Re: Odp: Odp: Town and Fence

From: Piotr Gasiorowski
Message: 1129
Date: 2000-01-25

 
----- Original Message -----
From: David James
To: cybalist@eGroups.com
Sent: Monday, January 24, 2000 11:37 PM
Subject: [cybalist] Re: Odp: Town and Fence

David says:
Thank you for your intersting replies to my original questions.
Piotr, you state that the Anglo-Saxon placename element *ham* means
*home*,
it can also mean (rarely) a *water-meadow*, examples of which are to be
found in the London suburbs, namely East and West Ham. This placename
element is also found in Germany, for example the town of Hamm, which
is situated near Dortmund, and, I'm speculating here, in Hamburg. No
doubt I will be corrected if this second example is incorrect.
Yes, you're right. There's another "ham" in English placenames; in fact, it's pretty frequent, especially as the first element of compounds. OE hamm (with a short a) means 'meadow, plot of pasture'; ditto in Low German. I suppose your guess about Hamburg is correct. Some English placenames are ambiguous, e.g. Hampton may be OE *hamm-tu:n or *ha:m-tu:n (with pre-cluster shortening in late Old English), not to mention other possibilities.
 
I think hamm may be related to hemm 'border, edge' (= ModE hem). My Collins English Dictionary (not very reliable) cites Old Frisian hemme 'enclosed land'.
 
And talking of hams, another common placeneme element is OE hamol 'scarred, uneven' (cf. Latin camur, Irish cam 'crooked'). For example, Hambleton Hill (in Nidderdale, Yorkshire; 13 c. Hameldune) < *hamol-du:n 'scarred hill(side)'.
 
Piotr