How do you spell Siddle?
Well, It all depends when you want to spell it. Before the middle of the nineteenth century,
ordinary folk didn't get much of an education. So how your name was spelt depended entirely on the clergyman recording your
birth or marriage or eventually death - but I suppose by then you wouldn't much care.
As I've researched the records, it has become clear that any spelling of Siddle, Siddall, Siddell, Siddill is equally valid
before 1851. It was then, in the census, that the current spelling took hold.
My suspicion is that we almost certainly originated in Arkengarthdale. I've got as far as Ralph Siddle in
Wensley in 1677, originally called Wodensley, it means the ley or clearing dedicated to the pagan
god Woden. Part of that family of Siddalls eventually move to Masham. Three brothers Ralph, Stephen and
Benjamin turn up in the early 1770s.
Have a look here
to see the map. Swaledale, like most Yorkshire Dales runs roughly West to East.
Arkengarthdale runs due north to south with Arkle Beck (Brook) meeting the River Swale just south of
Reeth. So that makes it a Side Dale. Geddit? Side Dale - Siddall. It's got to be a possibility.
There are other explanations for the origin of the name and they could all be equally valid.
Because one works, it doesn't rule out any of the others.
This is sheep country, they even have their own breed of sheep, the Swaledale.
The wool is so tough and oily, it's almost waterproof. Before the Industrial Revolution, our forebears
would almost certainly have been involved in the local hand knitting industry. Every man, woman and
child would carry a skein of wool round their waist and they would knit garments all day and into the
night. A carrier would collect the garments or stockings every so often and deliver a new load of wool
known as a 'bump'. Drop a bale of wool and see what sound it makes.
Read up on the history
of the area.
My uncle Bob had a genetic condition known as Dupuyten's Contracture. This condition affects
certain elderly people and causes the fingers to curve down to the palm and not be able to be straightened out.
The condition only affects people who have Viking blood, so we can be reasonably certain that we are descended
from Norse warriors, which confirms my suspicions about uncle Olaf here.