Argam, or Argham (sometimes Ergam, or Ergham), was a civil parish and village in the

East Riding of Yorkshire The East Riding of Yorkshire, or simply East Riding or East Yorkshire, is a ceremonial county and unitary authority area in the Yorkshire and the Humber region of England. It borders North Yorkshire to the north and west, South Yorkshire to t ...

, England. The site is listed in many historical documents, but was deserted by the early 19th century, now being part of the

civil parish In England, a civil parish is a type of administrative parish used for local government. It is a territorial designation which is the lowest tier of local government below districts and counties, or their combined form, the unitary authority ...

Grindale Grindale is a village and civil parish in the East Riding of Yorkshire, England. It is situated approximately north-west of Bridlington town centre. The village has an airstrip, which is used predominantly for skydiving. It is currently opera ...

. The village was depopulated, becoming one of the known

deserted Medieval villages In the United Kingdom, a deserted medieval village (DMV) is a former settlement which was abandoned during the Middle Ages, typically leaving no trace apart from earthworks or cropmarks. If there are fewer than three inhabited houses the convent ...

Yorkshire Yorkshire ( ; abbreviated Yorks), formally known as the County of York, is a Historic counties of England, historic county in northern England and by far the largest in the United Kingdom. Because of its large area in comparison with other Eng ...

History

Argam is mentioned in the

Domesday Book Domesday Book () – the Middle English spelling of "Doomsday Book" – is a manuscript record of the "Great Survey" of much of England and parts of Wales completed in 1086 by order of King William I, known as William the Conqueror. The manusc ...

as being part of the Hundred or Torbar. Torbar was later joined with the hundreds of Burton and Huntou to form the

wapentake A hundred is an administrative division that is geographically part of a larger region. It was formerly used in England, Wales, some parts of the United States, Denmark, Southern Schleswig, Sweden, Finland, Norway, the Bishopric of Ösel–Wiek, C ...

of Dickering. The parish was bisected along a north-east/south-west axis by Argham Dykes (or Ergham Dykes), a

Bronze Age The Bronze Age is a historic period, lasting approximately from 3300 BC to 1200 BC, characterized by the use of bronze, the presence of writing in some areas, and other early features of urban civilization. The Bronze Age is the second pri ...

earthwork that extends from

Reighton Reighton is a village and civil parish, in the Scarborough district of North Yorkshire, England. From the mediaeval era until the 19th century Reighton was part of Dickering Wapentake. Between 1894 and 1974 Reighton was a part of the Bridlington ...

in the north-east, to

Rudston Rudston is a small village and civil parish in the East Riding of Yorkshire, England. It is situated between Driffield and Bridlington approximately west of Bridlington, and lies on the B1253 road. The Gypsey Race (an intermittent stream) ru ...

in the south west. The dyke, which was historically called the ''Argham

Cursus 250px, Stonehenge Cursus, Wiltshire 250px, Dorset Cursus terminal on Thickthorn Down, Dorset Cursuses are monumental Neolithic structures resembling ditches or trenches in the islands of Great Britain and Ireland. Relics found within them in ...

'', is now a scheduled monument. The dyke is believed to be pre-Roman, however in 1869, some Roman coins were unearthed from the dyke inside a mole-hill, which led to some assuming a Roman-built dyke. Pitt Rivers argues that if you stand on the dyke at Argam, "the whole of the wide extent of country which presents itself to the eye from this point, the whole of the ground appears as if it had been scooped out by nature for the defence of an army facing inland and westwards...." The parish was listed as having a church (dedicated to St John the Baptist), which was still extant in 1318 according to an ecclesiastical tax record of the

Diocese of York The Diocese of York is an administrative division of the Church of England, part of the Province of York. It covers the city of York, the eastern part of North Yorkshire, and most of the East Riding of Yorkshire. The diocese is headed by the A ...

. In 1115,

Walter de Gant Walter de Gant (died 1139), Lord of Folkingham was an English nobleman. Walter was a son of Gilbert de Gant and Alice, Dame de Montfort-sur-Risle. He inherited the English titles of his father, while his younger brother Hugh adopted his mother� ...

, granted some land in the parish, and all the chapels of

Hunmanby Hunmanby is a large village and civil parish in the Scarborough district of North Yorkshire, England. It was part of the East Riding of Yorkshire until 1974. It is on the edge of the Yorkshire Wolds, south-west of Filey, south of Scarborough a ...

, to the order at

Bardney Abbey Bardney Abbey in Lincolnshire, England, was a Benedictine , image = Medalla San Benito.PNG , caption = Design on the obverse side of the Saint Benedict Medal , abbreviation = OSB , formation ...

. However, like the village, the church building has been demolished, but the font, described as a "rough bowl", was moved into the Church of St Nicholas in Grindale. Whilst the location of the village can be identified from the outlines of the building walls in the ground, the exact location of the church is undetermined. Because the village of Argam had a church, the name of the area persisted beyond the destruction of the dwellings. Other lost Medieval settlements, lost their village or parish names if they did not have a church. The rights of the clergy in the parish were known to have been severely curtailed by 1632, by which time, no buildings existed in Argam village. The Archbishop of York left the decision of whether to hold religious services in the parish or not, to the incumbent vicar. One did exercise this right, preaching an open-air sermon on the site of the village in 1743. Historically, the parish, and village or Argam, led to the surname ''Ergome'', such as John of Ergome, who was a renowned scholar and

Augustinian Augustinian may refer to: *Augustinians, members of religious orders following the Rule of St Augustine *Augustinianism, the teachings of Augustine of Hippo and his intellectual heirs *Someone who follows Augustine of Hippo * Canons Regular of Sain ...

friar who studied at

Bologna Bologna (, , ; egl, label= Emilian, Bulåggna ; lat, Bononia) is the capital and largest city of the Emilia-Romagna region in Northern Italy. It is the seventh most populous city in Italy with about 400,000 inhabitants and 150 different nat ...

. Ergome came from a distinguished East Riding family. The parish and village have been recorded as being ''Ergone, Ergum, Erghum, Herghum, Ereghom,'' and ''Arholme''. The name derives from

Old Norse Old Norse, Old Nordic, or Old Scandinavian, is a stage of development of North Germanic languages, North Germanic dialects before their final divergence into separate Nordic languages. Old Norse was spoken by inhabitants of Scandinavia and t ...

meaning ''At the

shieling A shieling is a hut or collection of huts on a seasonal pasture high in the hills, once common in wild or sparsely populated places in Scotland. Usually rectangular with a doorway on the south side and few or no windows, they were often cons ...

s''. Argam covered approximately , being some north-west of

Bridlington Bridlington is a coastal town and a civil parish on the Holderness Coast of the North Sea in the East Riding of Yorkshire, England. It is about north of Hull and east of York. The Gypsey Race enters the North Sea at its harbour. The 2011 Cen ...

, near to the old road from Bridlington to Malton. The village was de-populated by end of the

Middle Ages In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the late 5th to the late 15th centuries, similar to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire a ...

, possibly for sheep-farming, which was the main use of the area listed in the

. Argam village does not appear in taxation records after the 15th century. Between 1801 and 1901, the population, which was scattered across the remaining homesteads in the parish, remained static numbering between 20 and 40 people. The census of 1901 details 40 people living in the parish (which had also grown to an area of ). The 40 people living in the parish were distributed across only six households or dwellings. In 1935, the parish was dissolved, and the area subsumed into the parish of

, which still exists as an area in the East Riding of Yorkshire. The last population census of the parish was conducted in 1931, and recorded 34 people. The remains of the village can be found at two grid coordinates: and .

Notes

References

Sources

* *{{cite book , last1=Beresford , first1=Maurice Warwick , title=The lost villages of England , date=1964 , orig-date=1953 , publisher=Lutterworth Press , location=London, oclc=1194441244

External links

Aerial image of the deserted village
Former civil parishes in the East Riding of Yorkshire Deserted medieval villages in the East Riding of Yorkshire