Rape (county subdivision)

Rape
Map of Sussex in 1832, showing the six rapes
Category	County subdivision
Location	Sussex
Created	Saxon period (pre-1066) Rape of Bramber (by 1086) Rape of Chichester (by 1275)
Number	6
Populations	30,113 (Rape of Bramber) (1831) – 71,921 (Rape of Lewes) (1831)
Areas	116,650 acres (472.1 km2) (Rape of Bramber) – 228,930 acres (926.4 km2) (Rape of Pevensey)

A rape is a traditional territorial sub-division of the county of Sussex in England, formerly used for various administrative purposes. Their origin is unknown, but they appear to predate the Norman Conquest. Historically the rapes formed the basis of local government in Sussex.

There are various theories about their origin. Possibly surviving from the Romano-British era or perhaps representing the shires of the kingdom of Sussex, the Sussex Rapes, like the Kentish Lathes, go back to the dawn of English history when their main function would have been to provide food rents and military manpower to the king. The rapes may also derive from the system of fortifications devised by Alfred the Great in the late ninth century to defeat the Vikings.

The Sussex rapes each had a headquarters in the developed south where the lord's hall, court, demesne lands, principal church and peasant holdings were located, whereas to the north there were smaller dependent settlements in the marsh, woodland and heath. Each rape was split into several hundreds.

One suggested etymology of the word, from Edward Lye in the 18th century, is in the Icelandic territorial division hreppr, meaning 'district or tract of land'. However, this is rejected in the New English Dictionary, and according to the English Place-Name Society 'phonologically impossible'.

First suggested by William Somner in the 17th century, it seems that the derivation of the word from the Old English rāp (rope) has been made practically certain. The suggestion that ropes were used to mark out territory, was well countered by J.H. Round, asking "do those who advance such views realize the size of the districts they have to deal with?" However, Heinrich Brunner explained the application of 'rope' to an administrative district by the old German custom of defining the limits of the 'peace' of popular open-air courts by stakes and ropes, the ropes then giving a name first to the court and then afterwards to the area of its jurisdiction, and produced a case where reep, the Dutch cognate of rāp, is applied to such a judicial area. The parish of Rope, in Cheshire is one place name in England derived from the word rāp.