CHRIS KOENIG delves into stories that are bizarre, but also tragic, from Curiosities Of Oxfordshire

How to pave the streets of Oxford seems to have been a headache for councillors since time immemorial. Most recently there was the tragi-comic fiasco of the granite from China and used, briefly, to pave Cornmarket Street.

Briefly, of course, because it almost immediately cracked and had to be removed at further cost to council taxpayers to a store where I suppose it is gathering further storage charges.

Now, anxious not to repeat the blunder, I understand that the city council is scratching its collective head over what to do about Broad Street.

In earlier times their predecessors came up with a novel idea. In 1869 The Builder magazine reported bone paving there. It said Broad Street was "laid with trotter bones in a pattern of squares arranged angle wise within a border".

I owe that crackling piece of information to a book, lent to me the other day, called Curiosities Of Oxfordshire by Edward Gill (published in 1995 by SB Publications). It describes the knuckle-bone paving still extant in Wantage, preserved on either side of the covered main entrance to Stiles Almhouses. Sheep, of course, abounded on the Downs roundabout so of course it must have made good sense to use their knuckles in place of cobbles, but I gather the bones of other animals, including deer and goats, were also often used.

The book is perhaps a little short on dates for all this bone-work, but is nevertheless full of tantalising titbits. There is the story of how in the 17th century the people of Burford complained to the vicar that the spirit of the deceased but still unpopular Lady Tanfield was haunting them. He then caught it in a bottle and threw it in the Windrush!

Or, still in Burford, there is the intrigueing case of John Pryor, Gent. His gravestone states categorically that he "was murdered and found hidden in the priory garden in this parish on the third day of April Anno Domini 1697". Mr Plod, do your duty.

Then there is the sad tale of the four families from Shipton-under-Wychwood, commemorated with a memorial on the village green. The 17 Shipton men, women and children were emigrating to New Zealand in 1874; their ship caught fire off Tristan da Cunah. All perished.

Crossing the county to Henley-on-Thames we learn that the marble statue adorning the temple, built in 1771 by James Wyatt on Temple Island, is not the original. An unnamed rowing eight apparently removed it one night in 1954 after being knocked out of the regatta.

They tried to take it by punt to the Judge's Box at the other end of the course but the punt sank (of course) and the statue was lost for several years. By the time it was found by dredgers, its place on the Temple had long been taken up by the interloper.

Some of the quirkier stories are fun: half a mile from Nettlebed, on the B481 road to Stoke Row, opposite Merrimoles Farm, is a very miniature castle indeed, on the roadside and almost hidden among the trees. The only clue to its origin is an inscription: "1942 343 Engineers U.S. Army".

But I particularly like the author's comments about the pikes displayed in the St Mary the Virgin church at Great Milton, opposite the 17th-century sword and helmet of Sir Michael Dormer. The point here being that the pikes were issued to the Home Guard (Dad's Army) in 1940.

He writes: "The younger generation might well ask: 'Did they really get up to all those funny antics during the war?' For those of us who remember the far off days of the 1940s, the answer is a resounding 'Yes!'