Survey of English Place-Names

Historical Forms

• Ceddesfeld c.1040 HSC(C)Hinde 12th

• Seggesfeld c.1150×1200 DEC c.1174×89 FPD 1174×95 Elemos c.1190 Spec c.1190 Scam 1392 GD

• Seggesfield 1180 Spec

• Seggesfeld' 1183 BB c.1320

• Seggesfelde c.1190 RD

• Segesfeld c.1190 RD 1208×10 Fees 1229 Ep

• segesfeld 1217×26 Ct

• Seggefeld' 1183 BB c.1320 Pont 1283 RPD 1313

• Seggefeld 1183 BB c.1382 Finc late13th Wills early14th 1304 RPD 1307 RPD 1311 GD 1312 Ct 1341etfreqto1370 IPM 1349–50etfreqto1400 Hatf 1382 Rot 1385 Scam late14th Lang 1407–9 Wills 1408 GD 1501

• Seggefield 1350 Rot

• Seggeffeld 1382 Hatf

• Seggeffelde 1558 Wills

• Secchefeld' 1197 Pipe

• segefeld 1242×3 Ass

• Segefeld' 1283 Bek 1438×9 Vis

• Segefeld 1312 RPD 1336×7etfreqto1557 IPM 1380 Halm 1382 Hatf 1388 Salvin 1406 Pont 1459 Eldon 1507 DST 1522 et freq

• Segefelde 1312 DEC 15th

• Segefeild 1547 IPM

• Segfeld 1408etfreqto1480 IPM 1418 Lang 1565 Wills

• Sedgeffeld, sedgeffelde, Sedgefeilde 1558 Wills

• Sedgefielde 1558 1647 ParlSurv

• Sedgefeld 1559,1581 Wills 1589 Ct 1605×6 IPM

• Sedgfeld 1561 ib

• Sedgefield before1576 GD 1647 ParlSurv 1662 GDCbox3/2 1803 NRCbox7

• Sedgfeild 1620 IPM 1658 Salvin 1717 Hud

• Sedgfield 1675 Ogilby 1723×4 Hud 1798 GD 1799 EP/Di

• Sedgefeild 1717 Hud 1723 HC/CB129/76 1726 ib

• Sledgefield (sic) 1840 RedmarshallTA

• Seggemore 1263 DEPN

Etymology

The earliest and most authoritative spelling is incontrovertibly 'Cedd's open country', OE  pers.n. Cedd or Ceddi , genitive sing. Ceddes , + feld . At a very early period the personal name seems to have become confused, presumably with OE  secg 'sedge, reed, rush', as in the p.ns. Sedgebrook Lincolnshire SK 8537, Sechebroc 1086, Seggebroc 1202 DLiPN 109; Sedgemoor Somerset ST 3535, Seggemore 1263 DEPN; Sedgwick West Sussex TQ 1827, Segwike 1222, Seg (g )ewyk (e ) 1239–1446 PNSx 231; and Setchel Fen Cambridgeshire TL 4771, Seghchawfen 1343, OE  secg-haga 'sedge enclosure' PNCa 150 — rather than with secg 'warrior, hero' or the pers.n. Secg derived from it, as proposed for Seckloe Buckinghamshire, Seggeslawa 1182, Seggelawa 1189, 'Secg's or the warrior's barrow' PNBk 16; Sedgeberrow Worcestershire SP 0238, Segcgesbearuue [778] 11th, 'Secg's grove' PNWo 164; and Sedgley Staffordshire SO 9194, Secgesleage [985] 12th, 'Secg's clearing' DEPN, although the genitive ending -es does survive for some time. The motivation for the substitution is unclear. Mawer, NbDu 173, citing Zachrisson 19–20, referred to supposed occasional instances of OE palatal c becoming s , but the theory of Anglo-Norman influence on English place-names is in its crude Zachrissonian form no longer tenable: see Cecily Clark, 'Towards a Reassessment of “Anglo- Norman Influence on English Place-Names”' in Language Contact in the British Isles : Proceedings of the Eighth International Symposium on Language Contact in Europe , Douglas , Isle of Man , 1988 , edited by P. Sture Ureland and George Broderick, Tübingen 1991, 275–95 and in Words , Names and History : Selected Writings of Cecily Clark , ed. by Peter Jackson, Woodbridge 1995, 144–55. More likely is a native dissimilatory process whereby the late OE pronunciation [tʃedιsfeld], becoming [tʃedzfeld] or [tʃeʤfeld] with syncope of the medial syllable, was then simplified to [seʤfeld] aided by the analogical influence of the common word 'sedge', ME  segge .

The pers.n. Cedd or Ceddi , otherwise known as the name of one of the Irish-trained priests who accompanied Bishop Finan at the baptism of Peada in 653 (BHE III 21), subsequently becoming a bishop active among the East Saxons and at the Synod of Whitby and originally buried at his foundation at Lastingham, N Yorks, is interesting, for although Bede calls him English, the pers.n. is of Celtic origin, < Catu - names with OE hypocoristic doubling of d and i -mutation (LHEB 554). There is, of course, no known or suggested connection of Sedgefield with St Cedd whose name would otherwise certainly have survived here.

“A small, neat, market town, with the appearance rather of a handsome village”, Surtees III 25. It stands on a “fine gradual swell of dry gravelly soil considerably elevated above the marshy lands to the South and West”. A member of the bishop of Durham's great manor of Middleham, it was granted a market in 1312 and was an administrative centre of some importance, probably owing its status to having been a member of an early multiple estate.