CHURCH SERVICES

The Services of Sonning and of All Saints' Church will be the same as in the month of July, 10:1911 mor2 elgnɑ no ytimban ALL SAINTS' CHURCH." 10

et

During the past month the Chancel of All Saints' Church has received the addition of a Reredos, the kind gift ift of Mrs. and Miss Crawshay, of Caversham Park! The Reredos consists of seven canopies, worked in Bath stone, 'supported on columns of Devonshire marble. The design is effective, and gives great satisfaction. We are now able to congratulate ourselves upon the completion of the New Chancel and we desire to record our heartfelt thanks to those, to whose munificence the parish is indebted for this great and useful and beautiful addition to the Church.

On Wednesday, July 10th, the Festival of the Henley Choral Association, was held in Henley Parish Church. The Choir of All Saints' took part in the Festival. Eleven Choirs were present, num- ‹ bering nearly 200 voices. The service was extremely well done, the careful chanting of the Psalms, and the precision and spirit with which the Anthem was sung, being specially noticeable. The Anthem was 66 The Heavens are telling," (Haydn). An eloquent and practical sermon was preached by the Lord Bishop of Oxford, from S. Luke xv., 32. The weather was all that could be desired.

SONNING SCHOOL.

The Examination for Monitors was held at St. Mary's Hall, Henley, on Thursday, July 11th, and was conducted by the Rev. A. Barber, Diocesan School Inspector. The second exhibition for Boys' Schools was awarded to Joseph Francis, of Sonning School.

MEMORIALS OF THE PARISH OF SONNING.

1.

Having completed our account of Sonning Church, it remains to say something about the Parish and its History. But here the difficulty is greater. For the fabric of the Church, for the most part, tells its own story, whilst the materials for the History of the Parish are scanty, and to a great extent inaccessible. We must however make a beginning, and hope that as we proceed, more information on the subject may reach us.

Few villages, in Berkshire certainly, are so worthy of record as Sonning. Not only is there the beauty of its situation, hardly surpassed by that of any other village on the Thames, and the architectural richness of its Church, but there is also its great historical interest in very early times. Of course we do not presume to come in competition with the towns of Windsor, or Reading, or Abingdon, but amongst Berkshire villages none can set up a claim against the ancient episcopal See of Sonning. Before however entering upon the vexed question of our early history, a few words must be said in this number, about the position, limits, and natural features of the Parish.

I have long been anxious to find out the meaning of the word Sonning, but I can discover nothing to throw light upon it in any Continued at end.

}

I

Continued from second page.

ancient document. I am however informed by Mr. Earle, the great authority on Anglo-Saxon literature, that all terminations of proper names in "ing," or "inge," as it used to be spelt in old writings, indicate the site of a Saxon settlement, founded by a clan or family, whose name is retained in the first part of the word: and he therefore believes that Sonninge means the place belonging to the tribe or family of Sonni, or Sonn, just as Redinge or Readinge, represents the family of Rede. or Reade. Sonning parish contains 10.000 acres of land, and is situated in the counties of Berks, and Oxford, the Thames dividing it. Very few parishes in any part of England cross a river, and I imagine none overleap a natural boundary of such importance as the river Thames, which might well divide a kingdom. The Parish consists of four" Liberties," as they are called, or districts, i. e. Sonning Town, Woodley and Sandford, and Earley, in Berks., and Eye and Dunsden, in Oxfordshire. These four Liberties are in fact four separate parishes, having each a Churchwarden and Overseers. and a separate rating. Sonning and Woodley are in the Hundred of Sonning, Earley in the Hundred of Charlton, and Eye and Dunsden in the Hundred of Binfield and Longtree. Eye," it need hardly be said, or "ey," or "I," means Island, and Sonning Eye is, of course, the island formed by the backwater of the Thames.

66

A large part of England," says Archbishop Trench, "all that portion of it which the Saxons occupied, is divided into Hundreds. The Hundred is supposed to have been originally a group or settlement of one hundred free families of Saxon colonists. If this was so, we have

between the at once an explanation of the immense disproportion

area of the "Hundred" in the southern, and in the more northern counties; the average number of square miles in a "Hundred " of Sussex or Kent being three or four and twenty: of Lancashire more than three hundred. The Saxon population would naturally be far the densest in the earlier settlements of the east and south, while more to west and north the tenure would be one rather of conquest than of colonization, and the free families much fewer and more scattered." This seems to be substantially a correct view. In the earliest times we find the inhabitants of the country classed in tens and hundreds, each probably comprising respectively a corresponding number of members, together with the necessary officers, viz., a tithing-man for each tithing, (or company of ten families), and a hundred-man for each hundred. It is said that we owe this institution of tithings and hundreds as well as shires to Alfred the Great, but it is probable that they existed before his time. "The ready willingness," observes Mr. Jones, in his learned work, "Domesday for Wiltshire," "to believe Alfred to have been the author of these institutions, is an instance of the strength of national feeling, which, in reverence for the memory of that great man, makes him the representative of everything that is good, and connects every institution of worth with his name. Possibly the tradition may be in part true, for he may have found it necessary after the devastation of the Danish wars to make a new muster or regulation of the tithings, nay, even to cause in some districts of his kingdom a new territorial division to be established on the old principle."

The Parish, comprising these four divisions, is of unusual extent: it is between 10 and 11 miles from the furthest point of Sonning

CHURCH SERVICES.

The Services of Sonning and of All Saints' Church will be the same as in the month of July.

ALL SAINTS' CHURCH." D ""*

During the past month the Chancel of All Saints' Church has received the addition of a Reredos, the kind gift of Mrs. and Miss Crawshay, of Caversham Park. The Reredos consists of seven canopies, worked in Bath stone, supported on columns of Devonshire marble. The design is effective, and gives great satisfaction. We are now able to congratulate ourselves upon the completion of the New Chancel: and we desire to record our heartfelt thanks to those, to whose munificence the parish is indebted for this great and useful and beautiful addition to the Church.

CHORAL FESTIVAL.

On Wednesday, July 10th, the Festival of the Henley Choral Association, was held in Henley Parish Church. The Choir of All Saints' took part in the Festival. Eleven Choirs were present, numbering nearly 200 voices. The service was extremely well done, the careful chanting of the Psalms, and the precision and spirit with which the Anthem was sung, being specially noticeable. The Anthem was "The Heavens are telling," (Haydn). An eloquent and practical sermon was preached by the Lord Bishop of Oxford, from S. Luke xv., 32. The weather was all that could be desired.

SONNING SCHOOL.

The Examination for Monitors was held at St. Mary's Hall, Henley, on Thursday, July 11th, and was conducted by the Rev. A.. Barber, Diocesan School Inspector. The second exhibition for Boys' Schools was awarded to Joseph Francis, of Sonning School.

MEMORIALS OF THE PARISH OF SONNING.

1.

Having completed our account of Sonning Church, it remains to say something about the Parish and its History. But here the difficulty is greater. For the fabric of the Church, for the most part, tells its own story, whilst the materials for the History of the Parish are scanty, and to a great extent inaccessible. We must however make a beginning, and hope that as we proceed, more information on the subject may reach us.

Few villages, in Berkshire certainly, are so worthy of record as Sonning. Not only is there the beauty of its situation, hardly surpassed by that of any other village on the Thames, and the architectural richness of its Church, but there is also its great historical interest in very early times. Of course we do not presume to come in competition with the towns of Windsor, or Reading, or Abingdon, but amongst Berkshire villages none can set up a claim against the ancient episcopal See of Sonning. Before however entering upon the vexed question of our early history, a few words must be said in this number, about the position, limits, and natural features of the Parish.

I have long been anxious to find out the meaning of the word Sonning, but I can discover nothing to throw light upon it in any Continued at end.

Continued from second page.

ancient document. I am however informed by Mr. Earle, the great authority on Anglo-Saxon literature, that all terminations of proper names in "ing," or "inge," as it used to be spelt in old writings, indicate the site of a Saxon settlement, founded by a clan or family, whose name is retained in the first part of the word: and he therefore believes that Sonninge means the place belonging to the tribe or family of Sonni, or Sonn, just as Redinge or Readinge, represents the family of Rede. or Reade. Sonning parish contains 10.000 acres of land, and is situated in the counties of Berks, and Oxford, the Thames dividing it. Very few parishes in any part of England cross a river, and I imagine none overleap a natural boundary of such importance as the river Thames, which might well divide a kingdom. The Parish consists of four" Liberties," as they are called, or districts, i. e. Sonning Town, Woodley and Sandford, and Earley, in Berks., and Eye and Dunsden, in Oxfordshire. These four Liberties are in fact four separate parishes, having each a Churchwarden and Overseers. and a separate rating. Sonning and Woodley are in the Hundred of Sonning, Earley in the Hundred of Charlton, and Eye and Dunsden in the Hundred of Binfield and Longtree. "Eye," it need hardly be said, or "ey," or "I," means Island, and Sonning Eye is, of course, the island formed by the backwater of the Thames.

"A large part of England," says Archbishop Trench, "all that portion of it which the Saxons occupied, is divided into Hundreds. The Hundred is supposed to have been originally a group or settlement of one hundred free families of Saxon colonists. If this was so, we have at once an explanation of the immense disproportion between the area of the "Hundred" in the southern, and in the more northern counties; the average number of square miles in a "Hundred " of Sussex or Kent being three or four and twenty of Lancashire more than three hundred. The Saxon population would naturally be far the densest in the earlier settlements of the east and south, while more to west and north the tenure would be one rather of conquest than of colonization, and the free families much fewer and more scattered." This seems to be substantially a correct view. In the earliest times we find the inhabitants of the country classed in tens and hundreds, each probably comprising respectively a corresponding number of members, together with the necessary officers, viz., a tithing-man for each tithing, (or company of ten families), and a hundred-man for each hundred. It is said that we owe this institution of tithings and hundreds as well as shires to Alfred the Great, but it is probable that they existed before his time. "The ready willingness," observes Mr. Jones, in his learned work, "Domesday for Wiltshire," "to believe Alfred to have been the author of these institutions, is an instance of the strength of national feeling, which, in reverence for the memory of that great man, makes him the representative of everything that is good, and connects every institution of worth with his name. Possibly the tradition may be in part true, for he may have found it necessary after the devastation of the Danish wars to make a new muster or regulation of the tithings, nay. even to cause in some districts of his kingdom a new territorial division to be established on the old principle."

The Parish, comprising these four divisions, is of unusual extent : it is between 10 and 11 miles from the furthest point of Sonning