English Villages

by P. H. Ditchfield

The scene changes. The Roman legions have left our shores, and are trying to prop the tottering state of the falling empire. The groans of the Britons have fallen on listless or distracted ears, and no one has come to their succour. The rule of the all-swaying Roman power has passed away, and the Saxon hordes have poured over the hills and vales of rural Britain, and made it the Angles’ land—our England.

The coming of the Saxons was a very gradual movement. They did not attack our shores in large armies on one or two occasions; they came in clans or families. The head of the clan built a ship, and taking with him his family and relations, founded a settlement in wild Britain, or wherever the winds happened to carry them. They were very fierce and relentless in war, and committed terrible ravages on the helpless Britons, sparing neither men, women, nor children, burning buildings, destroying and conquering wherever they went.

Bede tells the story of doings of the ruthless Saxons:—

“The barbarous conquerors ... plundered all the neighbouring cities and country, spread the conflagration from the eastern to the western sea without any opposition, and covered almost every part of the devoted island. Public as well as private structures were overturned; the priests were everywhere slain before the altars; the prelates and the people, without any respect of persons, were destroyed with fire and sword; nor was there any to bury those who had been thus cruelly slaughtered. Some of the miserable remainder, being taken in the mountains, were butchered in heaps. Others, spent with hunger, came forth and submitted themselves to the enemy for food, being destined to undergo perpetual servitude, if they were not killed even upon the spot. Some, with sorrowful hearts, fled beyond the seas; others, continuing in their own country, led a miserable life among the woods, rocks, and mountains, with scarcely enough food to support life, and expecting every moment to be their last.”

Many antiquaries believe that the extirpation of the Britons was not so complete as Bede asserts, and that a large number of them remained in England in a condition of servitude. At any rate, the almost entire extinction of the language, except as regards the names of a few rivers and mountains, and of a few household words, seems to point to a fairly complete expulsion of the Britons rather than to a mingling of them with the conquering race.

What remains have we in our English villages of our Saxon forefathers, the makers of England? In the first place we notice that many of the names of our villages retain the memory of their founders. When the family, or group of families, formed their settlements, they avoided the buildings and walled towns, relics of Roman civilisation, made clearings for themselves in the primeval forests, and established themselves in village communities. In the names of places the suffix ing, meaning sons of, denotes that the village was first occupied by the clan of some chief, whose name is compounded with this syllable ing. Thus the Uffingas, the children of Offa, formed a settlement at Uffinggaston, or Uffington; the Redingas, or sons of Rede, settled at Reading; the Billings at Billinge and Billingham; the Wokings or Hocings, sons of Hoc, at Woking and Wokingham. The Billings and Wokings first settled at Billinge and Woking; and then like bees they swarmed, and started another hive of industry at Billingham and Wokingham.

These family settlements, revealed to us by the patronymic ing, are very numerous. At Ardington, in Berkshire, the Ardings, the royal race of the Vandals, settled; the Frankish Walsings at Wolsingham; the Halsings at Helsington; the Brentings at Brentingley; the Danish Scyldings at Skelding; the Thurings at Thorington; and many other examples might be quoted.

Many Saxon names of places end in field, which denotes a forest clearing, or feld, made by the axes of the settlers in the primeval woods, where the trees were felled. These villages were rudely fortified, or inclosed by a hedge, wall, or palisade, denoted by the suffix ton, derived from the Anglo-Saxon tynan, to hedge; and all names ending with this syllable point to the existence of a Saxon settlement hedged in and protected from all intruders. Thus we have Barton, Preston, Bolton, and many others. The terminations yard, stoke, or stockaded place, as in Basingstoke, worth (Anglo-Saxon weorthig), as in Kenilworth, Tamworth, Walworth, have much the same meaning.

Perhaps the most common of all the terminations of names denoting the presence of Anglo-Saxon settlers is the suffix ham. When the a is pronounced short the syllable denotes an inclosure, like stoke or ton; but when the a is long, it means home, and expresses the reverence with which the Anglo-Saxon regarded his own dwelling. England is the land of homes, and the natural affection with which we Englishmen regard our homes is to a great extent peculiar to our race. The Frenchman, the Spaniard, the Italian, do not have the same respect for home. Our Saxon forefathers were a very home-loving people, and it is from them doubtless that we inherit our love for our homes.

We find, then, the Saxon holding the lands. The clan formed settlements; sections of each clan formed branch settlements; and several members of each section cut their way through the thick forests, felled the trees, built homesteads, where they tilled the land and reared their cattle.