Latin Influence

Most of the documents in which English place-name forms are found were written in Latin and the clerks frequently translated attributes, and sometimes whole names, into Latin. Woodditton (C) is Dittune siluatica in 1086, Brentwood (Ess) Bosco Arso in 1176, Leaden Roding (Ess) Roynges Plumbata in 1238 and Newmarket (Sf) is Novum Forum in 1200 and Novum Mercatum in 1219, whilst such attributes as Great, Little and High commonly appear as Magna, Parva and Alta. The majority of such names are found today in their English form, but some have retained the Latin of the official documents. Pontefract (WRY) is first found in 1069 in the genitive form Fracti-pontis and in 1102 in the ablative Pontefracto. Here we have a translation of the Norman French Pontfreit (1177) ‘broken bridge’, which, in spite of the official Latin form, has given the local pronunciation Pomfret. Montacute (So) was also a French name, identical with Montaigu near Caen, Latinised as (de) monte acuto ‘pointed hill’. Both these names replaced earlier OE names. Pontefract was earlier Tateshale ‘Tāt’s nook of land’ whilst Montacute was Biscopestun ‘the bishop’s farm’.