The village has a hermit's cave, an unusual church sharing a roof with a dwelling-house, and the majestic arch of a window which was once the glory of a large abbey, all set in a green valley near the busy industrial district, and all coming into a story over 800 years old.
It was between 1130 and 1140 that according to tradition, a Derby baker (after having a vision of the Virgin Mary) found his way to Deepdale, a wild and marshy place, and made it is home, cutting out the sandstone rock a dwelling and a little oratory where he lived. One day when Ralph FitzGeremund had come from Normandy to hunt in his English woods, he found the hermit, and touched with pity for his poverty, gave him not only the site of the hermitage but a tithe of his mill at Borrowash, towards Derby. Then the hermit built himself a more pretentious oratory and a cottage in which to end his days.
After 1149 Deepdale passed to the Augustinians canons of Calke, who founded a small priory here. In 1197 the estate passed to William de Grendon, who replaced the canons with monks of the Premonstratensian order from Lincolnshire.
The hermit;s cave is here, hewn out of the rock and measuring six yards by three, with a doorway, two windows, a peephole, and a niche for light. The division which made it into two compartments for the dwelling place and the oratory has gone. The hermit's well is said to be that in the orchard, now the water supply for the house.
The curious little church which shares a roof with the old house must surely be one of the smallest in the land, yet, while it measures only 26 feet by 25 feet, it is really two churches thrown into one, for it is said that the south aisle is on the site of the hermit's second oratory, and that the nave and chancel are the chapel built by the Augustinian canons. In about 1198 the aisle seen today took the place of the original oratory and new windows were put in the walls, but these were altered in the 15th century.
By a strange chance, this tiniest of churches has one of the biggest things of its kind in the country...a chalice of 1701 measuring 9 inches high and 15 inches round.
The farmhouse with the church has had a varied life. At first presumably the hermit's hut and separate from the church, it was rebuilt in about 1480 and attached to it. For some time before 1820 it was an inn, the bar being used as a vestry, with a door into the aisle,but it was rebuilt in 1883.
Of the abbey itself, which was completed in the late 13th century, and grew in importance and wealth until its dissolution, there remains the splendid arch of what must have been a glorious east window with fine tracery. The tracery has gone, but the arch stands proudly, 40 feet up to its keystone, and 16 feet wide. The sites of part of the nave, the choir, the transepts, two chapels, and the chapter house have been discovered, while some remains of the kitchen, the refectory, and a gateway are in buildings round about.
Some fine relics of the abbey have been used in the enriching of other Derbyshire churches. Radbourne has some splendid old wood-work, and Morley church has the old stone framework of the abbey windows and much rich 15th century glass.
On the hill north of the village is the Cat and Fiddle Windmill, one of the last in Derbyshire to retain its machinery. Fine view of Dale Abbey can be obtained from the main road near the
windmill.
The area in rich in footpaths.
