Comments on: Will the real Mr Golding please step forward

By: zythophile

zythophile — Tue, 22 Jan 2008 16:48:35 +0000

Thank you, Teresa - if you find anything to add to the narrative, I’d be very keen to read it …

By: Teresa Golding

Teresa Golding — Mon, 21 Jan 2008 22:54:53 +0000

What an interesting read - in the ‘family’ we were always aware of ‘the hops’ as being part of family lore.
It is a bit strange to see all the names, places etc on a family tree (copied from an original parchment document) that we are working on at the moment duplicated in your information!
The other reference that ties in with some of this information comes from the 1798 Hastead History of Kent - reference the Hundred of Larkfield - available from British History Online - a great resource.
Regards,
Teresa

By: Zythophile

Zythophile — Thu, 03 Jan 2008 17:27:05 +0000

Sorry, Alan, I’m making the old mistake of assuming everyone’s familiar with the terminology: the “hills” are part of the older method of growing hops, when three hop roots were planted about a set of wooden poles (for the bines to grow up), and the earth raised up around each set of roots in little hillocks - see Reynolde Scot’s A Perfite Platforme of a Hoppe Garden, which has illustrations of the hillocks, and a chapter on “Of hylling and hylles”. The “hills” were about two feet across and 18 inches high. They don’t seem to have been replaced by the familiar wirework system, in England at least, until the 1870s.

By: Alan

Alan — Tue, 01 Jan 2008 15:08:06 +0000

Excellent stuff. Can you please clarify yet another uncertainty due to my my congenital state of ignorance? When there are references to “hill” made in your post above, it that a topographical feature of the lands in question or just an agricultural technique as in the hilling of spuds? If it is the former, you may have a mapping opportunity to assist in the research.

By: Zythophile

Zythophile — Tue, 01 Jan 2008 11:46:28 +0000

Don’t blame me, blame Edward Hasted, or at least the on-line version of his The History and Topographical Survey of the County of Kent: Volume 8 (1799), pp. 537-549, on this website, which spells it thus – I quote:

RHODES-COURT is a manor situated in the south-east extremity of this parish, in the borough of the same name, which borough, though within the parish of Selling, is yet within the hundred of Faversham”

In his addenda Hasted then says: “Mr. Sawbridge has sold Rhodes-court to Mr. Golding, a hop-factor in the borough, who now owns it.” Anyway, I have now tweaked the blog entry to reflect your correction, many thanks …

By: Arthur Percival

Arthur Percival — Tue, 01 Jan 2008 09:28:25 +0000

Interesting. It’s Rhode Court, Selling, not Rhodes Court.

Best wishes

Arthur