis. The name may come from the Old English Ledecumbe meaning the "lede in the combe" – i.e. "the brook in the valley.""Regis" may derive from the Latin 'rex' meaning 'Royal' with 'Regis' meaning The King's, giving, perhaps, "The Kings brook in the valley."
From 1959 to 2002 the Letcombe Laboratory, a major centre for plant research, was located at the Letcombe Manor Estate. The centre was initially a UK government laboratory, but was sold to the chemical company Dow Elanco in 1985.