DORSET PLACE NAMES

PUDDLETOWN

Many of us may have heard certain unacceptable words being described as ‘Anglo-Saxon’.

This is hardly accurate as we do not know if the Saxons considered any of their language as swearing.

None of them appeared in writing but remember these were all written by monks, and men of the cloth would never use obscenities (at least not in writing).

Puddletown features the Saxon word pidele, a stream name today seen as Piddle.

It originally described a wetland although, as a river name, is applied to the running water draining the marsh or fen.

The modern ‘town’ suffix is quite unusual, for it is certainly from Old English tun or ‘farmstead’ and this name would be expected to be seen as Piddleton.

ANTHONY POULTON-SMITH