A HISTORY OF BEDFORDSHIRE 



when the West Saxons, under Cutha (^or Cuthwulf ), ' fought with the Britons 

 at Bedford and took four towns,' including 'Lygeanbyrig,' at or near Luton,* 

 This suggests that the West Saxons claimed at least the south-western 

 part of the modern county ; but at no time between the rise of Penda, 642, 

 and the conquest of Mercia by Egbert, 823, except perhaps for a short time in 

 the reign of Ine, about 694, were they in a position to support their claim 

 against Mercia.' The fact that the shire was within the diocese of Dor- 

 chester in the loth century makes it Hkely that while the southern part 

 may have belonged to the original West Saxon bishopric of Dorchester* which 

 was established before the rise of Mercian power, the rest had been part of 

 the diocese of the Middle English,' known during the 8th and 9th centuries 

 as the diocese of Leicester, part of which became, about the epoch of the 

 Danish Invasion, the later diocese of Dorchester." Its ecclesiastical history, to 

 say nothing of other evidence, forbids the supposition that Bedfordshire was 

 ever part of East Anglia, or of Essex, which bordered it on the east. At the 

 division of England between Alfred and Guthrum Bedfordshire did not fall 

 wholly to either Danes or English ; whatever may have been the territorial 

 arrangements of 878, of which we have no accurate information, the later 

 treaty (about 885) defines the marches thus : — ' up on the Thames, and then 

 up on the Lea, and along the Lea as far as its source ; then straight to 

 Bedford, then up on the Ouse as far as Watling Street.'^ But the actual 

 settlement of the Danes did not necessarily coincide with the district over 

 which they acquired political power, and the place-names of Bedfordshire 

 afford no evidence of the displacement of the English by the invaders.* 

 Edward the Elder raided the Danish territory in 905, in retaliation for the 

 action of the Danes of East Anglia who had invaded Mercia, and he is 

 described as harrying ' their land between the dykes and the Ouse, all as far 

 north as the Fens.' ' This is explained by Florence of Worcester '" as meaning 

 ' between the boundary of the land of St. Edmund and the river Ouse ' ; and 

 he refers doubtless to the dykes that cross the Icknield Way in the south-east 

 of Cambridgeshire. Thus the Bedfordshire hundreds of Biggleswade, Clifton, 

 and Wixamtree were laid waste ; and the Ouse appears to have formed the 

 boundary of Danish East Anglia. Luton distinguished itself by beating 

 off a Danish force from Northants in 917," when Edward and his sister 

 Ethelfled were busy building ' burhs ' and preparing to sweep the Midlands. 



' Angl.-Sax. Chron. (Rolls Ser.), sub anno. ' At or near Luton ' may safely be said. The first element 

 of the name 'Lygeanbyrig' suggests a connexion with the River 'Lyge' (Lea) and the town ' Lygetun ' 

 (Luton) ; and Gaimar, who had an interesting local connexion, identifies it with Luton {Lestorie des Engles, 

 [Rolls Sen], i, 40). The more precise identification with Limbury, at the source of the Lea, and within 

 the parish of Luton, is elaborately discussed by Rev. H. Cobbe, Luton Church, App. F. Lenborough, near 

 Buckingham, popularized by J. R. Green {Making of Engl. 118), is impossible on philological grounds; for 

 earlier forms of the name Lenborough see the Bucks. Domesday, and Feud. Aids, i, Index. 



' J. R. Green appears to exaggerate the importance of the events of 5 7 1 in relation to the perma- 

 nent settlement of this part of the country. He supports his view by linguistic evidence — « Bedfordshire 

 men still speak a Saxon, Huntingdon and Northamptonshire folk speak an Engle dialect' (op. cit. 125), but 

 this is not confirmed by Dr. Joseph Wright, who says ' there is absolutely nothing in the Bedfordshire dialect 

 which would point to its being of Saxon and not of Mercian origin.' 



* Plummer, Baedae Of. Hist, ii, 24.6. ' Bede, Hist. Eccl. iii, 21. 



' Haddan and Stubbs, Councils, iii, 129-30, and note on 'See of Dorchester ' in Plummer, op. cit. 

 ii, 245. 



' Thorpe, Anct. Lows and Inst, of Engl, i, 66. ' Isaac Taylor, Words and Places, 175-6. 



' Angl.-Sax. Chron. (Rolls Ser.), sub anno. " Chron. (Engl. Hist. Soc), i, 119. 



'" Angl.-Sax. Chron. (Rolls Ser.), sub anno 914 (917). 



