Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!
Eric Pickles wants to bring back the county of Middlesex, Harringay's 'historic county'
Eric Pickles, the Communities Secretary, has pledged to resurrect historic county names that stopped being used nearly 40 years ago as part of an effort to champion the “tapestry” of England says The Telegraph
This would include Middlesex, the county to which Harringay once belonged.
Mr Pickles also has something to say about local identity, “our local history makes us who we are and do what we do" he says going on to say that "administrative restructuring by previous governments has sought to suppress and undermine such local identities"
Do you think he's right? Is being part of Middlesex important to our local identity? Or is it all too long ago and far away to be important, something only those interested in local history could get excited about?
Links: For an interesting quick read on what became of Middlesex, see this blog post
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Tags for Forum Posts: Middlesex
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by John McMullan on
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Excellent, he sounds like a man who may well listen to my plans to convert Britain to a nation of people who drive on the right.
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Permalink Reply by Old-Age-Emporium(OAE) on
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If Eric should amble forth on one of his post-prandial perambulations, the British peoples could drive neither on the left nor on the right.
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Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton on
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I wonder, does Mr Pickles actually think - as the Telegraph reports - that the history of British place names only goes back a thousand years? The Middle Saxons came a bit before then. And perhaps he's forgotten those militaristic Italian immigrants who gave their own names to places they founded, camped in, or occupied. Not to mention the gangs of heavily armed Scandinavian farmers who sailed over.
Perhaps Mr Pickles should have a chat with his colleague Mr Gove about amending the history curriculum in Eric's old school.
Of course there is a wonderful "tapestry" of names. Which is why I'm in favour of remembering and retaining all the old names. But then as now, the naming and renaming of places was often contentious - sometimes bitterly so. The craftswomen and men who wove tapestries often seem to have been weaving a pictorial history of events as seen by the powerful and the victors of battles.
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And perhaps he's forgotten those militaristic Italian immigrants who gave their own names to places they founded, camped in, or occupied
So Eric must also have forgotten my long lost Prythonic-speaking cousins. We tried to persuade them to sail west from Manainn to the Isle of the Blest and learn Goidelic but they didn't know their ps from their qs.
Not to mention the gangs of heavily armed Scandinavian farmers who sailed over.
Right Alan - better not mention that lot. But, since you did, did our Anette miss the last longship home? Those damn cats again!
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I take it Eric will use this map to prove conclusively that both Haringey and Harringay are merely the hallucinations of overwrought imaginations?
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Permalink Reply by Liz on
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I've a feeling that that map might be older than Harringay, probably around the 1880s as the station on Green Lanes is marked but not named. Groom's New Map of Middlesex of 1883 shows Harringhay (sic) House.
'Haringey' is such stuff as Pickles' nightmares are made of...
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A privilege: to be part of Eric Pickle's waking nightmares.
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Outside my neighbour's house in Crouch End, there was a sign attached to the very stout lamp standard which read:
Borough of Hornsey - County of Middlesex.
But here's the rub. The Act that set up the original Greater London Council and abolished the old London County Council was the McMillan - Home Tory government. The likes of Pickles and even Thatcher forget this.
But how much will this cost? After all they have even abolished the Middlesex Hospital.
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There can be something evocative about old signs.
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Eric can pal up with Russell Grant - another advocate for the reinstatement of Middlesex. Sounds like a dream team.
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Permalink Reply by Dick Harris on
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Why reinstate only Middlesex? The ancient county was divided into six hundreds so we could recreate these too (Edmonton, Elthorne, Gore, Isleworth, Ossulstone and Spelthorne).
Where we live now seems to have been within the Finsbury Division of the Ossulstone Hundred. See: http://www.british-history.ac.uk/image.aspx?compid=22489&filena...
The process may already have started. A couple of weeks ago I met a gentleman who introduced himself as a member of Spelthorne council. I had to ask him where it is and the answer was Staines.
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The problem is you are likely to start a local Civil War, as the Spelthorne district has now been passed to SURREY! Shepperton used to have a Middx postal address, but all of those inner Surrey districts, like Runnymede and Elmbridge all have some historic link.
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