‘The Somerset-Dorset boundary, an exercise in hercology’, Katherine Barker.
Paper given at the 2011 SDNQ symposium: County Connections – historic links between Somerset and Dorset, held on 1 October 2011 at Downside Abbey.
Published in SDNQ, vol.37, pp.151-159, September 2012.
Launched in 2006 the Dorset County Boundary Survey took its inspiration from work on the Dorset/Devon border first undertaken in the 1980s[1]. In existence by AD 774 the boundary here between Uplyme and Lyme Regis probably dates to the 680s[2], the first reference to the shires is found in the Laws of Ine about a decade later[3]. From the OE sciran, to ‘cut’ or ‘divide’ to the Normans they were ‘counties’. As Campbell notes[4] ‘the shiring of England was ‘a system of formidable and integrated power… a major feat of government’… to remain in place ‘until the major revisions of 1888 and 1987’. The six shires of Wessex first listed between 800 and 860 may be a century or more older.
The Dorset/Devon border at Lyme not only follows a very man-made course but is marked by a distinctive boundary bank supporting several veteran tree stools not hitherto recorded. Coincident with the boundary here is a length of a Glastonbury Abbey charter boundary of 938[5] which presents several names suggestive of a former function of the early shire boundary, that related to the collection of tolls, and which has prompted that suggestion that what we see here is the re-instatement of the old Roman portoria[6] where a trade route crossed an established border[7]. The later seventh century was a prosperous trading period and one enhanced at Lyme by the production of salt, a valuable commodity and a long-established source of revenue[8].
The route running up valley from Lyme crossed the Devon border at the salteforde of 938 alternatively the warelackeforde and the old road running westwards up from the harbour crossed the Devon border at werboldiston represented today by Ware House in the hamlet of Ware; the road itself marked here by a waegn geat, ‘way’ or ‘wagon’ gate. The first element in both warelackeforde and werboldiston is OE waru, ‘ware’ ‘merchandise’ that found in current English ‘warehouse’ which also carries the meaning ‘watchful’ ‘observance’ as in ‘beware.’
While there have been changes made to the course of the Dorset boundary most recently in 1974[9] there is sufficient here to have prompted a fresh look at its significance as a linear, historic landscape feature of considerable antiquity. The study is one to bring together the two ‘arms’ of the Dorset Natural History and Archaeological Society.
Suffice to say there is, as yet, no definitive statement on the Dorset/Somerset border; this is work in progress. Joining the Axe just south-east of Chardstock it leaves the river at Clapton and then follows a route across country reaching the Yeo at Yeovil, whence it runs eastwards defining the northward Sherborne salient enhanced by boundary changes in 1896[10] and then across Blackmore to the junction with the bounds of Wiltshire and Somerset at Penselwood. Its course along the Axe itself invites further inspection; the collection of tolls along continental rivers is evidenced for seventh-century Merovingian Gaul.[11] Border estates here are characterised by ecclesiastical lordship. Forde Abbey (in Thorncombe), its function vested in its name, formerly occupied a Devonshire enclave on the east bank of the river was included within the jurisdiction of the Exeter diocese. In 1086 Thorncombe was held by Baldwin the Devonshire sheriff; Forde held by Ranulf from Baldwin.[12] Transferred to Devon from Dorset in 1844 and 1896[13] were the prominent south-western Chardstock ‘spur’ formerly a Sherborne episcopal estate together with Stockland held by Milton Abbey and Hawkchurch by Cerne Abbas; the latter is not recorded in 1086. Of note here are the beacon sites at Chardstock and Coleson House in Hawkchurch.[14] A ‘strategic’ border significance is presented by Sherborne’s hundred/manors of Beaminster, Yetminster and Sherborne itself which run with the Somerset border.[15] The Benedictine charter of 998 includes reference to ‘beacon service’ as the responsibility of the bishop[16] an ‘institutional’ role we may understand as held by the medieval church.[17] Lines of sight – strategic viewpoints across Somerset – have presented a number of times along those lengths of the boundary so far walked, including not only the Chardstock beacon, but Ashland Hill above Halstock, [Kingston] Penn Hill at Yeovil and from Purse Caundle which, by 1086, was an Athelney Abbey manor.
The location of Sherborne itself on the Dorset/Somerset border is of a significance hitherto, it seems, unexplored. The cathedral community set up in 705/6 was itself based on an earlier British Christian estate.[18] Its location in relation to the two counties-to-be goes far to acknowledge the existence of two seventh-century British lordships spanning the higher part of the south-western peninsula. Their naming, their designation in terms of their respective –saete, ‘dwellers’ ‘inhabitants’ goes far to suggest a re-naming – indeed a re-creation – by an incoming English administration for purposes of administration and taxation.[19] That is those inhabitants of Doro– [Durotrigian] country and of ‘summer’ country – echoes here of one-time seasonal movement to the Moors and Levels.[20] The earliest reference to the two counties is as a combined force when in 845/8 the Somerset men with the Dorset men under their respective duces led by Bishop Ealhstan fought against the Danes raiding at the mouth of the Parrett.[21] The two counties were to share the same shire reeve ‘sheriff’ until 1566.[22]
The Somerset/Dorset boundary here follows the River Yeo which emerges at the foot of the limestone escarpment at what is now Yeovil Pen Mill, a strong candidate for the site of the battle of 658 aet peonnum ‘at pens.’ Conflict at a boundary ford is a well-known theme in early literature and there were two Pen Hills here, if not three. The victor King Cenwealh ‘strong Briton’ ‘drove them [the wealhas, ‘welsh’ i.e. his fellow Britons] in flight [downstream] as far as the Parrett’.[23] From this time he plausibly took at least nominal control of both territories and was to be claimed as the fundator of the episcopal estate just upstream at Sherborne with the granting – the confiscation – of a British Christian estate at Lanprobi.[24] The Yeo is a tributary of the Parrett and – geographically-speaking – Sherborne is in Somerset. The prominent northward salient in the county boundary here may be understood as related to the tax status of this early episcopal estate. Sharing a common pattern of assessment in 1086 the Sherborne predium monasterii, ‘home estate,’ up-valley from the old Roman Ilchester civitas was to claim ecclesiastical immunitas from demands made by the Crown. Henceforward no long assessed as part of the territory to the north it was to be included within that to the south where it had no pre-existing status.[25] The character of prominent county boundary salient, if not related to an obvious geographical feature may thus well merit further inspection.[26]
The Yeo river name of today, OE ea ‘water,’ was formerly the River Ivel or Gifle. Suggested here is an element related to a fork or confluence.[27] A plausible alternative is presented by OE gafol ‘tax’ ‘tribute’; as noted above the river here runs with the county boundary.[28] The gafol river ford at pens at Yeovil/Pen Mill bounded the early royal manor/borough of Yeovil and it is surely not by coincidence that it is located here; control of the river crossing may be reflected in its name. An alternative river crossing, a ‘bypass,’ may be represented a mile and a half up river to the south by the [failed] medieval borough foundation at Stoford; the ‘stone ford’ on the shire boundary, the foundation of which probably represents an attempt to divert toll-paying traffic.[29]
There are two places along the Somerset/Dorset border which present an association with a medieval saint’s life, Halstock with St Juthwara and Perrott with St Indract. Both Lives include references to movement, to pilgrimage; that for Indract supplies the context for his martyrdom. Juthwara’s remains were translated to Sherborne c1050 by Bishop Aelfwold. Virtually nothing is known of her Life. Entertaining pilgrims she was beheaded by her brother and carried her head to the altar.[30] Her name later rendered as ‘Judith’ is probably of Brittonic origin but remains problematical; its present a British name element Iuth but ‘of the wrong gender’ and an OE second element –waru Latinised as –wara as in Cantwara ‘people of Kent.’ The name presents ‘immense possibilities for distortion through mis-hearing, mis-rendering and/or folk etymology’ comments Carole Biggam.[31] Considered in a border context however draws attention to OE waru ‘ware’ ‘merchandise’ already mentioned, and a rendering of OE idue ‘jew’, Halstock, halgan stoce ‘holy place’[32] was the site of a major Roman villa.[33] In 1086 it ‘slipped the record;’ there is no reference to this manor for either Somerset or Dorset. A Sherborne prebend, the bounds of the estate are recorded in a charter of 847.[34] A preosta lege, ‘priest’s lea’ and a dic ‘bank’ or ‘vallum’ mark the border with Somerset, a prominent manmade feature, today much eroded and overgrown. As noted above lengths of this border offer a panoramic view across Somerset. There is a reference to a lost Moryate ‘moor gate’ at Halstock[35] but no gate is mentioned in the charter bounds.
We are better informed on St Indract[36] although no one has yet made mention of the possible significance of the shire boundary in his martyrdom. Indract is a well-attested Irish name. His story is found in an anonymous passio of the early twelfth century, which claims to be a copy of an earlier exemplar, now lost. His cult was certainly a local one. William of Malmesbury notes that Indract’s relics were held at Glastonbury placed there by King Ine.
Returning from Rome, Indract resolved to visit Glastonbury with his 7 (or 9) companions. At the time the king was holding court at Pedret [writes John of Tynemouth[37], Pedred to the writer of passio] and his ministri dispersed in the surrounding villulae. Indract and his company were robbed and killed on the orders of King Ine’s evil henchman Huna.
[South] Petherton was a royal manor in 1086 and has been given as the site of Pedred.[38] But not before considered here are the manors of North and South Perrott which not only straddle the shire boundary but the Axe-Parrett watershed; this is a border of some antiquity. Ine is listed as one of the benefactors of Sherborne with the gift of land at iuxta Pedridun ‘next to’ ‘up against’ Pedridun which, as O’Donovan observes, could be either North or South Perrott.[39] In 1086 North Perrott was held by the Count of Mortain and South Perrott was ‘on lease’ from the Bishop.[40] Thus presented is an example of a ‘pairing’ of royal and ecclesiastical interests across a shire boundary which we find elsewhere.
On the ground the county boundary today is marked by a large and distinctive bank which follows a very manmade course running east-west across what is now a golf course and on into woodland where it is unmanaged and overgrown. And again presents a number of a large veteran coppice stools and pollards of Oak, Field Maple and Ash giving some indication as to its antiquity.
The anonymous passio gives the date of 689 for Indract’s martyrdom – one year into the reign of King Ine. Given that the Indract cult may ‘be attributed to the ingenuity of two hagiographers’[41] this was an ‘ingenuity’ which may have embraced knowledge of early shire ‘border controls’. One of the decisions taken at the Synod of Hertford in 672 was to direct attention against the practice of clergy, peregrini, wandering about without written permission from their bishop and which is duly cited by Bede. Lapidge notes that the writer of the passio seems to echo Bede in his introductory passages.[42] Indract and his company in making their journey followed the social conventions of one order only to fall foul of another newly imposed by the Ecclesia Romani and (re-)enforced by West Saxon rule. The story may not have been written down until the tenth century, but this is the time which witnessed the Glastonbury Uplyme charter of 938 and declaration of the werboldiston and waegn geat on the Dorset/Devon border. Murder on a contested border remains a current theme into the twenty-first.[43]
There is no reference to the waegn geat in the 1516 edition of the Uplyme charter[44] by which time dues were presumably only payable at the port itself. The origins and evolution of the Somerset/Dorset county boundary, as noted above, is a subject for further enquiry, for further field survey. The territorial pairing implicit in the Notes and Queries is of considerable antiquity, the course of the administrative boundary destined to be established between them is well worthy of attention.
[1] K. Barker, ‘The Early History of Sherborne’ in S.M. Pearce (ed.), The Early Church in Western Britain and Ireland, Studies presented to C.A. Ralegh-Radford, BAR British Series 102 (1982), 85-91; Fig 7.6. See also K. Barker, ‘The Sherborne Estate at Lyme’ in K. Barker, D. Hinton and A. Hunt (eds.), St Wulfsige and Sherborne: essays to celebrate the millennium of the Benedictine Abbey (2005), 199-205. ‘Hercology’ is the study of boundaries a word first coined by the author (Antiquity LVI, 1982, 214).
[2] K. Barker, ‘Usque Domnoniam: the setting of Aldhelm’s Carmen rythmicum’ in K. Barker with N. Brooks (eds), Aldhelm and Sherborne: essays to celebrate the founding of the bishopric (2010), 20.
[3] F.L. Attenborough [transl and ed), The laws of the earliest English Kings (Cambridge/Llanerch, 1922/2000), 39, 49.
[4] J. Campbell, The History of the English Shires (1993), 2.
[5] H.S.A. Fox, ‘The Boundary of Uplyme’ in The Devonshire Association Report and Transactions, vol.102 (1970), 35-47. See also K. Barker, ‘Lyme and the Devon-Dorset county boundary; where the questions began’, Proceedings of the Dorset Archaeological and Natural History Society, vol.129 (2008), 197-208; fig 4.
[6] See K. Barker, ‘Usque Domnoniam: Sherborne, Glastonbury and the Expansion of Wessex’ in Barker and Brooks, Aldhelm and Sherborne, 85, 94-95; Fig 2.9.
[7] D.S. Potter, The Roman Empire at Bay (2004), 47-8. See also W.T. Arnold, The Roman System of Provincial Administration (1879), 191-2, and I. Wood, The Merovingian Kingdoms (1994), 214-17.
[8] T. Pestell and K. Ulmscdhneider (eds), Markets in Early Medieval Europe, trading and productive sites, 650-850 (2003); A. Drouin, Les Marais Salants en Aunis & Saintonge juspu ‘en 1789, Société d’Histoire ed d’ Archaéolgie en Saintonge Maritime (1999). For Lyme see K. Barker, ‘Of salt and the coast at Lyme’, Proceedings of the Dorset Archaeological and Natural History Society, vol. 127 (2005), 49.
[9] G.S. Fry, ‘Boundaries of Dorset’, SDNQ, Vol. X, Pt. LXXXIV, June 1906, 86-87; R.L.C. Wood, ‘Dorset: the County’s Boundary’ (Dorset County Council, 1981), unpublished.
[10] With the transference from Somerset to Dorset of the parishes of Goathill, Poyntington, Sandford Orcas and Trent (Fry, ‘Boundaries of Dorset’, 86).
[11] I. Wood, Merovingian Kingdoms, 215.
[12] Domesday Book, Devon (1985), 2 vols, 16: 165, 166.
[13] Fry, ‘Boundaries of Dorset’, 86.
[14] J. Hutchins, The History and Antiquities of the County of Dorset (1774), vol 2, 299.
[15] K. Barker, ‘Sherborne in AD 998; the Benedictine Abbey and its Estate’ in Barker, Hinton and Hunt, St Wulfsige and Sherborne, 157, fig 16.
[16] S. Keynes, ‘King Aethelred’s charter for Sherborne Abbey, 998’ in Barker, Hinton and Hunt, St Wulfsige and Sherborne, 10, 12; Barker, ‘Sherborne in AD 998; the Benedictine Abbey and its Estate’, 151. The Bishop’s estate also included Holcombe Rogus [‘beacon’] on the Somerset-Devonshire border by 1086 held by the Devonshire sheriff. K. Barker, ‘Bishop Wulfsige’s lifetime: Viking campaigns recorded in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle for southern England,’ in ibid, 127 and Barker, ‘The Sherborne Estate at Lyme’, 202.
[17] As may be implied in Aldhelm’s Farus Editissima where it was the duty of the priestly flammiger to maintain the Light. See K. Barker, ‘Usque Domnoniam: Sherborne, Glastonbury and the expansion’ in Barker and Brooks, Aldhelm and Sherborne, 105-6; and ‘Usque Domnoniam: the setting’ in ibid, page 48, note 174. The responsibilities of the church in the maintenance of [coastal] beacons – not hitherto noticed it seems – may be implied in the founding of Trinity House by Henry VIII. With the Dissolution of the monasteries such services were no longer provided. See K. Barker and G. Le Pard, ‘St Aldhelm and the Chapel at Worth Matravers,’ Proceedings of the Dorset Archaeological and Natural History Society, vol. 126, 2004, 148-156.
[18] Barker, ‘Usque Domnoniam: Sherborne, Glastonbury and the Expansion’, 59-62; Fig 2.
[19] Barker, ‘Usque Domnoniam: Sherborne, Glastonbury and the Expansion’, 86; see also C.P. Lewis, ‘Welsh Territories and Welsh Identities in Late Anglo-Saxon England’ in N.J. Higham (ed), Britons in Anglo-Saxon England (2007), 130-43.
[20] See K. Barker, ‘Usque Domnoniam: Sherborne, Glastonbury and the Expansion’, 86, note 153. In Welsh, Somerset is ‘Summerlands’.
[21] M. Swanton (transl and ed), The Anglo-Saxon Chronicles (1996), 65.
[22] W. Gresswell, Dumnonia and The Valley of the Parrett. A Historical Retrospect (1922), 3.
[23] Swanton, The Anglo-Saxon Chronicles, 32.
[24] K. Barker, ‘Pen, Ilchester and Yeovil: a study in the landscape of south-east Somerset’, Somerset Procs., 130 (1986), 12-14; also K. Barker, ‘Usque Domnoniam: Sherborne, Glastonbury and the Expansion’ in Aldhelm and Sherborne, 60-65; Fig 2, Pl2.1.
[25] Barker, ‘Usque Domnoniam: Sherborne, Glastonbury and the Expansion’, 89-90.
[26] East of Sherborne, Gillingham presents the only –ingas name in Dorset; the Gillingas; ‘the homestead or village of Gylla’s people’, A.D. Mills, The Place-names of Dorset, pt. 3 (English Place-name Society, vol. LIX/LX), 9-10. The focus of a larger royal manor in 1086, Gillingham occupies a distinctive northward salient in the Dorset boundary, the north-western length bordering Somerset and the north-eastern bordering Wiltshire. It is clear from Aldhelm’s writing that there were fluent Latin speakers in seventh-century Wessex. Latin Gillo is a legacy hunter. Lewis and Short, A Latin Dictionary (1879).
[27] E. Ekwall, English river names (1928), 221-2.
[28] K. Barker, ‘The Dorset/Somerset county boundary at Yeovil: Roman Order from Imperial to Episcopal, Taxation and Landscape’, Proceedings of the Dorset Archaeological and Natural History Society, vol. 131 (2010), 219-236; for OE gafol. See pp.219-20. Ilchester the old Roman ‘gafol chester’ was destined to lose its Latin name. Bosworth and Toller, An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary (1898), 358, note a gafol-ford, a ‘tributary ford’ in Cornwall, now Camelford, the site of a battle between the Weala, ‘Welsh/British’ and the Defna, Devonians aet Gafolforda in 823. One of the principal tributaries of the Yeo is the River Cam, ‘a late back formation from camel’. See also Ekwall, English river names, 64.
[29] Barker, ‘The Dorset/Somerset County Boundary at Yeovil’, 228, fig 4. As Beresford noted ‘the borough is one of those that stand at the boundary of two counties, and the [control of the] ford crossing into Dorset may have more importance than the present lane would suggest’ see M. Beresford, New Towns of the Middle Ages, Town Plantation in England, Wales and Gascony (1967), 141, 485. B. Arnold, Princes and Territories in medieval Germany (1991), 178-9, notes the intense competition engendered by border tolls. ‘In order to tax the lucrative transport of salt… Duke Henry the Lion impiously knocked down the bishop of Freisinig’s bridge over the Isar at Oberfőhring in 1157 and diverted the road to a new bridge and toll station on land of his own.’ ‘This diversion proved so successful that the settlement at Munich quite rapidly grew into a town…’
[30] R. Love, ‘The Life of St Wulfsige of Sherborne by Goscelin of Saint-Berthin’ in Barker, Hinton and Hunt, St Wulfsige and Sherborne, 101-2, 104, 115-7. See also J. Fowler, Mediaeval Sherborne (1951), 208-10.
[31] Dr Carole Biggam, Dept of English Language, University of Glasgow, St Juthwara, unpublished note to the author; grateful acknowledgement for her assistance.
[32] A. Fagersten, The place-names of Dorset (1933), 223.
[33] B. Putnam, Roman Dorset (2007), 92-94. See also R.N. Lucas, ‘The Romano-British Villa at Halstock, Dorset, Excavations 1967-1985,’ Dorset Natural History and Archaeological Society Monograph Series, vol. 13 (1993).
[34] G.B. Grundy, ‘Saxon Charters of Dorset: Halstock’, Proceedings of the Dorset Archaeological and Natural History Society, vol. 58 (1936), 112-115. See also Barker ‘Sherborne in AD 998’, 149-50, 156.
[35] Fagersten, The place-names of Dorset, 223.
[36] M. Lapdige, ‘The Cult of St Indract at Glastonbury’ in Anglo-Latin Literature 900-1066 (1993), 419-52. See also Canon G.H. Doble, ‘Saint Indract and Saint Dominic’, Somerset Record Society, LVII (1942), 1-24; also SDNQ, XXIV, (1946), 126, and Rev. C. Platts, ‘The Martyrdom of St Indract’, SDNQ, XVII (1921-3), 18-23.
[37] G.H. Doble, The Saints of Cornwall, Part 6, The Saints of North Cornwall (1997), 28-9. On his return from Rome John on Tynemouth described Indract as landing at the port of Tamerunta where he built an oratory, and it was from there he set out for Glastonbury.
[38] Lapidge, ‘The Cult of St Indract at Glastonbury’, 423, 433; the Latin in the passio reads Pedred (ibid, 435, line 20).
[39] M.A. O’Donovan (ed), Charters of Sherborne, Anglo-Saxon Charters III (1988), xli, sliv.
[40] Domesday Book, Somerset (1980), 19:45, and Dorset (1983), 27:9. See also Barker, Barker, ‘Usque Domnoniam: Sherborne, Glastonbury and the Expansion’, 100, notes 208, 209.
[41] Lapidge, ‘The Cult of St Indract at Glastonbury’, 438.
[42] B. Colgrave and R.A.B. Mynors (ed and transl), Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of the English People (1969), iv 5; 351. Lapdige, in ‘The Cult of St Indract at Glastonbury’, 434, notes that the anonymous author of the passio begins his account with sentences which present verbal similarities to those used by Bede. There is as yet no means of knowing the origins and age of the boundary between North and South Perrott and when it may first have been formally marked out; many lengths of the shire boundary will surely have followed the course of already-existent boundaries. It has been suggested that, in furtherance of the fiscal, judicial – and military – aims of the West Saxon administration, there may have been a ‘directive’ by which the newly-established shire boundary could be recognised, see K. Barker, ‘Lyme Regis in in Dorset, Uplyme is in Devon: thoughts arising from the research seminar of October 2008’ in Proceedings of the Dorset Archaeological and Natural History Society, vol. 130 (2009), 224. Crouched inhumation burials found at North Perrott school (n Somerset) may be ‘considered as outliers of the Durotrigian form of burial’ notes Papworth, where disruption of occupation is evidenced under Roman occupation and where, as at Ham Hill and South Cadbury’ there is evidence of severe measures taken against the local people’ (M. Papworth, Deconstructing the Durotriges, A definition of Iron Age communities within the Dorset environs, BAR British Series 462 (2008), 84, 164-5, 183, 187). One of the results may have been the formal establishment by the Roman administration of the Axe-Parrett watershed tribal/regional boundary.
[43] The audience of the Indract story would have been familiar with the association between boundaries and places of execution. See Andrew Reynolds, Later Anglo-Saxon England, life and landscape (1999), 79, 109.
[44] Fox, ‘The Boundary of Uplyme’, 39, 45.
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