Anglo-Saxon Romsey and the Lower Test Valley
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North Baddesley
by Jane Powell
Geology & Geography –
The bedrock geology of the parish is Earnley Sand Formation and Wittering Formation dating to approximately 41-56 million years ago in the Palaeogene period indicative that the local environment was previously covered by shallow seas.
Small superficial deposits of river terrace and alluvium are also present. As a result, the soil varies between sand, silt, clay, and gravel.
The soil seems to have been poor for the cultivation of crops. John Marsh, Rector of North Baddesley, states in his 1808 memoranda of the parish that until recent times there was hardly any corn grown as the land was exceedingly springy but now draining was generally practised by the farmers, either by digging trenches and filling them with stones and heath to act as a drain, or, more often by chalking.
Old maps show large areas of heath and woodland and there are many boggy areas with Emer bog (on the 1588 Hursley map this is called Enmore) lying to the north-west of the parish.
Pre-1900 the dispersed settlement was situated north of what is now the main Botley Road which runs east to west, bisecting the village. South of Botley Road was one large expanse of common. (Now the reverse is the case with the southern portion being the main area of settlement).
Most of the larger farms, the church, manor house, and small cottages were strung out on the northern ridge along Flexford Road with the exceptions of Knightwood farm and Zions Hill farm situated to the east.
Cottages were dotted along Nutburn Road which leads south from Flexford Road to Botley Road and in the opposite direction there was fairly sparse occupation along Pound Lane towards Ampfield as far as Bucket Corner. Pound Lane is generally said to be a drove road that is thought to be “ancient”.
Archaeology
In 2002 a desk-based archaeological survey was undertaken before the construction of the housing estate built on the Borden Chemicals factory site in Rownhams Road. This concluded that there was unlikely to be did anything of significance on the site.
On the eastern edge of the village the extension of the Valley Park housing estate onto land belonging to Knightwood Farm and Zions Hill Farm produced archaeology surveys, and currently, repeated attempts by the developers to build on the Great Covert (Castle Lane) area of woodland has generated a number of reports.
The finds discovered in the above-mentioned areas cover the periods from the Mesolithic through to post-Mediaeval, however, nothing has been found from the early mediaeval/Saxon period.
In Zions Hill copse an Iron Age settlement of approximately 70 metres in diameter was found. Robert Garnham of Hampshire Field Club has written a paper (arch43b.html) suggesting that, because the Iron Age enclosure was built in a low lying wet area, it may have been exploiting a particular geological feature. As he explains, the land in this area is riddled with streams. As a result he doubts whether they could have supported themselves with conventional farming and no evidence was found for industrial activity. He notes there are three lines of hills which shed rain-water run-off into a basin which would have provided an excellent environment as a source of fish and wildfowl.
In the surrounding area a Bronze Age small cremation cemetery was found, in addition to round barrows and possible bowl barrows. There was also a large quantity of pottery from the early Roman period although a scarcity of other features at the find spot indicates that this was not the location of the centre of the site.
An earthwork survey undertaken in the Knight Wood area details various boundary earthworks, lynchets, and drains but the report states that none of the features were dateable. The one exception was a large ditch and bank which was very tentatively dated to the Saxon period on the basis that earthworks of a similar scale found in the Meon Valley are thought to be Saxon.
On the western edge of the village there is a feature noted on maps as a ‘double bank’ which extends eastwards for some distance across Baddesley Common but it is now difficult to detect on the ground. It has been tentatively suggested that this is possibly a continuation of the ‘Bishops Bank’ – a boundary point referred to in the Saxon boundary charter for Romsey dated 970AD.
Six Inch OS map 1872 Sheet LII from National Library of Scotland
Saxon Boundary Charters
Although Baddesley has no Saxon boundary charter it may be possible to make a guess at a boundary by using the charters for the adjacent parishes; Romsey to the west, Ampfield and Chilcomb to the north, Nursling to the south, and North Stoneham to the south-east.
As an example, following my scrutiny of the 1826 Chamberlayne Estate Map, an identification of two points of the North Stoneham charter seem particularly convincing:
Oth hit cymth to grenan leage = until it comes to the Kitebrook Spring
And swa andlange broces = and so along the brook
Oth hit cymth t[o] Ipping-pame = until it comes to the farm of the Ippings
At the potential location of ‘Kitebrook’ the 1826 estate map has a wood named as ‘Kites Oak Copse’, from this flows a stream/brook along to the next point of the charter ‘the farm of the Ippings’ which is named on the 1826 estate map as ‘Epingham Corner’.
It is to be noted that the old parish of North Baddesley included Rownhams until 1897 when it became a separate civil parish although Rownhams original attachment to Baddesley seems likely to have happened post-Conquest.
Examination of the Nursling boundary charter (877AD) and the Romsey boundary charter (970AD) descriptions point to the likelihood that pre-Conquest Rownhams fell within Nursling.
Map showing the boundary of North Baddesley and Rownhams before 1897 on a background of the modern
Open Street Map
Domesday
In the Domesday Book Baddesley is named as ‘Bedeslei’ - thought to derive from the Old English Baeddes leah meaning Baeddi’s Wood referring to a settlement in an area of cleared woodland.
The Phillimore Domesday entry (29.7) reads: Here Ralph de Mortimer holds Baddesley (Bedeslei). Chipping held it from the King. Then and now it answered for 2 hides. There are 4 ploughlands (carructae). There are four villeins and seven bordars (smallholders) with 2 ploughlands and 7 slaves. Here there is a church and woods for 10 pigs and herbage worth 10 shillings (solidi).
Its value in the time of King Edward was £10 (libras) afterwards 100 shillings (£5), now 60 shillings (£3). Taxable value 2 geld units.
It is a plausible assumption that the Domesday church was situated on, or close to, the site of the present day church of St John the Baptist in Flexford Road.
St John's Church, North Baddesley
(Photo: Jane Powell)
Chipping, the pre-Conquest land-holder of Baddesley, has been identified as ‘Cypping of Worthy’ (Headbourne Worthy). His name appears as Cheping, Cypping, Chipping, and Cupping and the PASE (Prosopography of Anglo-Saxon England) database https://pase.ac.uk/considers that the scarcity of the occurrence of the name puts it in the rare names category.
Chipping was extremely wealthy with approximately 20 estates in Hampshire valued at £128. His Hampshire properties ranged in extent from the coast to Winchester plus several estates across the north of the shire, including Silchester. This was an area where members of the court had estates, a possible indication that Chipping was from a high status family.
Post-Conquest, most of Chipping’s estates were granted to Ralph de Mortimer.
It has been debated whether Chipping survived after 1066. The Domesday Book lists two land-holdings for Chipping so, if it is the same person, he did survive but at a much reduced status. One of his holdings is 2 hides in Preston Candover which he held from the King. Interestingly, Ralph de Mortimer also has 4½ hides in Preston Candover that had previously been held by Chipping.
His second land-holding is in Chilcomb and he has land for one plough. The estate of Chilcomb was held by Bishop Walkelin and used for supplying the monks of Winchester.
The Saxon tombstone at Stratfield Mortimer Church
Photos from Rupert Willoughby's website - RupertWilloughbyco.uk
At Stratfield Mortimer church there is a large Saxon tombstone, dated to the 11th century, which was found in two pieces under the tower of the old church when it was pulled down in 1866. It is 6 ft. 6 in. in length by 20 in. wide at the top and 14 in. at the bottom. Around the perimeter of the stone is an inscription that reads:
On the eighth day before the Kalends of October (24 September) Ægelward son of Kypping was buried
in this grave. Blessed be the man who prays for his soul. + Toki wrote me.
(The names Ægelwardus and Kyppingus represent the Old English masculine personal names Æthelweard and Cypping; Toki is a masculine personal name of Old Norse origin).
The name Chipping also appears in Winton Domesday.
By the late 11th century the Mortimer family had been given the task of controlling the Welsh Marches and they established a base at Wigmore, Herefordshire.
As Baddesley was such an outlying estate it seems to have been sub-let to the Labanc family around the beginning of the 12th century for the service of half a knight’s fee.
A charter of Richard Labanc dated between c.1153-1180 grants to the Knights Hospitaller brethren all the land and wood of Baddesley as a gift in perpetual alms on condition that the ‘Hospital’ renders annually 50s. Richard Labanc and his heirs acquit the brothers for the land and wood of all service to the King and Hugh de Mortimer and the heirs of Hugh except for geld and danegeld.
One of the witnesses to this was Ralph, Archdeacon of Winchester.
As a result of this conveyance the Hospitallers held the whole of the Domesday estate of North Baddesley which appears to have included Rownhams.
If the assumption is correct that Rownhams was situated within the Saxon boundary of Nursling, it is not known at which date it was separated and then subsequently annexed to North Baddesley.