Kirkby-on-Bain is a village larger than most of those in the immediate neighbourhood, situated on the river Bain, between 4 and 5 miles from Horncastle, in a southerly direction, about 4 miles north-east of Tattershall, and rather less south-east of Woodhall Spa, where are the nearest railway station, money order, and telegraph office, there being a post office in the village.
It was a saying of one of our chief archæologists, that “anciently every local name had its meaning”; and we may extract more than conjectural history from the name, Kirkby-on-Bain. The first syllable carries us back into a distant past, earlier than the date of most of our written records. As a rule, when the word “Kirk” forms part of a place-name, it implies, not only the former existence of a church in the locality (the name in Domesday is “Chirchebi,”) but also of a still earlier, and probably Druid, temple. The syllable “Kir,” or “Ker,” [98a] with its plural Kerrog, Kerig, or Curig (hence “Church”) means a sacred circle, which was the form of the ancient British, or Druid, place of worship, such as are still to be seen, on a large scale, in the megalithic remains of Stonehenge near Salisbury, and at Avebury near Marlborough, in Wiltshire; and, on a smaller scale, in many a lonely spot among the hills in Wales and Scotland, and on the continent, as far Palestine. These remarks apply to many places in our own neighbourhood, as Kirkstead, Kirkby Green, beyond the once sacred stream of the Druids, the Witham, or Rhe, East Kirkby beyond Revesby, &c. We have 5 Kirkbys, and 2 Kirtons (Kirk-ton), in the county. Thus we get a British origin for this parish; while the name of the river, on which it is situate, is also British; the word “Ban,” meaning “bright,” or “clear,” is found not only in the river Bain, but in several other streams. [98b]
The second syllable of the name Kirkby yields further information. While the two contiguous parishes of Kirk-stead and Kirk-by have the first syllable in common, in their suffix, they differ, since “stead,” connected with our word “steady,” is Saxon, meaning a settled domicile; and “by,” is an old Danish word, (still surviving in Scotland as “byre”) meaning the same. [99a]
The Britons, therefore, have left their mark in the first half of both these names, but from the second halves we gather that the Saxons made their permanent residence in Kirkstead, whereas in Kirkby, although they doubtless there also succeeded the Britons, they were, in turn, supplanted by the Danes, who made this place their “byre,” or “by,” with three “by-roads,” or village roads, branching from it.
In this connection we may also note, that “Toft,” which is a farm name in the parish, is also a Danish word, and this is another of their “footprints on the sands of time”; while further we may observe, that those roving invaders were called “Vikings,” because they first frequented our “viks,” “wicks,” or creeks; and there are geological indications, in the beds of sand and gravel, in this parish, that the river Bain was, at one time, much wider and deeper than it is in the present day [99b]; and so, we may well suppose, that, up this “ancient river,” the river Bain, those Danish marauders steered their way, from its mouth at “Dog-dyke,” originally Dock-dyke, because there was a Dock, or Haven, for shipping there (as the present Langrick was a long-creek of the sea, a few miles beyond; the sea then coming up from Waynfleet); and made their settlement here, from which they ousted the Saxons, whose presence is implied in the name of the hamlet Tumby, originally Tunne-by, which is, in part, a Saxon appellation.
Thus, by the analysis of a name we are brought down from those far-off, dark ages to within the range of historic times. Kirkby is stated to be in “the soke of Horncastle,” in a document of date 1327–8 (“Lincolnshire N & Q.” vol. v., No. 44., p. 248), but the local historian, Mr. Weir (“Hist. Horncastle,” p. 310, Ed. 1828) says, that it had a jurisdiction of its own, including Kirkstead, and even more distant parishes, as Wispington, and Waddingworth. [100a]
The Domesday survey of this county, made in 1089, by order of William the Conqueror, and so named by the Saxons, because it recorded the doom of many a Saxon Thane, ejected from his possessions by Norman warriors, contains several notices of this parish; and although at first sight they appear somewhat conflicting, yet a careful study of them enables us to put together something like a connected account of some of its former proprietors.
First we may mention the Saxon owners, who were dispossessed of their lands by the Normans.
One of these was Ulmar, who had 150 acres, charged with the land tax, called “gelt,” which was about 2s. to the carucate (or 120 acres); besides which he had 1½ carucates (180 acres), sub-let to smaller bond tenants, making in all 330 acres. He had also in the adjoining parish of Tattershall Thorpe, 240 acres, “in demesne,” i.e., in his own occupation, as Lord of the Manor, besides 360 acres sub-let to dependents. Ulmar was therefore what we should call, “well to do,” a Saxon yeoman of substance.
There were also two other Saxon owners in the parish, who would seem, to some extent, to have been partners. Godwin and Gonewate had between them 60 acres in Kirkby, charged with the aforesaid payment of “gelt,” and 75 acres exempt from it. They had also 360 acres in Tattershall Thorpe; and separately, or together, they had lands in several other parishes. Especially in Tumby, they owned 300 acres rateable to “gelt,” and 360 acres more sub-let to dependents.