SOUTH SHIELDS  

A town in the County of Tyne and Wear, England, at the mouth of the River Tyne.

It is in one of the Five Districts of Tyne & Wear called South Tyneside comprising the towns of South Shields and  Jarrow, together with Hebburn, Whitburn, East and West Boldon, Marsden, Cleadon and Harton.

Location : Latitude 55º  North, Longitude 1º  25' West 
Distance : 9m. E. of Newcastle, 277m. N of London

The Stone Age - before SOUTH SHIELDS developed

There is evidence of Stone Age inhabitants having been in what is now South Shields as early as 400 B.C., and it is thought that evidence suggests the existence of roads from that period. In 1949 a man digging his garden found a skeleton which was dated at 2,000 BC

The earliest recorded known inhabitants of this part of the country were a small, dark, non-Aryan race of men, who were tattooed all over their bodies: Rudyard Kipling referred to them as the "painted people" in his stories about Hadrian's Wall (referred to later). 

 The Celtic Age - civilisation begins to be formed

About five or six centuries before the Christian era this aboriginal race in England was conquered and driven northward by the Celts, a race of tall fair-haired, blue-eyed invaders from the east. They were the first of the Aryan peoples to begin the great trek westward which over-ran and peopled modern Europe.

They gave the Celtic name CAER URFA to this settlement on the River Tyne - loosely translated as "A City of the chieftain Urfa". However it is suggested by some that Caer Urfa means "a town on the rock" This was the first of the three names by which this town was to be known. These local inhabitants were the Brigantes, a hardy, warlike and adventurous people who settled in a stronghold at the mouth of the R. Tyne on a naturally defensive area which is still known as the Lawe.

The early settlers possessed a rudimentary civilisation. Their tools and weapons were of flint, laboriously chipped into rude shape and sharpness, and fastened to wooden shafts by thongs of hide or sinew. Many examples of these tools were revealed in the old Celtic settlement when excavations were undertaken at and under the later built Roman Fort on the Lawe Top.

These early Shieldsfolk were fishermen using first, coracles (light skiffs of basketwork covered with skins, and later rude boats hollowed out of the trunks of trees. As time went on our Celtic predecessors reached a high level of civilisation. Their religion was Druidism, which seems to have originated in Britain and spread later to the continent. This was a form of nature worship, with the Sun as chief Deity. They believed in the immortality of the soul  and they taught as the three principles of their religion, to worship the gods, to do no evil and to be brave. But these religious rites were marred by human sacrifices - at least of prisoners taken in battle, and other practices resembling those of witch doctors in Africa.

This Celtic civilisation prospered and by the time of the Roman invasion in the first century A.D. the    local Britons had acquired the art of smelting and working in metals. They forged swords, axes, spear heads, shields and breastplates of bronze. Specimens of these have been found from time to time and are now displayed in the local museum.  

The Roman Age - and the building of the fort at ARBIEA

Julius Caesar had made his first landing in Kent in 55 B.C. but the Britons offered such stout resistance that he didn't stay long. It was not until A.D. 43 that the Romans were able to maintain a sufficient foothold that they were able, in A.D. 71, to sent an expedition north to subdue the troublesome northerners: this invasion of Northern Britain was not completed until A.D. 79.  It was then that the Roman troops under Agricola defeated the native Brigantes at the R. Tyne. Then in A.D.122 the Emperor Hadrian visited Britain from which date the building of the famous Hadrian's Wall (now a Heritage Site) was begun in order to keep out the marauding Scots from across the border. It took six years to complete the 73 mile long Wall from Wallsend on the Tyne to Bowness in Cumbria. (for more information about Hadrian's Wall visit www.hadrians-wall.org ). South Shields, on the opposite bank of the Tyne to both North Shields and its adjacent town of Wallsend, was obviously of strategic importance and became a major eastern port for the Romans building the Wall and became the major store for grain. The remains of these granaries are well preserved and can be seen today at the site of the Roman Fort on the Lawe Top. This fort was known to the Romans as ARBEIA, thus giving Shields its second name. [ For fuller details about the fort click on Arbeia]

The Romans were to remain in Britain and to occupy the fort on the Lawe until A.D.400 at which time the Roman Empire declined and Britain was abandoned. During the period of occupation the populace had prospered and enjoyed the security which the Roman occupiers gave the country. This made the locals less self-reliant and were thus unable to resist the incursions of the Picts - a pre-Celtic tribe in Scotland - who followed hot foot upon the heels of the retreating Romans. The Britons appealed for help, firstly and unsuccessfully, from the departed Romans and they then sought help from the Saxons who inhabited the German coast. 

The Anglo-Saxon Dark Ages - the forming of Northumbria

They came over in their 'cyuls' or keels accompanied by their kinsmen the Angles and Jutes. However after beating back the Picts they then conquered or drove out the native Britons. These new invaders had never been under Roman rule or influence and were totally different in their approach to society. They were pagans and introduced their own heathen deities - Tiu, Woden, Thor and Frigga - their names being the origin of the days of the week Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday. (Ed. writes -no doubt useful information for compilers of pub quizzes!). They were to occupy most of the land including the North-East by about A.D. 45. Whilst the Saxons settled in the south and south-east, the Angles took over the east and north-east, thus establishing the original Angleland, which later became the name for the country's united Kingdoms, England. 

At first the new settlers were a mere collection of independent clans of tribes, but almost a century after their settlement they united into larger groups under super-chiefs. One such chief was Ida who set up the area called Bernicia (roughly the modern counties of Northumberland and Durham) and after marrying the British Princess Bebba set up Bebbanburgh (Bamburgh) as its capital. At the same time the tribes in what we now call Yorkshire similarly set up the kingdom of Deira with its capital at Eoforure (York). Ida's grandson, Ethelfrith, was later to unite both these kingdoms into  one - Northumbria. In A.D.603 he extended its boundary northwards to the Forth after defeating the Scottish King Aidan. 

One of Ethelfrith's heirs, Edwin, spent his youth at the court of Redwald of East Anglia. In A.D.616 Redwald and Edwin defeated and killed Ethelfrith in battle. Edwin succeeded the Northumbrian throne and under his kingship the North-east's conversion to Christianity was rekindled after its earlier introduction by the Romans. He was to die in A.D.633. This period is well chronicled in Bede's "Ecclesiastical History", referred to later, in which Bede suggests that Edwin had been more powerful than any other previous king.

The Dark Ages continue - with just a chink of light

Ethelfrith, had defeated the Scottish king, Aidan, who was exiled to Iona, the centre of the Celtic Church, off the west coast of Scotland and here he embraced Christianity. Now it was the turn his son, Oswald,   in A.D.635 to conquer the heathens who earlier had defeated his father, Aidan, (by now a monk on Iona).  Oswald, later to be elevated a Saint, invited his father to become Bishop of Lindisfarne (Holy Island) (634 - 651) and who was also later to become a Saint.  He was empowered to complete the conversion of Northumbria to Christianity which had been introduced during the Roman occupation and encouraged by Edwin during his reign. This period is also well chronicled in Bede's "Ecclesiastical History". 

King Oswald had a number of royal seats, one of which was at CAER URFA, and resided there on occasions. It was there that his son, Oswin, was born who later was to provide about 15 acres of land at CAER URFA  for the erection of a church in the vicinity. At the request of Aidan, in 647, Princess Hild, granddaughter of Ella of Deira and a near relative of  King Oswin, established in the town a small religious house to be used by herself and a few companions as a convent. This was the site of one of the earliest Christian Churches in the North of England and was followed  by another church, later to be known as St. Hilda's Church, South Shields. 

This church was established about 40 years before that of the monastery, St Peter and Paul, at Jarrow  made famous as a result of Bede's work there. At seven years of age Bede had been sent to be educated at the nearby monastery at Wearmouth and he lived there and, when built, at the monastery at Jarrow  for 50 busy and studious years. As well as teaching, he was to write the earliest of our English histories, both secular and ecclesiastical, and much of our knowledge of this area stems from his writings. Bede was also to make a translation into English of the Gospel of St. John which he completed on the day he died on 25th May 735 (For further information see Dates)

Oswin, one of the greatest Northumbrian kings, who had laid the foundations of Christianity in this part of England, died in 670.

In his history of South Shields, Hodgson comments that ".....while Roman rule left little impress upon the language, the laws, or the customs of the people, The Anglo- Saxon invasion brought in its train the English language of today and left its lasting impress on our national life and social polity."

The Viking Age - The Vikings were Danes who came mainly from Norway (It was part of Denmark until 1907)

In 789 the Danes, (the Vikings), arrived and there are records of their ships being wrecked on the Herd Sands (now called Littlehaven) but their main onslaught was further north where they destroyed the church at Lindisfarne in 793. They then turned their attention again to the Tyne and in 794 it was the turn of the monastery at Jarrow. However the locals resisted the attack and many of the Viking leaders were killed. The weather also helped to favour the locals and the storms broke up many Viking ships: those who weren't drowned were killed as they came ashore on the Lawe at the Roman Fort, ARBEIA

The Danes continued to harass the coast and in  875, Halfdene (the Danish 'Drake') brought his large fleet to the Tyne to what is now known as Jarrow Slack and settled on the 'island' of the Lawe using it as his winter quarters. At that time the area comprising  the Lawe was a delta of the Tyne and the main river at this period was the River Don, not the present route of the Tyne as we know it today.

Halfdene conquered the whole of Deira and the southern part of Bernicia and settled there with his followers - but not for long. Within a year King Alfred (he who burnt the cakes!) put to sea with his fleet and, in spite of the Danish naval experience which was both admired and feared at that time, managed to defeat the Danes.

Meanwhile the local chiefs were doing their bit to remove the Danes. Eadred, the Abbot of Carlisle was directed, in a vision, by St Cuthbert to find Guthred, the son of a past chief, Hardacnut. He had earlier been taken into slavery. and when found he was to be taken to the Lawe there to be invested with the royal insignia as King of Northumbria. King Alfred accepted Guthred as his Viceroy, and together they overthrew the Danes and by 883 they were driven out of Durham. As a result Shields and Durham again came under Anglian rule..

In gratitude of his release and his victory over the Danes, Guthred bestowed on the Church of God and St Cuthbert the whole of the territory between the "Tyn" and the "Weor". King Alfred agreed to the gift and added to this, for persons accused of crime,  the privilege of 37 days sanctuary  in whatsoever Church the remains St Cuthbert's should rest. The great bronze knocker on the main door of Durham Cathedral is a relic of this privilege of sanctuary.

 The Norman Age - SOUTH SHIELDS is born 

Peace reigned once again and the influence of the church was to be felt for many years up to  the time of the Norman Kings. When King Harold was killed at the battle of Hastings in 1066 William brought his own men over from France and they started throwing their weight around. Waltcher, a German was appointed Bishop of Northumbria in 1071 and in 1078 was given the title Earl of Northumbria.  He was assassinated at Gateshead in 1080  and following this William sent his half-brother, Odo to quash the insurrections in the region. He did this with typical brutality, killing and maiming as many as his troops could without respect for sex or age. In the same year a new castle was built on the northern bank of the Tyne, opposite the site of Walcher's death, by William's son Robert. The city of Newcastle grew under its walls, and was a tangible sign of Norman rule in the area.

William caused an inventory to be made of his new kingdom in what came to be known as the "Doomsday Book" but  Durham County was omitted  from this it because of the punitive expedition earlier by Odo. However in 1183 Bishop Pudsey of Durham produced for the county the equivalent to the Doomsday Book, known as the "Boldon Buke", called such merely because Boldon was the fist entry in it! 

A later book - the "Melsamby Buke" - a rent book of the Prior and Convent of Durham, was compiled in 1235. It lists, under the heading "South Sheles", the names of 24 tenants of small-holdings and tenements. Later, in 1256, the same Prior of Durham was indicted to appear before the judges at the Assize in Newcastle for founding "a large ville" (town) in the port of Tyne with 27 houses, two bakeries and four breweries for the purpose of trade and also that the men of "Suthcheles" sold their fish at home wholesale, to the detriment of the market at Newcastle. This is of interest on two counts. Firstly, the local accent of South Shields is pronounced "Sooth Sheels" - not unlike the name of  "Suthcheles" referred to above. The story of the trade being taken away from Newcastle by this new town was the beginning of the 'trade war' which existed between Newcastle and the towns of North and South Shields and was to continue in various forms until  29th August 1865 on which date the Customs Port at South Shields was established.

Thus the third and present name of the town SOUTH SHIELDS dates from the 13th century,  This name and that of the Lawe on which stood the Roman Fort, Arbeia, are both of Anglian origin. In his book, 'Northumbrian Words' R O Heslop said that in no part of the country is the impact of the Anglian tongue and Anglian customs more marked than in, and around South Shields, '.............the folkspeech today is Anglish in origin, probably affected in its vocalisation by subsequent Danish invasion' , but inherently and essentially Anglish or English in the original signification of the term'

 Each occupier over the centuries of the territory of CAER URFA, ARBEIA and SOUTH SHIELDS have added their qualities to the richness of character of the folk who live here. We, who were born, not just a 'Geordie' but particularly a 'Sand-dancer', are proud to be part of this conglomeration of our various ancestors. It is thanks to them that we take pride in being citizens of a town renowned for its friendly folk and of being generous in our help towards others. Whilst we will grumble 'til the cows come home about 'this and that' that should be done or should not be done, in and around our town, we still rejoice in being  one of the 'Folks o' Shields' (click to listen to Fred Lawson singing it's history.)

Thanks is extended to the authors of many of the extracts used in this story. These include 

"The History of South Shields", based on the 1903 book by George B Hodgson

  "South Shields - A story of a town and its people" author Peter Gillanders

"The Millennium Remembered - From the Mists of Time" Text by Doris Johnson

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Copyright © 2001 Ron Drew
Last revised: January 16, 2005.