Survey of English Place-Names

Historical Forms

• Sevinhampton 1255 FF

• Sevenham(p)ton 1255 Ass 1327 SR

• Seveham(p)ton 1275 SR 1332 SR

Etymology

This curious name must be taken with Sevenhampton (Gl), a place of the same name in Wilts, Seavington (So), DBSeovenamentone and the seofonhæmatun of KCD 767. Grundy (Arch. Journ. lxxvii. 106) finds a difficulty in associating the bounds of this place with Sevenhampton (W), and suggests that the bounds may be those of the Gloucestershire place. There is no evidence however that they fit here and it may be pointed out that there is a byde wil in the bounds and this may contain the same stream-name as Byde mill Brook just by the Wiltshire Sevenhampton. Further, the estate in the Saxon Charter is one of 'x mansae.' In DB the Wiltshire manor is assessed at 10 hides, while the Gloucestershire one stands at 20 hides.However that may be, it is clear from the OE  form that we have a compound of seofon , 'seven' and hæme and tun . The only possible interpretation of such a name would seem to be that it denoted a village which included at least seven homesteads (v. ham ) and, from the frequency of the name, that there must have been some particular feature about a group of seven homesteads which led to their being given a distinctive name. The first hint we have in OE  law and custom of the importance of the number seven is in the laws of Ine (§13). Up to the number of 7, thieves are reckoned as individuals, from 7 to 35 they form a hloð or band. With this statement should probably be linked the clause in the agreement between Aethelred II and Olaf Tryggvason which states that 'if eight men are slain, that makes a breach of the peace,' i.e. an act of war as distinct from an act of private violence (Liebermann, A. S. Gesetze i. 220). These passages at least suggest that some special significance was attached to the number seven in OE times. Later in actual date, but undoubtedly representing ancient custom, is a clause in the little custumal which introduces the DB description of Nottinghamshire. It states that a thegn who has more than six manors pays a relief of eight pounds to the king. A thegn with six or less pays three marks of silver to the sheriff. No doubt the maneria of this passage are very different from the hams under consideration. It nevertheless proves that in late OE law a person who possessed more than six units of property might be subject to far heavier payments to the king than a person who had six or less. The possibility therefore arises that, at the early date at which these names may be presumed to have arisen, a village which contained seven homesteads may have been assessed far more heavily to public burdens, such as the king's feorm , than a village which contained only six. No absolute certainty is possible but it is highly probable that the explanation of these difficult and interesting names should be sought along these lines.