Bishop Bonner's Cottage Museum

Virtually untouched by the 21st century, this beautiful timber-framed, thatched building is particularly noted for its unusual coloured pargetting. Originally three cottages, it is the oldest surviving domestic building in Dereham, and with its original sloping ceilings, tiny rooms, twisting staircases and wooden beams, it is easy to imagine how the many previous inhabitants lived here in the past.

We are very sorry to have to report that we are unable to open the Museum to visitors this year. Essential maintenance work by the Town Council has been delayed to July and August, leaving no time for us to mount our displays before September.

This is always our final month of opening because of the damp condition of the building once autumn comes along, so we cannot justify all the work involved in mounting displays only to take them down again within a few short weeks and with very few visitors.We hope for a 'normal' year in 2022 - opening at the start of May.

Can we tempt you to experience 'hands-on'running of a museum? We are always looking for people to join our group of volunteers who staff the museum on a rota basis. You would decide what time you could give to us - it could be as little as one session a month if that's all the time you have to spare.

From academic beginnings in 1953, the Dereham Heritage Trust (formerly the Dereham Antiquarian Society) is now a friendly group of people who have a shared interest in the history of Dereham and the surrounding areas. Guest speakers are invited each month to give talks at Trinity Methodist Church hall in Theatre Street, Dereham.

For Black History Month 2020 we have an article written by Trevor Ogden for Dereham Heritage Trust Newsletter a few months ago about a black woman whose skeleton was found in the 10th century cathedral cemetery at North Elmham, mid-Norfolk, in Peter Wade-Martin's excavations in the 1970s. What was her story, and how might she have come to Norfolk so long ago?