In which English county is the village of Chawton located?

Chawton is a village in the English county of Hampshire. It lies in the East Hampshire district, near the town of Alton and within the South Downs National Park.

The village is especially important to literary history because Jane Austen lived at Chawton Cottage from 1809 until shortly before her death in 1817. During those years, she revised and prepared several novels for publication, including Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice, Mansfield Park and Emma.

Chawton’s connection with Austen is sometimes confused with Chawton House, the nearby manor associated with her brother Edward Austen Knight. Edward inherited the estate through the wealthy Knight family and provided the cottage where his mother and sisters lived. Jane Austen’s House, now a museum, stands in the village and preserves the domestic setting where much of her mature writing took place.

The settlement has older roots: Chawton is recorded in the Domesday survey of 1086, centuries before it became associated with Austen.