Wunt be Druv! A Salute to the Sussex Dialect

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On the eve of the First World War’s Battle of the Somme in 1916, the Royal Sussex Regiment took part in the Battle of the Boar’s Head - it became known as The Day Sussex Died. According to the 2011 census there were about 23,000 Muslims in Sussex, constituting 1.4 per cent of the population. Within Sussex, Crawley had the highest proportion of Muslims with 7.2 per cent of the population. In 2016 I combined my love of video production and ceramics. My film The Drop was selected from an open call for films looking at our relationship with materials and making. This was awarded a screening at Reel to Reel, the Crafts Council and Crafts magazine Film Festival, held at Picturehouse Central in London’s West End during London Craft Week. The same year, I was on stage with Duncan Hooson for a Q+A after a screening of The Drop at Ceramic Art London, Central Saint Martin’s, London. Sussex has a traditional shield of arms, blue with six martlets; arms which heralds anachronistically attributed to the Kingdom of Sussex. Synonymous with the historic bonfire traditions of Sussex, “We Wunt be Druv” is still a statement which is still fairly commonly used in modern day Sussex, but what exactly does this proud phrase mean in English, and what are its origins?

Each year the County Hall, in the Sussex capital of Chichester, flies the Sussex flag, which is made up of six martlets (a Saxon bird) on a sea of blue, each one representing the six rapes of the kingdom of Sussex which it was divided into, forming the basis of local government. The combined population of Sussex as of 2021 was about 1.7 million. In 2021, Sussex had a population density of 451 per km 2, higher than the average for England of 434 per km 2. The Sussex dialect has been preserved in a number of the older books on Sussex. In the 19th century, The Reverend W D Parish published his “Dictionary of the Sussex Dialect” which was updated and edited in the last century by Helena Hall, local historian of Lindfield. And a number of the old authors (many of them clergies like E Boys Ellman and K Coker Egerton) and others like Barclay Wills, chronicler of “The Shepherds of Sussex” and Bob Copper, the greatest songster of the South Downs kept dialect alive.Sussex has a strong local identity. The county's unofficial anthem is "Sussex by the Sea" by William Ward-Higgs, inspired by a poem by Rudyard Kipling, and which became a regimental march of the Sussex Regiment. The county's motto, "We wunt be druv", reflects the strong-willed nature of its people in past centuries. The county day, Sussex Day, is the 16 June, the feast day of St Richard of Chichester. Jewish people have been recorded as living in Sussex since the 12th century and are first mentioned in 1179/80 pipe roll for Chichester. A considerable Jewish community existed in Chichester by 1186. All Sussex's Jews would have been expelled in 1290 when Edward I of England issued the Edict of Expulsion. A Jewish population had returned to Sussex by the late 18th century in Brighton and Arundel. Today, there is no religious context to our event. We remember the historical events, and give thanks for freedom, democracy and tolerance. Our burning crosses remind us of all martyrs who have died for the rights of religious freedom, and the poppies commemorate those who have died for our democracy and freedom.

The City of Chichester, the county town, is the seat of the Diocese of Chichester and home to its cathedral. We Won’t Be Druv! was commissioned by Battle Arts and Music Festival in 2014. Over 250 children from 8 primary schools joined to give the first performance in the De La Warr Pavilion, Bexhill on Sea. It translates as “country of the lakes.” Which sounds altogether more welcoming than the counties mottoes of England! What about the missing counties? My public showcase, KEEP, features both a family of extruded ceramic products and wooden furniture.

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PPR for information, its standard overhead joins now and we have offset approach to RW24/offset climb out on 06, so please do PPR so we can pass relevant information for the safety of your flight. But Sussex’s Ouse is one to be particularly proud of, not least because it could soon become England’s first legally protected waterway.

The earliest statement as to the population of Sussex is made by Bede, who describes the county in the year 681 as containing land for 7,000 families; allowing ten to a family (a reasonable estimate at that date), the total population would be 70,000. The coast has towns such as Bognor, Brighton, Bexhill-on-Sea, Chichester, Eastbourne, and Hastings, Hove and Worthing. Newhaven and Rye are ports, although the latter is also of historical importance. Their mostly Latin mottoes favour, amongst other things, teamwork (County Armagh’s “In Concilio Consilium”), hard work (Down’s “Absque labore nihil”), wisdom and prudence (Tyrone’s “Consilio et Prudentia”), or failing that, God (Londonderry’s “Auxilium a Domino” – “Help comes from the Lord”). Read More Related Articles BBC South East covers Brighton & Hove and East Sussex, and also Haywards Heath, East Grinstead, Burgess Hill and Shoreham-by-Sea in West Sussex.Finally, we leave you with the ending lines of a remarkable poem by W. Victor Cook from 1914. We hope that every time you read “We wunt be druv” it will set as a reminder of what it means to live or be of one of the most beautiful and individual of counties; Sussex. Lewes Bonfire Night always takes place on 5 November, unless it’s a Sunday, in which case it’s moved to Saturday. The town starts to grow quiet in early afternoon as the streets close to traffic and cautious shopkeepers board up their windows before the centre transforms into a temporary war zone.

There are many different Bonfire Societies each holding their own event and attending each others. Celebrations last from the start of September to almost the end of November! See our Event calendar

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One of Tony’s first jobs was working at Andrew’s Record store in the 1950s. Here he was able to explore his musical tastes and he especially became fond of Traditional Jazz, followed by Blues with performers such as Big Bill Broonzy and Josh White. The towns of Sussex have grown with fishing along the coast, and latterly holiday resorts, and agriculture and iron mining on the Weald. Sussex is therefore most heavily populated along the south coast and along the main routes between Brighton and London; the M23 - A23 corridor. One lesser known legend claimed that King Harold did not die from an arrow in the eye at the Battle of Hastings, but escaped and became a hermit at Chester.