LECTURE I.
Part I.—Introductory, Geological.—The Waveney.—The Silting up of the Estuary.—Burgh Castle.
Part II.—Domesday Book.—The Parishes of Lothingland.—Lowestoft in Domesday.—Neighbouring Parishes.—Herring Rents.—Live Stock on the Farms.—Condition of the People in Saxon Times.—Serfdom.—Craftsmen.—The Merchant.
Part i.—Introductory—Geological.
You will think that I am going unnecessarily far back in commencing my sketch with a reference to that very remote period
“When Britain first at Heaven’s command
Arose from out the azure main.”
But if a thousand years or so would take in the origin of both Lowestoft and Yarmouth, questions have arisen affecting the relations of these towns which involve a much more extended retrospect.
It has long been a tenet of Lowestoft people that Lowestoft is a more ancient town than Yarmouth. In some of the numerous petitions presented to Parliament in connection with the disputes between the two towns about the Herring Trade, her greater antiquity was put forward by Lowestoft as giving her a prior claim to the herrings which visit the seas off this coast.
There is a story that the learned Potter, the translator of Æschylus, when vicar of the parish (about 1780) received a letter from the Archbishop of Canterbury addressed to him at “Lowestoft near Yarmouth.” The vicar was indignant at what he regarded as a slight on his town, and when replying to the Archbishop, added this postscript “My Lord, when you direct to me again be pleased to write simply Lowestoft—Lowestoft does not want Yarmouth for a direction post, for Lowestoft was ere Yarmouth rose out of the azure main.”
Again, the question whether the Waveney ever flowed out at Lowestoft was a matter of warm discussion some 60 or 70 years ago, when the project of making a connection between that river and the sea, and providing Lowestoft with a harbour (an undertaking since so successfully carried out) was first mooted. The belief that the Waveney did once run out here, was supposed to give much sanction to a project which would only restore to the town an advantage which nature had originally given her.