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by Richard Wallington
Ekwall’s Concise Oxford
Dictionary of English Place Names, and Mary Cosh’s History of Islington, agree that in the Anglo-Saxon period Islington
was originally called Gisla’s Dun (‘Gisla’s Hill’, Gisla being an Anglo-Saxon
personal name). They also both give as the earliest reference to it a charter
from the year 1000 AD which refers to the Bishop of London being overlord of
the settlement of Gislandun.
There is, however, an earlier reference to Islington, which
is recorded in a 17th Century copy of a now lost Anglo-Saxon charter
of 903 AD, which was, when copied, in the archives of St
Paul’s Cathedral, London.
This copy is a manuscript which forms part of the large and important collection
of manuscripts made by Sir Matthew Hale (1609-1676), who was Lord Chief Justice
1671-76, and a man of wide intellectual interests. He left this collection by
his will to Lincoln’s Inn,
who still have it. The collection includes manuscripts made by John
Selden (1584-1654), the great pioneer historian of law, including a copy made
by him of this charter of 903 AD which mentions Islington.
The charter of 903 AD refers to an earlier grant which had
been made of ten hides of land at ‘Gisladune’ by King Cenwulf (King of Mercia 796-821)
to Ealdorman Beornnoth, and states that this earlier charter had been destroyed
in a fire along with other documents of title of the person who had inherited
the land from Beornnoth, Ealdorman Æthelfrith. The charter of 903 AD then
confirms the earlier grant in order to provide Æthelfrith with a good document
of title. King Edward the Elder (son of Alfred the Great and King of England
899-924) is the person who confirms this grant, with the concurrence and
additional witness of two ealdormen of Mercia
and numerous bishops. As Æthelfrith was a secular lord, this was therefore
before the Church acquired the Islington land, though the fact that this
document ended up in the possession of St Paul’s Cathedral means that it
related to land which was subsequently acquired by the Church .
An ealdorman was a man put in charge of a shire or county by
the king, and who commanded the army of that area. A hide was not a fixed
amount of land, but a unit for tax assessment based on the amount of land
needed to support a family. The more fertile the land was, the smaller would be
the area of a hide. It is estimated to have varied between 15 and 30 modern
acres. Professor Keynes (see below) thinks that ‘Gisladune’ in this document is
a copying error for ‘Gislandune’.
The discovery of this manuscript among Lincoln’s
Inn’s archives was made by Simon Keynes, who is now
Professor of Anglo-Saxon at Cambridge
University. He wrote it up in an
article entitled ‘A Charter of Edward the Elder for Islington’, Historical
Research, No 161, 1993, pp 303-316, printing the full text (it is in Latin) and
a translation. The information given above comes from that article, and I also am
most grateful for the help of Guy Holborn, the librarian of Lincoln’s
Inn, for alerting me to this piece of research and
providing the reference.
First published in the IA&HS Newsletter, Summer 2008
Re-published here with the author's permission |
