Place Name
This was was built in 1785 for Beckenham Place, the Palladian-style mansion built for the exceptionally wealthy John Cator the younger, who had acquired the rights of the Manor of Beckenham by 1785. As it goes through the park it becomes Cator’s Drive. Beckenham was first recorded in the Anglo Saxon charter as Biohhahema mearcin in AD862 (mearc meaning boundary or mark in Old English) and in AD973 Beohha hammes gemœru (gemære being Old English for boundary). It is thought to be a reference to the Anglo-Saxon landowner, meaning Beohha’s village. By the time of the Domesday Book in 1086 the village name had been transformed to Bacheham. Experts say that the name Beohha suggests a person who was stooped or submissive, from the Old English word beonot meaning bent grass. The name almost certainly does not relate to the river Beck which was probably named after Beckenham, not the other way round.
