WHERE EXACTLY WAS HEFENFELD/'HEAVENFIELD'?

Altar to Caelestis Brigantia

Several years ago I suggested that the site of the famous Heavenfield battle had to do with the epithet given to a goddess at Corbridge.  But I left the matter there without further discussion.  

"According to Bede, Heavenfield is close to Hexham (the Cantscaul of the Welsh) and thus quite possibly near Corbridge.  Bede has this as Hefenfelth or 'caelistis campus'.  The name is unlikely to be of Christain origin.  Instead, we should look to the Roman period dedication (https://romaninscriptionsofbritain.org/inscriptions/1131) at Corbridge to Caelestis Brigantia, the 'Heavenly Brigantia'.  Caelestis campus would then be a field (or plain?) sacred to the pagan goddess of the Brigantes."

The question has always been: where exactly is the battle site?  Well, let's see if I can answer that now.

The English call the battle site Denisesburn ("id est Rivus Denisi vocatur" in Bede III, 1).  Various streams in the vicinity have been identified with this lost place-name, but no good identification has been made, and no good etymology for Denises- has been forthcoming.  

I would call our attention to Bede's account, in the original Latin:

Nec mora, utrumque rex Brettonum Ceadualla impia manu, sed iusta ultione peremit. Et primo quidem proxima aestate Osricum, dum se in oppido municipio temerarie obsedisset, erumpens subito cum suis omnibus inparatum cum toto exercitu deleuit. Dein cum anno integro prouincias Nordanhymbrorum, non ut rex uictor possideret, sed quasi tyrannus saeuiens disperderet, ac tragica caede dilaceraret, tandem Eanfridum inconsulte ad se cum XII lectis militibus postulandae pacis gratia uenientem, simili sorte damnauit. Infaustus ille annus, et omnibus bonis exosus usque hodie permanet, tam propter apostasiam regum Anglorum, qua se fidei sacramentis exuerant, quam propter uesanam Brettonici regis tyrannidem. Unde cunctis placuit regum tempora computantibus, ut, ablata de medio regum perfidorum memoria, idem annus sequentis regis, id est Osualdi, uiri Deo dilecti, regno adsignaretur; quo, post occisionem fratris Eanfridi, superueniente cum paruo exercitu, sed fide Christi munito, infandus Brettonum dux cum inmensis illis copiis, quibus nihil resistere posse iactabat, interemtus est in loco, qui lingua Anglorum Denisesburna, id est riuus Denisi, uocatur.

Note that Caedwalla is based in a fortified town (oppido municipio).  It is laid siege to by Osric, who is killed there.  Eanfrid comes there suing for peace and is killed.  Then Oswald comes forth with an army and kills C. at Denisesburn.

Now, in Cumbric a fortified town is called a dinas.  So what I see in the Denisesburn place-name is the use of the Cumbric word for what was previously described in the Latin.  I would propose that the dinas in question is none other than Corstopitum, and that Heavenfield should be identified with the Corchester Fields.  The burn or stream itself is the Cor Burn, as that name betrays a back-formation utilizing the same Cor- as found originally in Corstopitum (see Mills, etc., for the Cor- names here as deriving from the earlier Roman fort name).

We have evidence for dinas names continuing in the North, and being Anglicized.  The following is from https://spns.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/Alan_James_Brittonic_Language_in_the_Old_North_BLITON_Volume_II_Dictionary_2019_Edition.pdf and https://spns.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/Index_of_Celtic_and_Other_Elements.pdf:

dinas

a1) Simplex forms in the North generally show initial devoicing, d- > t-:
Dinnis Hill WLo (Bo’ness and Carriden) PNWLo p 147.
Tennis Castle Pbl (Drumelzier) CPNS p. 372.
Tinnis, with Tinnis Burn etc., Slk (Yarrowkirk).
Tinnis and Tinnishall Dmf (Canonbie) [Tinnishall + OE –halh].
Tinnis Burn (x2, in Dmf and Rox), both rising on Tinnis Hill on the Dmf (Langholm)/Rox
(Castleton) border CPNS p. 372.
Tinnis Hill Dmf (Kirkpatrick Fleming) Hough 2004 p. 128 [+ OE –halh].

dinas (Br, W), dinis (Br, Corn), Angl tennis, tinnis, refuge, camp

The -es of Denisesburn suggests to me that at some point dinas was wrongly taken for a personal name. In other words, the place was thought of as Dinas's stream.  No English place-name element (like denu, pl. dena, gen sg dene, for example) works for Denises-, and the personal name Denis (from the Norman French) is far too late for Bede's time (information courtesy Alan James).