Rape (county subdivision)

A rape is a traditional territorial sub-division of the county of Sussex in England, formerly used for various administrative purposes. Their origin is unknown, but they appear to predate the Norman Conquest of 1066. Historically, the rapes formed the basis of local government in Sussex.

There are various theories about their origin. Possibly surviving from the Romano-British era or perhaps representing the shires of the kingdom of Sussex, the Sussex rapes, like the Kentish lathes, go back to the dawn of English history when their main function would have been to provide food rents and military manpower to the king. The rapes may also derive from the system of fortifications devised by Alfred the Great in the late ninth century to defeat the Vikings.

The Sussex rapes each had a headquarters in the developed south where the lord's hall, court, demesne lands, principal church and peasant holdings were located, whereas to the north there were smaller dependent settlements in the marsh, woodland and heath used for summer pasture. Each rape was split into several hundreds.

The toponymy of the rapes is unclear and debated to this day. First suggested by William Somner in the 17th century, it seems that the derivation of the word from the Old English rāp (rope) has been made practically certain. The suggestion that ropes were used to mark out territory, was well countered by J. H. Round, asking "do those who advance such views realize the size of the districts they have to deal with?" However, Heinrich Brunner explained the application of "rope" to an administrative district by the old German custom of defining the limits of the "peace" of popular open-air courts by stakes and ropes, the ropes then giving a name first to the court and then afterwards to the area of its jurisdiction, and produced a case where reep, the Dutch cognate of rāp, is applied to such a judicial area. The parish of Rope, in Cheshire is one place name in England derived from the word rāp.

The Saxon origin has been questioned, as the Normans showed little interest in learning the English language, and thus it seems unlikely that they would have adopted a local word. It has been suggested that the term comes from the old French raper, meaning to seize or take by force.

One suggested etymology of the word, from Edward Lye in the 18th century, is in the Icelandic territorial division hreppr, meaning 'district or tract of land'. However, this is rejected in the New English Dictionary, and according to the English Place-Name Society is "phonologically impossible".

The origin of the rapes is not known. It is possible that the rapes represent the shires of the ancient kingdom of Sussex, especially as in the 12th century they had sheriffs of their own. According to John Morris the boundary between the Rapes of Lewes and Pevensey, which cuts through the middle of Lewes, probably pre-dates the founding of Lewes in the late 9th or early 10th century. If one boundary had existed so early then it is quite possible that other boundaries also existed. Sussex's rapes may have been a similar division to the six or seven lathes of neighbouring Kent which were undoubtedly early administrative units.

Another possibility is that the rapes may derive from the system of fortifications, or burhs (boroughs) devised by Alfred the Great in the late ninth century to defeat the Vikings. The Rapes, or similar predecessors may have been created for the purpose of maintaining these early boroughs, or they may have re-used earlier divisions for this purpose. In Sussex, the fortifications in the Burghal Hidage were recorded as being at Eorpeburnan on the Sussex-Kent border, Hastings, Lewes, Burpham and Chichester. The "Burghal Hidage" lists boroughs in geographical order. Burpham was the predecessor of Arundel and Eorpeburnan or Heorpeburnan should be the predecessor of Rye. Pevensey and Steyning were not included. It looks as if the lands of Steyning served Lewes and those of Pevensey served Hastings, while the eastern portion of the later Hastings rape was attached to the Rye area. It is possible that these divisions might be rapes as four of them (taking Burpham as equivalent to neighbouring Arundel) had the same centres as later rapes. If this is the case then the rapes must have been completely reorganised in the next century and a half. Since the system of fortifications introduced by Alfred the Great extended into Surrey and Wessex as well, but neither of these regions have rapes or any similar sub-divisions.