ELTHAM, a parish in the hundred of BLACKHEATH,
lathe of SUTTON at HONE, county of KENT, 85 miles
(S. E. by S.) from London, containing, with the hamlet
of Mottingham, part of which is in the parish of Cbiselhurst,
1977 inhabitants. This place, in Domesdaybook
called Alteham, from which its present appellation
is deduced, is supposed to have derived its name from
the Saxon Eald, old, and Ham, a dwelling. It- formed
part of the royal demesne in the reign of Edward the
Elder, by whom it was given to Odo, Archbishop of
Canterbury, and at a very early period became a fa-
vourite retreat of the English kings. Henry III. kept a
grand festival in 1270, attended by his queen and the
whole court, in the palace, which was enlarged by An-
thony Beck, Bishop of Durham, about the close of the
thirteenth century. Edward II. resided here for some
time, where also his son was born (and from this circumstance
called John of Eltham), and the palace, erroneously,
King John's palace. Edward III. held parliaments
here in 1329 and 1375,.and in 1364 sumptuously
entertained his prisoner. King John, of France, in the
palace. Richard II. here celebrated the festival of Christmas,
in 1384 and 1386; and Henry IV. in 1405, on which
occasion the Duke of York was accused of an attempt
to surprise and murder the king. Edward IV. repaired
the palace and enclosed one of the parks; Henry VII.
built a front to it, and otherwise improved it, and it
continued to be the occasional residence of the kings of
England till the reign of Henry VIII., who celebrated
two splendid festivals in it, after which time it began to
yield in importance to Greenwich, which, in the reign of
Elizabeth, obtained the ascendancy. During the civil
war in the reign of Charles I., Eltham was occupied
by the Earl of Essex, the parliamentary general, who
died here in 1646. Of the extent of this once magnificent
pile, some idea may be formed from the parliamentary
survey, in which it is described as having " one
fair .chapel, one great hall, forty-six rooms and offices
below stairs, with two .large cellars; and above stairs,
seventeen lodging-rooms on the king's side, twelve on
the queen's side, and nine on the princes side, thirtyfive
bayes of building, or. seventy-eight rooms in the
offices round the court-yard, which contained one acre
of ground." Of these, the only remains are, the great
hall, being one hundred feet long, and thirty-six wide,
having ten windows on each side, and a finely ornamented
roof, which has for many years been used as a
barn, but is now .being restored, with a view to its
preservation; . two  ancient stone bridges, portions of
the walls, . subterraneous passages, and parts of the
inferior offices converted into .modern buildings, and,
with the surrounding lands, constituting what is called
the Court Farm: the area is enclosed by a stone wall
of great thickness, and from eighteen to twenty feet
in height: the moat by which it was surrounded was
from seventy to eighty feet in breadth, and from fourteen
to fifteen in depth; it is quite dry, and though
converted into a garden, its original form may be distinctly
traced; the principal bridge has two pointed
arches finely groined.
The village is irregularly built, but contains many
handsome houses, and the environs abound with noble
mansions and elegant seats; Shooter's hill, so named
from its having been anciently used for the practice of
archery, and on which a singular triangular tower has
been erected, by his lady, to the memory of Sir William
Daines, Bart., is celebrated for the beauty of its situation,
and the extent and variety of its prospects; on
its summit has been erected one of the telegraphs com-
municating between London and Dover. The parish is
within the jurisdiction of the court of requests held
weekly at Greenwich, under an act passed in the 47th of
George III., for the recovery of debts not exceeding £5.
The living is a discharged vicarage, in the archdeaconry
and diocese of Rochester, rated in the kjng's books at
£3. 2. 6., endowed with £400 private benefaction, and
£400 royal bounty. Sir Gregory Page Turner, Bart.
was patron in 1783. The church, dedicated to St. John
the Baptist, is a plain edifice, with a spire; in it
were interred the remains of Dr. Home, Bishop of
Norwich, who died in 1792; and in the church-yard,
those of Sir William Daines, Bart., and Dogget, the
comedian, partner -with Wilks and Gibber, and who
left a coat and badge to be rowed for annually on the
1st of August. There is a place of worship for Independents.
A free school was built in 1634, and endowed
in 1714, by Mrs. Elizabeth Leggatt, with lands producing
more than £30 per annum; there are sixteen boys at
present taught in this school. An almshouse was
founded, in 1680, by Mr. Thomas Phillipot, for six aged
persons, four of this parish, and two of the parish- of
Chiselhurst, and endowed with lands producing upwards
of £30 per annum. This parish has the privilege of
sending three of the pensioners to Queen Elizabeth's
hospital at Greenwich. Among the benefactions to-the
poor are a grant of land by Henry VII., in 1492, and
another in 1509, by Mr. John Passey. On the summit
of a hill south by east from the town, are the rer
mains of a Roman camp. Dr. William Sherard, the
-celebrated botanist, resided here in the early part of-the
eighteenth century, and cultivated a botanical garden.,
assisted by the German botanist, Dillarius, who published
a catalogue of the plants in two volumes, folio,
under the title of Hortus Elthamensis, in 1732. The
learned herald and Kentish historian, John Phillipot,
was either a native of this place, or resided here. Frederick,
Prince of Wales, was created Earl of Eltham
in 1726, which title is still borne by the King of England.