DUNSTER  , a

market town in the Western parliamentary division of Somersetshire, England, 12 m. from the shore of the Bristol Channel, on the Minehead branch of the Great Western railway . Pop . (1901) 1182 . Its streets, sloping sharply, contain many old houses . On an eminence stands the ancient castle, entered by a gateway of the 13th century . There are portions of later date, but still ancient, in the main building, but it has been considerably modernized as a residence . The church of St George has Norman portions, but the building is in the main Perpendicular . The fine tower in this style is characteristic of this part of England . There are traces of monastic buildings near the church, for it belonged to a Benedictine house of early Norman foundation . The church is cruciform and the altar stands beneath the eastern lantern arch, a fine rood screen separating off the choir, which was devoted to monastic use, while the nave was kept for the parishioners, in consequence of a dispute between the vicar and the monastery in 1499 . The Yarn Market, a picturesque octagonal building with deep sloping roof, in the main street, dates from c . 1600, and is a memorial of Dunster's former important manufacture of cloth .

There were

British, Roman and Saxon settlements at Dunstel (Torre Dunestorre, Dunester), fortified against the piracies of the Irish Northmen . The Saxon fort of Alaric was replaced by a Norman castle built by William de Mohun, first lord of Dunster, who founded the priory of St George . Before 1183, Dunster had become a mesne borough, owned by the de Mohuns until the ,4th century when it passed to the Luttrells, the present owners . Reginald de Mohun granted the first charter between 1245 and 1247, which diminished fines and tolls, limited the lord's " mercy," and provided that the burgesses should not against their will 1 The date of Dunstan's birth here given is that given in the Anglo-Saxon chronicle and hitherto accepted . In an appendix to the Bosworth Psalter, edited by Mr Edmund Bishop and Abbot Gasquet (1908), Mr Leslie A . St L . Toke gives reason to believe that the date must be set back at least as early as 910 . be made bailiffs or farmers of the seaport . John de Mohun granted other charters in 1301 and 1307 . Dunster was only represented in parliament in conjunction with Minehead, one of its tithings being part of that borough . Representation began in 1562, and was lost in 1832 . Feudal in origin, Dunster's later importance was commercial, and the port had a considerable wool, corn and cattle trade with Ireland .

During the

middle ages the Friday market and fair in Whit week, granted by the first charter, were centres for the sale of yarn and cloth called " Dunsters," made in the town . The market day is still Friday . The manufacture of cloth had disappeared, the harbour is silted up, and there is no special local industry . See Sir H . C . Maxwell Lyte, Dunster and its Lords (1882) ; Victoria County History, Somerset, vol. ii .