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AxbridgeAxbridge is a town in Somerset, England, situated in the Sedgemoor district on the River Axe, near the southern edge of the Mendip Hills. The village has a population of 2,024 (2002 estimate). Axbridge grew in the Tudor period as a centre for cloth manufacture, but its decline led to stagnation and the preservation of many historic buildings in the town centre. These include King John's Hunting Lodge (actually a Tudor building) and the thirteenth century parish church. Village or Town? In contrast to the much larger settlement of Cheddar immediately to the southeast that remains a village, Axbridge is a town. This apparently illogical situation is explained by the relative importance of the two places in historic times. While Axbridge grew in importance as a centre for cloth manufacture in the Tudor period and gained a charter from King John, Cheddar remained a more dispersed dairy-farming village until the advent of tourism and the arrival of the railway in the Victorian era. This situation is unlikely to change in the near future, with the residents of both Axbridge and Cheddar proud of their settlement's respective status and the inevitable friendly local rivalry between the two.
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