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by Andy Horton Prehistoric
(Page started in 2000 and amended later)
At
the start of the Cretaceous Period, the sea level was 25 metres above now
and by the mid-Cretaceous the seas were 200 metres above now with no polar
ice caps. The Tethys Ocean separated Laurasia (north) from Gondwanland
(south). The Santonian Age from which the fossil below dates was about
87.5 million years ago.
Ocean
Temperature Notes
The
fossil content of the chalk
of NW Europe, particularly the abundance and diversity of the planktonic
foraminifer and coccoliths indicates tropical water temperatures of 20
°C
or more. This has been confirmed by oxygen isotope analysis.
Fossil
bivalve Spondylus spinosa (pic).
Fossil Sea Urchin Echinocorys scutatus from
Shoreham beachTimeline
(BBC)
http://www.bbc.co.uk/education/ancestors/chronology.shtml
Flint
Axe head (from the Marlipins Museum) |
2000 BC
Beaker style pottery from a grave in Ravensbourne Avenue (near Buckingham Park, south-west of Slonk Hill, Shoreham (discovered 1958), one mile due south of Mossy Bottom on the downs. (Marlipins Museum exhibit) |
 |
A bronzed flanged axe (Marlipins Museum exhibit) from Buckingham Bottom |
 |
A bowl discovered at Southwick
Roman Villa. It was reconstructed from broken pieces.
(Marlipins
Museum exhibit)
|
A
Cockerel
Plate Brooch from Slonk
Hill Shoreham is dated to the 2nd century AD but found in the debris
from the third. (Estimated length: 50 mm.)
Anglo-Saxon
Society (Ða Engliscan Gesiþas)
Also:
Anglo-Saxon History: A Select Bibliography, by Simon Keynes (updated to 1998).
The Ruin and Conquest of Britain 400 A.D. - 600 A.D.
ASSESSING THE ANGLO-SAXON INVASIONS OF THE FIFTH CENTURY
ANSAXNET is a SIG (Special Interest Group) for scholars of the culture and history of England before 1100 C.E.
ANSAXDAT
http://www.mun.ca/Ansaxdat/
Old
English Pages
http://www.georgetown.edu/cball/oe/oe-orgs.html
Anglo-Saxons
(BBC)
http://www.bbc.co.uk/education/ancestors/saxons.shtml
Question:
where did the Suð Seaxe, South Saxons come from ?
This
is unclear. It is difficult to separate Saxons from Romano-Britons, so
separating Angles & Jutes (from modern day Denmark, that settled in
East Anglia etc.) from the Saxons from the Weser-Elbe area, now known as
Niedersaschen in Germany (south of the Frisian Islands, cities of Bremen
and Hanover) from the Franks (no positive record*
of settlement in Sussex of these Germanic tribes living in Gaul) is not
certain. The culture and language of the South Saxons were similar to the
Old Saxony, hence the name Saxons, although Germanic tribes is perhaps
a better term. (This general description excludes the settlers of the area
near Hastings in East Sussex.) (* Evidence
of a Frankish brooch has been found north of Shoreham.)
Link
to OE Glyphs (Icelandic Characters etc.)
German archaeologists refuse to label any cultural complex in northern Germany as "Saxon". There were so many different tribes in this area during the Migration Period that they refer to these artefacts as belonging to a "Mixed Group" instead. Where a British archaeologist rubber-stamps an object as 'Saxon', a German archaeologist might see influences belonging to the Chauci, Suebi, or Frisian tribes.
There
were basically two types of Anglian settlers: those that came directly
from their Anglian homes in Denmark and those that travelled first to the
Elbe-Weser area to combine with other tribes such as the Frisian, Chauci,
and Suebi. They were the hybrid people that have been rubber-stamped as
'Saxon'!
Myth
of Saxon England
Comment: not really a myth, but a misleading term or a generic name for different tribes assigned by outsiders. (AH)
5th Century
A Saxon settlement atBotolphs
on the river Adur north of Shoreham dates from the mid-5th to the mid-6th
century AD. Antler pottery dies and evidence of sunken huts were discovered.
Pagan cemeteries discovered dating from the 5th century are recorded on
both sides of the Adur. (Ref: Historical
Atlas of Sussex).
6th century
This is the probably
the century of the beginning of most of the settlements ending in 'ing'
between the Adur and the Arun.
Hay
and fodder collected or harvested for domestic livestock around this time.
Notes
7th century
607
The West Saxons under Ceowulf attacked the South Saxons (AS Chronicle).
The barrow burial site
at Old Erringham is dated to this century. A solitary copper alloy ansated
brooch, Frankish ? (parallel types from the Netherlands) unlike others
found in Sussex, from Old Erringham is dated from the 8th century.
Sussex
Brooches
c. 680
In the 680s St. Wilfrid,
(exiled Bishop of York) expelled from Northumbria, spent several years
converting the South Saxons (Sussex) to Christianity (this was the last
Saxon area to be converted). At that time the South Saxon ruler was Æthelwalh
(from Encyclopaedia Britannica) who ensured the Bishop's protection. A
legendary Saxon Saint called Cuthman visited the Adur Valley spreading
the word of Christianity (Cheal: History
of Shoreham). Churches
were built about this time, or two or three centuries later (see St.
Nicolas Church).
(Until the conversion
to Christianity of Ethelbert of Kent by St Augustine (597) the Anglo-Saxons
had been heathen.)
"Sussex
has resisted attack by the other [Anglo-Saxon] kingdoms owing to the many
hills and thickness of the woods." (Bishop Wilfred).
c.700
Ine's
code, preserved as an appendix to Alfred's laws, deals mainly with judicial
procedures, listing the punishments to be inflicted for various offences.
His laws show that people of British origin had been incorporated into
the West Saxon social system.
Original
Ine's Laws in OE English
(Ine
succeeded to the Wessex throne upon the retirement of King Caedwalla,
and in 694 he forced the men of Kent to pay compensation for slaying Caedwalla's
brother Mul. In 710 Nunna, the king of the South
Saxons, or Sussex, lent Ine aid against the Cornish Britons, but in 722
and 725 Ine took up arms against the South Saxons, who were harbouring
a rival claimant to his throne.)
8th Century
c. 750
Loom
weight from the Weaving Hut, on display in the Marlipins
Museum9th
Century
891
Sussex
(as South Saxons) first mentioned as a place in the historic records
from the record for AD 449 in the AS Chronicle. The AS Chronicle
was written at a later date, 890 et seq. The local people would not refer
to themselves as Saxons and this label was put on them by others, Romans,
Bede etc. Notes
The enquiry question is when did Sussex as a name become a political entity?
Suth
Seaxe (late 9th century) Sudsexe (1086) from Mills, English Place
Names.
Late
9th
The
fyrd
system of recruiting the army was in operation under Alfred the Great,
who reigned as King of England from 877 to 899.
c.
919 A
document
called the Burghal
Hidage gave a list of the Wessex fortified burghs on the south coast
and Thames valley. This presumably consolidated the Wessex conquest and
protected the local inhabitants form attacks by Danes and Vikings. From
the Adur Valley the burghs (forts) at Burpham (Arun) and Lewes (Ouse) were
equidistant, but it appears that the Lewes fortification was the greater
of the two. The location of the other fort called Eorpeburnan has
not been identified (the most likely location is near Bodiam on the border
with Kent and River Rother which enters the sea at Winchelsea).
c. 1020 Julius Work Calendar
In the 11th century the
Norman's established Shoreham as an important haven. The church of St.
Mary de Haura is dated at AD 1103. (NB:
the suffix "de haura" is an old name. The exact date that suffix was first
recorded is 1103.)
Message
about the first inclusion of 'de Haura"
In a document of 1103 Philip de Braose, 2nd Lord of the Rape of Bramber, confirmed a gift made by his father in 1075 to the monks of St. Florence, Saumur. In the original gift St. Mary's is not listed, but in the latter document it is mentioned, indicating that construction had begun around the start of the 12th century.
The original building comprised the present tower (though only up to the first storey, the upper part being a later addition), a nave consisting of five bays (entirely ruined, save for the bay nearest the tower), transepts (which had apsidal chapels to the east), and an apsidal choir (taken down and later replaced).
Architecture of St. Mary de Haura
Churches
of Old & New Shoreham (Victorian History Online)
1066
Norman invasion of England. Shoreham (Soreham) in Domesday Book, 1086.
Sorham 1073. Soraham 1075. Toponymy.
Shoreham is in the Rape
of Bramber, where a Castle is built, including a construction of knapped
flint. The remains are 23 metres (76 ft) high. The Normans introduced a
comprehensive extension to the English language, but the basic Anglo-Saxon
concepts remained. The Normans introduced the feudal system tying the peasants
to the land. William de
Braose was the local Baron that commissioned the church of St.
Mary' Church at New Shoreham (first recorded in the historical record
c.1103).
1086 Domesday
Book.
The
Domesday book was commissioned in December 1085 by William the Conqueror,
who invaded England in 1066. The first draft was completed in August 1086
and contained records for 13,418 settlements in the English counties south
of the rivers Ribble and Tees (the border with Scotland at the time).
Shoreham
was in the Rape of
Brembre (Bramber), in the Hundred
of Fiskergate (Fishersgate).
NB:
The system was based on pre-Norman, Old English, administrative units,
called rapes, hundreds, shires etc.
Sudsexe.
(? I am not sure that the absence of the -shire suffix is important or
not ?).
In the time of Edward the Confessor " Soresham was assessed for 12 hides," but when the survey was made, "for five hides and half a virgate." There was land for 15 ploughs. On the demesne were three ploughs and 26 villeins and 49 bordars (cottagers) with 12 ploughs. There was a church, six acres of meadow, and woodland yielding (support for) 40 swine. In the time of King Edward the manor was worth 25 pounds, and afterwards 16 pounds. At the time the survey was made the value was stated to be 35 pounds, " and yet," says Domesday Book, " it was (formerly) farmed for 50 pounds, but that could not be borne."
"
William (de Braose) himself holds Soresham "
(Cheal
p 35, p. 50).
The Normans introducing "coppicing" of trees e.g. Hazel.
Medieval History: de Braose (by Lynda Denyer)
Important Quote from
the above pages:
William
de Braose sailed to England with William the Conqueror in 1066 (2.1) His
home was Briouze in Normandy, near Falaise where the Conqueror was born.
The de Braose family origins are unknown, except for the name of William's
mother Gunnor. (2.2)
King William distributed manors across the country to his companions but he chose his best warriors from the Norman nobility to defend the coast of Sussex. Trade and travel between Sussex and Normandy was a lifeline for the new conquerors.
Sussex was divided into five (later six) rapes. The king created a lordship for each rape, possessing all its manors, and the lord built or strengthened a major castle and a port. Trade with Normandy soon flourished, free from interference by English rebels or invaders such as the French or the Danes.
William de Braose became lord of the Rape of Bramber and held over two hundred manors elsewhere. His rape was carved out of the lands of his two Norman neighbours, William de Warenne and Roger de Montgomery. The de Braose rape straddled the River Adur, rectifying the Conqueror's early defensive error in creating a boundary at a vulnerable river estuary.
William de Braose began building Bramber castle, near Steyning, before 1073 to dominate the fertile Adur river valley and its estuary. At first the castle would have been a ditch and a wooden enclosure with a high defensive mound inside. Stone castles were only started after local resistance was under firm control.
A medieval cresset was discovered in Shoreham High Street (near Woolworth's) in 1968 dating from the 11th to 13th century. A cresset is a medieval lamp, this one had 4 bowls which would contain oil and wicks. A Santionage jug was also discovered.
The fortifications at Old Erringham were strengthened with a ringwork-style defences, probably in the 12th century.
There is documentary evidence of a castl in Shoreham.
11th
century
The
evaluation archaeological dig on Ropetackle, Shoreham, by Archaeology Sussex
in October 2000,
revealed pottery shards dating back to the 11th/12th century
(Talk
by Simon Stevens to the
Shoreham Society on 20 September 2002).
1103
In the 11th century
the Norman's established Shoreham as an important haven. The church of
St.
Mary de Haura is dated at AD 1103. (NB:
the suffix "de haura" is an old name. The exact date that suffix was first
recorded is 1103.)
Message
about the first inclusion of 'de Haura"
1170
TheKnight's
Templar had a chapel in Shoreham. (This
subject has not been researched.)
Manors
of Shoreham
1187 King
Henry II's household embarked at Shoreham for Dieppe.
1199 King John
landed at Shoreham with an army and marched to London to be crowned. He
succeeded Richard I.
1205 For three
years, five Royal Galleys were stationed at Shoreham, making it as important
as any Port in England.
(In the previous year
the French had gained Normandy from the rule of King John).
1208 A Market
is recorded in New Shoreham in competition to the market at Steyning.
Market
Towns in SE England (link)
Abridged
Information
1209 A Charter of King John mentions a ferry at Shoreham. It was also mentioned in a Court case of 1249, and again in papers of 1263. In 1302 this ferry is identified from New Shoreham to Lancing and again identified as a passagium in 1316 and a ferry in 1327 and 1332.
1210 The
outlawed William de Braose escaped to France
through the port of Shoreham. Ref.
1211
King John acquired the lands of William de Braose (d 1211) at Bramber
for himself.
1225
St.
Mary's Church is completed in its finest glory. Before the nave fell
down the total external length of the church was 205 feet (62 metres)*.
Now it is less than half this length. The current nave, originally the
chancel, was added with the Norman Buttresses in the 12th century.
The tower and the small spire would also make the church considerably higher
than today, certainly over 100 feet (30+ metres).
Churches
of Shoreham (Victorian County History)
Noo-Noo is a green-glazed ceramic aquamanile (discovered on the archaeological dig at Ropetackle in March 2003) in the stylised shape of a ram, probably manufactured in the Scarborough area in the C 13th/14th.
Only
two such complete examples are known from Sussex (from Seaford and Lewes
: both found in the C 19th).
International
discoveries of complete ceramic ones, which are delicate and therefore
rare.
Picture and information by Simon Stevens (Archaeology South-East)
1232 John de Braose, Lord of Bramber, Gower and Tetbury fell from his horse at Bramber and died.
1254 The
County Court was held alternately at Lewes and Shoreham until this date,
when the sheriff ordered this practice to stop and the Court to be held
at Chichester.
(The
Statute of Pleading in 1362 required that Court proceedings be conducted
in English, though "enrolled in Latin")
1262 Simon
de Montford, Earl of Leicester, in dispute with King Henry III, sails from
Shoreham to France. (In 1264 Simon de Montfort led an army that defeated
the King Henry III at Lewes in East Sussex.)
A small bronze shield
identified as the arms of John Giffard who fought for Simon de Montford
was discovered in the Adur Valley. (Evening Argus
Report 6/10/99).
1282
Custom
duties were collected (cocketted), and evaded, at this time for duty to
the King Edward I. The merchandise was sealed with the cocket
of "de Sorham" (Cheal
p.99-100). Duties were collected on wool and hides. The 14th century
wool smugglers became known as "owlers".
12th century
Introduced Fallow Deer
recorded at Bramber Castle. Ref.
1295 Shoreham was
made a Borough.
(Borough:
incorporated town with special privileges or a district entitled to elect
a member of Parliament. The medieval English borough was an urban centre
identified by a charter granting privileges, autonomy.)
1295:
Richard de Beauchamp and Thomas Pontoyse are the first Members of
Parliament (until 1885) for New
Schoreham.
In 1296, 90 taxpayers resided in the town. New Schoreham was also known as Hulkesmouth after the ships known as HULCS that were the main trading vessels in European seas during Medieval times. Salt, beans, corn, wool and woollen goods are likely to have been important exports at this time. With the British population and agriculture expanding, Shoreham enjoyed prosperous times.
13th Century
Borough Seal of New Shoreham
The writing includes the name Hulkesmouth.
The pattern design depicts a stylist representation of a hulc.
1305 King Edward I and Queen Margaret visited Shoreham.
(1306: harsh winter, 1315-1318 Famine occurred in Europe. Source.) (1318: Earthquake in England)
1316-22 Sir John de Mowbray founded a Carmelite Priory* in New Shoreham (see Cheal and 1348). (*Important in the medieval commercial world.)
1323
A
person called Lamb was a prominent wool merchant in Shoreham.
1327 Nails and
horseshoes exported from Shoreham, indicating the iron-working industry
was in operation in the forests of Sussex (Roughey, near Horsham).
The Hospital of St.
Katherine of Shoreham is known from this date.
1346 The
deeds show the Marlipins building (now a Museum)
sold by Stephen Must. It is described as a stone corner tenement called
'Malduppine' situated in the Otmarcat .....
The
initial estimate of the date of the building is estimated to be the late13th/early
14th century for most of the building. It status as the oldest secular
building in Britain is based not on its oldest component part but the the
oldest complete building still in its original form.
1347 Shoreham supplied 26 ships of war and 329 men for the siege of Calais during the reign of Edward III. In 1342, Shoreham provided 21 ships out of the total fleet numbering 347 vessels in the war with the French.
1348
A Carmelite Priory in Shoreham was in danger of being washed away by the
sea. (See 1493)
1350
Reconstructed
map, circa AD 1350. (Link to)
(During
the second half of the 14th century (from the winter of 1348-49),
a third of the population of Britain was killed by the Black Death or "plague?",
with port towns suffering as bad or worse than any place. I have not located
any records for Shoreham, but it is expected that the town suffered many
deaths, and a resultant downturn in the economy of the town. St. Botolphs
(a port) and Coombes on the west side of the River Adur north of Shoreham
suffered and their decline has never been rectified.
(Historical
note: 1381 Peasants Revolt, and the beginning of the end of Feudalism.)
During
the 14th century there are records of piracy off Shoreham, by both the
French and the English.
(Henry
Cheal: Story of Shoreham, pages 124 - 129).
1359 Sea walls at Pende (lost settlement next to the Shoreham) commissioned for repair. They may have been destroyed in an attack by the French. Ety: pynd. (2)
1400
Shoreham
is required by Henry IV to build one balinger (a ship) to protect against
privateers and piracy (from the French).
1404 Shoreham
suffered encroachment by the sea. The shipbuilding centre of La Pende disappeared
from the records during this century.
(Pende is mentioned
as a harbour from 1250 to 1539 only, and in 1566 as a landing stage. Its
location is not known. In 1587, a lagoon at Lancing was called Penhowse.
This is unlikely to have been the present Widewater
Lagoon.)
1421 Another date
I have for flooding by the sea (from P. Brandon in "Sussex Downs")
1426 The
last de Braose died (Bramber lands).
1477 Silting was preventing navigation under Bramber Bridge.
(1450
Historical note: Jack Cade's Kentish rebellion including thousands of peasants
from East Sussex in an uprising against Henry VI.
1485.
The Tudors come to power.)
1489
Procession
Street is described on the south of the Malapynnys.
(The Malapynnys is described as a cellar with a chamber or loft above it
in New Shoram and sold to a merchant of Suthampton.)
1493
Carmelite
Priory becomes uninhabitable because of the inroads from the sea. (see
1348)
The Friars move to Sele near Bramber.
1541 Erringham Farm (north of Shoreham) is a mixed arable and sheep farm.
1545 The French attack Hove, Aldrington and Shoreham.
1571 Ship building recorded in the town after a quiet period.
1584-5 Waghenaer's
(Dutch: the first detailed atlas of charts of the coastlines of Western
Europe.) chart "Spieghel der Zeevaerdt" of the English Channel shows
Shoram,
Brighthelmstone,
Tarring.
1592, later chart
shows Shorehing, Bramber, Staning, Bramber, Terring, Lewes. (The
longshore drift is not shown and the Adur estuary emerges almost straight
into the sea. cf. 1595 John Norden's map of Sussex shows the longshore
drift.)
1594 Another
chart by N. Lambert (a Catholic) commissioned by Philip II of Spain (not
seen yet).
1586 The greatest part of New Shoreham is ruined and under water.
(Although the residents of Shoreham did not know at the time
