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Get the kettle on! You'll be needing a cup of tea. This might just be a wee bit long. First of all I give my apologies to Mawer. His name was Allen - not Alan, as I previously wrote. Having now read the complete work I think we have to knock any ideas of the Venerable Bede's involvment on the head. Sorry Maggie! Firstly, it wasn't only he who had the name Bede. It appears to have been quite a common name at the time. Secondly, -ing would appear to be purely genitive in function and monks didn't own anything. Thirdly, as Bede entered the monastery at the age of seven he was unlikely to have set up any homestead and place names of the era were topographical or denoted ownership. Mawer's work is a tough read, not least because of the compositor's interpretation of the original work, which was almost certainly hand written. I give you a synopsis of the relevant points: Mawer, in discussing the -ington names of Northumberland, refers to an article on the early settlement of Northumbria written by one Dr. Woolacott. This appeared in the Geographical Journal (year of publication unknown to me). According to Woolacott the effects of the glacial period had a great bearing on the location of early settlements. Glacial surface deposits, he claimed, lay thickest "along the washes" and "on higher ground escarpments rise like islands from beneath the superficial deposits ". In Northumbria especially, this had considerable influence in determining the location of minor settlements as it was easy to obtain water in these places. With reference to Topley (no information as to who Topley may be) he says that the Northumbrian villages with -ing "are old settlements and either stand on sand and gravel hillocks lying on the boulder clay, or on exposures of sandstone which rise above the uniform level of the surface formations. A large number of the pit villages, which are in many cases merely enlargements of the ancient settlements belong to the latter class". Mawer tested this theory by completing a fresh survey of the topography. The theory, he said, "would appear to hold good for Acklington, Bedlington, Cramlington" and half a dozen other named places. All were situated on high ground where the geology of the area favoured the occurance of springs. However, this could not be applied to Choppington, he said, as it had a nearby stream from which water could be obtained. Taking all the evidence into consideration Mawer concluded that this theory was proved, at least for East Northumberland, where the number of -ington names on this type of ground was far too large to be due to pure coincidence. As for the genitive (posessive) nature of -ing Mawer names three different types: -inga - genitive plural, -ingas - genitive singular and , by far the most common - simple -ing. Various theories, ranging from number of syllables in the personal name to loss of inflectional suffixes have been put forward to explain the differences but all have subsequently been rejected in favour of one Professor Moorman's explanation that -ing denotes posession. According to Mawer the theory has been "confirmed beyond a doubt" by the examination of Old English evidence. Such place names, he says, are simply the farm, clearing or whatever it may be, of or belonging to a man bearing a certain name. So, there we have it. If you fancy wading through the whole book you'll find it at: http://archive.org/stream/cu31924028042996/cu31924028042996 djvu.txt

Of course there is a more modern theory that a Chinese pirate called Ling Tong was the terror of the North Sea until he was ambushed in his junk at a bend in the river Blyth. Over the years the name of the place changed from 'The Bend of Ling Tong' to Bedlington. But I think this this is a bit far fetched because the only source for this is in this post. If you've heard this theory before it's because I told a lot of people when I made it up in 1962.

I've just found a wonderful book on the Internet. It was published as an academic thesis in 1920 and has somehow ended up in the library of Cornell University USA. Despite its age the contents are valid even today. Over a period of 8 years the authors, Alan Mawer M.A. and his professor, Joseph Cowen,(both Durham University) researched the Place names of Northumberland and Durham. This is what they discovered about the changing name of Bedlington. 1050 Bedlingtun 1085 Bethlingtun 1104 - 1108 Betlingtun 1150 Bellingtona 1170 Bethlingtone, Betligtun 1175 Betlingetun 1203 Bellingeton 1228 Bellington 1291 Bedelinton 1315 Bedelington 1335 Bellington 1507 Bedlyngton There was an Old English version "Bedeling(a) tiin of Bedel or of his sons. Bedel is a diminutive of Beda". Mawer goes on to say that those Spellings with double L are probably due to an assimilation that never became fully established. Those Spellings with tl are due to A.N. influence (sorry I don't know what that is as I haven't found Mawer's list of abbreviations too helpfull). And, finally, those Spellings with thl are due to a common interchange of dl in certain Anglian Words.

Are you sure it was made up Smudge? I heard from a good source that Ling managed to drop his Granny Kam off at the Dun Cow Quay and she opened the Kam Tong restaurant in Blyth. I was told that story from Someone who doesn't tell porkys in fact the same guy went on to become an MP. In the meantime think we better get back on course.

Bede in Old English = Baeda or Beda Bede in Latin = Beda It's the ing that puts a damper on the theory as it means belonging to. But it's interesting so don't give up hope!. Bede himself has never noted the exact whereabouts of his birth. He says only "on the lands of the monastry" (meaning Monkwearmouth) However, monasteries owned vast amounts of land so it could have been anywhere. Somewhere on the internet I've also read Sunderland and a Place called Tyne.