Ledene a Saxon Estate

Ledene a Saxon Estate YLn Investigation of the Leacfon o/a[e ancf tfte !forest of f})ean Jt[an Sfie[[ey Highleadon History Series Volume 6 Preface Harold Godwinson is King Edward the Atheling1 defended his home, land and people, until suddenly came death and bitter, and took the dear one, the atheling from the earth; the angels accompanied him, his soul strong in truth, into the sky's light. The wise one therefore committed the kingdom to one high in rank, Harold himself, noble earl, who at all times faithfully obeyed his lord in words and deeds, holding back nothing 2 at the need of the king of the people • The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle This is the sixth volume in a series of information about the history of Highleadon 3 and its surrounds • It forms a part of a progressive research. This information was gathered during September 2004 © Alan Shelley BA DLA FSTD FRSA, Wycken End Cheltenham, Sept. 2004 1 Edward the Confessor son of Ethelred (Atheling, meaning birthright to the throne) 2 See table of the 'English' kings at the rear of this composition. 3 It is worthy of note that when Edward had set up his court in 1051 at Kingsholm, Gloucestershire had become an area of great desire to Godwin, and Harold in particular, as they collected more land and greater powers over the dominiom. Contents Chapter Page i. Introduction i. 1. Ledene (background, argument & debate) 1. 2. Summary 4. 3. Investigation of Ledene an Anglo-Saxon estate 5. APPENDICES 4. Anglo-Saxon Gloucestershire 10. 5. NOTES 12. 6. Conclusion 13. ILLUSTRATIONS i. Upleadon 14. ii. The Church at Upleadon 15. iii. 'Middleton', Upleadon 16. iv. Relics at Highleadon 17. MAP1. 'The Forest' at Domesday 18. MAP II. Dean Forest, 1228 and 1282 19. TABLE Kings of Wessex and England, before 1066 20. POSTSCRIPTS 1P. The Norman Conquest 21. 2P. The Influence of Danish & Norman Dominion 31. 3P. William Fitz-Norman's Castle at Taynton 33. MAPA The Village of Taynton 35. MAPB. The Old Village and Castle Grounds 36. MAP C. Taynton Tithe Map of 1840 37. Introduction This pamphlet is a compilation of notes intending to explore the origins of the rustic hamlet named Highleadon and to discover its relationship with the Leadon Vale. The investigation has also led me to consider the possibility that the name Ledene may have influenced the title of the 'Forest' that was later officially named the 'Forest of Dean'. The Anglo-Saxons did much to shape our present English landscape. Roman roads and ancient trackways provided the rudiments of the infrastructure adopted, and developed upon, by the Saxons. Our language has been developed from Anglo-Saxon origins. The majority of our towns and villages were originated and named during that period. Unfortunately, only very few written documents survive to describe the Leadon Vale, of those times. However, the Saxons employed a simple method of naming places, that provide us with a lasting descriptive meaning. Macro-etymology* of place names allows us to look back at the original meaning of these names. A title given to a settlement or estate would often represent features of its location. An example is with names ending in 'ton', these are mostly based on the Saxon word tun meaning farmstead. Often the prefix is representative of the founding owner or leader. Sometimes the name concludes with ... ing and this gives meaning to 'the people of' (a place or leader) e.g. Reading. Names ending ... ington would refer to the 'tun of the people of ... '. The word 'dene' is accepted as an old English word for valley. It is descended from denu, the Anglo-Saxon word for dene or dean. Where the word 'dean' is applied to the Church, it has a different origin. Derived from the Latin decanus meaning a 'monk set over ten other monks'. Dean has been applied, in modern times, to 'Deaneries' of anywhere from six to sixty parishes as an administrative overhead. Finally the word should not be confused with the origins of 'don' which was given to refer to a hill fort. It is true to say that little importance was given, by the Saxons, to forested areas. They were more inclined to live outside, or to remove most of the woodland and adapt the land for agriculture. The Saxon population of the Leadon Vale, never highly populated, would have become considerably reduced by famine, prevalent in the early eleventh century, and by the results of bitter dynastic competition. As little recorded information exists of the area, for the period before Domesday, some opinions/ conclusions may rely upon conjecture. In 1066, following the death of King Edward and the dynastic battles at Fulford Gate, Stamford Bridge and finally at Hastings resulted in the Norman Conquest and a change of government over England that had a direct affect upon the people of the Severn Vale. Thegns of the Severn and the Leadon Vales would have by Saxon tradition have joined their Earls, Edwin of Mercia and his brother Morcar at Fulford Gate where large numbers were destroyed. Most of their lands were eventually confiscated by the Normans, including those of the Leadon Vale. The outcome, undoubtedly, forced immediate changes, if not the complete destruction, of their Saxon estates. After the Conquest, the agricultural lands of the Leadon Vale were granted, in the main, to the monastery at Gloucester and remained 'church property' for more than four-hundred years. When the lands were distributed, following the Dissolution in 1541, the manors and estates took on a new independence that may have hidden, or modified our suppositions with regard to an earlier history of the Leadon Vale. Concentration, during the Middle Ages, was directed upon the new town of Newent, that dominates the Vale today. *Breakdown of word formation (an account of sense-development). 1 Ledene About five and a half miles north-west of Gloucester are the rural communities of Upleadon and Highleadon. They are in the valley of the river Leadon and from which they have been widely assumed to have gained their titles. Such assumptions would be wrong! Today, Upleadon is a broadly scattered village and the adjacent Highleadon is a small hamlet attributed to the parish of Rudford. In Saxon times, there existed an estate known as Ledene, which included these settlements. By the time of the Domesday survey, some eighteen years after the Norman Conquest, the old estate had been broken up and mostly transferred to the property of the monastery of St Peter's at Gloucester. It will be the purpose of this dissertation to bring to life the origins of the manor, and its wider estate, in Saxon times. This also leads one to speculate over its possible importance and influence on the surrounding area. As very little is known of the occupants and their administration during the Saxon period, much may be conjecture, based upon subsequent historical facts, references and potential connections. Before examining the evidence, it will be necessary to remind ourselves of the period, its historical background and the landscape of those early times. The nearby city of Gloucester had been established by the Romans and was among the four principal (and garrison) towns of England. The immediate locality was inhabited by the Celtic British tribe of the Dobunni. These were people who had developed, initially from the red haired tribes of Swiss and German origins and later intermixed with the Belgic invaders during the first century BC. It was a loosely unified kingdom (ruled by the Romans) stretching from northern Somerset to the southern half of Worcestershire and including the whole of Gloucestershire east of the Severn. To the west of the Severn was forest, all the way up to Hereford. The woodland was steadily denser toward the area now the heart of the Forest of Dean. A tribe of British Celts known as the Silures, who were hardy hill-men, had settled into Wales and parts of the Forest. It is important to remember that the forest had no specific title until several centuries later. The Silures were of a hostile nature, [unlike the Dobunni] they fought the Romans and were not inclined towards domestic harmony. Iron being mined from the Forest, formed an important part of the local economy and paid the taxes for the city of Gloucester. The Forest was generally an inhospitable place and also harboured fugitives, small bands of immigrants and outlaws. The Silures were eventually quelled when Caradoc, their leader was defeated in a skirmish in AD 50. A few wealthy Romans cleared areas of the forest and established villa estates. During the Roman period, Christianity was established in England and became largely understood by the majority. Following the end of the Roman civilisation in around 450 AD, the villas and towns fell into decay. A steady influx of Saxons had been arriving and moving across the country. They came from Angeln, Denmark, Jutland, northern Germany and Fresia. The Romans had dubbed them all with the title of Saxon. They were of a common ancestry and strongly influenced the eventual culture of Britain. The current thinking of historians is that they were less an invading force and more of an immigrating people that assimilated with the indigenous British who by intermarriage and association became, in time, a Saxon society. It seems that Saxon leaders commanded strengths that opposed typical British tribal resentments. In 577, a force of West Saxons killed three British kings in a battle at Dyrham and formally took over the control of Gloucester, Cirencester and Bath. The region then became a part of 1 the Kingdom of Mercia and the locality was peopled by a Saxon dominated tribe called the Hwicce.

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