Talk:List of generic forms in place names in the British Isles

[Untitled]
Is there anyone out there who could make this page more complete? I have been all over the place looking for the meaning of wick/wich/wyk only to find a bunch of sites which give me the etymology of the word "sandwich." It's getting frustrating. This list is very helpful, but it could be much more so.

Reply to Untitled I have always been taught that Wick (..wyche or ..wich) was Saxon. A Saxon trading village, usually near the sea because a major trade was in salt, vital to preserving food. They were surrounded by a fence made of strong posts standing upright, through which (pun not intended) was woven with pliant saplings. That is the origin of Wicker-work and also a wicket (in cricket) and wicket gate. Historygypsy (talk) 19:47, 14 May 2017 (UTC)

Don't they have abers in Scotland too? And I thought it was a confluence. -phma

It has both meanings in Cornish: I will amend the entry accordingly. user:sjc


 * I guess a confluence can be seen as the mouth of one of the rivers (the more minor), so it still works, at least as a mnemonic if nothing else.Graham

Since 'ton' is so common at the end of town's names, such as Newton, Tiverton, Accrington, etc. does it ever mean just town?


 * It may do occasionally but that would be a (later) exception rather than the general rule. The two latter 'tons' which you have cited conform to the general rule as far as I am aware. The word 'town' is derived from 'ton' in any case. user:sjc

How about, for example: acre, air(e)(y), ald, aller, ar(den), barn, barrow, bag, bath, beach, beech, beth, b(o)rough, breck, bride, bridge, broke, burg(h), burn, bury, castle, caston, chester, church, cliff(e), comb(e), cot(t)(e), croft(e), cross, cumb(er), dale, dell, dor, dun(e)(s), dike, dyke, easton, fen, f(i)eld, folk, ford,for(e), forth, fox, free, fry, gate, hall, hampton, heath, helm(e), henge, hill, hold, holm(e), horn(e), hutton, ine, kirk, land, lea, lee, leigh, l(e)y, lind(e)(n), lon, lynd(e)(n), man, marsh, mede, mer(e), minster, mond, monk, moor, more, mouth, nell, nor(ton), ox, penge, port, reave, ridge, sea, see, set(t)(le), sex, s(e)y, sham, shire, (st)able, stock, stoke, ston(e), sut(ton), thorn(e), tree, try, ville, wait(e), ward, (w)ell(e), weston, whit, wich, wick, wil(t), win(e), wold, wood, worth(y), wyk(e), wyn(e)? All you have to do is look thru Domesday to see lots more. -- isis 06:54 Oct 24, 2002 (UTC)

Exeter isn't descended from &mdash;chester, is it? In Latin, it was Isca Dumnorium (dumnorium relating to Devon), that doesn't imply a &mdash;chester link to me. And I've added a W to that reference, as caer is decidedly Welsh &mdash; Gloucester is an anglicisation of the Welsh name Caerglo, glo meaning coal. &mdash; OwenBlacker 02:34, Jun 20, 2004 (UTC)


 * Seems to me most likely that Exeter is from Exetre, meaning a settlement on the Exe. But I don't know for a fact. Graham 23:19, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)


 * Exeter is indeed from "Exe caester", the second element of which can be modern -caster, -cester, or -chester, etc. In this case "Execester" became shortened in pronunciation just as hapened with Worcester, Leicester, etc. The first element Exe, from Isca, is of course Celtic (isca = water is cognate with the uisce beatha (aqua vitae, water of life) of "whisky"). It was usual for the Romans to append the tribal name to settlements which had been tribal capitals, hence Isca Dumnoniorum (Isca of the Dumnonii); this would also have distinguished this Isca from others, since Isca (water) was a common river and setlement name: Exe, Axe, Esk, Usk, etc.
 * Caer may be "decidedly Welsh"; however, it is - just like Anglo-Saxon "caester" - derived from Latin "castra". It is not so much that Gloucester is an anglicization of "Caerglo" as that both Old English "Gleawanceaster" and Old Welsh Caer Gloui are versions of what the Romans called Glevum, plus the element caester/caer (denoting a Roman fort). -- Picapica 19:52, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Magna and Parva; Upper and Lower; --stead ? Graham 23:44, 25 Jul 2004 (UTC)


 * Magna/Parva = Great/Little. (Cf. the motto of the county of Rutland: Magnum in Parvo: a lot in a little.) -- Picapica 19:52, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)


 * better to add it to the article rather than just tell me ;-)Graham 02:37, 26 Aug 2004 (UTC)


 * Done -- Picapica 12:03, 18 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Language classifications
I would suggest that a little more rigour is needed in this article:
 * "Viking" is not a language - I would suggest replacing it by "Norse" alone
 * Why distinguish between Cornish and Welsh? - I would suggest, if we are talking about origins, simply "Brythonic" -- "Brythonic (Welsh and Cornish) if you wish -- though Brythonic was, of course, spoken far outside present-day Wales and Cornwall
 * Scottish Gaelic? - I would suggest simply "Goidelic": there are Goidelic/Gaelic place names in present-day Wales too
 * Pictish? - What evidence is there for such a language?

Reactions?

More immediately, "axe/exe" is most certainly NOT Old English - so what shall we call it? It is no longer Welsh; probably Brythonic (P-Celtic) speakers "inherited" the word from Goidelic (Q-Celtic speakers) in the way so common for denominators of natural features... -- Picapica 19:48, 16 Sep 2004 (UTC)

There is a case for Pictish. It goes as follows
 * 1) There were inhabitants of Scotland before the Gaels.
 * 2) They spoke to each other.
 * 3) The Romans called them "Picti" ("Tattooed People").
 * 4) The Gaels called them "Cruithne" ("Britons").
 * 5) English speakers call them "Picts".
 * 6) They spoke a language different from the Gaels.
 * 7) Since we are not sure whether that language was Celtic or not (although the place name evidence indicates that it was Brythonic or at the least P-Celtic), we should not make unwarranted assumptions about its linguistic family.
 * 8) All that we know about it for certain, is that is was spoken by the Picts.
 * 9) Pictish is a good name for an unknown language spoken by a people called "the Picts".

In my view, the probability is good that Pictish is a synonym for Brythonic (or at the least is a Brythonic dialect). However others do not agree. In fact there are those who continue to believe that Pictish is non-Indoeuropean. Therefore it would be rather presumptuous to replace Pictish by Brythonic since we would be implying that we know for certain that Pictish is Brythonic.

Your suggestions about Viking and Scottish Gaelic on the other hand make perfect sense and should be implemented. I think that your Welsh/Cornish amalgamation idea has some merit although there are enough differences between the two to make me favour the status quo at the moment. -- Derek Ross | Talk 21:31, 2004 Sep 16 (UTC)


 * I accept all your points about Pictish, Derek. I was perhaps being over-provocative in my formulation. My real question is that, given we know almost nothing about the language the Picts used amongst themselves (except that it wasn't Goidelic), how can we list items here as being not only certainly Pictish but also having sure meanings. What authority is there, for example, for saying not only that "carden" is Pictish, but also that it means "thicket?" How can we know that?


 * And - while I'm being picky - (the "carden" example being a case in point) is there any real justification for the column classifying elements into "prefixes" and "suffixes"? We can see with our own eyes whether the element is prefixed, suffixed, infixed, or "stand alone". And the same elements can, in any case, be both "prefixes" and "suffixes": this is especially the case for Welsh placenames, where the older language had the structure Modifier-Modified while later and modern Welsh have Modified-Modifier (noun + adjective, head noun + genitive noun, etc.) -- Picapica 19:35, 17 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Hmmm. Those points are a little more difficult to answer. The placenames exist in territory which was known to be Pictish and some of them are obviously cognate to Welsh (Lhan, Pit, Fin, Aber and others) but when it comes to stating that these were definitely Pictish names, well, as you point out, that's a little more problematic. It seems pretty likely that they are, given that the only other known linguistic influences in the north and north-east of Scotland were the Gaels, the Vikings, and the Angles, all of whose elements are fairly easy to identify. That being so, it would tend to suggest that Pictish is Brythonic. As to the ultimate source of the meaning for Carden, it is cognate with Welsh cardden, but as far as the meaning goes, I'm not sure, and it seems that nobdy else is either. Read http://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/institutes/sassi/spns/oldnotes2.htm for more info. In any case whether these elements actually are Pictish or not, the current academic viewpoint assumes, by-and-large, that they are, so we should reflect that in line with the Wikipedia policy of "no original research". -- Derek Ross | Talk 06:37, 2004 Sep 18 (UTC)


 * Thanks for the very interesting link. I am still mulling over a possible improvement for the classification of K/W/P, SG (I think, at the very least, a little explanatory material will be needed). Meanwhile I have gone ahead and changed V to ON and added NF (no examples yet, though).


 * I am afraid that reading through the introduction I couldn't help but, in the end, give it a thorough makeover. (Will now don my tin hat and wait for the shells to start coming in.) -- Picapica 11:26, 18 Sep 2004 (UTC)


 * P.S. I am sceptical, though, about Torpenhow = hill hill hill. "Tor" and "how" are both OE; and OE-Br-OE seems improbable. I think it more likely (especially given the quoted pronunciation) that the "tor" stands for something else, meaning now forgotten. Better examples of "hill hill hill" are Bredon Hill and Pendle Hill. -- Picapica 12:03, 18 Sep 2004 (UTC)

I doubt that you'll have too many shells to worry about. You've done a fine job of the rewrite. Cheers. -- Derek Ross | Talk 18:19, 2004 Sep 18 (UTC)

Personally, I like Derek Ross's nine-point case for Pictish, except for one point, where he says "They spoke a language different from the Gaels." The neutral assumption here is that they spoke several languages, probably belonging to at least two unrelated language families, one of which was Brythonic, the other probably non-Indo-European. Let me explain. Whenever you're dealing with areas in which there are tribal settlements that do not go back to a single large wave of invaders, you are bound to encounter a lot of different languages. This is particularly true for mountainous areas. Consider the Caucasus, where some 70 languages are spoken, 50 of which have no known relatives outside the Caucasus, and even these are classified in either three or four distinct and possibly unrelated language families. This was the case for ancient Asia Minor, ancient Italy, ancient Iberia, etc., and it is still the case for large sections of Asia, Africa, the Pacific, the Americas, and so on and so forth. This is basically why the term "Pictish" must always be taken with a huge grain of salt.

One more thing. Could whoever put the "V" next to fax and shaw either change it or specify it in the "Key to languages" above the table? I put "V - Viking ??" there, but I am not very happy with it. Thanks. Pasquale 20:35, 22 September 2005 (UTC)


 * Fair enough, Pasquale, I admit that there could well have been more than one language spoken by the Picts. In which case the "P"'s should be taken as referring to the Brythonic one. I could go through my nine points and reword them to come to the conclusion that "Pictish is a good umbrella term for a group of unknown languages spoken by a people called "the Picts" but I won't at this late stage. Re the "V" this did originally stand for "Viking", but someone changed that to Old Norse and did not update all the existing "V"'s to "ON"s when they did that. -- Derek Ross | Talk 23:47, 22 September 2005 (UTC)

I would agree with the original points of Picapica above. 'Goidelic' and 'Brythonic' alone is quite an adequate way of classifying Celtic placenames in Britain, without differentiating between Welsh and Cornish etc. 'Pictish' is a floating label used by different people to refer to different peoples speaking different or unknown languages and living in varying parts of Scotland. In dealing with place names, and in other fields, I think we are better off not using the term. Oaken 19:04, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

Dale
I have taken out the comment "Used in Yorkshire"; while this is true, Dales are not exclusive to Yorkshire. Paul Tracy

Fax = "fair, pale"?
Where is this info from? Every origin I can find for the name "Halifax" gives fax as OE for "hair" or "coarse grassland", ME for "face", or Norman for "highway". The only references I can find for fax meaning "pale" or "fair" are all copies of this article. To be fair, I only have access to the net, not Fodor's Old Norse for Travellers, so could someone help me out? SigPig 08:38, 4 December 2005 (UTC)

I'm not sure what the meaning is, and there seems to be zero information about it on the web, but "fair" seems a little suspect. There are several places called "Fairfax," which would mean "Fairfair" if "fax" were defined in that way.Themill 11:53, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Merger?
There has been a merge tag on Place name origins for a long time, proposing a merger to this article. I do not know the subject well enough to comment on the merge - could someone who does initiate a discussion to arrive at a decision on the merger proposal. Kcordina Talk 09:42, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

I think this article is specific enough to deserve its own page. Hopefully someone will write articles on generic toponymic forms in other countries as well, in which case merging them onto Place name origins would make that article far too clunky. Themill Talk 09:42, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

Kingston
Kingston (disambiguation) redirects to Kingston, so why revert the latter to the former? —Tamfang 06:59, 19 August 2007 (UTC)
 * In general, direct links to disambiguation pages are "bad". The link should go the the intended specific article instead. It is a never-ending wikipedia maintenance job to review and correct links inadvertently created to disambiguation pages. However there are some links that are supposed to go to the disambig page. By deliberately linking to Kingston (disambiguation), it shows that the link is deliberately to the disambiguation page, and need not be checked again like the others at Special:Whatlinkshere/Kingston. See the second paragraph under WP:DISAMBIG for the guideline, WikiProject Disambiguation for a project about disambiguation, and Disambiguation pages with links if you want to help. --Scott Davis Talk 06:04, 22 August 2007 (UTC)
 * Given the subject matter – the name, rather than one of the places that share it – the disambiguation page may be the most appropriate thing to link to. &mdash;Tamfang 19:49, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Hyphen
This article and others linked to it use the forms place name, place-name and placename. According to my understanding of hyphenation, all three are possible, but we should be consistent. Anyone fancy trying to sort that out? --Doric Loon (talk) 10:05, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

Merging
As has been raised previously, the article 'Place name origins' overlaps substantially (and unnecessarily) with this list. I am in the process of re-writing 'Place name origins' to make it a bit more interesting (and accurate); I aim to convert it to a 'Summary Style' article, providing links to British Toponymy and here, and to any other articles I find that are relevant. I am placing the list from Place Name Origins here for the sake of reference, until I am sure that all the elements are transferred into this list.

I would also propose moving the 'preliminary remarks' section from this article of to British Toponymy, where it will add depth. In a 'list' article, it does not seem appropriate to have a long pre-amble. I will do this later, unless anyone objects.

Brythonic (Celtic) origins
From 800 BC Celtic names (Brythonic and Goidelic) were dominant around the British Isles. Over time the names, along with the Celts, were pushed back into Ireland, Scotland, Cornwall, and Wales, where these names are still very common.
 * Aber – a river confluence or river mouth
 * Afon, avon, esk, eye, dee – a river, river bank
 * Allt, bre, drum, pen, bryn – a hill or hillside
 * Caer, castell, plas – a castle, fortress or palace
 * Capel, llan – a chapel or church
 * Coed – a wood or forest
 * Cwm – a valley
 * Din, dinas – a fort
 * Llyn – a lake
 * Mynydd – a mountain
 * Pant – a hollow
 * Pont, bont – a bridge
 * Porth – a harbour
 * Treath – a beach
 * Ynys – an island

Roman origins
Parts of names used until the Roman Empire withdrew from the British Isles until the 5th century.
 * Caster, cester, chester, caester – a fort or camp
 * Fos, foss – a ditch
 * Port – a harbour or gate
 * Street, Strat-, Stret- – paved road

Saxon origins
Names taken from the Saxons up until around the 11th century.
 * Bourne, burn, delph – a stream
 * Burg – a large village
 * Coombe – a valley
 * Croft, worthy – a small enclosure
 * Don, den – hill
 * Eg, ey, ea, eig – an island
 * Ham – a village
 * Holt, Halt; a managed woodland, Used as in Northolt, Southall (which lost it's "T" over time) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.218.163.190 (talk) 21:19, 24 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Hurst, ley, lea, riding – a clearing
 * Ing – people
 * Ling, lyng – hill
 * Mere – a pool
 * Moss – a swamp
 * Stoc – a summer pasture
 * Stoke – a secondary settlement
 * Stow – a holy place
 * Stowey, stanway – stone way, paved road (usually Roman)
 * Ton, tun, wic, wike – a house, farm or group of huts
 * Weald – high woodland
 * Worth, worthy – fenced or enclosed area

Viking origins
Names taken from the Vikings up until around the 12th century.
 * Akr – acre
 * Beck, kelda, slack – a stream
 * Booth – a summer pasture
 * By – a farm or village
 * Ey, holm – an island
 * Fell, how – a hill
 * Fiskr – fish
 * Gardr – a landing place
 * Garth – an enclosure
 * Gate – a road
 * Gill – a valley
 * Hus, toft – a house
 * Ings – a marsh or meadow
 * Kald – cold
 * Kirk – a church
 * Laithe – a barn
 * Lund – a grove
 * Melr – a sandbank
 * Orme – a serpent
 * Pollr – a pool
 * Sker, stan – a rock
 * Stakkr – a rock in the sea
 * Stokkr – sound
 * Tarn – a lake
 * Thorp – a secondary settlement
 * Thwaite – a clearing in a forest
 * Wray – a remote place

MinisterForBadTimes (talk) 20:28, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Ford/Forth
The name Horsforth in Yorkshire has long been explained as "Horse Ford". Only problem - no river! No river, therefore no ford. What has been ignored from Ekwall onwards is the fact that the "forth" in "Horsforth" is pronouced "firth" (as in Holmfirth). Add to this the fact that the "Hors" part is pronounced "haw" and combine it with the the preponderance of Hawthorn trees that once thickly covered the area, and the name is far better explained as "Hawthorn-wood"

It really is about time that the academics that dream up many of these fanciful topographical explanations actually visit to check them out first before rushing into print with explanations that simply cannot be correct. (Jude710 (talk) 15:44, 30 September 2008 (UTC))

Hartlepool
Here is what Ekwall The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Place-names says about Hartlepool:
 * Hartlepool (-lǐ-) Du [historic spellings omitted] means 'the pool by Hart', the reference being perhaps to the bay south of the peninsula. The original name was very likely Heruteu, this name including both the present Hart and Hartlepool.  The latter was later distinguished from the former by the addition pool.  Hartlepool is thus from Heorotẽg-põl, which became Herte-põl and, owing to influence from Herterness (now Hartness, the old name of the district of Hart and Hartlepool), Herterpol and by dissimilation Hertelpol, Hartlepool.

(The article Hartlepool also gives several old spellings not containing le.) Accordingly I deleted it from the entry le (leaving Chester-le-Street), saying, Hartlepool does not contain -le- according to Ekwall. User:CJ DUB reverted, saying, ''what, is it a mirage? lol. it is another example of the form..see list''. The form, but not the substance. What list is meant here?

Let's not neglect App-le-By, Att-le-Borough, Cast-le-Bay, Cong-le-Ton, Has-le-Mere, Ing-le-Borough, Kil-le-Arn, Nett-le-Bed, Temp-le-Combe, Wens-le-Ydale. —Tamfang (talk) 09:23, 2 May 2009 (UTC)


 * Funny, funny guy. Those examples are just non-phonetic spellings that have simple become spelled "l-e" (except Wensleydale). They are photetically "EL" or "UL". For example, Appleby the sound is a-PUL or apEL. There is no LE sound (leh, li, la, lay, li, lye) anywhere in any your hilarious examples. Why is Hartlepool pronounced Hart-LEE-pool? Why does it sound that way? Why is it spelled that way? CJ DUB (talk) 01:32, 3 May 2009 (UTC)


 * Good question. Particularly since the old pronunciation was HART-el-pool. Why did it become Hart-LEE-pool in modern times? -- Derek Ross | Talk'' 03:17, 3 May 2009 (UTC)


 * spelling pronunciation, I imagine. —Tamfang (talk) 04:40, 3 May 2009 (UTC)


 * Okay, I guess the joke was an unwise distraction. Still I'm seeing no evidence, other than the current pronunciation, that Hartlepool reflects the French article in any way.  On another hand, the table could include it with a note that it's only folk etymology. —Tamfang (talk) 21:16, 11 May 2009 (UTC)


 * I'm not at all convinced that Hartlepool has the french element 'le' in it. All the other examples I can think of, off the top of my head, have the french word(s) very clearly hyphenated: Chester-le-street, Chapel-en-le-frith, Ashby-de-la-Zouch. MinisterForBadTimes (talk) 07:20, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

I still wanna know what list CJ DUB wanted us to see. —Tamfang (talk) 06:20, 14 December 2009 (UTC)

Wich towns
Found this entry on "-wich towns": http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wich_town - thus, perhaps the definition for "wich" ('place') should be amended on this page? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 204.210.192.35 (talk) 02:35, 14 December 2009 (UTC)


 * Yabbut see Talk:Wich town. That article might be a candidate for deletion.  (Put new matters at the bottom, using the "new section" button.) —Tamfang (talk) 06:17, 14 December 2009 (UTC)

Corby Glen
Using Corby Glen as an example of 'Glen' is not straightforward. The Village was known as just Corby until after the 2nd world war, and took the Name 'Glen' to differentiate it from the new town built in Northamptonshire for steel production. The name comes from the adjacent river Glen, which does occupy a narrow valley, but not where the village is!

That said, I have a feeling that it was me that added it. I just thought though that this note may be helpful--Brunnian (talk) 19:47, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

Interesting, would of thought the newtown which rose out of the Corby in Northamptonshire would of gotten Glen added to its name. To both differentiate (not that big towns truly need to with smaller villages) and celebrate its historic Scottishness. By the way, -glen- bears an heavier Scottishness then -burn- which is even found in placenames in London suchlike: Tyburn and Kilburn. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 5.65.142.56 (talk) 04:32, 19 September 2015 (UTC)

*ness
"ness[7] OE, ON promontory, headland (literally 'nose') Sheerness, Skegness, Inverness, Furness suffix" in the case of scottish Inverness the assignment can't be right. "Ness" in this case means the River Ness like in Loch Ness and had nothing to do with the word ness with the meaning headland etc. Am I right? --195.200.70.37 (talk) 07:33, 7 March 2011 (UTC)


 * Correct! --Doric Loon (talk) 10:47, 8 March 2011 (UTC)

Thank You All
I'm a wikipedia lurker and donator and I want to say thank you so much for compiling this information! As someone working on a fantasy video game, this has been immeasurably useful. Gharowse (talk) 19:23, 4 January 2013 (UTC)

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Stow
With regards to the article

Stow = Place understandable.

Not sure how the 'holy' and 'of assembly' fits in? Looking at these two below. I'd like a source for this translation.

Felixstowe

“The monks were licensed to hold a fair and Walton Priory was also referred to as Fylthestow, which is Saxon for place of felled trees where hay grows."

"Felixstowe does not appear in any documents until the 12th century. It probably comes from the name Fylthestow, meaning a place where trees or meadowgrass were harvested."

West Stow

"Anglo-Saxon wēste stōw = 'deserted place', rather than 'western place'".

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Mede/Mead
As seen in Runnymede, Thamesmead, probably others but i don't get about much. I believe it just means "meadow". I don't have a source, so won't add it!

Well, i've got this, but it's not exactly what we want: https://quod.lib.umich.edu/m/middle-english-dictionary/dictionary/MED27141 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.169.25.2 (talk) 22:25, 23 August 2020 (UTC)

Royd
Suffix. Mainly in West Yorkshire. Meaning, A woodland clearing. Examples: Mytholmroyd, Hanging Royd, Hebden Royd. Pilotpete01 (talk) 14:29, 20 October 2023 (UTC)