Great bustard Army training area. Here the lack of public access allows them the freedom needed as a large ground-nesting bird. It is classified by the IUCN as "vulnerable". The great bustard was classified with its scientific name in 1758 by Carl Linnaeus, though the species was referred to as "avis tarda" in the much older writings of Pliny the Elder, and hence its names in English (from Old French "bistarda") and some other languages: "abetarda" (pt), "avetarda" (gl), "avutarda" (es). "Otis" is an Old Greek name for "bustard". The specific name, "tarda", is Latin for "slow" and "deliberate", which is apt
Great and Little Kimble represented saints (the church is dedicated to All Saints). They include St Francis preaching to the birds and a large figure of St George, but not all can be identified. There seems to have been a doom on the west wall, where a devil is pushing two women into the mouth of Hell. There is a small chapel in the Tudor style, built in 1922, to the west of the railway bridge at Little Kimble. Great Kimble has a special claim to fame as the parish where John Hampden refused to pay his ship-money in January 1635/6. King Charles I,