Heritage Open Day: Join us for a fascinting tour of East Yorkshire's famous 'deserted’ medieval villages of Wharram Percy, Cowlam and Cottam . Wharram Percy is a nationally famous as one of the best excavated and studied ‘deserted’ or ‘shrunken’ medieval villages of England. Today, the ruins of the church survive as a reminder of this once-thriving settlement, surrounded by the earthwork remains of peasant tofts and crofts and manor houses which gradually disappeared over the centuries. Once thought to be a legacy of the Black Death, archaeological excavations and analysis over several decades has revealed a much richer and longer history of places like Wharram, and surrounding sites such as Cowlam and Cottam.