On the Changes -which have taken 

 place in East Kent in the Coast and 

 River Valleys since the Roman occupa- 

 tion of Britain. 



A PAPER BY G. DOWKER, F.G.S. 



We will now proceed to give the historical evidences, or 

 at least a brief summary of them. 



At the eastern extremity of Kent is situate the Isle of 

 Thanet, now however hardly to be called an island. But that 

 it was formerly so is evident. Bede, in his Ecclesiastical 

 History, writes — " Thanet, divided from the other land by 

 the river Wantsum, which is about three furlongs over and 

 fordable only in two places.'-' On the north and south entrances 

 to this strait were two noted Roman stations — Rcgulbium and 

 Rutupium, sometimes called Rutupia;, and now seen in the noted 

 camps of Reculver and Richborough. Ammianus Marcellus, a 

 Roman historian, relates that Lupicinus, with troops, arrived at 

 Boulogne ; there he collected a fleet, and having embarked his 

 troops, set sail with a favourable wind, and arrived at Rutupise, a 

 station on the opposite coast. There are numerous other 

 mentions of Rutupium as a seaport, it being the usual landing- 

 place from the Continent. In the Anglo-Saxon chronicle it is 

 related that in 1052 Harold and his father (Earl Godwin), with a 

 great fleet, went from Dover to Sandwich." And they went to 

 North Mouth, and so towards London. This North Mouth was 

 the Reculver end of the Wantsum estuary. When Richborough 

 ceased to be used as a port we have no direct evidence. But 

 Stonar and Sandwich — Lundenwich very early in Saxon times 

 assumed its place. Sandwich under the Normans became one 

 of the Cinque Ports, though they are not mentioned collectively 

 in Domesday ; Dover, Sandwich, and Romney occur as privileged 

 ports. But in Edward IV.'s reign, 1100 to 1135, the Head 

 Ports were Hastings, Sandwich, Dover, Romney, Hithe, Rye, 

 and Winchelsea.f Boys' History of Sandwich says " That the 

 Cinque Ports were originally safe and commodious harbours is 

 clear from their name, as well as from their history. It 

 is, however, curious to advert to the alterations that have taken 

 place in these once famous havens, Hastings, Romney, and 



* Bede, Ecclesiastical History, chap, i, 25. 

 t Boys, p. 769. 



