, completed in 1935 The name Hornsey has its origin in the Saxon period and is derived from the name of a Saxon chieftain called Haering. Haering's Hege meant Haering's enclosure. The earliest-written form of the name was recorded as Harenhg' in about 1195. Its development thereafter gave rise to the modern-day names of Harringay (the district of London), the London Borough of Haringey and Hornsey. The church was first mentioned in 1291. Hornsey Village developed along what is now Hornsey High Street, and in the seventeenth century it was bisected by the
New River that crossed the village in three places: first at the end of Nightingale Lane, secondly from behind the Three Compasses and lastly, as it does now, at the bottom of Tottenham Lane. The village grew dramatically after about 1860 and eventually merged with the separate settlement at
Crouch End (first mentioned in 1465), to form an urban area in the middle of the parish. Hornsey was a much larger original
ancient parish than today's
electoral ward of the same name. These entities are smaller than the
Municipal Borough of Hornsey which co-governed the area with
Middlesex County Council from
1889 until 1965, since when the name refers, as a minimum, to the London neighbourhood with a
high street at its traditional heart to the west of
Hornsey railway station. Its
parish ranked sixth in size, of more than forty in
Ossulstone, the largest
hundred in
Middlesex and was a scattered semi-rural community of 2,716 people in 1801. The
N8 postcode district, the current form of Hornsey ward as devised from time-to-time for
equal representation (electorate) across wards of the Borough, and the choice of other railway and tube stations towards, on these definitions, outer parts create conflicting definitions of Hornsey and it is unclear whether since 1965 the term is distinct from Hornsey Village, a term unrecognised by some residents. The old parish used to have two small
detached parts immediately beyond and within Stoke Newington Parish. In the 1840s the parish had 5,937 residents, slightly reduced by the loss of
Finsbury Park but comprised taking in besides its own village, the established
hamlets of
Muswell Hill,
Crouch End,
Stroud Green, and part of
Highgate. In the later eighteenth and the first half of the nineteenth century, Hornsey became an increasingly popular area for wealthy merchants wanting a comfortable home close to London. With them came the laying out some large estates and subsequently the development of large villas along the principal routes. The arrival of the railway in 1850 made Hornsey a commuter town and accelerated urban development. In the late 1860s, large areas of Hornsey were developed by freehold land societies for working-class housing including Abyssinia (later known as Hornsey Vale) and Campsbourne. Development of a generally much more middle-class nature continued throughout the
Victorian and
Edwardian eras with the final gaps being filled during interwar period. Most of the early freehold land estates have since been demolished for public housing, or in the case of Abyssinia (Hornsey Vale) to accommodate the
Hornsey School for Girls. The tower of the original parish church still stands in its ancient graveyard in Hornsey High Street, at the centre of the old village. One-time well-known poets buried in the churchyard include English poet
Samuel Rogers and Dutch poet Gerrit van de Linde [] [aka The Schoolmaster].
Thomas Moore's daughter Barbara is buried but the location has been lost. Other notable places are the former
Hornsey Town Hall in
Crouch End, and Highpoint and
Cromwell House in
Highgate. On the north side of the High Street was the old public bath and wash house (not to be confused with Hornsey Road Baths & Laundry away on Hornsey Road) which was demolished to make way for a new housing scheme and
Sainsbury's. Opened in 1932, it had 33,000 users a year in the 1950s. A small group of residents wished
Haringey Council to purchase the site and install arts and crafts studios, with a gallery, primarily for local artists. For 1978 to 2002 in the borough, having in its initial 13 years no wards mentioning
Hornsey, three wards bearing the name existed and so popularised it among bordering, competing areas with newer names, strongly reflecting their historic, shared identity: • Hornsey Central • Hornsey Vale • South Hornsey
Economic development In the 1840s a section of a major new railway line from London to the north, the
Great Northern Railway (Great Britain), was constructed right through Hornsey near to the centre of the village, and a station - the first out of London on the line - was built to serve it on Tottenham Lane, opened on 8 August 1850. It was successful and sidings on both sides of the line were constructed s well as goods depots, so Hornsey became somewhat of a railway town. This tradition continues: two major maintenance depots for the new electric trains running from Finsbury Park to Brighton have been constructed beside the main line. In 1870 the first shop of what would become the
David Greig national grocery chain, once a rival to Sainsbury's, was opened in 32 Hornsey High Street by Greig's mother. In 1951 the first
Lotus Cars factory was established in stables behind the Railway Hotel (now No5 Dining) on Tottenham Lane. The company was formed as Lotus Engineering Ltd by
Colin Chapman. The Railway Hotel pub was owned by Chapman's father. In its early days, Lotus sold cars aimed at private racers and trialists. Its early road cars could be bought as kits, in order to save on
purchase tax. Lotus moved to
Cheshunt in 1959, and to Hethel in Norfolk in 1966. Adjacent to the pub was the first Lotus showroom. The site is now being developed by Fifth State as the Lotus Buildings and will celebrate the Lotus heritage with a community cafe, new public spaces and housing for students. Established in 1964,
Hornsey Co-operative Credit Union was Britain's oldest
credit union, until it merged with
London Capital Credit Union in 2013. Since 2000 Hornsey's residential developments have been architecturally diverse and overall accommodative of a diverse range of the local community. This has included estates of more than 50 homes with a proportion available under
social housing and
affordable housing schemes. The Hornsey Water Treatment Works were developed alongside the
New River, the water supply system constructed in the 17th century that brings water from Hertfordshire to London. The brick buildings associated with the works were the last constructed by the
New River Company before the
Metropolitan Water Board took over in 1904. They are now run by
Thames Water and still supply some of London's water. ==Rail transport==