Grain and Chaff from an English ManorSavory, Arthur Herbert
History
Grain and Chaff from an English Manor
Savory, Arthur Herbert
Aldington (Worcestershire, England); Country life -- England; England -- Social life and customs
If, therefore, we can find a place of importance with the name of
Antona, or a name that may fairly represent it, having regard to
subsequent corruptions, existing also in Roman times on or near the
Avon branch of the Severn, we shall be justified in assuming that this
particular Avon was the river he had in his mind. Such a place is the
area I have described as full of traces of long Roman and pre-Roman
occupation, situated at the junction of two ancient roads, very
important from the military point of view, and within a mile of the
Avon.
On the supposition that Antona and Aldington may be identical, the
present site of the latter is perhaps a quarter of a mile from the
Roman area which I have described, but the original Aldington Mill,
traces of the foundations of which are still to be seen, was actually
on the Roman area. A better position for it was found later, away from
the difficulties of approach caused by floods, and it was moved to the
site occupied by the present mill just below the Manor House, probably
in Anglo-Saxon times. Although the name of the village became, in
Anglo-Saxon, Aldington, or something similar, the old name of Anton or
Aunton was evidently in common local use, as appears in the following
list of names which the present village has borne at different times.
It is specially interesting to notice that the more elaborate
"Aldington" and its variants appear in the more scholarly records,
such as those of Evesham Abbey and Domesday Survey, written by people
not living in the village; while the parish churchwardens 1527-1571,
the will of Richard Yardley 1531, the village constable 1715, and the
villagers at the present day, all living in the place itself, carry on
the old tradition in the names they use which approximate very closely
to the Roman Antona, and are indeed identical in their manuscripts, if
the Latin terminal _a_ is omitted.
_Date_
Aldintone, Charter of the Kings Kenred and Offa,
possessions of Evesham Abbey 709
Aldingtone }
Aldintun } Domesday Survey _circ._ 1086
Aldintona }
Aldringtona, An Adjudication; Evesham Abbey 1176
Aldetone, Institutes of Abbot Randulf, died 1229
Awnton, Will of Richard Yardley of Awnton 1531
Aunton, Churchwardens accounts 1527 to 1571
Anton, Old MS. "A Bill for ye Constable" 1715
Alne or Auln, Villagers present day
As parallels of the local persistence of old names, the neighbouring
village of Wickhamford (present-day name) is still called Wicwon by
the villagers, the same name under which it appears in the Charter of
the Abbey possessions in 709. And the Celtic London still persists in
spite of the Roman attempt to confer upon it the grander name of
Augusta.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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