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Rape (district)




By the time of the Domesday Book , Sussex was divided into Arundel , Bramber , Chichester , Hastings , Lewes and Pevensey rapes. Each was centred on a Castle , had a single Sheriff and ran as a strip, north-south, from the Surrey border to the English Channel . It is known that this formation was a creation of William I Of England , presumably designed to protect routes to Normandy .

Whether the origin of the rapes, as districts, is to be found in the Iceland ic territorial division ''hreppr'' (rejected in the New English Dictionary), or in the Saxon ''rap'', a rope, or is of Norman origin, as lordships they undoubtedly owed their existence to the Normans.