S. Margaret’s Bay and S. Margaret’s at Cliffe retain their Norman
dedications. The church originally belonged to S. Martin’s Priory at
Dover. Lillechurch House, near Higham, marks the site of the old Priory
of Higham. The Hundred of Lesnes (A.S. leswes, pastures) is the district
once attached to the Augustinian Abbey (whence the present name of Abbey
Wood) founded in 1178 by the Chief Justice and Regent Richard de Lucy.
Of the five parishes named from the river Cray two are named from the
patron saints of their churches. S. Mary Cray is, however, called
Sentlynge in Domesday Book. S. Paul’s Cray is a misnomer, since the
dedication is to S. Paulinus, Bishop of Rochester, and afterwards
Archbishop of York. So in a deed of 1291 I find it as Creypaulin, and in
a fine of Edward II., 1314, as Paulynescraye. In 1560, however, it
appears as Powle’s Crey.
Brenzett, in Romney Marsh, does not suggest in its present form either a
Celtic or a Saxon origin; but as its old church was dedicated to S.
Eanswith, a popular Saxon Saint, also commemorated in the S. Mary and S.
Eanswith of the original church at Folkestone, it has been suggested
that Brenzett has been evolved in process of time out of Eanswith.
Bresett and Brynsete (1416) are variants of the place-name. There is
also the parish of S. Mary in the Marsh hard by. Newchurch, also in the
Marsh, is Neucerce in Domesday (1036), but as there is no Norman work in
the church, which is of Early English architecture, it is supposed that
shortly before Domesday an older church had been pulled down. Then and
still it gives its name to the Hundred of Newchurch in the Lathe of
Limea or Limowart, which was re-named Shepway in the time of Henry the
Third. Also in the Marsh is Dymchurch, earlier Demchurche. But earlier
still it is said to have been called simply Dimhus or Dimhof, which
would mean in Saxon the dark or hiding place; so that “church” may be a
later addition to an old name. Eastchurch, in Sheppey, was, and is, the
easternmost church in the island.
Place-Names from Persons.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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