Shaftesbury is a town and civil parish in Dorset, England. It is positioned on the A30 road, 20 miles (32 kilometres) west of Salisbury, close to the border with Wiltshire. It is the only substantial hilltop negotiation in Dorset, being constructed concerning 215 metres (705 feet) above sea level on a greensand hill on the edge of Cranborne Chase. The community looks into the Blackmore Vale, part of the River Stour container. From different perspectives, it is feasible to see a minimum of regarding Glastonbury Tor to the northwest. Shaftesbury is the website of the former Shaftesbury Abbey, which was founded in 888 by King Alfred and turned into one of the wealthiest religious facilities in the country, before being ruined in the Dissolution in 1539. Adjacent to the abbey site is Gold Hill, a steep cobbled road used in the 1970s as the setup for Ridley Scott's tv ad for Hovis bread. In the 2011 census the town's civil parish had a population of 7,314.