And Then There's Place-Name Studies

 

by John Whitbourn
author of the Binscombe Tales series

‘If—strange fancy—he were able to tear himself from his turf prison, rise up from the hills and stride to Canterbury, he would by several feet overtop Bell Harry, the central tower of the Cathedral... The Statue of Liberty, which is only two-thirds as tall as the Giant...’

 

Rodney Castleden. ‘The Wilmington Giant’. 1983.

 

* * *

 

‘URGENT—URGENT—URGENT

To: The Secretary of the English Place-names Society.

From: Dr. Prof. Tristram Fry. PhD (Dunhelm). OBE. FSA. Field Antiquaries Guild (Committee).’

‘And so modest too!’ reflected said Secretary as he read. Plus: ‘How come Fellows of the Society of Antiquaries get an acronym but Field Antiquaries don’t? Oh…’

‘Sir.’ said the letter. ‘I write as a matter of urgency...’

‘Yes..., I believe you may have mentioned that,’ thought the Secretary.

‘…regarding a matter of great importance demanding your full and immediate attention…’

‘As do all your whims and oh-so many strong OPINIONS…’ The Secretary and dear Tristram had crossed swords before.

‘Namely to cancel, withdraw permission for and absolutely forbid publication of my recent submitted article to the Journal of the English Place-names Society. Said article, for the banishment of all doubt, being entitled “Avronehelle—An Alien Place-name Indeed. Recent Researches in East Sussex by a Senior Scholar.”

‘I cannot sufficiently stress that I retain copyright in said article and unless you confirm BY RETURN your absolute compliance with my instructions as above, I shall immediately institute legal proceedings against the Society and also you personally as an officer of that Society. For breach of copyright, infringement of my legal and human rights, and, I am advised by retained Senior Counsel, criminal trespass as per the terms of the Scandalum Magnatum Act of 1357, as supplemented by the Invent ut Loqueris Act of 1997. For which costs in obtaining said legal advice you and the Society will be held liable. Plus punitive damages.

‘Furthermore… [Cont overleaf].’

‘Furthermore for four closely typed sheets of A4,’ counted the Secretary, skim reading as he went. ‘Blimey!’

Finally through its circuitous repetitions the Secretary hoisted the missive between two fingertips and, with all due respect, filed it in the circular container beside his desk. Then, with heavy heart, fired up his email account.

‘Dear Mrs Gordon-Smith,’ he tapped.

‘You will want to murder me. I appreciate that the current Journal is with the printers, and likewise what mountains you have moved as editrix to make it so. Alas, a contributor threatens to nuke eleventy cities per day if we dare publish his article. Plus bring on Ragnarök and Fimbulwinter and the Eschaton. Worse still, he’s hired mercenaries from the Legal Racket. And, as both you and he well know, a voluntary Society such as ourselves cannot afford legal costs…

And Lord knows we don’t want any repetition of what happened after that proposed Binscombe and Disvan article! I still have nightmares about that. And it was we who got criticised by the coroner!

 ‘I’m so sorry, Dolores, but what else can we do but grind our teeth and raise the white flag?

‘I always feared that Fry would one day sue us for NOT including his infinite wisdom in every issue, but now, the one time he finally has something momentous to say...’

 

* * *

 

Just days earlier—until that day all went spectacularly wrong (or right…) one was of a different opinion and plan. I’d proudly mentioned my forthcoming article to many people, and to a man (and one unavoidable woman) they assured me they’d lose no time in reading it.

Meanwhile, this Historic England annual drinks n’ nibbles reception for the great-and good of UK Archaeology served to divert me. I’d been circulating and thus able to set people straight on a number of topics—archaeological and otherwise. Thus ably acting as ambassador for the Field Antiquaries Guild amidst these mere diggers. And now, duty done, I’d found a fine post-nibbles digestif of a filly to round off the evening—and possibly night too...

It is an incontestable FACT, inadequately celebrated and so far unexplained, that a wildly (le mot juste…) disproportionate (le mot juste plus!) of English female archaeologists are callipygous. Indeed, I’d go so far as to say splendidly so.

However (sigh) I perceive that in present presumably non-classically educated company I must now define that for you as: ‘Possessing a curvaceous or otherwise sexually attractive bottom’. From the Greek: (kalli = beautiful and pugē = buttocks). See, for instance, the famous 1st century BCE Roman statue Venus Callipyge in Naples.

Were I a believer I would take this phenomenon to be evidence that our Creator loves us and wishes us to be happy. ‘There are signs for those who would see,’ as the Quran rightly says (Surah 30, Al-Rum—Byzantium). But I am not and so accept it as just wonderful happenstance.

And—oh my goodness!—this particular filly, probably a Historic England or English Heritage temptress, was no exception to the delectable dictum above. Yum! Add to that an apparent willingness to listen-and-learn and I might well allow her to seduce me. If she asked nicely.

I didn’t quite catch her name: ‘Liz’? Surely too hypocoristic (‘abbreviated’ to you) for the Heritage game? Or ‘Di’, as in Diane? Ditto. ‘Juliet’? That’s more plausible. What does it matter? It was my name she’d be shrieking before the day was done. If she played her cards right.

Anonymous she might be but our conversation, or rather my instructive monologue, was going swimmingly. After an initial froideur following my insistence on being addressed by my professorial title, our chat ranged freely.

‘…And though I say so myself,’ I said. ‘I’m a fairly prominent member of FAG.’

‘Oh, I see…,’ said What’s-her-name. ‘I thought the Field Antiquaries Guild were going to change their name? Because of the acro—’

‘Some fainthearts tried. I stopped them. But gracious me: aren’t you a member yet?’

‘No, Tristam—I mean Professor,’ she said, not sounding suitably sad. ‘Their annual sub’s a bit steep for my wages. Plus there’s all those tests you have to keep sitt—’

‘Nonsense, dear girl: I might be able to help you there, proposer-wise. You should definitely join—and join in—if you want to get on, that is…’

A kindly given heavy hint if ever there was one…

Things progressed and there arrived that moment when courtesy compelled asking her what she did. Which proved to be ‘on secondment’, directing some dig somewhere. Kent I think she said. Or Cornwall. A Roman villa, plus possible Anglo-Saxon aftermath. Including a mosaic, albeit non-figurative. Come to think of it, the modest project rang distant bells from my monthly flick through Current Archaeology magazine.

What’s-her-face went on to say (regardless of not being asked) that, like always, funding for further seasons of excavation, plus publication of course, entirely depended on a funding application currently with the relevant Lottery Fund Heritage Committee, but that ‘the signs were good’.

Oh, indeed they were! I was on the cusp of informing What’s-her-name that modesty alone prevented me from mentioning my own seat on said committee. However, instinct providentially postponed that in favour of asking:

‘What weight are you giving to associated place-name evidence?’

She giggled. In any other context it might have arousingly coquettish.

‘All the weight it’s worth, you may be sure, Tristram.’

I’d observed that during our converse she’d been taking trips to her wine glass. One now realised that the wench was intoxicated. There could be no other explanation.

‘And what precisely do you mean by that?’ I enquired, my brows already beetled by her forgetting my honorific again.

My second hint of the evening wasn’t taken up.

‘Well, you know what archaeologists say about place-name studies…’ she said.

‘Refresh my memory, young lady. If you will.’

She proved all too willing, but not in the way I’d hoped.

‘Well, that there’s extrapolation, and then inference, then speculation, then fantasy, then astrology and economics, then dreams and then—well, you see where I’m going with this…’

‘Indeed one does,’ I said.

‘And then finally,’ she went unwisely on, ‘at the furthest extent of telescope range—the Hubble Space Telescope say—there’s place-name studies!’

Oh goodness me: how we laughed!

She at her witty wisdom. I at the death of her dig and career.

 

* * *

 

I slept alone and not well. If the blasphemous Historic England houri slept with anyone that night it wasn’t me. Her loss.

One was still fuming the next day. Making packing fractious and me late getting away. Such that the familiar drive down from London to Sussex was rush-hour clogged, causing further infuriation. Even though the Range Rover almost drove itself and sat-nav warned of every hold-up and how one might avoid it. Leaving one free to enjoy myriad state-of-the-art accessories and driver comforts.

Alas, under-derriere seat heating and concert-pitch Wagner failed to comfort. There are only so many ways to get to Wilmington and none were designed to cope with 21^st century mass car ownership and Friday afternoon get-aways.

So, sooner or later you hit the A27 and things slow down, the road jammed with pre-coronary salesmen (next appointment: Penzance, then Penrith) and culturally-challenged family units on a weekend away. When it would be far better for all concerned if they stayed where they were—save, that is, for their neighbours where they were.

In short, situation normal and tedious, providing zero distraction. Except for, perhaps, suspiciously extra myriad minibuses, ‘people-carriers’ and coaches heading in the opposite direction. All visibly packed to the gunnels or with windows opaqued out for some reason. Doubtless heading to some down-with-everything demo in the capital.

You should not be surprised therefore to hear that, several time-dilated hours later, even sight of Lewes—‘Zion-in-the-Downs’—failed to lift one’s spirits. I’d spent several productive days there patronising Sussex Archaeological Society’s archives to research my article, so I spared it a benign glance as I crawled by. One also lived in hope of seeing an ascending firework or two, it being nearly time for Lewes’s infamous Bonfire bacchanalia. But no; another disappointment.

Ditto Lewes-adjacent, frisson-rich and mysterious, Mount Caburn. Atop that treacle-pudding shape sundry hang gliders and paragliders had gathered to launch themselves off, in pursuit of Sussex’s new national sport of attempted suicide. As the narrow and inattention-punishing road skirted Caburn, I risked a glance to see if any aeronauts hit the power lines or railway track beside the mini-mountain’s base—as they quite often did. Alas, none obliged me.

Ever dependable however were the silhouetted figures, either alone or in small groups, who always seemed to be atop Caburn come rain or shine. Not garishly clad like the aeronauts, and standing unnaturally still, as if engaged in study of the traffic and town below. In further contrast with the hang gliders, past enquiries about them hadn’t shed any light on what they were about. Not that it mattered any more.

Other projects now cried out to bask in the bright light of my abilities. Meaning this might be one’s final visit here for a while. Time to explore pastures new before this well worn route wore out and became wearisome. Excitement at each first sight of the curvaceously feminine (albeit green) and iconic South Downs, ought never to pall. Every wise Epicurean knows that life’s pleasures please most when enjoyed in moderation, and

 

‘… not enterprised, nor taken in hand, unadvisedly, lightly, or wantonly, to satisfy men’s carnal lusts and appetites, like brute beasts that have no understanding; but reverently, discreetly, advisedly, soberly…’

 

As was intoned at my second wedding. In the Abbey! Because Mrs Fry II was a Christian—before martial bliss with me sorted her out! I wasted one whole second wondering what continent she currently blighted, if any.

But enough of such dark thoughts! Today must be about an indulgent coda to all the hard work on my groundbreaking Place-name paper. To pre-emptively celebrate its inevitable acclaim and assured accolades. Champagne would be involved.

Finally! A faint flicker of cheer! And not a moment too soon. Since sat-nav (an expensive variant employing Nigella’s Lawson’s most ‘Come hither’ tones) then announced I’d arrived.

Slow down, Nigella! You peaked too soon. Postcode coordinates don’t deliver precision in the Downs Country. I was still a minute or more from the Wilmington turning—although in another sense also spot on. Because to my right, maybe half a mile off, stood the Long Man.

 

* * *

 

I saluted him but didn’t dare look. Remember how I said the road was inattention punishing? Well, this particular stretch was a positive accident blackspot, home to vehicle head-ons ever since they ditched the-man-with-a-red-flag-in-front. One ill-timed gawp at the giant chalk hill figure was all it took to clip something oncoming. Goodness knows how many drivers haunted the verges here, ‘untimely wrenched’ from life by curiosity. Which, as the proverb should have forewarned them, is fatal even to nine-lived cats.

They say that’s probably what happened to that Welsh actor here—the one who played ‘Q’, the gadget-man in the Bond films.

Anyway, anxious to avoid an ironic end via the subject of my studies being the death of me, I maintained ‘eyes front’ and obeyed Nigella’s repeated and now slightly tetchy instruction (‘You wicked boy…’) to turn into Wilmington Village and journey’s end.

Which was a mere hundred yards from the A27 of untreasured memory but also a world away. A collection of delightful domestic architecture, plus, alas, modern council stuff. One tea-room, one pub: The Giant’s Rest, (one’s own resting place for the night also), one ruined medieval Benedictine priory, and—AND—one hill figure.

Equally, just one road ran through it, logically named The Street, ever narrowing until it reached Windover Hill and the Downs. Whereon stood the Long Man. The patron of my feast.

Dusk arrives early in November, and I arrived only just ahead of it. However, a convenient, indeed Hollywood-style, parking space (always at a premium in tiny Wilmington) awaited, centre of the pub forecourt and directly beneath its painted sign. Which depicted the giant at ease, or indeed ‘rest’, inside the establishment, lolling in an armchair and sipping a pint (oh how droll). At last, events were turning auspicious.

Ditto that one was expected and my room ready—and just as well too, for coruscating Tripadvisor reviews are a major force multiplier nowadays. Within minutes I was at the bar with that self-promised bottle of champers sitting in an ice-bucket beside me, chatting to the barman. Who’d have been offered a glass himself had he been a bit more deferential.

‘Know much abut the Long Man?’ I asked, as opening gambit.

He shrugged.

‘So so. I’ve lived here all me life.’

‘Well,’ I quipped, ‘they do say travel broadens the mind. Allow me to enlighten you then…’

Then, ten minutes later:

‘… Plus it’s the largest depiction of the human form in the northern hemisphere,’ I related, maybe midway through my oration on the figure that, outside and unseen, loomed over us. ‘And I know what you’re thinking now.’

‘Really?’ he replied, searching round for yet more glasses to shine, ‘I do hope not.’

‘You’re thinking what’s the largest one anywhere then? Well, doubtless that’s some Aztec scrawl in the Atacama Desert. But I maintain Sussex boasts the best. A mighty figure—over two hundred feet tall—serving as a symbol of the Downs: a genius loci one might say (that’s Latin for ‘spirit of the place’) or tutelary—that means a guardian—deity. You see?’

‘How could I fail to?’ the barman replied. ‘What with you being such a mine of information.’

I detest ungrateful people. This was a free education he was getting here. I believe it was Frances Burney, or perhaps Ms Austen (and who dares defy the divine Jane?) that first remarked on the intrinsic surliness of the Sussex serving classes. Whose ancient and insubordinate motto, let us not forget, is: ‘We won’t be druv!’

This particular fellow’s focus shifted to some other bar-barnacle who, by pointedly turning his back, had chosen not to interact with us.

‘You okay, Raphael?’ the barman asked him even so. ‘Can I get you anything? You absolutely sure?’

Rejected by ‘Raphael’ (the name, by the by, of one of only three identified angels in the Bible; unless you count Satan) via a curt ‘Naa’, the barman returned to my discourse. It being a small bar left him little leeway.

‘The two staves he holds are even taller,’ I went on. ‘Making his stance reminiscent of Odin on the Fingelsham belt buckle, or the Betchworth pot appliqué Jupiter figure, although—’

The barman decided it was time he made an—unsolicited—contribution.

‘Ah, but what if they’re not staves?’ he asked.

‘Or spears,’ I conceded. ‘Or Roman road-engineer surveying poles perhaps. Though the rake and scythe in Burrell’s laughable 1766 drawing can be discount—’

‘No,’ the bore interjected. ‘I meant they might not be sticks at all. Some reckon they could be door jambs. That the Long Man’s holding open for us. Or someone. Into somewhere.’

‘Unlikely,’ I replied, in no uncertain terms. Amateur interest in archaeology is to be welcomed, in principle, but uninformed contentions most definitely not. Tolerating that is a slippery slope than ends up with Time Team.

‘Likewise the preposterous proposal,’ I sped on, lest he go off remit again, ‘born of a so-called investigation some years back, that the Long Man is post-Medieval. A few Tudor sherds found at his feet was all it took to generate that canard. No. Neolithic would be my bet, or Iron Age at the latest. The same as the Cerne Abbas Giant: A Cromwellian cartoon? Balderdash! The trouble is that modern archaeologists dance to whatever music’s presently playing in the marketplace: constrained captives of the contemporary—to employ ‘apt alliteration’s artful aid’.

The Barman plainly had no taste for wordplay He saw fit to interrupt again.

‘Have you considered talking about it?’ he asked. ‘Sometimes it helps to talk about it.’

‘So I shall,’ I replied. ‘And in the most public manner possible. Modesty alone prevents me from naming to you the author of a major article about to be published on the subject. Its innovative use of place-name evidence will shake the archaeological pigeon-coop, if not give it a much needed kicking. As will its thesis that the Long Man is even more mysterious than was thought.’

‘Or maybe ley lines,’ said the barman, whilst stocktaking his supply of straws.

‘What?’

‘Mebbe the giant’s to do with those ley lines things. There’s that theory too.’

‘Ley lines?’ I scoffed. ‘Piffle and poppycock! What’s one of those when it’s at home? A queue outside a brothel?’

Like many rustics he had zero sense of humour. His mouth inverted to twenty-past-eight position and looked like to stay there. So I took my bucket and bottle and company away to the furthest free table, to spend time in the company of someone I respect: i.e. alone.

Ley lines!

However, contrary to hope and expectation, things weren’t left there. Minutes later the barman re-materialised in peripheral vision, on the blatant pretext of collecting glasses. Clearly he’d had second thoughts on the matter, a delayed and dim light bulb of pricked interest flickering to life in his head.

‘Actually, something you said struck me,’ he admitted, all contrite and conciliatory now. ‘About that article of yours. Tell me more. May I?’

He meant join me. Magnanimously in the circumstances, I gestured he might, thinking to myself, ‘Why not? What could possibly go wrong?’ Maybe it was the champagne speaking but how likely was it that this provincial skivvy was actually an undercover academic, out to plagiarise my discovery? And even then, he’d have to move fast, for publication and thus my apotheosis into place-name studies Olympus was but days away.

Therefore:

‘Well, if you are genuinely interested, it concerns the Domesday Book. You’ll have heard of that I hope? Oh good. In which case Domesday’s name for Windover hundred—an ancient land unit—wherein the Long Man stands, was Avronehelle. Which pedestrian scholars preceding me chose to interpret as “Ælfrun’s Hill”: conjoining a minor female name plus topography. And there matters stood for a century until yours truly came along to upset the applecart. Namely by proving that such constructions don’t occur in Sussex or the Deep South at all. The nearest parallel is in Bedfordshire—which I don’t suggest you visit to verify, since it’s the least welcoming county before Scotland. Furthermore, whereas “Windover” is a fairly modern appellation—not attested until 1779—if you get as daring as I and revisit the Domesday Book entry, and take it to derive from Ælfrūna hyll—ah then, you find a far more arresting conjunction. Because Ælfrūna can be construed as “Elf mystery” or “Elf moot”. Meaning when you add back on helle you get “Hill of the Elf Mystery”, see?’

I doubt he did, because the barman seemed discombobulated. Which was hardly my fault. He shouldn’t have enquired about things beyond his intellect.

‘Annoyingly,’ I graciously went on even so, ‘there was an amateur who’d dabbled with the subject before me. A chap called Coats or Cloaks: some clothing-related name anyway. But he failed to publish properly, meaning it was incumbent on me to take up the baton and—’

‘Is that the pub phone?’ asked the barman suddenly, swivelling round and cocking his head to hear sounds not vouchsafed to me.

‘Don’t think so,’ said I, dismayed, since further pearls of wisdom for him were pending plus pendent on my lips. ‘I didn’t hear anything.’

Despite which, the wretch was already on his way.

‘Better just check,’ he said, and departed in haste.

Honestly—some people! Well, as per the digger lady he’d had his chance. She of TOTAL SEXUAL FULFILMENT, he of mind-expanding enlightenment. Their loss.

Although it did leave me at a loose end and bottle’s end also. No one else present appeared minded to converse. All seemed suddenly preoccupied with their phones or company, or engrossed in reading beermats.

So, instead, late and dark as it was, I decided to pay my respects to the Long Man. At least he wouldn’t spurn me.

 

* * *

 

For all that it climbs steeply towards the Downs, Wilmington’s sole street is no great length, unlikely to tax even those of ‘fuller form’ such as I. Accordingly, deadline-free and so fancy-free for once, I took my time, ticking off the sights as I went. First St Mary and St Peter’s Church, with its millennium-plus old graveyard yew. Then Wilmington Priory: not the usual Henry VIII hit-job, but Henry V’s suppression of an ‘alien’ i.e. French, establishment, and now desacralised-to-the-max as a Landmark Trust holiday home (‘sleeps six, dogs allowed’). Plus last and least, the Jeffery Farnol memorial bench. Where that rightly forgotten author (1878-1952) was apparently wont to bide when not penning Edwardian bestsellers. I’d previously lingered to decipher the stone seat’s worn inscription, my only reward being lines from one of his word-tsunamis.

Once bitten, twice shy. I now shunned it and any further temptations to foreplay. One was eager for the main event and a Long Man. I strode the extra yards required for us to be in each other’s sight.

And there he was! As if waiting for me, his interpreter.

Yet mutual communion was put off. Another distraction distracted me. Immediately to my right lay a small public car park, decently concealed within former Priory walls. At night a barrier was dropped across its entrance to deter caravans and similar riff-raff, and tonight had evidently been no exception. Save that subsequently it had been beheaded and now reared aloft again, several severed feet short of its original span. And I say ‘severed’ with confidence because the gleam of clean-cut metal stood out. Angle-grinder work presumably, unless the Sussex anti-social classes carried two-handed axes, like King Harold’s huscarls at Hastings.

It irked me. I like things to be as they should: always and all the time. Plus that irk-power was doubled by people thinking their petty needs take precedence over rules and regulations. Save perhaps when I personally perceive that a rule serves no purpose.

Trebly irksome therefore were the parked minibuses taking advantage of the car park’s unofficially extended hours. I had a good mind to go over to give their owners a piece of that mind. And would have too, had not the vehicles sat dark and deserted. And had not the Long Man called afresh, banishing lesser jihads.

For, as I’ve said, there he was! In all his (moonlit) glory, portrayed on his own personal, anciently levelled, Windover canvas. If indeed he is a he. Because seen from afar, as apparently intended, the figure looks far more proportional, plus… awfully androgynous. Whereas the closer you get the less he is himself. Which may be a clue left by his creators.

Be that as it may, I say one final time (to remind myself, not you) there he was! In all his milky moonlit glory: doorman to the Downs and sponsor of my soon-to-be academic success.

Except—hang about!—check, re-check and re-re-check! Presently that glory was not just moonlit. Additional light glorified him. An azure glow, hot and aberrant. Albeit only in one part. From a foot, his left one. Which, like its twin, pointed downwards!

Which they didn’t. Not normally. Or not since 1874. When well-meaning antiquarians had him outlined in white brick—but not 100% correctly. As proven by a photograph taken soon after and in just the right light. Beside a horse-borne and top-hatted vicar (arranger of the works), grass shadows clearly showed the feet as they were before and still should have been.

And tonight were again. Tonight the figure was truly restored. Not standing athwart Windover but advancing down it, boldly going where he’d gone before!

Alas, my curiosity knew no bounds. My own feet were ordered further than intended. Across the road. To the footpath leading to the Long Man. Up the steps it started with.

Aided by that extra elevation I saw better—or certainly more. Around the left foot there was activity. Not, thank Dawkins, actually the giant himself, but on him. And within him.

Squinting resolved the shapes into figures surfacing one by one. From an aperture. Whatever was going on, it was well underway. A line of them now straggled down Windover heading towards… me.

Whilst it paralleled Wilmington’s Street the footpath was sheltered by hedgerows on either side. But then a sharp left curve up to the giant brought all on it into view. In keeping with shrinking interest I shrank back from that.

In fairness to myself, academic life provides little training in fear management. An absence of mortal dread from one year’s end to another deludes you that the beast is dead. Not so. It merely sleeps. In a unlocked cage.

But why should I feel fear? I wasn’t where I shouldn’t be. I was a law-abiding person of, if I may say so, some standing in my world. Nonetheless, I somehow knew, and to a degree beyond dispute, that I was no longer wholly in that world.

So, as said, I shrank down below the hedge-line. In which degrading crouch, eyes casting about to confirm invisibility, I noticed the sets of clothing laid out. An array of primary colour hiking gear. As worn by what I believe Sussex aboriginals call ‘bag rats’.

Umpteen tops and bottoms and boots were arranged along the path’s edge. I got the impression—‘impression’ as in with all the faith of a saint—that these ensembles weren’t discards or evidence of a backpacker orgy, but laid out to be worn shortly. And no prizes for guessing who by.

Then came the word no one yearning for obscurity wants to hear.

‘Oi!’

It came from the path’s turning point. And from a farmer-sort in Sussex traditional dress (flat cap and battered Barbour).

‘Oi, you!’

Did he mean me? He most certainly did, and proved it by charging in my direction. And not with ‘hail fellow, well met’ foremost in his heart.

Although what’s called ‘large boned’ I can put on a burst if given good reason. I reversed my route and even jumped(!) the steps down to the street.

From the frying pan into the fire. Alerted by ‘Oi!’s, an advance guard postponed getting dressed to burst through the hedge instead. Which betrayed inhuman strength.

Though that barely needed revealing. They were indecent—in every sense. Naked—I think. And unnatural—I’m sure.

Interstellar-black silhouettes surged into the roadway. Preliminary sketches of humanoids from blob head to blob toes. Not yet fully formed. Yet those blobs prefigured where head and hands and feet would be—and were evolving even as I looked.

None had eyes, not yet, so far as I could see—but they could see. And they saw me! They did not like what they saw.

Meanwhile, unseen but all-too audible, what sounded like Wellington boots thundered along the hedge-hidden path I’d just quit. Suggesting a reinforced human contingent. Shouting no more ‘Oi!’s or anything else, but with palpable malevolent intent. They didn’t want to warn me off—they wanted me.

Did I mention my surprising sprint abilities? I believe I did. They now sprang into life so fast I surprised even myself.

Something thrummed past my head and then skittered along the road to halt a few feet ahead of my rout. It was an arrow. A honest-to-badness bright-fletched arrow! With a flint tip. It struck sparks off the tarmac.

Then another. An even nearer miss. A tiny triangle was clipped from my ear lobe. Which, as any wet-shaver will tell you, is the most dramatic of razor mishaps. A solar system of blood specks sped backwards from me.

To witness which I spared a rearward glance. To where humans and blob-men continued to deploy from Windover. The former had shotguns but seemed disinclined to point them. Not so those with bows—exclusively the not-human contingent. They were nocking new arrows. Into longbows no less!

Then an apparent leader-human, head clamped to his mobile phone, arrived amongst them. His free hand worked fast at spoiling archers’ aims, whilst in ringing tones he ordered:

‘Hold fire!’

And was almost obeyed. A final loose, probably only intended to convey frustration, went way over my head. To thwock home and imbed in a far off house roof. An enigma to enliven some future thatcher’s day.

A minute’s more progress and I dared look back again. The mob now mobbed rather than shot, plus seemed deterred from pursuit. Proving that abject cowardice had been the right decision and my salvation.

One’s outlook didn’t yet encompass tomorrow. Mere moments of more life would do. So Farnol’s bench and Wilmington Priory passed by in a blur. However, the friendly lights of The Giant’s Rest gave pause. Them and realisation I was in an pre-spew state of breathlessness. Ditto an agony of stitches.

A compulsory breather ensued. Slowing to a stop I put hands to knees and heaved in air like a drowning man. Meanwhile, as lungs refuelled and my heart quit my mouth to resume normal residence, elements of a plan emerged. I would take refuge in the Rest. And rally. And tell my tale. And plan revenge! The police would hear of this! The Chief Constable of Sussex to start with and then ever upwards.

I noticed busy-ness in the pub car park. My car was being loaded onto a recovery truck. Supervised by the barman.

Our eyes intersected. His first-thought scowl was replaced by a mocking wave.

His team turned too. They seemed standard-Sussex but other signs suggested not. The Range Rover started its hauled ascent upwards and out of my ownership.

Panic returned, full force. I resumed my journey and was soon back up to speed. With nowhere else to flee bar…

Any port in a storm. Such was my unconditional surrender that I dashed onto the A27. Where horns blared and cars swerved, their headlights weaving wildly, but somehow one wasn’t mown down as one deserved. Perhaps Pan watches over those in his thrall.

A White-Van-Man, in the grip of powerful emotions almost equal to my own, skidded to a halt in the nearest lay-by. From where he bellowed no-nonsense advice about road safely. Essentially what at school was called ‘The Green Cross Code’, plus added F-words.

I curtailed the recital by wrenching his passenger door open and climbing in. At that moment it would have made no difference had it been locked.

‘You’re right!’ I said. ‘I’m sorry! So sorry. Just drive on. Please! I’m begging you.’

This man could think on his feet. He sized me up. My accent, dress and distress declared I was no standard loony. On the other hand I had blood on me.

Happily, heart overruled head.

‘I’m only going as far as Lewes,’ he said, still not reconciled to a hitchhiker.

‘It’ll do,’ I gasped. ‘Anywhere! Here’s my wallet. Keep it. Just drive, drive, drive!’

So he drove and Lewes is where we went. Travelling in not very companionable silence whilst my mind revisited an evening of horror.

Nevertheless, one feels obliged to record that my wallet was handed back intact, White-Van-Man refusing to accept any payment. In Lewes High Street he even wished me well. Which bears mention given what I would later hear about humanity.

 

* * *

 

White-Van-Man’s last words to me concerned how I’d labour in vain to find accommodation:

‘Not with Bonfire coming up. Everything’s booked yonks in advance.’

So it proved. Awareness of Lewes Town’s infamous annual Guy Fawkes inspired anarchy-fest had penetrated even my High Culture carapace. Because of it, even days before kick-off, every hotel, hostelry and B&B was ram-packed. Even the streets had an edge to them, echoing to the occasional home-made and totally illegal ‘Lewes Rouser’ set off in anticipation. Taken together, the town felt like somewhere on the brink of a—welcome—coup d’état. Complete with firefight sound effects.

What did I care? From Lewes the curvature of the earth saved me from sight of the Long Man. By which I mean both me seeing him and maybe—him seeing me. The mere fact it wasn’t Wilmington was the main attraction. Even if I had to sleep on a spike in the castle grounds in the rain.

Which, upon reflection, was setting the bar a bit low. What I actually wanted was somewhere warm where I could wring the sweat from my suit and hunker down and—possibly—process—all that had happened to me. What a former committee colleague in the Field Antiquaries Guild called ‘Re-evaluating all options in the light of latest developments’. A man possessed by a demon of malign timidity, it was his invariable response to every event. Until I eased him out.

For the first time I felt a twinge of compassion for him, albeit faint and split-second. Like me he’d been evicted from his safe place (he a sinecure, me a white van) into an insouciant world, both of us reluctant and weepy. In my case White-Van-Man had been adamant. Evidently his ‘Doris’ wouldn’t ‘dig’ him ‘dragging no no-name home’. Whatever that means in pleb-speak. Accordingly, I’d been abandoned to my fate as cold night fell in a (in every sense) strange town.

Though not totally strange. As said, I’d been here before to visit Sussex Archaeological Society at Barbican House. So I knew of the twisty narrow ways—‘twittens’ in Sussex dialect—in which Lewes abounds, and down which no car can go, and which few furriners know about anyway. Animal cunning suggested I’d be safest restricting myself to those and keeping out of view. Plus, who knows, such obscure routes might even lead me to the last vacancy in Lewes. So I stuck to that and them until they took me to The Lewes Arms.

Which was another place I’d been before. Escorted there (‘You’ll never find it...’) and treated to a half of Harvey’s Brewery Sussex Best Bitter by the Sussex Archaeology Society’s Librarian. Who deluded himself the Society was doing me a favour by opening their archives to my important research!

By modern pub standards, it was a miniscule place (two tiny bars plus a ‘games room’) inserted as a sliver into a mysterious mound. ‘Brack Mount’ being either an abortive castle motte, windmill base or—my theory—one of the prehistoric barrows that gave Lewes its name (it’s complicated: trust me—I’m a black-belt toponymist).

Sigh—‘place-name professional’ to you.

Most relevant in my present predicament, access to the Lewes Arms isn’t car-friendly—in fact, positively averse . Which seemed important at the time. My thinking was that the distance between my persecutors and I would take them a long while to walk.

So much for thinking. Or dreams of finding a room: I never even got to ask. Because after swerving the public bar and its ‘locals’ clientele plus… uncompromising wall-mounted town coat of arms, and walking on the yard extra required to reach the saloon, one of them followed me in.

It was Friday evening and the place was full (it didn’t take much) of convivial office-escapees. Even so, my as-yet unseen companion commanded attention. And sudden silence.

Initially I assumed they’d noticed me. Which wasn’t so unlikely I’ll have you know. I was interviewed on Channel Four television once. However, tracking the lines of sight disabused me.

Not least the landlord’s, who shot over to greet my shadow.

‘Problem?’ he asked. Not addressing me. Which caused me to turn to look. And see.

The man—fortunately it was a wholly formed man—shook his head.

‘Not from me,’ he answered.

His voice rang doleful bells, geo-located in less than a second. It had ordered the cease fire at Wilmington. Yet if I’d made record time getting to Lewes, how on earth had he?

‘Fair enough,’ said the landlord, returning to his post. Adding, Parthian-shot style, over his shoulder as he went ‘Your money’s no good here. They’re on me.’

General hubbub resumed.

‘You heard our host,’ said my new ‘friend’. ‘What’ll you have?’

I had another choice to make first: either dissolve into a jelly or else pretend to still be me. I just scrambled together the wherewithal for the latter.

It helped that he wasn’t all that awesome. Tall, yes, suave, for sure, and Jack-the-Lad most definitely, but nothing monstrous. Imagine a poacher as imagined by Vogue. Too well turned out and well-spoken to convince. Plus cheek-bones to open tins with.

Nevertheless, there were the eyes. Affability itself, but should need arise for slaughter, then sadly…

I had to say something. Those feline eyes were focussed on me.

‘Brandy, please.’

‘Not Harvey’s? Barbarian!’

It was a joke, though his smile alone supported that. The rest of him abstained.

The brandy and his pint of beer—which I hadn’t heard him request—arrived. I downed it and self-ordered another. And another.

‘Still no charge,’ said the landlord, obliging in rapid fire succession. ‘But don’t push it, Rupert.’

‘My name’s not Rupe—’ I protested—or started to.

‘Or Aubrey or Tarquin or Tristram,’ he interrupted me. ‘Whatever’s your Norman-yoke moniker.’

‘Hang on, how did you know my name’s Trist—?’

This time Jack-the-Lad interrupted.

‘Let’s take a seat,’ he said, defusing the sudden spike of tension. A nod of his deerstalker indicated a corner table I felt sure was fully occupied a moment before.

‘Right then,’ Jack-the-Lad said once we were seated, meanwhile inspecting the random-stocked bookcase beside me. ‘What would you like?’

I displayed my drained brandy. I even inverted it.

‘Our host implied the well is dry,’ I replied.

He grimaced.

‘I did not mean more brain-killer. Listen good, legacy lifeform. What. Would. You. Like?’

Well, to start with, I didn’t like the sound of that description. Umbrage reinstalled some backbone in me.

‘I might ask you the same question!’

Then I got distracted, despite everything. One second his pint was full, the next it stood empty. I hadn’t seen an intervening stage or him go near it.

‘Ok,’ he answered, swiping his mouth free of Harvey’s foam.

‘Ok what?’ I said, still drowning-not-waving.

‘As in: ok, ask me what I want.’

So I waited. And waited. Silence reigned. He started to look round for diversion. Which, save for people and pub ornaments there wasn’t much. Even the window behind us was cast into permanent pointlessness by being inside Brack Mount’s insides.

Then I got it. He was being maddeningly literal. I gripped the table’s edge fit to leave fingerprints.

‘Ok, TELL ME WHAT YOU WANT!’

Customers at the bar looked round. The landlord gave me a silent but unmistakable final warning.

Jack-the-Lad smirked.

‘Excitable, your kind, aren’t you?’ he said. ‘That would be down to those emotions I presume…’

I didn’t rise to it. Instead I spun my hand, theatre-prompt style, to urge him on. So on he went.

‘I want your cooperation. Or failing which, your silence. That’s all. Just cooperation. It’s not a lot to ask for some reticence. Plus a few further tasks we might have for you, maybe, further along the line...’

‘Or what?’ I hissed. Personal survival was still my uppermost priority, easily trampling curiosity underfoot.

‘Or nothing,’ said Jack-the-Lad, his face an epitome of innocent innocence. ‘Except complications for us. Because you’ve seen too much. Whereas you—or any of your sort—shouldn’t see anything. Not yet.’

His pint glass filled again, from the bottom up. It then emptied again, interaction-free, as before. He wiped his lips again, as before.

‘Scrumptious!’ he said. ‘Are you sure you wouldn’t like one?’

I shook my head. The brandy was fogging matters enough as it was.

‘But you shot at me,’ I exclaimed. ‘Arrows! I could have di—’

(And yes, I know you loose arrows, not shoot them. Pedant!)

If feigned his dismay was the work of a world-class actor.

‘Don’t talk of that!’ he said. ‘Please! We thought you were from another tribe, not another species. One of our own factions—of which there’re many—intent on sabotage. Heaven forefend! There’d have been such a hoo-hah! Because we’re forbidden from hurting you lot, let alone killing. By the deity whose firstborn we are but disowns us in favour of affection for you, strange as it may seem.’ Then, plainly striving for utmost candour: ‘Or leastways so at this stage. The rules may well change as the game changes, that’s our hope... And speaking of which neatly brings me back to my initial question: what do you want? For giving us what we want.’

He let the question hang. Appropriately enough, I dangled.

‘Anything you want,’ he urged me on. ‘Be bold!’

‘I don’t know,’ I said—in all truthfulness, because I felt omni- ignorant. About who he was, what I’d seen, what was going on. My self-confidence—hitherto a strong point—had been shredded. Now I was sure of my name and not much more.

He seemed to sense my cognitive free-fall and, post a moment’s pondering, condescended to catch me.

‘Elves,’ he said. We’re elves—or the Fay, or Faerie, or any number of namings your kind invented. No, don’t bother asking: our own term would shred your larynx and still get nowhere near. ‘Elves’ will do: “A rose by any other name…” as one of our poets wrote. And we’re infiltrating your world. Well, invading really. Intention? Conquest. Because—why deny it?—we’ve ruined our own. Wars and rash experiments and senseless hatred and... many other sins—as you’d term them—I’d rather not confess exist. Lacking a soul and solipsist selfishness can do that to a species you see. And as for fanaticism! You thought your kind were bad? You know nothing, Rupert.’

‘Don’t you start too,’ I said, riled despite all the revelations. ‘My name is Tristram.’

Again, his response was patently genuine.

‘Really? My briefing said all humans who sound like you are called Rupert...’

‘No. Not all.’

‘If you insist. Oh, and to round my explanation off, what you call the Long Man—oh, how wrong could you be?—is our portal. Our beachhead. Of which I have the honour to be beachmaster. The last surviving entry point we’ve not poisoned, though Cerne Abbas and White Horse still function sometimes, fitful and perilous. Through it we filter—via fire and smoke and acid rain I might add—a few at a time to start our adventure. Arriving as part-formed things, traumatised by the abyssal trip. Like you saw. Yet we elves are nothing if not survivors. Minibussed to Burlough Castle a mile from the Long Man for an induction course, we soon—’

‘Just a minute,’ I said, antiquarian amour-propre seizing control of my tongue, ‘I know that area. There’s never been a Burlough Castle; never. It’s just a knoll puffed up by folklore. I haven’t seen the slightest evidence to suggest—’

‘Well, your eyes wouldn’t, would they?’ said Jack, speaking with authority. ‘Not yet. Do try to keep up. This is for your benefit. So, if I may continue?’

‘I am answered,’ I said, and indicated he might.

‘Like I was saying, we soon adapt and transform to pass as men. Adopting your appearance, acquiring your status and property and roles. Which isn’t that difficult—there’s so little to you. A veneer of character atop a stormy sea of self-interest and randiness. No offence.’

‘None taken,’ I lied.

‘Save for those pesky souls,’ he added, again so as to be completely candid. ‘Unlike us, like I’ve said. That fact complicates things. Brings in higher players: angels and upwards. Not that we envy you. What suffering that gift brings you! Akin to your teeth—a curse at both beginning and end of your little lives.’

I gaped as it sank it. The inner brandy effect evaporated instantly.

‘And you want me to cooperate with that? Collaborate even?’

He had no shame. Presumably no soul equals no shame.

‘Yes please. Although collaborate’s such an ugly word,’ he said, making a face. ‘In your world anyway. Far too much baggage. We prefer “co-existence.”’

‘But… given what you plan… Against my own…’

‘Rest assured,’ he replied, smooth as butter, ‘we will be every bit as merciful to you as you have been to other, lesser, species. And with that promise I must ask you one final time: what do you want?’.

I was speechless—safe in my person apparently, for the moment—but lost for words. And lost.

My companion and would-be corruptor sighed.

‘Come here, he said, ‘let me look for you.’

He lent across the table to fasten elegant fingers to my brow. No ‘Vulcan mind-meld’ this: more of a behind-the-wheelie-bins quickie. All over in seconds. I felt violated.

‘Really?’ queried ‘Jack’—though not actually doubting. ‘Is that all? How sordid! And far cheaper than I feared. Why didn’t you say? No matter: say no more—since no sooner said than done!’

He whipped out a mobile phone—a wood-panelled one—and drilled numbers into it.

‘To me,’ he said when it was answered—which was instantly.

Likewise compliance. How could the response arrive so speedily? I now recognised I was immersed in the uncanny. Doubly so when, scant seconds later, that response arrived.

A lithesome girl: a gothic vision plus saucy corkscrew curls. Petite: you might even say elfin—but still Sussex-aboriginal and-Sussex-voluptuous. As shown off in a cotton-print summer dress (in November!).

In short and in the Old Tongue: ‘Ælfscine’: ‘As beautiful (and unsafe) as an elf’…

I was privy to someone greeting her: ‘Elaine.’ Which sounded sort of… Arthurian.

But why strive and fail with words? Why try to enumerate? She rang my every bell, she fulfilled every need. Even ones I never know I had.

‘Elaine’ ordered a drink (yes, sigh, Sussex Best) and then sipped it leaning against a wall, surveying the scene. She said nothing to anyone but her eyes and the tilt of her hips also said it all.

‘We have half-breeds and hybrids,’ explained Jack-the-Lad. ‘Via intercourse with the indigenous English. Which is… doable. They serve as our vanguard and emissaries: a cadre who can handle iron or operate machines, plus tolerate your company for whole conversations. And other mundane needs. True, the outcome is sometimes… impermissible. Those we expose on Windover. Or send away to become lawyers. Mostly though: well, look and weep, human.’

I did and almost did.

‘As your so-called Good Book’ says—Proverbs 31: 10-12—‘A good wife, who can find her?’ She is, by your standards, wonderfully mad. Plus silk stockings as standard. Early blooming but long-lasting: not susceptible to burn-out. Decades’ worth of lively early nights. Maybe even ‘let’s stay up all night!’ nights you will look forward to, if only as compensation for her madcap days. Plus, whilst steering you along the proverbial ‘warped and broad’, she might even breed you an heir: maybe the equally proverbial ‘heir and a spare’. Quarter-breeds arrive easier and are less likely to be abominations. Either way, she should see you out under the present dispensation. For I doubt you’ll notice much difference—not visibly—in your lifetime.’

I looked within. Would loyalties other than to myself give voice? If so did I care?

Instead, the immortal words of Philip Larkin sprang to mind:

 

‘My life is for me,

As well ignore gravity.’

 

‘OK,’ I whispered. ‘I’m in.’

‘It brings you inside the charmed circle,’ said ‘Jack’, sugaring the medicine to help it go down. ‘Safe even to return to Wilmington should you wish..’

‘I don’t!’ I blurted.

‘Tough. We may order otherwise.’

Which was but the first crack of the whip. The first of many.

Somehow Elaine heard all—or somehow knew. She came over and sat herself down between us.

‘Of course,’ she said: a girlish voice, riding atop a lovely Sussex burr, ‘your article can’t be published now.’

How could she possibly know of that I thought? Ditto, how did she then hear my inmost thoughts?

‘We have a bit of a hive-mind thing going on,’ she clarified. Followed by a top-to-toe scrutiny of me, assessing I know not what.

‘Righto,’ she said to Jack. ‘Anything for the cause. When’s the wedding?’

‘Soon,’ he said, very decisive. ‘No more than a month; these creatures set store by such things. Plus their minds work contractually. Obviously a church is out, but I believe Harvey’s host ceremonies now. Don’t they call their brewery ‘the Cathedral of the Downs’?’

Elaine nodded. ‘Sorted,’ she said.

So that sealed things. Including my fate.

Jack and Elaine tentatively raised their glasses, glacial eyes locked onto mine. I found I could not bear their stare—nor break with it either. I was pinned like a card-mounted butterfly.

Which left me little choice. Or maybe resolved remaining doubts. Or stunned them into silence. I raised my (empty) tumbler. Then we three chinked.

‘Done!’ I said.

And I had been.

 

* * *

 

We left the Lewes Arms soon after. Every eye within watched me go. I realised now that the clientele were complicit.

Elaine linked her arm with mine. Jack led the way. Where we were going I neither knew nor cared. I was in their hands now.

What my prospects were remained unformed as a blob-man, but one thing seemed certain, if I may be permitted to drag Scripture in again. I’d found ‘life more abundant…’

Was it my imagination or did the stars sparkle more brightly now that I had one foot in their world? Likewise all the sundry sensory inputs of Lewes: so much richer than before!

Truth be told I never was all that wrapped up in Place-name studies. They were just something I did to fill my days. Ditto socialising and society. Ditto the drag of being human.

What? Do you judge me? Call me a traitor? Charge me with betrayal?

I refute it thus. By borrowing words from arch-spy Kim Philby: another so-called traitor:

‘To betray, you must first belong. I never belonged.’

 

The author adds:

Scholarly underpinning to this tale—for which due thanks—was provided by Richard Coates, Professor emeritus of Onomastics at University West of England, Bristol, writing in Sussex Archaeological Collections, no. 131, 1993, and the Sussex Archaeological Society Newsletter no. 90, April 2000. And who, for the banishment of all doubt, is clearly not the story’s unlovely protagonist, bent on plagiarising the professor’s pioneering work.

As for myself, not having not read the above sources until well into the 2000s, it can only have been the powers of prophecy or imagination or… something that previously led me along parallel paths. To, for instance, set ‘The High Moot’ of the Elves (also attended by King Charles II!) on Windover Hill in my novel The Royal Changeling (a.k.a. Elves & Muskets) published in 1998. Likewise my short story ‘Bury My Heart At Southerham, (East Sussex)’, first published in 1997, which saw the Long Man witness the end of a very old faerie story.

‘Verily, there are signs for those who would see’.
The Quran. Surah 30, Al-Rum (Byzantium).

The emphasis being on the volitionary ‘would’…