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Concept
Hitchin
Summary
Hitchin (ˈhɪtʃᵻn) is a market town and unparished area in the North Hertfordshire district in Hertfordshire, England, with an estimated population of 35,842.
Hitchin is first noted as the central place of the Hicce people, a tribe holding 300 hides of land as mentioned in a 7th-century document, the Tribal Hidage. Hicce, or Hicca, may mean the people of the horse. The tribal name is Old English and derives from the Middle Anglian people. It has been suggested that Hitchin was the location of 'Clofesho', the place chosen in 673 by Theodore of Tarsus the Archbishop of Canterbury during the Synod of Hertford, the first meeting of representatives of the fledgling Christian churches of Anglo-Saxon England, to hold annual synods of the churches as Theodore attempted to consolidate and centralise Christianity in England.
By 1086 Hitchin is described as a Royal Manor in Domesday Book: the feudal services of avera and inward, usually found in the eastern counties, especially Cambridgeshire and Hertfordshire, were due from the sokemen, but the manor of Hitchin was unique in levying inward. Evidence has been found to suggest that the town was once provided with an earthen bank and ditch fortification, probably in the early tenth century but this did not last. The modern spelling of the town first appears in 1618 in the "Hertfordshire Feet of Fines".
The name of the town also is associated with the small river that runs through it, most picturesquely in front of the east end of St. Mary's Church, the town's parish church. The river is noted on maps as the River Hiz. Contrary to how most people now pronounce the name, that is to say as spelt, the 'z' is an abbreviated character for a 'tch' sound in the Domesday Book (as in the name of the town). It would have been pronounced 'River Hitch'. The Hicca Way is an walking route along the River Hiz Valley, believed to have been used for trade between the Danes and English in the Anglo-Saxon age. It is also likely that Hitch Wood, which lies some south of the town also derives its name from the Hicce tribe, who gave their name to Hitchin.
Official source
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