54 ANTIQUITIES OF OKEHAMPTON. 



US that they called their territories Danmonia, the country of the 

 vallies, and that it once stretched eastward as far as the Belgae 

 or Somerset. This limit became reduced, about the time of Al- 

 fred, to the river Exe; when the ancient British and Saxons 

 seem to have tenanted Exeter in common. Mathew of West- 

 minster mentions more than one irruption of the horsemen, or 

 Danes as he calls them, into the western counties about this 

 period ; and the valour shewn by the Britons in repelling these 

 might have led Alfred to decline attacking their fastnesses. But 

 with Athelstan came the term of their independence. A pitched 

 battle was fought near Exeter, in which the Britons suffered a 

 total defeat ; all resistance was crushed at once ; the territory 

 between the Exe and the Tamar fell to the conquerors and 

 Devonshire became for ever a part of England. 



But from that period, until the Danes at length ascended the 

 throne, this county seems to have suffered all manner of rapine 

 and devastation from them. As an instance of the terror these 

 invaders inspired, Stowe mentions that a chief who was slain near 

 Appledore was said to carry an enchanted banner that had been 

 wrought for him in needle work by the daughters of Lodbroy. 

 Weeced-port, now Bideford, the once important post of Lydford, 

 Tavistock, with its richly endowed abbey, and Exeter, with its 

 churches, were all plundered and burnt. Sir Richard Baker, in 

 his Chronicle, gives a fearful list of enormities committed at this 

 last place, when it was sacked by the Danes, 27th Aug., 1003. 

 The establishment of the Danish monarchy brought release from 

 these evils, but their reign was too brief to effect much beyond it ; 

 within half a century the Normans took possession of the throne. 



Okehampton, spelt in Doomsday book Ochenton, or the town 

 on the Oche, was, as we gather from this circumstance, in exis- 

 tance prior to the Norman conquest : it is mentioned in that sur- 

 vey as having four burgesses and a market. Indeed the term 

 included in its name Hampton, which signifies a town with in- 

 habitants, as it is a Saxon word, seems to establish its claims to 

 antiquity. However this may be we find that, soon after the 

 battle of Hastings, this place was conferred on one of the many 

 noble adventurers who followed the Norman standard. This was 

 Baldwin de Brionys also called Sass, the second son of Gilbert 

 Crispin, who was descended, with the bar sinister, from Richard 

 duke of Normandy; and consequently nearly allied in blood to 

 the conqueror himself. To this De Brionys it is usual to attribute 

 the building of Okehampton castle. 



