Bapchild is a village and

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 authorit ...

in the Swale district of

Kent Kent is a county in South East England and one of the home counties. It borders Greater London to the north-west, Surrey to the west and East Sussex to the south-west, and Essex to the north across the estuary of the River Thames; it faces ...

, England, about two miles inside of

Sittingbourne Sittingbourne is an industrial town in Kent, south-east England, from Canterbury and from London, beside the Roman Watling Street, an ancient British trackway used by the Romans and the Anglo-Saxons and next to the Swale, a strip of sea separa ...

. It lies on the old

Roman road Roman roads ( la, viae Romanae ; singular: ; meaning "Roman way") were physical infrastructure vital to the maintenance and development of the Roman state, and were built from about 300 BC through the expansion and consolidation of the Roman Re ...

(

Watling Street Watling Street is a historic route in England that crosses the River Thames at London and which was used in Classical Antiquity, Late Antiquity, and throughout the Middle Ages. It was used by the ancient Britons and paved as one of the main ...

) now the A2, and according to the 2001 census, the

parish A parish is a territorial entity in many Christian denominations, constituting a division within a diocese. A parish is under the pastoral care and clerical jurisdiction of a priest, often termed a parish priest, who might be assisted by one or ...

had a population of 1,068, including Tonge, increasing to 1,141 at the 2011 Census. According to the Kentish

antiquarian An antiquarian or antiquary () is an fan (person), aficionado or student of antiquities or things of the past. More specifically, the term is used for those who study history with particular attention to ancient artifact (archaeology), artifac ...

Edward Hasted Edward Hasted (20 December 1732 OS (31 December 1732 NS) – 14 January 1812) was an English antiquarian and pioneering historian of his ancestral home county of Kent. As such, he was the author of a major county history, ''The History and T ...

in 1800, it was anciently written 'Beccanceld', which he claimed was the Old English for 'moist and bleak' as it was mostly marshland. However this is a

false etymology A false etymology (fake etymology, popular etymology, etymythology, pseudo-etymology, or par(a)etymology) is a popular but false belief about the origin or derivation of a specific word. It is sometimes called a folk etymology, but this is also a ...

. The place-name 'Bapchild' is first attested in an Anglo-Saxon charter of 696 AD, where it appears as ''Baccancelde''. It appears as ''Bacchechild'' in the Pipe Rolls in 1197, and as ''Babchilde'' in 1572 in a charter in the British Museum. The name means 'Bacca's spring'. The second element ''celde'' is derived from the

Old English Old English (, ), or Anglo-Saxon, is the earliest recorded form of the English language, spoken in England and southern and eastern Scotland in the early Middle Ages. It was brought to Great Britain by Anglo-Saxon settlers in the mid-5th ...

''ceald'' from which the modern word 'cold' derives. According to a late seventh- or early eighth-century charter, the Synod of Baccanceld was held in Bapchild, but historians now believe that the charter is a

forgery Forgery is a white-collar crime that generally refers to the false making or material alteration of a legal instrument with the specific intent to defraud anyone (other than themself). Tampering with a certain legal instrument may be forb ...

. The village has its own church, the

Grade I listed In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern I ...

'Church of St Lawrence'. in the diocese of Canterbury, in Kent, and in the deanery of Sittingbourne. Other listed buildings in the parish include, the former post office, No 35, The Street (on the A2 road), and No 1, School Lane Bapchild was also on the planned extension of the Swale Way, the Sittingbourne Northern Relief road built in 2010/11, which passes over Milton Creek and heads from the

A249 road The A249 is a road in Kent, England, running from Maidstone to Sheerness on the Isle of Sheppey. It mainly functions as a link between the M2 and M20 motorways, and for goods vehicle traffic to the port at Sheerness. In 2006 an upgraded du ...

at Kemsley towards the Eurolink Industrial estate in

Murston Murston is a suburb of Sittingbourne in Kent, England. It is about 1 mile north-east of central Sittingbourne, on the east bank of the Milton Creek. History According to Edward Hasted in 1798, it was once called 'Muston'. The parish contains abo ...

. Plans were to extend it, over the railway to Bapchild, and onwards to the Kent Science Park near Highsted, before joining the M2 Motorway, but these have been put on hold due to cost and planning issues.

References

Villages in Kent Civil parishes in Kent Borough of Swale {{Kent-geo-stub