A book of the west. Volume 1, Devon

by S. Baring-Gould

When Brute woke he was much encouraged by the vision, and he returned to his ship, hoisted the mainsail, and away, away, before the wind the ship flew, throwing up foam from her bows, and leaving a track as milk in the sea behind. He passed through the Straits of Gibraltar and coasted up Aquitaine, and rounded the Cape of Finisterre, and at length, with a fair wind, crossed the sea, and came to the marble cliffs of Dunan Dyffnaint, the land of deep vales, and in the cliffs opened a great rift, down which flowed a beautiful river, and he sailed up it. And lo! on either side were green pastures spangled with buttercups, and forests of mighty oaks and beech, and over his head the white gulls screamed, and in the water the broad-winged herons dipped; and so he sailed, and before him rose a red cliff; and now the tide began to fall. So he ran his ship up against the cliff and leapt ashore, and where he leaped there his foot made its impress on the red rock, which remains even unto this day. Then, when Brute had landed, he sat himself down and said:—

"Here I sit, and here I rest,
And this town shall be called Totnes."

Which shows that Brute had not much idea of rhyme, nor of measure in his rhyme.

It must be told that the very spot where Brute sprang ashore is half-way up the hill from the river Dart, up which he sailed; but then the river was much fuller in those days, or men's legs were longer.

Totnes, in fact, occupies a promontory of red sandstone rock, round which the river not only winds, but anciently swept up a creek that ran for two miles. In fact there was a labyrinth of creeks there; one between Totnes and the sea, another between Totnes and the mainland, so that the town was accessible on one side only, and that side was strongly fortified by castle and earthworks. The creek to the south still fills with water; its mouth is below Sharpham, and the tide now rises only as far as Bow Bridge. Formerly it ran quite a mile further up. The town of Totnes, in fact, occupies one point alone in a ness or promontory that was formerly, when the tide rose, flushed with water on the three sides. It has, however, been supposed that the term Totnes applies to the whole of that portion of South Devon to the coast; some even assert to the whole peninsula of Devon and Cornwall. The creeks have silted up with the rich red mud, and with the washings from the tin mines on Dartmoor, to such an extent that the true ness character of the little district of Totnes and the villages of Ashprington and Harberton has not been recognised. It is a hilly district, and the clefts which formerly filled with water are natural dykes fortifying it.

The Ikenild Street, which was a British trackway, passed through Totnes, which is the old Durium of the Itineraries. The river Dart is the Dour, that comes out as Durium in Latin, and is simply the Celtic word for water. We have it again in Dorovernia, Dover, and in Dorchester, the castle or camp on the water.

The name Totnes is probably Saxon, from tot, toten, "to project," as in Tothill, Tottenham; and we have it again in a promontory on the coast, as Dodman's Nose, which is peculiar, for this is a combination of three languages. Dod is the Saxon, man is the Celtic maen, stone or rock, and ness is the Scandinavian nose or headland.

The railway station and line to Plymouth now occupy the old creek, up which barges, and undoubtedly smuggled spirits, went to Dartington. Anyone standing on the Dartington side and looking across at Totnes will see at once what was the old character of this headland. The town occupies a long ridge, which reached to the river by one street that ran its entire length. The magnificent church of red sandstone, with its grand tower and pinnacles, occupies the centre, and on the land side, the only side assailable, towered up the castle on a mound that was thrown up in prehistoric times.

The castle is now ruined; the circular "mote" remains, and a few crumbling walls and great elm trees full of rooks' nests rise in the place of towers and battlements. The grounds about the ruins have been nicely laid out, and what remains of the castle is saved from further disintegration. The character was very much that of other castles in the West, as Rougemont, Plympton, and Launceston. There was no square keep, but a circular drum, and a large yard surrounded by walls that stood on earlier earthworks. A picturesque gate gives access to the town near the castle. The town itself is quaint and full of interesting relics. A great number of the houses date from Elizabethan times, and belonged to the wealthy merchants of Totnes, which was a great place for the manufacture of woollen cloth. Indeed in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries it was already famous.

Totnes is one of the oldest boroughs in the country. Its earliest charter dates from 1205, and I believe I am right in saying that at a dinner at the Mansion House given by a Lord Mayor of London within the last few years to the mayors of England, precedence was given to the representative of the borough of Totnes over all others.