Rottingdean

Rottingdean is a village in the city Brighton and Hove, on the south coast of England. It borders the villages Saltdean, Ovingdean and Woodingdean, and has a historic centre, often the subject of picture postcards.

The name Rottingdean is normally interpreted as the valley of the people associated with Rōta (a male personal name). Rota was probably the leader of a band of Saxons who invaded the region in 450–500 AD and replaced the existing Romano-British inhabitants. The first recorded mention is Rotingeden, in the Domesday Book of 1086. Other variations to be found in ancient charters include Ruttingedene (1272), Rottyngden (1315) and Rottendeane (1673).

The name was contrasted unflatteringly with Goodwood (another place in Sussex) in a national 1970s advertising campaign for wood-preserver.

Rottingdean is in a dry valley whose sides in the upper reaches are quite steep, and this valley comes right down to the English Channel coast.

The parish became part of county borough of Brighton in 1928. In 1996 it regained an independent parish council, the only one in what is now the city of Brighton and Hove. Within the parish lies the deserted hamlet of Balsdean. The adjacent village of Woodingdean was formerly (until 1933) part of Rottingdean parish. Also formerly in the parish were most of the district of what is now Saltdean; Roedean School, an independent school for girls; and the Blind Veterans UK Centre, a rehabilitation centre for blinded ex-Service personnel.

The first settled inhabitants of Rottingdean were the Neolithic people, arriving around 2500 BC. They would have hacked down trees and scrub to make fields for the growing of cereals such as barley. Through the ages, from Neolithic to Bronze to Iron Age, from Roman to Anglo-Saxon the same fields were probably worked. A Bronze Age barrow and pottery fragments were found when houses were being built in the area now known as Rottingdean Heights, east of the village centre. On the other side of the village, an Iron Age burial site was uncovered in 1863 on Beacon Hill.

The Celtic Iron Age mode of life probably continued much unchanged after the arrival of the Romans in 43 AD, but, from the middle of the third century, people living near the coast were terrorised by Saxon raiders. Some panic-stricken wealthy Romano-Britons took their money from their villas and buried it in pots on remote downland sites. One such hoard was unearthed at Balsdean and contained over a thousand coins dating from the years 275–287. After the Romans withdrew from Britain, Saxons started to settle in Sussex, the name Sussex being derived from the land of the South Saxons. In the sixth century, the South Saxons settled in Rottingdean, with their leader probably giving rise to the name of the village (see above).

Five hundred years later, in 1066, the Normans invaded. The new king, William the Conqueror, rewarded his followers with land. Rottingdean was part of the Lewes district given to his brother-in-law Earl William de Warenne. From information in the Domesday Book of 1086 it can be estimated that Rottingdean had a total population of between 50 and 100 at that time.