h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I’ve been reading these boards with interest, and wonder if any members might be able to suggest the meaning of Penn Recca. It is the name of two old quarries and a slate mine in the parish of Staverton, in an area near Woolston Green (aka Landscove), not far from Buckfast or Ashburton. I believe that two quarries, Penn and Recca, came together in the nineteenth century, going out of use in 1908.

The meaning of Penn is straightforward, but Recca has me puzzled. The location is a high piece of ground, showing on maps as Penn or Higher Penn. The mine beneath has a tunnel leading down to a place below called Lower Coombe. It all sounds pretty Celtic to me, although I am but an amateur.

The Staverton village site gives the earliest reference to Penn slate at 1338, http://www.staverton.com/HISTORY/HISTORY.HTM although other information states 1388. (There is also a reference in The Place Names of Devon, under Staverton, to Richard Rugge de la Penne dated 1238).

Any suggestions please…

PennRecca,

One possibility is that the term ‘recca’ comes from the early Brythonic word ‘ricc’ meaning a groove, which could conceivably refer to early quarrying at the site.

It refers to someone who chews the end of their biro too hard.

I'll get me coat....

Plymouth Exile

Thank you for your suggestion, I didn't have that one. I've found a few similar looking words in Morton Nance's dictionary, but the meanings don't lend themselves. I've had a look in Mr Biddulph's book and found 'Rak', to which he gives various meanings, one of which is 'in front of' which could fit, although Mr Nance doesn't list that meaning. It could of course be from a personal name.
Many thanks.

Hi PennRecca,

I was interested how Penn Recca quarry got its name as well, but I got absolutely nowhere trying to find out how. Was ‘recca’ a person, a place, an ancient word, or even perhaps the name of some now forgotten quarrying company? None of these ideas led to any clues.

Plymouth Exile’s suggestion that it may be Brythonic ‘ricc’ is possible, as I found this word has survived in Welsh as ‘rhic’ meaning a notch, nick or groove. As in English we use the word ‘cutting’ to describe excavations, ‘ricc’ may have been used in the same sense.

I think we should award a prize to anyone who finds out the truth about this one.

Does anyone have suggestions for these two other mystery names?

On Okehampton Common, Dartmoor, there is a stream which goes by the name of Red-a-Ven Brook. As with Penn Recca, I could not find any explanation for where this unusual name came from.

Likewise, all my attempts to find out the origin of the weird south Devon place name Noss Mayo have, so far, come up with nothing.

I'd have thought Red-a-Ven is merely 'red fen', complete with the extra syllable customary in Devon. There are quite a few Venns around the county. As for Noss Mayo, I've no idea; there is at least one other Noss, the site of the former Phillip & Son shipyard a mile or so up the Dart from Kingswear.

ExeValleyBoy

Red-a-Ven. I think 'ven' is 'fen'. I know an area called Puddaven, in Dartington near Totnes, this lies next to a marshy flood plain of the river Dart, so 'fen' seems likely. (There are other Puddavens in the county, I don't know if that would apply to them). I was once told by an elderly Devonian gentleman, in no uncertain terms, that Puddaven came from the French 'Pot de vin'. I'm not sure about that, but thought the better of discussing the matter...

Further to previous posting... I should have mentioned that 'Pot-de-vin' is French for 'Bribe'.

Penn Recca,

Yes - it may imply bribery, but literally it may simply mean "Jug of wine".

It begs the question wehther the French had a reputation to do anything for alcohol.

Indeed one may ask whether that tendancy stops at the Western Approaches.....???

Now - where's my drink....


Cres!

Thanks for the suggestion guys. Fen does seem to be a likely explanation. I found an old Victorian map which shows Venn Ottery spelled as Fenottery, and apparently ‘venn’ is a Dorset dialect word for the same.

Regarding Puddaven, not sure about the ‘pot de vin’ though! Pud-a-ven or Pud-a-fen seems more likely.

Unless, in both or either, the a-ven or aven element is actually ‘avon’ or ‘afen’, an Old Celtic word for river, as found in the many rivers called Avon.

EVB
Re place-names Puddeven & Red-a-Ven
By coincidence, I've just read a message on the Rootsweb genealogy mailing list for Devon regarding a family named Puddefen. The spelling 'fen', as opposed to 'ven', possibly adds weight to the 'water' rather than the 'wine' theory of origin, although such a minor spelling variation cannot really mean anything. I haven't noticed many families named after places in Devon, although I haven't especially looked: maybe that would be an interesting piece of research to undertake sometime. I wonder if there's a family name Redafen?

As you may know, a large part of today's Brittany used to be known as Domnonea in the early Middle-Ages, since this country was mainly settled by Britons from Devon and Cornwall. Knowing the Breton language and the meaning of Breton place-names can be a useful tool to understand Celtic names in Devon. Being a native Breton-speaker, I make the following proposal : in both Puddeven and Red-a-Ven (obviously related to watercourses or wetland), you might well find the word Aven, which is a variant of Avon (afon -f being pronouced v- in Welsh), a stream. Puddeven could be the equivalent of Pont-Aven, "Aven Bridge", name of a little Breton town built on the banks of river Aven ("pont" is bridge in Welsh and in Breton, it is "pons" in Cornish). As regards Red-a-Ven, it reminds me of a place named Rodaven, just by a ford crossing the river Aon (present form of Avon/Aven, written Aulne in French). "Rod" (akin to Welsh "rhyd") meaning a ford... But you ought to have the old forms of your 2 place-names whenever you want to see if my hypothesis fits.

PennRecca,

Transmarinus’s posting shows an interesting Breton cognate ‘Rodaven’, so I think the ‘aven’ water idea is getting a bit more credible.

Like yourself I haven’t properly looked into it, but I think you will find that a number of Devon surnames probably relate to places, as they do in Cornwall. Spellings were not fixed until comparatively recently, so the origins become blurred. You can probably expect even more variation with surnames than with place names, as there are many more incidences of one family with a shared name in many different places than there are with a single town or village name in either one or a few locations.

A large number of Devonian surnames contain the elements ‘cott’, ‘beer’ and ‘combe’, that are also frequent place name elements. Like Devon place names, these surnames often including the extra syllable or epenthesis discussed here before, as seen in the Devon surnames Wonnacott (Wonn-a-cott) or Langabeer (Lang-a-beer).

Hello Transmarinus,

Thanks for the interesting Breton input. It is great to have a native Breton speaker contribute, and I hope you stick around as I think we will have many more queries to pass your way. I have thought for a long time that Brittany may hold many insights into Devon’s old language, but because you have to approach Brittany largely either through French or through Breton itself I have never felt very confident about exploring this avenue—my French being a relic of a school course taken many years ago. So I tend to rely on Cornish or Welsh comparisons.

In your post on Darracott, here a Celtic explanation seemed to make more sense.

Whether instances of ‘cott’ in Devon are Celtic or English I don’t think, as with many other Devonian place name elements, that it is a question of the element always being either Celtic or English everywhere it occurs. I think some ‘cotts’ are English and some are Celtic. Because English became the dominant language, and because the Celtic form was probably never written down, whenever it occurred the Celtic coed-coat form always changed to ‘cott’, simply because coed-coat sounded like ‘cott’ in English.

Trecott (Okehampton) is another example, in which the ‘tre’ is most likely of Celtic origin, with the ‘cott’ possibly being an anglicization of coed-coat. Maybe you can help out with this, as doing a bit of internet research, I see there is a place called Treuscoat in Brittany, which goes by the alternative names Trecoet or Treuscouet.

http://histoiresdeserieb.free.fr/lieuxdits_scaer_cassini.html

There are also instances of Trecoed in Wales.

Hello ExeValleyBoy,
I visited Dartmoor once and I must say that I felt at home there...
Breton Treuscoat/Treuscouet/Treuscoët is, I think, different from your Trecott. Today, "treus" (you would find "traws" in Welsh) means "aslant". You find it in many Kerdreuz (sometimes written Guerdreux)place-names, meaning something like "village which is not regularly designed". But you always need to have an idea of the age of a toponym. If Treuscoat belongs to an older "names layer", "treus" could mean "through"; then, Treuscoat could be "Through the wood". One must be cautious looking at Cassini's maps, he made many mistakes in his writing of Breton names. In W Brittany, you may find place-names and surnames Tregoat/Trégouët, meaning, of course, "village of the wood". "Tre" belonging to a "names layer" older than the "Ker layer", many younger "villages of the wood" are... Kergoat/Kergoad, used as a place-name and as a surname.

Hello Transmarinus,

Welcome to the forum. It is refreshing to hear the Breton perspective on such matters. As you will probably be aware, it has normally been assumed (in cases where there is some doubt), that place-names in all parts of England (outside of the Danelaw area and Cornwall) are Old English in origin unless no possible OE derivation can be found. Many of us are now challenging this hypothesis for good logical reasons.

While it is conceded that there is an OE term ‘cott’ meaning a small dwelling (hence cottage), would one not expect to find most instances of this usage in areas where the Anglo-Saxon settlers were known to have been most numerous? However, most instances of ‘cott’ place-names are to be found in the South West, where it has been conclusively shown that the Saxons settled in small numbers relative to the Britons. Also, close analyses of the maps of Devon show that there is a high correlation between ‘cott’ names and the locations of ancient woodland. We believe that it is therefore much more likely that many of the ‘-cott’ settlements were named after the woodlands, and thus derive from the Brythonic ‘coet’ (meaning ‘wood’).

Your mention of the newer ‘village’ term ‘ker’ is interesting, as I was under the impression that it referred to a defensive or fortified settlement (Welsh ‘caer’), whereas ‘tref’ was originally a farmstead. Can you confirm this distinction?

Hello Plymouth Exile,

You are right. "Tre" (or "Treff" in Old Breton, a form you may still encounter in our several Pendreff, in W Brittany) was originally a farmstead. When I am speaking of a "village", it is in the specific meaning that we give, here in Brittany, to the French word "village": a group of rural houses and buildings corresponding to one or sometimes two, or more contiguous farmsteads, well, a rural settlement; in Normandy, what we call a “village” would be a “hameau”, a hamlet.
Caer was the old Breton form of our modern Ker (sometimes written Kêr). You are right, in the early Middle Ages, in Brittany, just as in Wales or in Cornwall, it was the name of a fortified settlement (akin to the Irish Cahair). But around the XIth century, due to the evolution of the mediaeval society at a time when "mottes" became the fashionable fortified places (regarding fortifications, remember for instance the changes that William the Conqueror brought to England), the meaning of “caer” took a “civilian trend” and thus superseded the old “tre”. From that time on, and until now, thousands of place-names beginning with “ker” were created and surnames beginning with “ker” (Kerguelen, Kermarrec, etc.) are typical Breton ones. In the XXth century a few newly created Breton farmsteads were named “Kernevez”, the new “ker”… Moreover, I must precise that “ker” took as well the meanings of “home” (“Poent eo mond d’ar ger” = “it’s time to go home”) and of “town” (on many W Breton town halls, beside the French “Mairie”, you may read the inscription “Ti Kêr”, i.e. “town house”).
I have a question. There are many Breton places-names formed with the word “killi” (“ar gilli”, with the article) sometimes written “quilly”, “guilly”, meaning “a grove”, “a small wood”. It is the same word as the Welsh “celli” and you find it in Cornwall too (it is the Irish “coile” anglicized in “kelly” as well). Have you a hint of this word hidden in some Devon place-name?

Transmarinus,

It is interesting to note how words change their meaning slightly over a long period of time, e.g. ‘ker’ meaning a fortified settlement at first and later becoming a village.

The term ‘killi’, in the form ‘kelly’ does indeed appear in Devon in a few place-names. The most notable is the village ‘Kelly’ a few miles to the north west of Tavistock. It is interesting to note that the nearby hamlet of ‘Kellybeare’ is a tautological formation, in that ‘beare’ is an Old English word meaning ‘wood’ or ‘grove’, i.e. exactly the same meaning as ‘kelly’.

Probably the most numerous Brythonic place-name element to be found in Devon is ‘combe’ or ‘coombe’, meaning ‘valley’, in such place-names as ‘Coombe’, ‘Combe Martin’, ‘Babbacombe’, etc. The Welsh equivalent is ‘cwm’ and the two words are pronounced the same. I believe that the Breton equivalent is ‘komm’. Can you confirm this, and if so, is this element used much in Breton place-names?

Transmarinus,

Some more common Devonian names in the Celtic language relating to woodland features are ‘morchard’ (mor+coed) meaning ‘great wood’ and ‘nymet’ which indicates a sacred grove. In Cornwall ‘nymet’ appears in the form ‘neved’.

Hello Plymouth Exile,
Quite interesting, what you said about « Kellybeare »!
I went to Challacombe farm (belonging to the “Duchy of Cornwall” i.e. to Prince Charles). Nice place with rare archaeological features. Did you know that the word “combe” is a French word too… At the turn of the 3rd Millennium, it is a local French term used to describe a type of valley in the Jura massif (mountains located at the boundary between France and Switzerland; thence comes the name of the Jurassic era). It is said to stem from the Gallic (continental Celtic) word “cumba”, meaning “valley”. When I was a student in geology I learnt that a “combe”, a “cluse”, a “nant” and a “crêt” are words used by “Jurassian” mountaineers to describe typical forms of the “Jurassian” relief. Having spent some time trekking in Wales, I could easily see in those French words the equivalent of the Welsh “cwm”, “clawdd” and “nant”… Crêt (OF “crest”) comes from the Latin but is the exact equivalent of the Welsh “crib”… In the Jura region, there is a town by the name of Ornans; if you know a bit of Welsh, you understand immediately the meaning of this town-name, the “Cold Valley” (“oer” is “cold” in Welsh). Being Breton, I could understand “cluse” without going a long way round through Welsh: a “kleuz” is a ditch… So, you see that Celtic words, close to Brythonic ones, are still in use in some continental mountainous areas. It suggests at least two ideas: first, that the Gallic language appears to have been spoken quite later than usually thought in remote mountainous areas of today’s France; second, that the Gallic vocabulary, at a late stage, was rather close to the Brythonic one. Going back to “combe”, this word was used in other parts of the former “Gallic” domain, and you even encounter French surnames like Lacombe, Combes, etc.
Regarding the modern Breton language, a “komm” is a trough, a manger (often carved into a granite block). But it belongs to the same semantic field as “cwm”, a valley; the idea of “hollow” is present in both terms. In the few place-names I know that show a component which might be “Komm” (Menez Hom, Kergombou, perhaps Commana), you can’t definitively refuse the hypothesis of a former meaning “valley”. But there is no evidence of it. Here, the common word for “valley” is “traon”, from Old Breton “tnou”, in some parts of W Brittany “tnou” (cf. Welsh tnau) gave birth to “teno”. This fact is interesting because, in some parts of England, if I am not mistaken, a “den” can be a dale… “Den” could come from a Brythonic word. By the way, are there “dens” referring to valleys in Devon?
Here is my interrogation about the “combes” of Devon: what about the idea of the Devonian “combe” form being influenced –at least in the way it is written- by Old French “combe”? I would like to know what you think about such a hypothesis. Thank you.

Hello ExeValleyBoy,
Here, in Finistère, we have a famous sacred wood, which is related to Saint Ronan's legend. In Breton its name is "Koad Neved", in French "le Bois du Nevet" (Nevet Wood). A famous religious "christian" procession goes around the ancient "minihy", the territory that the Irish Ronan is said to have evangelized, and brings the praying crowd along Koad Neved. If you scratch the christian varnish... you find that a "christian" rite still follows the itinerary of an old Celtic pagan round walk, and that Koad Neved is but an old "Nemeton". Elsewhere, such a rite can only be found in Ireland today (I think it is in Croagh Patrick).
In modern Brittany, a great wood is a "Koad Meur" (Coatmeur is a Breton surname too). In Old Breton it could have been "Mor Coet"...