The BBC website Kent Place Names is the quickest way to find out about the origin of the place name of your community. Click here to search the BBC database of names.
Place name evidence can be very helpful but it is a complex area of study and there is no more difficult county than Kent. Place names can give clues about aspects of the landscape that have changed as well as how and what language was in use at different times in the past. Place names were given for very practical reasons for features that were readily identified. Today these features may have disappeared or changed beyond recognition, but the name has left historians with valuable clues where of no other clues survive.
It is however necessary to be very careful not to jump to conclusions because place names have often changed as the spoken language has changed, so what meant something in one language can mean something completely different in another. Place names evolve and alter over time, rather like written language the standardization of place names is something that took place from about 1600 onwards. For this reason many very old settlements do not have the same names they were given when they were established. It is usually necessary to find best fit translations linking with the change in language over the years.
Some argue that the study often relies too much on opinion rather than an expert knowledge of the ancient spoken and written languages and grammar. It is not unusual for there to be several explanations for a place name. One of the ways of checking the accuracy of a place name is to look at the locality in which it sits, checking that the place name elements match with the area.
For example, Ramsgate in Kent is thought by some to include a personal name - Hraefn's gap or geat - and to relate to the gap in the cliffs. Elsewhere in the country there are other explanations for this place name element. 'Ram-', inRamsdale or Ramsey, could refer to a male sheep, or it could be from the Old English hramsa, meaning ransoms or wild garlic. Another explanation could be a contraction of the Gaelic rath, a circular fort, as with Ramornie in Fife, which may mean 'the fort of a member of Clan Morgan'.
The main source for ancient place names is in old documents. Often when place names are listed they are dated and this refers to a document in which the name has appeared. The Domesday Book is the single most important early record of place names but it is by no means accurate. The recording of place names must have involved some misunderstandings, mispronunciation and mistakes.
One of the issues that has caused problems in Kent is the association of certain names with the first Saxon settlements in the county. At one time a map of settlements was based on the place name endings ing, ingas ton and ham. This was then found to contradict the archaeological evidence. It is a complex and confusing area of study.
If you are starting to look at place names in your area there are several book for the beginner to consult including a number of place-name dictionaries.
Glover J. The Place Names of Kent, Batsford, London, 1976.
Ekwall E. The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Place Names, 4th edition, Oxford University Press, 1960.
Wallenberg J.K. Kentish Place-Names, Lundequistska Bokhandein, Uppsala,
1931.
Wallenberg J.K. Place-Names of Kent, Lundequistska Bokhandein, Uppsala,
1934.
Place names as recorded in Domesday Book can be found in H. C. Darbys and G. R Verseys Domesday Gazetteer, Cambridge University Press, 1975.
Gelling, Margaret, Place Names in the Landscape, Dent, 1984;
Gelling, Margaret, Signposts to the Past, Dent, 1978.
The University of Nottingham and the English Place Name Society are currently involved in an extensive investigation of the place names of Kent.
Websites worth visiting include:
Kent Archaeological Society
Kent Place Names Forum
For information booklists and national references
Staff at the University of Nottingham