h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Greetings, well at last someone is realising that Devon is full of mystical practical and physical knowledge of what was here before. I come from Boedica country, and our knowledge of the fens and Ely where I was born is quite extensive. I love this area and spend a lot of time researching the history, walking in old areas where we celebrated an older culture. Not all were celtic, at least some pagans were not of that known celtic tradition. Many pagans (i use that advisedly meaning pre-christian) were wiccan and many of us still exist. You may wish to include the sacred sites, stones, paths and wooded areas, rivers and other gathering places. Cornwall I find desolate, souless and introverted. It lacks the warmth of Devon and in its turn, Devon does not have the village culture of Wiltshire where I grew up - Devon seems to have lost its central communities which may be because of incomers like myself. If we can help I am sure I can raise many pagans who will be interested in assisting (no we do not have straw in our teeth/ears, we are all graduates and professional people in my group)but then you knew that! There is someone who I will not mention here who has already done TV programmes on this subject and she and I did some research many years ago regarding certain special places. I could get in touch with her if you like? Bright blessings.

Jazzwitch,

Welcome to the site - and I am glad you have enjoyed your visits to Devon.

Although I knew people who claimed to be Pagan/Wiccan I sadly never learned what that belief system is really about.

How closely does it reflect the traditional Celtic (pre Christian) values?, which (as far as I understand or can elucidate in one sentence) include a belief in an otherworld (running but half a twist from ours) a belief that everything (even inanimate matter) has life energy (an early insight that we are all made of atoms perhaps) and a belief that all things have their place and a value.

The Sacred Groves (Nymet in Devon) were especially revered.

Greetings

Do I gather you are from Australia? Your songlines are similar to our leylines, yes you are correct in your dissemination of pagan, wicca is somewhat different and is based on the level of commitment to a way of life. In that in the 60's there were dedicated hippies and weekend hippies - those who had professional jobs but still wanted to wear indian cotton, waft about in calming essences which gave birth to aromatherapy, use alternative medicines, and celebrate the seasons with all the herbal, healing, energy and respect for the environment and our forebears' wisdom (and confusion at times, it wasn't all wonderful). The latter became the new wiccans, joining with those who had been brought up in the craft but had to be underground for obvious reasons. For instance crossed fingers were dangerous, now it is the sign of the Lottery, five pointed stars were heretical but it is the logo of the most powerful industries and there are those who stick to the old religion and others, like me who are goddess related but insist on equal ops and groups are democractic, all taking responsibility for each other. A very gentle, caring, always learning, interested and involved with other religions and some like ours, love to go out into the natural world, dousing, tuning in, relaxing and re-energising sacred areas. What is so funny is that sometimes you arrive at a stone circle and find the stones have been re-set the wrong way - they have fallen from left to right and then get put up in the wrong order, especially after some were nicked for farms and building. You can see that at Avebury, next the my favourite Wiltshire pub the Red Lion, there are flat stones which belong across the road in the Avebury circle. If you stand on the 'lost' one and others are standing near the originals, you can link them up and it makes for a very strange sensation. Get off the 'lost' one and walk away and the others feel the loss of the energy input even though they have their backs to you and cannot see you leave! try it one day! There are people like me about in the Plymouth area and beyond - try In Other Words on Mutley Plain for contacts. Bright Blessings in your searchings.

Greetings from another Plymouth Pagan.

Although my interest in the Celtic history of Devon has only recently been stirred, I have always felt that such a history did exist despite Cornish claims to the contrary. I recently felt drawn to adopt the new online name of Sulla, an alternative spelling for the ancient British Celtic Sun Goddess Sul, who according to Brythonic mythology presided over hot springs. Research into this little known deity brought me to the Celtic Devon conversation forum, which I have been avidly reading over the past few days (and ordering books as a result). I wonder though if anyone could clarify a particular point for me? From what I have read, Dumnonia was a region (for wont of a better word) incorporating Devon, Cornwall and possibly Somerset. Then there is reference to Dyfnaint a Celtic Welsh form of Devon, and also Dewnans the Celtic Cornish version? Would the Cornish Celtic tongue have been the same as Devonian, so is it correct to refer to Celtic Devon as Dewnans, and would that have been further extended to become Dewnans of Dumnonia, or am I confusing a time line here?

Considering how much I detested any sort of history at school, local or otherwise, I find it quite puzzling that I have suddenly developed this fascination, but I think it's very important to preserve what knowledge we do have regarding this ancient culture of ours.

Sulla,

Welcome to the forum. The Dark Age Kingdom of Dumnonia definitely encompassed Cornwall and Devon, but its extent further east seems to be a little less certain. Some historians say that it stretched to the River Parret and the Devon/Dorset border, but others place the boundary further east than this to include most of Somerset and Dorset. Like many such borders at this time, it probably varied somewhat depending on who was at war with whom at the time.

I get the impression that the Welsh name for Devon (Dyfnaint or Dyfneint meaning deep or dark valleys) is quite old, but quite how old the Cornish word Dewnans (meaning the same) is seems to be less certain. It could have been a relatively recent translation into Cornish of the Welsh word.

West Country Brythonic (Old Devonian) as partly reconstructed by Biddulph would have been a forerunner of both Cornish and Breton, but one of the unanswered questions is how much did Old Devonian evolve away from Cornish by the time it finally disappeared, probably sometime between the 14th and 16th centuries. As it was almost certainly a purely spoken language, there are probably no written remnants to be found, which could answer this question.

I was also at school in Plymouth, where the history curriculum did not exactly grip my interest. It was only when I found that the history of the South West had not been satisfactorily covered at school that my interest was stimulated.

Dyth da Sulla,
I'm sure I speak for everyone when I wish you a warm welcome.
I've included the following Timeline for you,it is one of the most exhaustive listings of the Celtic Kingdom and will help in your research.
http://www.kessler-web.co.uk/History/KingListsBritain/BritainDumnonia.htm
DUMNONONIA was a Kingdom and Cornwall was a part of that Kingdom,and Dyfnaint is Welsh for deep valley dweller which refers to It's landscape.Dewnan means Devon and Dewnansek meaning Devonian.
This Link :-
http://members.fortunecity.com/gerdewnansek/ will answer your question on the Celtic Tongue of the Dewnansek.
This Forum is slowly Resurrecting our Ancestors from there ashes.Our Schools should be teaching our children of there Celtic Heritage and Language,we even have our own Tartans.
Enough of me for now,I feel sure the others will pop by and welcome you shortly and offer what help they can.
Best Wishes Bleidh

Many thanks to you both for the warm welcome and also the very useful links which I have already explored. Things are really starting to open up for me now, and it's reassuring to see that there are others who would like see the resurrection of Old Devonian and our Celtic history. I consider myself very fortunate to have found this forum.

A recent discussion on a (pro Anglo-Saxon) website indicated they had encountered a problem they could not resolve - at least within their belief system that Wessex had surplanted the Celts in Devon and Somerset in the seventh century.

The problem - King Alfred's will which (apparently) states that he left:

"To my younger son the estate at Arreton,and that at Dene and that at Meon, and at Amesbury, and at Deone, and at Sturminster, and at, Yeovil, and at Crewkerne, and at Whitchurch, and at Axmouth, and at Branscombe, and at Collumpton, and at Tiverton, and at Milbourne, and at Exminster, and at Sutheswyrthe, and at Lifton - and all the estates that belong thereto, that is all that I have among the Wealcynn except for Trigg-shire"

The Wealcynn could be translated as Cornish - except that only Trigg-shire is in Cornwall and most of the lands mentioned are in Devon or Somerset.

Wealcynn no doubt relates to the Ancient British (Celtic) inhabitants of south west Britain, and probably all relate to the Celtic nation of Dumnonia.

So its seems that even when King Alfred died substantial lands in Devon (and points further east) remained Celtic possessions.

King Alfred ruled until the turn of the ninth/tenth centuries - and is famous for his battles with the Vikings and for burning cakes!


There is further evidence of the surival of the Celtic language in Devon as well - and this time from a Cornish Bard.

The 'An Ger Dewnansek' website has the following posting

http://groups.msn.com/DevonsCelticLanguage/olddevonian.msnw?action=get_message&mview=0&ID_Message=24

Cornish Bard Chris Dunkerley wrote that "Athelstan in 936AD swept the Cornish (actually Devon's Celts) out of Exeter and set the border, not at the cultural border (there being Cornish speakers in south Devon for about another 400 years) but... the river Tamar".

The article is incorrect in a number of areas - not least that the expulsion of the Celts from the walled city of Exeter happened in 927AD, almost a decade before the Tamar was set as the boundary between Devon and Cornwall in 936AD.

Nevertheless the link references the survival of the Celtic language in Devon for a number of centuries AFTER the Norman invasion - which is when the expansionist behaviour of the Anglo-Saxons must have ceased.

Hi to everyone!

I have been an enthusiastic reader of the Celtic Devon discussion for some time now, and am fascinated by the wealth of 'forgotten' Devon history that is emerging.

I went to school in Crediton, and remember that in our GCSE history curriculum there was not a single mention of Devon's pre-Saxon past.

The whole subject of Celtic Britain seems to be have been engulfed by a bizarre notion called the ‘Ancient Britons’, who were presented to me as naked savages who painted themselves blue. The picture was one built up from Roman ideas. No clue was given in my history education as to what happened to the Britons after the Romans left. Until the Anglo-Saxon world of King Alfred, the burnt cakes, Knut and the tide, Bede, fighting the Vikings and etc. there was a huge vacuum in British history taking in 100s of years.

Finding out about the nation of Dumnonia was a big surprise. I had been intrigued by the idea since I was at college in Exeter when I saw Devon and Cornwall described in an old textbook we had as ‘West Wales’. I though ‘West Wales, how strange?’ How could Devon and Cornwall have been part of Wales? Of course they weren’t, it was just that the textbook did not explain the term, and Dark Age British history was off the A level curriculum. At university I did get the opportunity to study Dark Age history, but Devon and Cornwall’s history was not included. It is only through my own reading, and resources like this forum that so much more has come to light.

I was amazed when I read the names of Dumnonian kings and the battles and political struggles they engaged in. This was an entire part of history that I had never been taught, full of drama and infinitely more interesting, because it related to where I was brought up in, rather than the ‘Kings and Queens’ of England approach. The idea that Devon and Cornwall had their own history until well into the 9th century was a new one. Especially things like the letter between the Saxon bishop Aldhelm and the Dumononian king Geraint about the status of the Celtic church, and the references to Wealcyn in Devon in the late Saxon king Alfred’s will. This is important historical information, which does not appear, to my knowledge, in any standard GCSE or A level history course taught in Devon or Cornwall—correct me if I’m wrong.

Inspired by the discussion on this forum, I then started to look at placenames, and encountered all manner of nonsense. I read one statement that ‘only one percent of Devon placenames are Celtic’ or that ‘Denbury’ is the only Celtic placename in Devon. What nonsense! Denbury is actually an Anglo-Saxon placename, describing a fort of Devonians. Go a little way down the road to Ipplepen and that is a proper Celtic placename. So are Dawlish, Clovelly, Noss Mayo, Dunchideock, Whimple, Landkey, Cadover, Penquit. These are mainly, with the exception of Dawlish, villages or hamlets, but this reflects the state of Devon at the time of the Saxon settlements. Apparently, most large towns in Devon were founded in a medieval economic boom in wool, long after English became the dominant language. Cornwall did not share in this wool boom but nobody would suggest that the big Cornish towns of Launceston, Falmouth, Helston and St Austell, all of which bear English or anglicised names diminish Cornwall’s Celtic heritage. Of older names, how is Feock in Cornwall more Celtic than Hemiock in Devon?

Forgive me for droning on about the placename issue, but it is used as a stick to beat those who who assert a Devonian Celtic heritage. Look into Devon more deeply and there is incontrovertible evidence of Celtic survival in placenames, albeit it masked by the boom in new towns in the medieval time. I read recently that many new settlements at that time in Devon, founded with high hopes, never made it to town status. What this may show is that during the 12th and 13th centuries Devon’s rich farmland and its success in the wool trade was a new frontier for settlers, and that most of the current placenames derive from that time. These later ‘boom’ foundations now co-exist, as villages and towns, with earlier Celtic foundations that kept their original names.

What would really rock the boat is strong evidence that the Cornish or Brythonic language was used in Devon into the middle ages. I have read in these postings that there is some evidence the language was used in Devon into the medieval time. I would love to know more about this. If it is true, then the implications are quite dramatic, and it is something the people of Devon should know about, particularly regarding revival of Cornish-Brythonic language in Devon, which before has been regarded as something shut away across the Tamar and not part of our own history.

Welcome ExeValleyBoy.

You are quite correct about the GCSE and A-Level courses not covering the Dark Ages. The way that British history is presented in our schools is as if it was a train, which left the station at Roman Britain, entered the Dark Age tunnel and emerged in three separate sections at the other end before calling at Anglo-Saxon England, Celtic Scotland or Celtic Wales, with no explanation of what happened in the tunnel to cause such a separation. Not only that, but the descriptions given of the three destinations at the end of the tunnel are also wildly inaccurate. Scotland does not consist entirely of Dalriada Scots (from Ireland). Wales does have some continental settlers among its population. The truth concerning the largest misconception of them all though, is that in England, the Anglo-Saxons (together with the Danes) did not even constitute the majority of the population.

The blinkered view of a number of eminent Victorian academics is probably to blame for much of this institutionalised ignorance, when eminent historians such as E.A. Freeman ‘preached’ a doctrine of Teutonic (Anglo-Saxon) intellectual supremacy, with the Celts (especially the Irish) considered to be inferior. From the 1950s onward, most serious researchers have concluded that the theory of Anglo-Saxon/Danish mass migration throughout England was just not tenable, and recent DNA surveys have verified this conclusion, but our educational system goes blindly on propagating the same old outdated Victorian doctrine.

Even our place name specialists refuse (in the main) to abandon the tenets, formulated in the Victorian and early 20th century eras, which state that whenever Celtic roots such as ‘combe’, ‘tor’, ‘dun’, ‘pol’ or ‘cors’ are found in English place names, that they must be considered as being Old English, as these words were ‘borrowed’ from the Indigenous Brythonic Celts by the Anglo-Saxon settlers. This hypothesis was formulated by the Victorians to explain the large number of such roots in the place names in some parts of (supposedly solidly Anglo-Saxon) England. Even some 50 years after it was realised that indigenous Britons must have survived in large numbers, these outmoded tenets are still considered to be sacred cows by most place name experts. They expect us to believe that a relatively small number of continental settlers came into an area such as Devon, where they found themselves among a much larger number of Britons, and proceeded to give names to the dwelling places of the Britons in the Britons’ own tongue (not in their own Anglo-Saxon language). This would mean that although the Britons were presumed to be incapable of giving names to their own abodes, they were apparently capable of telling the Saxons the meanings of their own Celtic words for valley, rock stack, hill fort, pool and reeds, so that they (the Saxons) could make use of them. By stepping back and looking at this hypothesis from an impartial viewpoint, one can clearly see just how absurd it really is.

The reason for the concept, of only 1% of Devon’s place names being considered to be Celtic in origin, comes from the volume ‘Place Names of Devon’, published in 1931. Firstly, this book only covered major place names, and (adhering to the ‘borrowed’ names tenet) defined names containing ‘combe’, ‘tor’ etc. as being Old English in origin. As you have correctly pointed out, most of the medium sized and larger Devon towns were later medieval foundations, dating from times after the demise of the Celtic tongue in much of Devon, whereas most of the Celtic names are of much older small hamlets and farmsteads, which were not included in ‘PN Devon’. The leading authority on Cornish place names (Oliver Padel), in a recent lecture, stated that only three instances of ‘tre’ names are to be found in Devon (quoting from ‘PN Devon’). I have found 29 such names on OS maps without much effort. Are people such as Padel not capable of doing basic research to avoid coming out with such inaccuracies?

Most native Cornish people are more aware of their Celtic heritage than the people of Devon are, thanks to the efforts of the Cornish Nationalists, but even the Cornish are being fed a diet of misinformation about Devon, in an effort by the Nationalists to convince them that only they (the Cornish) are true descendents of the Celtic Britons, and as such, are unique in England. It is therefore not in their interests to admit that the people from east of the Tamar are also of predominantly Celtic descent.

How can this ignorance be overcome?

Thanks for welcoming me to the discussion Ozzie Exile.

The pernicious influence of ‘Teutonic’ Victorian academics in the suppression of Celtic culture—all over the UK---is indeed a fact. Witness the attempts to eliminate the Welsh language in the 19th century. The idea being, I suppose, to create some kind of unified homogenous Teutonic British state with which to compete with newly reunified Germany. I say pernicious without melodrama as this was part of a general 19th century strand of thought—here and in Germany—that brought us empires and the first world war. This legacy, as you say, remains in the centrally dictated educational system which gives teachers very little freedom to tailor courses to reflect local cultural realities.

Apparently, the GCSE in Cornish was abandoned in 1996, owing to lack of uptake—more likely lack of funding, training and promotion---and that was in Cornwall itself. I had heard that some schools in Devon had been interested in the GCSE, though I can’t verify that. If students in Devon and Cornwall had access to Cornish or Brythonic language classes, and through a history curriculum that contained a regional element, were informed of the relevance of these languages to their own history, it might well give rise to a healthier appreciation of the regional heritage rather than the introspective xenophobia and isolationism you sometimes see today. After all, there is no bar to the teaching of Anglo-Saxon literature. How many generations of schoolchildren have had to sit through Beowulf; at my school in Crediton we even had to enact episodes from it! When Beowulf was written neither Devon nor Cornwall were even a part of England, let alone speaking the Anglo-Saxon language it was written in. I am absolutely convinced no teacher at our school was even remotely aware of this absurdity. Unless they had a personal interest in Britain’s ‘alternative’ and I believe far bigger surviving body of ancient Celtic literature—mainly in Welsh—how could they have been?

Leaving education aside, and going on to the subject of Cornish nationalism, I think there is no point getting into arguments with them. Like the ‘Anglo-Saxonists’ they have their own hide-bound opinions that nothing will change. All I think that needs to be asserted is that the recovery of Devon’s own repressed and neglected Celtic history is not an attempt to ‘steal’ anything from Cornwall. Even in historical Dumnonia the present day counties of Devon and Cornwall were different provinces and almost certainly had distinct identities; possibly even their languages were somewhat different. It is grossly unfair for some Cornish nationalists to try and obstruct research into and promotion of Devon’s past, out of an irrational fear of being engulfed by the ‘English.’ They do not see that a more confident Devon, aware of its own history and culture, would benefit Cornish culture too. Today’s Cornish nationalism is not popular in Cornwall because it is selling an unpopular product; an isolated, introspective and xenophobic Cornwall.

The only way I see the ignorance you mention being overcome is through better general education about the region’s past. A good, readable book about the history of pre-Saxon Devon and Cornwall would be a start. I am not aware of such a book, and if anyone on this forum knows of such a thing, please tell me! My experience is of building up a somewhat vague picture from what are often very old, disparate sources; other than that the region’s history is given in a few cursory paragraphs, here and there, as a kind of footnote to the ‘real action’ further north and east.

I am interested in reading Joseph Biddulph’s book on the old Celtic West Country language, but the description of the book on his website falls a bit into the ‘Ancient Britons’ myth I mentioned in my last posting by describing ‘puzzles left to us by remote antiquity’. If, as many have alleged, Cornish, another dialect of Cornish or some other related language was being spoken outside of Cornwall well after the Norman Conquest, that is hardly ‘remote antiquity’! Despite that, I am still very much looking forward to reading it.

ExeValleyBoy,

I am afraid you appear to have got your names mixed up. I am Plymouth Exile, not Ozzie Exile. Easy mistake to make, and I am sure that Ozzie Exile would also like to welcome you to the forum when he sees your post.

On the topic of GCSE in Cornish, one contributor to this forum did say that he had seen it reported that more schools in Devon had offered Cornish on the curriculum than schools in Cornwall, but he did not supply a reference for this information. What you say may well have some foundation therefore.

I agree with you that there is no point in arguing with the extreme Cornish Nationalists, but they don’t need any provocation from us before directing their vitriol at us. They even went out of their way to inform us that we had no right to have our own Devon Flag, as Devon was not a Celtic nation like Cornwall, and accused us of ‘hijacking’ the Cornish St. Piran Flag, despite the fact that the Cornish Flag is mostly black whereas the Devon Flag is mostly green. When this fact was pointed out to them, they said that when viewed in black and white they looked the same (just how petty minded can they get).

The problem is that for the extreme Nationalists, it is not sufficient that people should recognise and confirm Cornwall’s Celtic identity. They also demand recognition and confirmation that Cornwall is ‘unique’ in Britain, outside of Wales and Scotland, in having a Celtic heritage. So even if Devonians do not even mention Cornwall, when asserting their own Celtic heritage, this still upsets the Cornish, because they see it as an attempt to rob them of their ‘unique’ Celtic status. They certainly don’t leave us alone to get on with our own business, as they spend much of their time writing fake Devon histories in order to prove to the outside world how different they are from the Devonians (just take a look at any of their literature, letters to the press or web sites).

Unfortunately, even many Devonians are taken in by this misinformation and assume that what they have read in the ‘official looking’ Cornish documents must be true. Only the other day, I had to correct a guy from St. Budeaux (Plymouth), who had stated in a Devon Flag forum that Devon did not have a Celtic past, like Cornwall had. I find this astonishing, as St. Budeaux (Budoc) was a Celtic Saint who had actually founded a settlement on the Tamar where the Plymouth district of St. Budeaux now stands. This guy had obviously believed the lies told by the Nationalists, and as he had not been taught anything to the contrary in his school education, he had remained totally ignorant of the background history of where he lived. This is the sort of thing we need to overcome, but how?

I think that you will find “A Handbook of West Country Brythonic (Old Devonian)” by Joseph Biddulph to be most informative. My only criticism would be that his history is a little bit suspect in stating that the language expired by 900AD. I also wish that he had taken the project further, as it leaves you wanting to know more.

I noted the comment that Joseph Biddulph's booklet (and Handbook of Westountry Brythoonic - Old Devonian) fell into the 'ancient Briton trap'.

By which I assume you mean that the book is focussed on the distant past rather than on the more modern day.

This may be true, but it should be remembered that Biddulph was not intending to write about the Celtic language as it was last spoken in Devon, but rather on the language that existed before the migration to Brittany.

The reason is simple. He could then compare the languages on both sides of the western approaches and look for what was common to both - and therefore in all probability the language of south west Britain at the time.

The development of the Celtic language in Devon after the migration is unclear. The Celts did not have a strong written tradition - in fact their focus was traditionally oral. As a result much of the written evidence from this period is actually in Latin (a hangover from the Romans) where such items as tombstones may be written in Latin, but the names are clearly Celtic.

The issue also plagued the Cornish - for when they tried to 'resurrect' the Cornish language about a century ago they found very few written records. This is one reason why the Cornish currently have (at least) three different language models.

What is evident is that the Celtic language survived in Devon - at least in parts of Devon - until the fourteenth century. This has been written about by a numer of historians, but (to my knowledge) there are no celtic texts which survived.

Sadly many records have been lost (I think there was a major fire in the Exeter libraries some centuries ago) and if written evidence existed of Devon's Celtic language it may then have been lost.

That is not to say that the evidence does not exist - when I contacted Exeter's Local Studies Library to ask whether they had any evidence the response was along the lines of "it would take too much work, but here are a few avenues to follow.."

Perhaps if Exeter University's had a 'Celtic Studies' rather than 'Cornish Studies' focus, more would be forthcoming into the public arena.

One interpretation of this is that only Lifton is being described as among the Wealcynn. What do people on this message board think of this interpretation; is it valid?

Einion,

I think I know the source of your posting - Nick, South Carolina - otherwise known as NXylas in this forum - onto the BBC Devon site.

The first time I saw Nick's 'interpretation' was within the last 48 hours, but I have tracked it down - again thanks to Nick.

He raised the question of King Alfred's will and the reference to "wealcynn" some time ago on two websites - the Wessex Society one (which I think he is president of) and also a site called Gesiðas Gedaderung - both 'Anglo-Saxon' proponents to various degrees.

The suggestion that the 'wealcynn' reference may be limited to Lifton only was made by one of the WS contributors as recently as 30 December 2004.

Nick has rushed (with apparent undue haste and lack for even the simplest scientific rigour) to claim this interpretation as the only possible one on the BBC Devon website - apparently because some of the places mentioned in Alfred's will may (and I stress "may") be locations in southern England counties such as Wiltshire and Hampshire and it fits certain preconceptions in those Anglo-Saxon forums that there could not possibly be Celtic speaking communities in these counties in the late 8th century.

Obviously this is not the only interpretation - and indeed by Nick's own admission it was not his original reading of the will.

I will comment that before this theory was proposed the proposer (on the Wessex Society site) said words to the effect that it was a pleasure to do business with people who actually respect the evidence, and in a posting after his suggestion he commented that the argument in this case hinged upon sentence construction, and underlying concerns about translational accuracy and noted that the WS forum did not have have the in-house expertise to resolve that issue conclusively.

Nevertheless........

Alright - bitch over! Nick appears to be jumping to any convenient suggestion and claiming it as fact, but that aside, is this claim true??

In short I think you can still read the will in three ways. Namely that the 'wealcynn' comment applies to all the land mentioned (remembereing that Alfred's will contained other bequests), that it might possibly apply to just the last mentioned Lifton estates, or perhaps that the 'wealcynn' estates are an undefined subset of the whole list.

I have seen a copy of Alfred's will, but (like the WS originator) I do not know enough of the ancient languages to interpret this with any definite answer - perhaps no-one can.

Nevertheless, we do know from other sources that the Celtic language was spoken in Devon until the 14th century (ie historians such as Risdon, Baring-Gould etc...) - and indeed it is reported that the Celtic language survived in parts of counties such as Wiltshire until well after the Saxon's first arrived. We also know that modern DNA evidence suggests that the native British (celtic) population formed (and genetically still form??) the majority of the population.

Why would it then be unreasonable to suggest that native speaking populations existed even in Wiltshire or Hampshire in Alfred's day??

It may be impossible to know what Alfred's will really meant, but we did know that Alfred used a Welsh biographer (Asser) and Alfred was reputed to have been close to the Celtic population (possibly even having some Celtic ancestry himself).

I await comment........

Ozzie Exile,

Yes, it was a posting of Nick Xylas's on the Gesithas Gegaderung which prompted my question.

One of their earlier queries was how could places in Hampshire and Wiltshire be said to be 'among Wealcynn' or under British control so long after having come under the rule of Wessex. However, I think it's a matter of understanding how early English (and British) kingdoms functioned. It seems likely to me that they operated in a similar way to the early kingdoms of Ireland, where there were large provinces or kingdoms (such as Ulster), then a number of smaller sub-kingdoms within the larger ones, then these smaller were in turn divided into 'tuaths', which were basically small principalities, although their ruler was known as a king or 'Righ'.

One example of such a condition in England is king Tondhbert of the South Gyrwe, who I think is sometimes known as an alderman.

This would explain why an area could be said to be controlled by wealcynn, and yet be part of an English kingdom; i.e. the local ruling class (including the king or alderman) of the area is British-speaking but nevertheless subject to an English king.

So personally I think it's likely that Alfred was indeed referring to the whole list, especially considering most of the places are in Devon and Somerset, and those in Hampshire appear to be in the Isle of Wight and in the southern mainland of the county; areas where one would expect British speech to have survived the longest.

>>So personally I think it's likely that Alfred was indeed referring to the whole list, especially considering most of the places are in Devon and Somerset, and those in Hampshire appear to be in the Isle of Wight and in the southern mainland of the county; areas where one would expect British speech to have survived the longest.<<

I would say quite the opposite - that British speech would have died out earliest in those parts. After all, they were conquered twice - first by the Jutes and then by the West Saxons. And even if British speech survived, it does not follow that those British speakers had their own kings. "Among the wealcynn" implies that the areas would have been under British political control at the time, in which case the interpretation that Alfred was referring to the estates at Lifton, in the far west of Devon, is the only one that makes sense.

Nxylas,

No - I don't think that your interpretation is the only one that makes sense. In fact it has some serious problems.

Firstly the original interpretation (that the wealcynn comment relates to all sites) could still well be the correct one.

Let us look again at the wording of the will (as translated). The will lists a number of estates, for which Lifton is the last. It then goes on to specify that any (sub) estates are included. Presumably Alfred intended all sub-estates to go to his son and not just the sub-estates at Lifton. Only after this (presumably) all inclusive statement is made does the will make reference to ‘that is all I have amongst the Wealcynn’. Therefore, the linkage to just Lifton appears to have been broken.

In any event, what is the problem with a couple of pockets of surviving Brythonic populations in Wiltshire or Hampshire in Alfred’s day?? As Einion suggests these might be local British controlled or led territories but they do not have to be kingdoms as such. For example the place 'Meon' in Hampshire (if this Meon is correct) happens to be the ancient site of Romano-British occupation and hill fort. How this particular site came to terms with the Jutish/Saxon insurgents appears to be unknown, but it may be that some form of autonomy was negotiated or permitted, or that it at least retained a separate identity .

Secondly, even if some of the estates mentioned do not have British connections, the will would still make sense if the wealcynn statement is all inclusive.

If a number of the estates (but not all) had Celtic connections then the comment about wealcynn still makes sense as it still clarifies that all of Alfred’s “wealcynn” estates go to his son, with the exception of Trigg-shire, even if they are but a subset of the estates given.

>I would say quite the opposite - that British speech would have died out earliest in those parts.<

I was also referring to the fact that most of the areas were in Somerset and Devon.

The West Saxons were, it seems (from archaeology), originally stationed around (if I remember rightly) Dorchester-on-Thames, so linguistic influences are likely to have taken longer to reach southern Hampshire and the Isle of Wight (and Devon/Somerset, of course).

>After all, they were conquered twice - first by the Jutes and then by the West Saxons.<

Being conquered twice does not make them more likely to have lost their language than does being conquered once, unless you're assuming that a conquest always involves settlement by the conquerors, an assumption which I believe is unfounded.
The Isle of Wight especially, was more isolated and as a result, probably more conservative even though containing some Jutes.

>And even if British speech survived, it does not follow that those British speakers had their own kings.<

By the time of Alfred they would'nt have been kings in the usual sense of the word; more like an alderman or some sort of local ruler. But my reason for having this idea is not because I think it "follows" that of British speech survival.

>"Among the wealcynn" implies that the areas would have been under British political control at the time<

Which, as I am about to say, supports what I stated in the earlier post.

>in which case the interpretation that Alfred was referring to the estates at Lifton, in the far west of Devon, is the only one that makes sense.<

Was not all of Devon under the control of Wessex at this time? if Alfred had estates at Lifton, then obviously it must have been under Wessex control; therefore the same problem applies to that area, and so there is little reason to assume that he cannot have been referring to the whole list.

So I think that Alfred was probably referring to local control, albeit under the overall control of Wessex.

nxylas,

Firstly, how sure are we that Hampshire and the Isle of Wight were conquered and settled to any great extent by the Jutes? Such events were reputed to have happened during the latter part of the 5th century when much of our knowledge of what really happened is based on pure conjecture. Certainly the early chapters of the ASC should be taken with a very large pinch of salt, as they were largely a vehicle for establishing foundation myths for the Angles, Saxons and Jutes., and often consisted of the landing of small numbers of men (usually in the obligatory three ships).

There may be a clue concerning British language survival in the places mentioned in Alfred’s will, in the fact that Meon is definitely an early native British name (Coates), as is Crewkerne. In fact there is much evidence for Brythonic language survival in a number of parts of England well into the 10th century (Edgar’s Law Codes talk of “this land of the Englisc, Danes and Britons”). In the book “Celtic Voices English Places”, Coates devotes a whole chapter to “Evidence for the Persistence of Brittonic in Wiltshire”, and other writers have discussed accounts of the language persisting until the Norman Conquest in isolated areas of the county. Add to this the genetic evidence for high levels of British survival in the South, and it would not seem at all far fetched to consider the possibility of Brythonic speech being still in use in the places mentioned during Alfred’s reign.

A lot depends on what is meant by the phrase “among the Wealcynn”. For a population to be recognised as being Wealcynn, there must have been some distinguishing feature, which separated them from the Saxons. As their visual appearance would have been similar to that of the Saxons, one can only assume that they were distinguishable by language. That may well have been the sole meaning of the phrase, i.e. “among a community of Brythonic speakers”. I do not believe that it implied that the Britons exercised political control over their community, as even Cornwall was under Saxon control by the time of Alfred. One might (for instance) use the phrase “among the Asian community” in modern Britain, but it would not mean that the Asian community was politically self-governing.

By the reign of Alfred, one might expect that Brythonic-speaking communities would have been more numerous in Devon than in the counties further East, where greater linguistic assimilation would have occurred, so it is not surprising that Devon place names predominate in the list of places “among the Wealcynn”. It is interesting that Alfred should have left his younger son the estates, which he held among the Wealcynn, but maybe these were the less wealthy estates, and more befitting the legacy of a younger son. Of course it did not necessarily imply that these estates represented the sum total of “Wealcynn” (or Brythonic speaking) communities, only that these were the ones personally held by Alfred.