Navimago regentium
Attested: Navimago regentium at position 44 in the Ravenna Cosmography
Where: The Roman city at Chichester and/or the grand villa at Fishbourne attributed to a client king ?Togodumnus.
Name Origin: Literally ‘waterside flat area of the rulers’, based on Latin navis ‘ship’, plus -magus discussed under Magis, plus Latin regentium ‘of the rulers (plural)’. Navis in place names may have referred to waterside marshes, as discussed here.
Notes: This is one name from which a spurious *Noviomagno *regnentium has been invented and applied to Chichester. When navis referred to a river, it is more likely to have meant ‘marshy shore’ than ‘boat-shaped valley’. Another possible candidate is Selsey, which is often suggested to be cymenes ora, where one of the first post-Roman Anglo-Saxon kingdoms was established. The whole Manhood peninsula behind Selsey has some of the “best arable land in the country”. Note the proximity of the Nab Tower and rocks, plus the uncertain origin of nub and knob. This analysis rejects the promontory fort jutting into the river Itchen at Bitterne, which also used to be assigned (probably wrongly) to Clausentum. See about Ptolemy's Ρηγνοι people for a discussion of the difficulties raised by Reg-, in an area where the Cosmography also lists Regno and Raxtomessasenua.
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