Okehampton/R. Okement preserves the *ux- of Ptolemy's 'Uxella' II.3.13 and Ravennas Uxelis 106.1. Whether it is a river-name used as a habitation name, or the name of a high place - the Darmoor uplands, is debatable. The Dev river-name O Brook Ocbroke, Ocbrokesfoten 1240 (ERN 306) may be the same. OE mund 'protection' is the second element of Ocemund, etc.
---- Nick Corbett <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> Just returned from W DOR - so I didn't see Ashmore - but I read about it in various guides, not really on my mental map
> before now.
> This is supposed to be the highest village in DOR, and so to me it feels like a good candidate for that group
> of PNs I suggested abt a year ago exists in SW England where top. Eng. Ash- looks to me very strongly like an OE assimilation of earlier Celtic "high" (i.e. uxello- or even at its simplest per J. Lacroix somewhere in his La Gaule des.. trilogy/Errance *ic/*uc), to the tree-name or the theonym Aesc (e.g. at Aescesdun now Uffingdon BRK I think - from memory. (And see DUDEN Geogr. Namen in D for Asperg SW Germany (?BAV) as in Asberger's via surname of describing doctor. Also a Celtic iron-age hill-fort )
Tom Ikins
The Roman Map of Britain
http://www.romanmap.com
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