In the mid-11th-century reign of Edward the Confessor, a certain Bardi held the manor of Chacombe "freely". However, the Domesday Book of 1086 records that after the Norman Conquest of England one Godfrey held the manor of Cewecumbe of Remigius de Fécamp, Bishop of Lincoln. This had four hides of arable land, nine acres of meadow and three watermills. In the 12th century the manor was still assessed as four hides and still held from the Bishop of Lincoln. The manor house has been demolished. It was on the north-west side of the village, just east of the parish church, in what is now Berry Field.
Priory
, lord of the manor of Chacombe, founded the AugustinianChacombe Priory in the reign of Henry II. It was just west of the present village. In 1536 the Priory was suppressed in the Dissolution of the Monasteries and passed all its properties to the Crown. The only visible remains of it are a small chapel apparently built in the 13th century and a set of medieval fishponds, although at least three medieval stone coffin slabs, one from the 13th century, have been found in the priory grounds. Part of the priory site is now occupied by a house, also called Chacombe Priory. The house has a large Elizabethan porch and a late 17th-century staircase, and was remodelled in the Georgian era.
By the 13th century many of the hundreds in Northamptonshire listed in Domesday had been consolidated, with Chacombe parish within Sutton Hundred. The ridge and furrow patterns of Chacombe's former open field system can be traced in much of the parish, particularly from the air. The common fields were enclosed long before the 18th century and without a parliamentaryInclosure Act. In about 1720 John Bridges wrote that the whole lordship was then enclosed and had been so "for near a 100 years". From 1605 until 1785 the Bagley family of Chacombe were bellfounders, casting more than 440 bells for churches in England including the four 1694 bells in Chacombe parish church. Master-founders at Chacombe included Henry I Bagley, Matthew I Bagley, Henry II Bagley, William Bagley, Henry III Bagley and Matthew III Bagley. Henry II Bagley also ran a foundry at Ecton and Henry III Bagley one at Witney. Before 1901, the hundred court was disused and Chacombe parish part of the Southern Division of Northamptonshire. In 1900 the Great Central Railway branch line between and was built along the northern edge of Chacombe parish. In 1911 the railway opened just north of the village on Wardington Road. British Railways closed this in 1956 and the whole line in 1966. The Conservative politician and government minister Norman St. John-Stevas, Lord St. John, died at Chacombe House care home on 2 March 2012, at the age of 82.
School and amenities
The parish school in Chacombe was founded in 1868. The school is now known as Chacombe CEVA Primary Academy. The village has a village hall and a public house, the George and Dragon, tied to Everards Brewery. There are bed-and-breakfast facilities at the Old Farmhouse in Banbury Road. There is also a care home for the elderly. Cherwell Edge Golf Club lies south-east of the village.
