Wirral minor and field names

 

 

Wirral parish map (19th cent.). The bold line demarks the approximate boundary of the 10th century Norse enclave, based on baronial manor holdings and place names. Courtesy of Chester and Cheshire Archives & Local Studies.

The Wirral peninsula in north-west England was once home to a vibrant colony of Scandinavian settlers, many of whom were Norsemen expelled from Ireland. The arrival of one group was led by Ingimund in 902, but there were others, including Danes. The intensity of the settlement is borne out by the distribution of major or settlement names in Wirral, such as Arrowe, Caldy, Claughton, Gayton, Larton, Lingham, Mollington Torold, Ness, Neston, Storeton, Thingwall, Thurstaston, Tranmere, the -by names (Frankby, Greasby, Helsby, Irby, Kirkby in Wallasey, Pensby, Raby, West Kirby, Whitby and the now lost Haby, Hesby/Eskeby, Warmby, Kiln Walby, Stromby and Syllaby) and the Norse-Irish Liscard and Noctorum. Some further settlement names, such as Birkenhead, Heswall and Woodchurch, are of Anglian origin but were influenced by the incoming Norsemen.

The intensity of settlement can, however, perhaps best be gauged from the minor or field names. Outstanding examples are brekka ‘slope, hillside’ (e.g. The Breck, Flaybrick, Wimbricks and the Newton Breken), slakki ‘shallow valley’ or ‘hollow’ (e.g. the Heswall Slack, the Bromborough Slack, Acre Slack Wood and the West Kirby Slack, the many instances of ærgi ‘shieling, pastureland’ (e.g. Arrowe Park), þveit ‘clearing’ (e.g. the many thwaites in the Bidston area), klint ‘projecting rock’ (e.g. the Clynsse stone (1642), now the Granny stone, at the Wallasey Breck and the Clints at Brotherton Park, Bromborough), hestakeið ‘horse race track’ (at Irby and Thornton Hough) and over 100 instances of the element rák ‘lane’.

The Wirral carrs and holms

Of particular interest are the 51 instances of kjarr (carr/ker) and 24 of holmr (e.g. Lingham) in north Wirral, names associated with marshy land: kjarr is an Old Norse word meaning ‘brushwood; marsh; boggy land overgrown with brushwood’ and holmr is  Old Norse meaning ‘dry ground in a marsh; island of useable land in a marshy area; a water meadow’. It is notable that there are no instances in Wirral of the corresponding English names – elements such as mersc ‘marsh’ and ēg ‘dry ground in a marsh’ – for the same features.

All names were recorded in the 19th century tithe map apportionments or earlier.

Bidston: Bedestoncarre (1306; now Bidston Moss), Wallacre, Oxholme, Olucar (1347), Holmegarth

Claughton: Near Holmes Wood, Further Holmes Wood (1824)

Grange: Carr x2, Carr Farm, Carr Field

Great Meols: Carr Side Field, Carr Hall Farm, Carr Farm, Carr House, Carr Lane

Hoylake: Carr Lane

Landican: Carremedowe (1306) now Carr Bridge Meadow, Carr Bridge Field, Near Carr Bridge Field

Leighton: Holme Hays

Little Meols: Carr x2, Carr Lane Field, Carr Field, Carr Side Hey, Carr Hey

Moreton cum Lingham: Lingham, Lingham Lane, Dangkers (now Danger) Lane, Bottom o’th’carrs, West Car, West Carr Meadow, West Carr Hay, Holme Hay, Big Holme Hay, Little Holme Hay, Holme Intake

Neston (Great & Little): Holme Heys

Newton cum Larton: Newton Car (1842), Sally Carr Lane (now footpath), Carr Lane, Carr, Carr Meadow, Holmesides, Banakers

Overchurch and Upton: Salacres#, Salacre# Lane, Lanacre#, Hough Holmes, Le Kar (1294)

Oxton: Holm Lane, New Home (1831), Home Field, Home Hey, Little Home, Carr Bridge Meadow, Carr Field Hey

Pensby: Carr House Croft

Prenton: Five Acre Holme, Bridge Holme, Top Holme, Lower Holme, The Holme, Higher Holme

Saughall Massie: Carr Farm, Carr Houses, Carr Meadow, New Carr, Carr, Carr Hay, Old Carr Meadow, Old Carr x2, Carr Lane

Wallasey: Wallacre Road/Waley-Carr, Routeholm (1306)

Woodchurch: Lower Ackers#, Higher Ackers#

Great Stanney: Holmlake (1209)

Stanlow: Holmlache (1209)

# = last element could be Old Norse kjarr or akr


Distribution map of field/track names in “carr” (filled circles) and “holm” (open circles)

Plotted on a map, they reveal an interesting trend and most congregate around the Rivers Birket and Fender. They suggest that much of north Wirral was of relatively low-quality farming land subject to flooding and tidal inundation, a feature that persisted through the centuries until the sea defences and embankments were constructed and completed in the late 19th/early 20th centuries.

Persistence of a Scandinavian dialect

Studies by scholars such as Kenneth Cameron (1997) have shown that the minor names in an area tell us a great deal about the kind of vocabulary of the community. The distribution of the carrs and holms taken alongside the distribution of all minor names in Wirral with Scandinavian elements attest to the persistence of dialect reflecting the intensity of the original settlement.

Distribution map of field/track names containing Scandinavian elements. Square marks Thingwall

Taken alone, individual names describing a landscape feature are limited to the occurrence of that feature – so that the distribution of carrs and holms shows the concentration of boggy areas in Wirral as much as the Norse influence of naming. The original Scandinavian words kjarr and holmr would have been borrowed early into English as ker and holm, and the evidence of the use of these elements in Wirral is all from after the Norman Conquest, the earliest recorded examples being Holmlache (1209) in Stanlow (perhaps the same place as Holmlake (1209) in Great Stanney, le Kar (1294) in Overchurch and Routeholm (1306) in Wallasey, where holmr is compounded with the Old Norse adjective rauðr ‘red’. But perhaps the fact that the normal Old English words for these particular topographical features are completely absent in these areas is of some significance. The Norse-derived words had become the normal ones in Wirral when the names were given.

Wirral was not entirely boggy and uninviting. In Bidston, close to the Bedestoncarre and Olucar, we have evidence of extensive clearing with large numbers of thwaite-names: from the 19th century tithe apportionments (with earlier forms recorded in 1644 or 1646) we find The Cornhill Thwaite, The Great Thwaite, Marled Thwaite, Meadow Thwaite, Salt Thwaite, Spencer’s Thwaite, Tassey’s Thwaite, Whinney’s Thwaite and the associated Thwaite Lane. Earlier we find Inderthwaite and Utterthwaite (both 1522), the Thwaytes and Oldetwayt (both 1357). Around the centre of the Norse enclave, moreover, we still find, for example, Youd’s and Bennet’s Arrowe, Brown’s Arrowe, Bithel’s Arrowe, Harrison’s Arrowe, Widing’s Arrowe, Wharton’s Arrowe etc., as well as associated names such as Arrowe Hill, Arrowe Bridge and Arrowe Brook, a tributary of the River Birket. The persistence of this word of Celtic origin, adapted by Viking settlers abroad is not only evidence of a continuing dialect but also of the continuation of a type of farming used (and still used) by the Norwegians, i.e. transhumance, whereby cattle and sheep are pastured away from the farmhouse during summer months, saving the nearby pasture for winter fodder.

 

Conclusion

 

The distribution of topographical minor names tells us as much about the distribution of natural features as it does about the people who named them. In the case of the Wirral carrs and holms, the high density in the former Norse enclave tell us about the distribution of boggy ground before the modern construction of the sea defences. It also reflects the persistence of the Scandinavian dialect throughout the centuries, and the absence of the corresponding English names for the same feature is testament to the dominance of this dialect in the medieval period.

 

Acknowledgements

 

The help and advice of Dr. Paul Cavill of the English Place Name Society is gratefully appreciated, as is that of Howard Mortimer (Wirral Council), Peter France and John Emmett (local archaeologists). The help and patience of Paul Newman, Derek Joinson, Margaret Cole, Caroline Picco and John Hopkins of Chester and Cheshire Archives & Local Studies is also very much appreciated.

 

This is an abridged version of an article originally written by Steve Harding and published in the Journal of the English Place-Name Society in 2007.

Harding, S.E. (2007). The Wirral Carrs and Holms. Journal of the English Place-Name Society 39, 45–57.

https://www.nottingham.ac.uk/ncmh/documents/dna/JEPNS-Nov-Dec2007.pdf

More articles about Vikings can be read on Steve’s Wirral and West Lancashire Viking page:

https://www.nottingham.ac.uk/ncmh/vikings/wirral-and-west-lancashire-viking-page.aspx

Further details of Wirral place names (and more) can be found in Ingimund’s Saga – Viking Wirral (Third Edition):


https://www.amazon.co.uk/Ingimunds-Saga-Viking-Stephen-Harding/dp/1908258306/ref=sr_1_1?crid=1VKVC9RN6DWAA&keywords=Ingimunds+Saga&qid=1645426500&sprefix=ingimunds+saga%2Caps%2C85&sr=8-1

Sue Bishop and Steve Harding

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