Place Names of Calne: The Strand

Looking towards The Strand from the river Marden.

Strand come from Old English 'strond', which means the edge of a river[1].

The Strand in Calne primarily includes the Lansdowne Strand, the Town Hall, Calne library, the Old Bankhouse - and the area of road that connects those buildings: under which, the river Marden flows.

The earliest map I can find which labels the area as 'The Strand' is the 1886 OS map of Calne, which shows a similar route to the Marden as now; with the river bending southwards down to the wharf.

The only physical sign that you'll see these days to let you know you're on The Strand is on the building of the Lansdowne Strand Hotel, as in the photograph below. If this hotel hadn't been renamed from Lansdowne Arms to the Lansdowne Strand, to reduce confusion with the Lansdowne Arms in Derry Hill, then there likely would be no physical evidence of the place name in the area.

Lansdowne Strand Hotel.

 

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References:
[1] strand - Wiktionary. 2019. strand - Wiktionary. [ONLINE] Available at: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/strand. [Accessed 06 January 2019].

Timeline Calne: 1066 King Edward is Lord of Calne

The 1086 Domesday book records King Edward as Lord of Calne in 1066. He is replaced by William in the 1086 Domesday book.

Prior to the conquest King Edward (Edward the Confessor), the last King of Wessex, is associated with 1996 places. A partial list of places King Edward was Lord of can be found here.

Place Names of Calne: Introduction / Thoughts

Calne boundary sign. Replaced in 2018.

As I've already published my thoughts on various Calne place names, it's probably a little late to call this an introduction. However, it can serve as my thoughts on the study of place names, how I research them, and how definite I feel we can be regarding any place name.

When I  want to study a place name, I try to get to the location. Due to a long term illness, I'm not always able to do this, so I use Google Streetview. What I'm looking for are any physical indicators relating to a place name, for instance a millstone on Mill Street, or any plaques that might reveal prior research at the site. Also any dated features, like the date on the house at 6 Curzon Street, are helpful when researching.

Dated 1617.

After this stage, I then look at the maps available to me. These tend to be maps I can find online, or maps I've previously photographed. They are a wonderful resource, particularly the tithe maps, as they can reveal past use of the place and any names connected to those places. Also checking if buildings are listed can provide other avenues of research, such as Heritage Assessments.

I also read from other sources, such as Marsh's history of Calne and the Victoria County History for Calne. Also Peter Treloar's photo books of Calne are a wonderful resource. I also check many out of print books. Whenever I find something out, I always try to find another source to corroborate those findings. It's important to find the most trustworthy source possible before publishing information.

Having said that some names are connected to places, events, and landscapes so deep in history that no reliable record (or sometimes no record at all) can be found. At this point it's important to look at all reasons a place could have been given its' name and then leave the conclusion to the reader, such as Quarr Barton, which was a fun street to research. Perhaps this may lead to debate, which may lead to other avenues of thought, however it's important to realise that for some place names a definitive answer may never be know.

Sadly, a lot of estates have disconnected streets from their locality. We have themed housing estates for plants, fish, and birds, for instance. Yes, the species involved may exist in Calne, but their meaning is a little more abstract. Perhaps simply a way to delineate that area from areas surrounding it.

Would it be fair to suggest that most Calne people would know where Lavender Drive is, but may not know where Walter Sutton Close is - purely because Lavender Drive is surrounded by streets also named for plants. While this reduces the historical connection, it can make it much easier for the emergency services to reach certain locations - which is of vital importance. The trend seems to have been that in recent decades, as areas are further built up and infilled, the developments are given nature-based themes to attempt to attract people to the new builds and to provide a much needed connection to nature and the outdoors.

Proclamation Steps

While these types of names may have a general link with Calne or Wiltshire, they don't reflect what's happened on the ground in the past thousand, years that Calne has existed. I find this to be a shame, we have so much history in Calne and often place names are the last remaining link to a past use - an example being Proclamation Steps. If that name hadn't survived in the history books - and then received a blue plaque to detail their past use - they would just have been a bunch of steps leading to and from St. Mary's church.

So, that's what I'm attempting to do with this place name project: Provide enough of an answer to reach a definitive conclusion, but where that's not possible provide various pathways to allow the reader to reach their own conclusion.

As this project has gone on, I've realised that along with the names of streets, buildings, and places, I can provide development dates and photographs of the areas I'm discussing. Hopefully this will provide an additional resource - particularly the photos are they show the areas at a certain point in time.

I hope you'll follow me on this journey. Please feel free to contact me with any additional information or if you have photographs you're happy for me to share on this blog or Facebook.

Thanks for reading,

Tim

 

To discover more about the place names of Calne, buy the book: