Holdingham is a hamlet in the civil parish and built-up area of Sleaford, Lincolnshire. It is bisected by Lincoln Road (B1518) which joins the A17 and A15 roads immediately north of the settlement; those roads connect it to Lincoln, Newark, Peterborough and King's Lynn. Sleaford railway station is on the Nottingham to Skegness (via Grantham) and Peterborough to Lincoln Lines.

Prehistoric and Romano-British artefacts have been uncovered around Holdingham. There was an early and middle Saxon settlement, which appears to have disappeared in the 9th century. The current settlement's Old English name suggests a pre-conquest origin, though it was not mentioned in the Domesday Book and appears to have formed part of the Bishop of Lincoln's manor of New Sleaford. Holdingham probably functioned as the agricultural focus of the manor, while New Sleaford (0.9 miles or 1.5 km south) was encouraged to expand as a commercial centre. The land was ceded to the Crown in 1540 and was acquired by Robert Carre in 1559; it passed through his family and then, through marriage, to the Earls (later Marquesses) of Bristol, who owned almost all of the land. Enclosed in 1794, it remained a small, primarily agricultural settlement well into the 20th century.

The late 20th century brought substantial change. Holdingham Roundabout was built immediately north of the hamlet in 1975 as part of the A17 bypass around Sleaford; the roundabout also accommodated the A15 bypass which opened in 1993. After Lord Bristol sold the agricultural land around the hamlet, major residential development began; private housing estates were completed either side of Lincoln Road between Sleaford and Holdingham in the 1990s and early 2000s. The hamlet thereby merged into Sleaford's urban area, functioning more like a suburb of the town. Further developments have taken place in the 2010s.

Holdingham had its own chapel in the Middle Ages, but this was abandoned c. 1550; its site has not been identified securely. It has had a public house since at least the early 19th century. It now has petrol filling stations on the roundabout and Lincoln Road, as well as fast food restaurants, a hotel, a café and a nursing home – all opened since the middle of the 20th century. The nearest schools and other public services are in Sleaford. The hamlet was anciently part of the parish of New Sleaford; in 1866, the civil parish of Holdingham was established but in 1974 was merged into Sleaford civil parish. The hamlet now lends its name to a ward in North Kesteven, although the boundaries differ somewhat from those of the old parish. It had a population of 2,774 in 2011.

Geography

Topography 
Holdingham is a settlement 0.9 miles (1.5 km) north of Sleaford, a market town in the North Kesteven district of Lincolnshire. The old hamlet clusters around and is bisected by Lincoln Road (B1518) immediately below Holdingham Roundabout which connects Lincoln Road to the A17 and A15 roads. A stream called Field Beck (also known as Holdingham Beck) runs east−west through the hamlet within a narrow, shallow valley. To the south of the hamlet is modern housing, which creates a contiguous urban area with Sleaford.

Holdingham lies between approximately 20 and 30 meters above sea level. The old hamlet on the west side of Lincoln Road is underlain by Jurassic mudstone belonging to the Blisworth Clay Formation, a group of sedimentary rocks formed 165–168 million years ago; this forms a narrow outcrop along Field Beck's shallow valley. The bedrock under the rest of the area (including the modern housing developments) is Cornbrash limestone belonging to the Great Oolite Group of Jurassic rocks formed 161–168 million years ago. The soil belongs to the Aswarby series of brown, calcareous earth. It is free-draining, loamy and lime-rich, suited for growing cereals and grasses but classified as a nitrate vulnerable zone.

Parish and ward boundaries 
Holdingham also gave its name to a civil parish which existed between 1866 (when it was separated from the ancient parish of New Sleaford) and 1974, when it was merged into the current successor civil parish of Sleaford. The parish boundaries, which contained the hamlet and adjacent fields and farm houses, were finally amended in 1882.

Since at least 1999, Holdinham has also given its name to an electoral ward (Sleaford Holdingham) in the district of North Kesteven. The ward's boundaries, as fixed in 2007, differ from those of the old civil parish. As well as the hamlet, they incorporate all of the land bounded by Lincoln Road, the A17 and the railway track; this includes the Jubilee Grove and Woodside Avenue housing estates, Sleaford Wood, Poplar Business Park and Sleaford Enterprise Park, which sit on land outside the former parish boundaries. The ward boundaries also include land to the north of the A17 and west of Lincoln Road which were included in the former parish (including the modern Stokes Drive, Peterborough Way, Furlong Way and Whittle Road housing estates). However, the ward boundaries exclude most of the land south of the line between The Drove and Sumner's Plantation which had been in the former parish.

Climate
The British Isles experience a temperate, maritime climate with warm summers and cool winters. Data from the weather station nearest to Holdingham (at Cranwell, 3 miles north-west), shows that the average daily mean temperature is 9.8 °C (49.6 °F); this fluctuates from a peak of 16.9 °C (62.4 °F) in July to 3.9 °C (39.0 °F) in January. The average high temperature is 13.7 °C (56.7 °F), though the monthly average varies from 6.7 °C (44.1 °F) in January and December to 21.8 °C (71.2 °F) in July; the average low is 5.9 °C (42.6 °F) which reaches its lowest in February at 0.8 °C (33.4 °F) and its highest in July and August at 12.0 °C (53.6 °F).

History

Prehistoric, Roman and early Saxon settlements 
A Bronze Age flint scraper and two pottery sherds from the same period have been uncovered at Holdingham. Lincoln Road, connecting Sleaford and Lincoln, may have Roman origins, although the stretch between Sleaford and Brauncewell (via Holdingham) could be prehistoric. East of the settlement is a suspected Roman villa and skeletons have been uncovered with Romano-British pottery to the south-west; coins and pottery recovered in archaeological investigations date between 2nd and 4th centuries AD. Along with ditches and gullies, the remains of early and middle Anglo-Saxon enclosures and post-built buildings have been uncovered east of Holdingham Roundabout (on the sites where the McDonald's restaurant and the Furlong Way housing development have since been built); finds included sherds of pottery, much of it produced locally though some from as far afield as Leicestershire. Animal bones, loom weights, querns, metal-working waste, remains of crops and domestic waste were also uncovered. The site dwindled in size and was "largely abandoned" in the 9th century; it probably reverted to agricultural use and it is possible that the settlement shifted to the present location of the hamlet on the western side of Lincoln Road. Its decline may also reflect the growing importance of Sleaford.

Later farming village 

The word Holdingham derives from the personal name Hald and the Old English words -inga and -ham, together meaning "Homestead of Hald's family or followers", as A. D. Mills puts it. The place name scholars Kenneth Cameron and John Ingsley make him Halda and his followers the Haldingas. This implies a pre-conquest origin, though the earliest record of the name does not occur until c. 1202. Although not mentioned in the Domesday Book, it was probably a dependent part of the Bishop of Lincoln's manor in Sleaford. In the mid-12th century, the Bishops of Lincoln encouraged trade at New Sleaford (as it became known); they granted it limited liberties and burgage tenure. An estate survey of 1258, however, shows that tenants in Holdingham held both tofts and bovates, implying that it remained a centre of demesne farming. The arrangement of the manor's open fields around the settlement add credence to this, suggesting, as local historian Simon Pawley wrote, that Holdingham was "the agricultural focus" of the Bishop's estate at Sleaford. By 1334, the settlement was valued at £2 16s. 3¼d. It remained a part of the Bishop's estate until Bishop Holbeach alienated it to the Crown in 1540. Mary I granted it to Edward Clinton, Lord Clinton and later Earl of Lincoln, who sold it to Robert Carre in 1559. It passed through his family and then, by marriage, to the Earls (later Marquesses) of Bristol.

In medieval and early modern times, the settlement was arranged into closes.