Nether Wallop in Hampshire

Wallop was a place of considerable size and importance with its name firmly established by the time of the Domesday Survey in 1086. Its amusing name may mean 'the valley of the stream', 'a pretty well in the side of a hill', 'stream of the Ancient Britons', or be a derivation from the name of a chieftain who fought in a battle referred to as 'Guolloppum or the Battle of Wallop' which local lore says was fought in Wallop Fields between the Saxon Vortigern and Romano-British Ambrosius in 508 A.D.

The Wallop Brook rises in Over Wallop running north to south across the middle of the large tract of land (over 7000 acres) which is the ancient parish of Nether Wallop, its village and church clustered in the main bend of the brook. Today most of this chalk downland, arable fields, woods and old water meadows is farmed by local landowners.

The earliest known inhabited site in Wallop is Danebury Hill (nothing to do with the Danes), both 'dun' and 'burh' Celtic and Saxon, mean 'a fortified place'. Danebury Ring is currently of international archaeological importance for its Iron Age Hill Fort excavations under Professor Barry Cunliffe. Danebury may have known continuous occupation since the Beaker Folk buried one of their dead there about 2000 B.C The surrounding landscape shows much evidence of early man.

Two long barrows, communal graves of Neolithic peoples before 1000 B.C. are in a field N.W. of Danebury, there are round barrows of the Bronze Age, and 'Celtic' field systems. About 400 B.C. a people from the Continent, skilled in the use of iron built the 27 acre hill-fort. They showed administrative, engineering and military ability in the building of those massive ramparts and the artfully designed East Entrance placed at the meeting point of several ancient trackways. The excavation of Danebury Ring will increase our knowledge of this Iron Age society which lived before the time of Christ.

The conquest of Britain by the Romans began in 43 A.D., and Hampshire succumbed, but Danebury seems to have surrendered to the brilliant general Vespasian without attack. The Romans occupied neighbouring areas but left scant evidence of occupation in Wallop. They built the strategically placed Venta Belgarum (Winchester), where later a weaving mill made cloth for the Roman Army, probably using wool from Wallop sheep. Throughout four centuries Romano-British culture evolved from the Iron Age society, and when Roman rule collapsed the Romano-British were left to cope with the Anglo-Saxon invaders.

By the seventh century Southern England knew many Saxon invasions and settlements. They were the first people to settle in river valleys. Local burials, artefacts and field layouts found suggest there was a settlement in the Wallop Valley. They used the brookside track, today's road, instead of the Roman road. About 648 A.D. Winchester had its first great Christian Church, and Christianity reached Wallop, for a Saxon Church stood where St Andrew's stands today, before the Normans came.

'Hamtunscire' existed as a county owned by Anglo-Saxon kings by 757 A.D. and by the time of Alfred the Great (871-899 A.D.) Winchester was the capital of Wessex, so it is not surprising that Wallop, so near to the principal royal city of the Anglo-Saxon kingdom, with its Buckholt Forest for good hunting, was one of the royal demesnes or manors. This was a large agricultural holding rather than a great residential estate, administered by a bailiff or reeve for the king. For a short while from 1016 A.D. invading Danes ruled Wessex under Canute after conquering the Saxons in a battle west of Andover. 'Kentsborough' said to derive from 'Canute's Barrow or Burh' may reflect the Danish overlordship of Wallop. However, Saxons regained the Crown by intermarriage and Edward the Confessor owned Wallop until his death in 1066.

Wallope was one of the many estates held (leased) by the powerful Saxon overlord, Earl Godwin, Edward's father-in-law. The largest Manor 'was held by the Countess Godiva of Earl Godwin' - Fifehead is reputedly her home. The second largest estate, roughly Over Wallop Parish, was held by Earl Harold, Godwin's son, who as King Harold was killed at the Battle of Hastings with men of Tytherly and no doubt of Wallope too.

William the Conqueror, Harold's triumphant cousin, took over the Crown lands of Wallope, and the daily lives of the peasants continued under new Norman overlords. William kept Nether Wallop in demesne, his friend Hugh de Port was given holdings in Over Wallop. Twenty years later in 1086 William ordered the first land utilisation survey of England to be made, a detailed inquiry and survey made by responsible men for taxation purposes. The returns were entered in that great report the Domesday Book, which was kept in the Treasury at Winchester. En route to the swearing-in of his landowners near Salisbury that year, William camped at Chirges Campe, thought to be Norman Court near Wallop.

'Wallope' - today The Wallops, has a long, detailed entry in Domesday Book which gives a picture of a large rural community in a wealthy agricultural area. The royal estate was worth £ 27 but was farmed for £ 31.5s and was overlapped by the royal Broughton demesne (now Garlogs). Ploughlands, water meadows, pastures for cattle and sheep, pannage for pigs, valuable woodlands, a saltern (somewhere along the coast) and two houses in Winchester worth 65d are recorded. Three water mills in Nether Wallop ground corn for its population of at least a hundred families for there were 30 villeins, each representing a farm, also 39 borderers and 18 servants. On the Wallop Brook, nine mills served the two Wallops and Broughton, as Nine Mile (i.e., mill) Water reminds us. There was a wealthy church owning land and tithes, and a chapel. Two small tenements were leased direct from the King.

William and his sons knew Wallope and the district well. They hunted in the New Forest and in the nearer Buckholt Forest which then covered a large area in southern Wallop. Wallop was only 13 miles from the Castle he built for himself in Winchester, and eight miles away from his favourite palace of Clarendon, on the Roman road from old Salisbury to London. It was at Clarendon Palace that Henry II in 1166 made the vital Assize of Clarendon introducing trial by jury, the Assize Courts, and other long esteemed foundations of English justice.

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