Clausentum
Attested: Clausentum on iter 7 of the Antonine Itinerary
Where: Shedfield, Hampshire, where a Romano-British settlement has been found at SU55301355. Located by mileages in the Antonine Itinerary on the Roman road between Venta Belgarum (Twyford, near Winchester) and Regno (Fishbourne palace, near Chichester).
Name origin: Latin claudo ‘to close’, with past participle clausus, seems to have acquired the prolific noun-forming suffix -entum for *clausentum to mean ‘enclosure’. Maybe that refers to a royal park enclosed by the ruler at Fishbourne, much like the later Normans claimed the New Forest. Or maybe it refers to this area of Hampshire being enclosed behind the Isle of Wight, because Latin vectis ‘pole’ could be mean ‘door bar’.
Notes: This site lies near the navigable limit of the river Hamble and the modern Fairthorne Manor boating centre, close to a Roman site at Curbridge, and to the locations of Cerdicesford and Cerdicesleah mentioned in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. Presumably it was a rest stop (like a later coaching inn) on the Roman road, where archaeological finds include a Roman settlement excavated under a new housing estate, a few miles from the junction (Armis) at Wickham, SU578111. The name Shedfield derives from shide (split plank of wood) and has a remote chance of being a calque of Clausentum by referring to an enclosure palissade. This analysis overrules previous guesses about Bitterne, on a promontory sticking into the river Itchen, with Roman engineering work, (e.g. a claustra ‘lock, barrier, dam’) in the river Itchen there. The whole Solent area is rich in early names with uncertain locations, with Navimago regentium, Portum Adurni, Armis, Ardaoneon, Leucomagno, and Raxtomessasenua all in the mix, along with interesting later places such as Carisbrooke and Mansbridge.
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Last edited 10 July 2024 to main Menu.