Godalming (hundred)

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The Arms of the Town of Godalming

Godalming Hundred was formed as a Hundred of the Shire of Surrey sometime after 825 when Wessex annexed the "south eastern provinces" of Surrey, Sussex, Kent and Essex (with Middlesex).

1 Religion in Godalming Hundred
2 Towns and villages in Godalming Hundred
3 References

Godalming takes it name from the Old English Godhelm Ingas meaning "the clan of Godhelm". It is supposed that Godhelm was a Saxon chieftain who first colonised this dry land, bordered by swamps and a steep valley, as he and his folk moved up the River Wey. They would have fought the native Britons who could fight, and enslaved those that could neither fight nor run, conquering the area sometime around the end of the 6th Century. Initially Godhelm Ingas would have had a quite an independent existence but the local Lord would have soon sworn fealty to a neighbouring king, be it South Saxons, East Saxons, Kentish or West Saxons depending on the politics of the time. It was not until 690 that the Godhelm Ingas were formally placed within the bounds of Surrey by treaty. Certainly the area would have been dominated by Sussex while Aelle was Bretwalda and later occupied by Wessex under Caedwalla.

Godalming Hundred continues to be one of the most densely wooded parts of England and during the Middle Ages was largely covered by the Forest of Essera – a northern lobe of the ancient and vast Forest of Andred. People survived through pig farming and the making of charcoal.

During the reign of Alfred the Great a defensive burgh was built at nearby Eashing to defend the area against the Vikings in around 885. By 1086 the population of the entire hundred is thought to have been only about 600 people.

Under the West Saxon local government model Godalming Hundred would have had a Hundred Reeve and a Hundred Court or moot. This moot is known to have met at the site of the present day Pepperpot in the centre of Godalming. In 1300 Godalming was granted the status of a town with a Town Warden and later a Mayor. It was only when Surrey County Council was established in 1889 and Godalming became a "municipal borough" that the old Anglo-Saxon Hundred Court system ended and the administrative centre was moved from the Pepperpot to a new site on Bridge Street. The countryside around the town which had been part of the hundred, and other parishes once part of Farnham Hundred, became Hambledon Rural District Council. The Borough of Godalming was reduced in status back to a Town Council when Waverley Borough Council was created in 1974.

There is much to remind a resident of the past in Godalming, but one of the most apparent is the Annual Town Meeting. On this day the Mayor leads the town councillors in procession down the High Street to the site of the old Hundred Court at the Pepperpot. The councillors on this one occasion wear distinctive long grey robes – the origins of which certainly hark back to the witan meetings of old Saxon times. This is now the only vestige of the tribal gatherings of Godhelm's people at the very beginnings of the town's long history.

[edit] Religion in Godalming Hundred

Silent Pool near Albury

Christianity is thought to have come to the area after 675 when Surrey's only known sub-king Frithuwold converted and founded Chertsey Abbey. This area was one of the last in southern England to convert formally to Christianity, however Godalming is and was a deeply pagan place. In Godalming itself there was a shrine to the war god Tiw at Tuesley (literally "Tiw's Clearing") on the hill above the town and another to Thur or Thor at Thursley a little further away. There remains much mystery surrounding a very ancient Yew at Peper Harrow or Pipers Hearg meaning, literally "pagan temple" and an even more ancient Druidic Grove at Newland's Corner next to Silent Pool a "holy well" once used for ritual offerings. Another "holy well" is now within the grounds of Ladywell Convent at Tuesley. After the Hundred converted to Christianity some of those shrines were sanctified as chapels and a convent still exists on the old worship site at Tuesley – just to make sure.

In the 11th Century a new parish church was built on recently drained land by the river. The oldest part of the Church of S.S. Peter & Paul – the Anglo-Saxon chapel – still survives today and in it retains a stone decorated with pagan carvings thought to have been brought down from the original 7th Century chapel at Tuesley on the hill.

For further history go to the Godalming page.