THE
P RTAL
February 2013
Page 13
Harlow in Essex
by Harry Schnitker
Many historians
of the Anglo-Saxons have noted the centrality of Rome in the worldview
of pre-Conquest England. Simply put, their salvation had come from Rome, Rome was the centre of their
Church’s authority, and these facts made the Eternal City and the Papacy the loadstones of the Anglo-Saxon
world view.
There is, of course, a delicious
irony in this, at least from a
Catholic point of view. The
Anglo-Saxon pagan invaders
had destroyed the indigenous
Christianity of England by
driving out the Romans.
Council of Arles
This happened in the Harlow
region, the focal point of this
month’s P ortal . We are certain
that this was a Christian area,
and hear of Bishop Restituts of
London attending the Council of
Arles in 314. Between the Anglo-
Saxon conquest of the fifth
century and the re-foundation of
the Bishopric of London in 604,
the area was pagan.
Domesday Book
This has ancient roots: at least
three churches close to Harlow
have Mary as their titular:
Sawbridgeworth
(Great
St
Mary), Little Hallingbury (St
Mary the Virgin) and Birchanger
(St Mary). All three have
retained Saxon elements in their
buildings; at Little Hallingbury
the complete nave is substantially
Saxon.
Mary is not an Anglo-Saxon
saint, but the dedications point
to a deeper truth: it expresses
in the landscape the worldview
of the Anglo-Saxons. Marian
devotion in the West was almost
totally confined to Rome. North
of the Alps it was in Anglo-Saxon
England that Our Lady was first
venerated.
The Harlow region was agrarian
Anglo-Saxon Harlow
and sparsely populated. In the
Domesday Book the manor of
The international orientation
Harlowbury, which included
of the Anglo-Saxon Harlow
most of Harlow, contained 31
region was not just confined
villeins, bordars, and serfs; there
to Rome, either. This relatively
was a water mill, 4 rounceys,
isolated region of small peasants
25 beasts, 50 swine, 60 sheep, 3
reached out to France, through
colts, and 5 hives of bees. If we
dedicating the church at Bishops
multiply the adult male ‘villeins, bordars and serfs’ by Stortford to St Michael, which happened as early as
about four, we have a population of around 120.
673. The cult of the Archangel, chief protector against
the devil and demons, was very strong in France. Also
From 1044, the estate belonged to the Abbey of Bury from there came the devotion to St Giles, the titular of
St Edmunds. It was only in the mid-twelfth century Great Hallingbury, constructed around 1050.
that a chapel was erected, and not until 1219 that the
church became a parish. All this is, of course, well after St Giles
the Norman Conquest, yet the dedication of Harlow’s
Giles was an eighth-century French hermit, who was
church is, nevertheless, revealing: its titular is the especially venerated by the Frankish kings. Traces,
Mother of God.
perhaps, of the origins of the earliest missionaries
in the Harlow region? We shall never know. What
Marian dedications
is certain is the role played by Faith in connecting
In the four hundreds around Harlow, over half Harlow and its vicinity to the wider world through the
the current churches have Marian dedications. Catholic Church.