Hi everyone - I've had a fallow month and so haven't got any more fireworks/wannabe fireworks at the moment.
Just to say thanks Carole, Martin, Anthony for comments on Pensax/Sixpenny.
I have bought the relevant 1:25,000 maps now for Pensax WOR - "rocky outcrop" looks like the right etymology here, doesn't it?
And for Sixpenny Farm DOR -l this was a "little seaxpenne", wasn't it? - the contours look good for
this - and I've reread the comments on this name in PN DOR, which quotes a Swedish philologist proposing "rocks" as the obvious correct meaning here - but seeing this as a metaphorical transfer of OE seax "sword" (I agree with "rocks" but not with an OE etym. of course...)
Martin - cheers for "6 hills" suggestion.
I've certainly been wondering if Pimperne DOR is "5 hills" rather than "5 trees"- with the Celtic 5-word (mod W. "pump" and -erna which I think as you know = meaning-transparent oronomic suffix) but now I've got the maps
for this part of the country, I don't think this looks right (2 or 3 hills, yes, but not 5).
There do seem to be a couple at least of P*MP hills in
France (in Dauzet, Rostaing, Deslandes "Dict. Etym. NR et NM" - ed. Liedsinck o/print), so maybe this is the way
to conceptualise this name, i.e. to see P*MP as a British oronymic element.
There are a couple of other not dissimilar hill-names near Pimperne, aren't there? (forms not to hand, didn't think
I'd be talking about Pimperne today).
Thanks everyone for reading this post.
Nick
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