HISTORY OF LYDGATE

The earliest record of any habitation at Lydgate is 1297 though it is probable that some one had lived here from the very earliest times. The road over Quickedge is a very old one and probably follows a track used long before the Romans came. It was known locally as the Roman Road or the Salt Road. A.J. Howcroft defines 'Lidyate' as being 'Lyed-yate', lyed from the Anglo-Saxon ?hlid?, a cover, protection, and the Icelandic ?hlith?, a gate or wicket. ?Yate? meant ?a road?, and Lyed Yate was a lifting or swinging gate securing the road against cattle, or a toll or tythe collecting gate. Very likely the latter as members of the Whitehead family who occupied the land under the Lord of the Manor of Saddleworth, seem to have acted as his agents or attorneys. C.E. Higson has a note that in 1707 John Whitehead of Lidyate was so acting. The home of such an agent would probably be known as the Manor House, which leads one to presume that the site of Adam?s homestead was the manor House at Lower Lydgate or very close to it. Until the 1820?s Lydgate was spelt ?Lidyate or Lydiate?, which is close to the original and ?Lydgate? is a corruption, due probably to some clerk misreading a ?y? for a ?g?. As late as 1764, the Whitehead estate at Lydgate was referred to as THE Lydyate', a survival suggesting the original purpose of the property as being a toll or tythe house or the home of the keeper of the gate.