All Outputs (54)

Continuing the “Family Names of the UK” Project (2025)
Journal Article

The first two phases of the “Family Names of the United Kingdom” [FaNUK] project, funded by the Arts & Humanities Research Council, set out to explain the origin of all surnames found in Britain and Ireland that had more than 20 bearers in 1881 and/o... Read More about Continuing the “Family Names of the UK” Project.

Park in English place-naming (2025)
Journal Article

This paper explores the development of the word park as an English place-name element, from its origin as a word for practical arrangements for livestock management, through the great social changes of early-modern times by which the possession of a... Read More about Park in English place-naming.

The Castiglione inscription in the Tower of London (2023)
Journal Article

An etymology for campshed (2023)
Journal Article

The Oxford English Dictionary [OED] defines this word as follows: ‘[a] facing of piles and boarding along the bank of a river, or at the side of an embankment, to protect the bank from the action of the current, or to resist the out-thrust of the emb... Read More about An etymology for campshed.

The trajectory of changing rhoticity in Bristol English: A consultative paper (2022)
Preprint / Working Paper

This consultative paper by Blaxter, Beeching, Coates, Murphy and Robinson presents data on rhoticity in Bristol English. Through an investigation into the speech of 30 Bristol speakers the study demonstrates that this traditional feature is declining... Read More about The trajectory of changing rhoticity in Bristol English: A consultative paper.

Fetlar (2019)
Journal Article

This article rehearses the history of attempts to account for the name of the island of Fetlar in Shetland. It is concluded that explaining it as pre-Celtic is beset with philological difficulties, and that it is probably, after all, Scandinavian, th... Read More about Fetlar.

Your City's Place-Names: Cambridge (2019)
Book

The fourth in a new series of books from the English Place-Name Society focusing on English cities rather than counties. Interpretations published earlier (1943) by P. H. Reaney have been extensively reassessed and critiqued, and new material added.

Naming Shirehampton and the name Shirehampton (2019)
Journal Article

Using the example of the place-name Shirehampton in England, this article explores (1) the complications involved in understanding the history of a particularly difficult place-name (an etymological and philological question) and in the history of th... Read More about Naming Shirehampton and the name Shirehampton.

Each p[ɚ]son does it th[ɛː] way: Rhoticity variation and the community grammar (2019)
Journal Article

This paper examines individual differences in constraints on linguistic variation in light of Labov’s (2007) proposal that adult change (diffusion) disrupts systems of constraints and Tamminga, MacKenzie, and Embick’s (2016) typology of constraints.... Read More about Each p[ɚ]son does it th[ɛː] way: Rhoticity variation and the community grammar.

Meaningfulness in literary naming within the framework of The Pragmatic Theory of Properhood (TPTP) (2018)
Journal Article

This paper develops ideas originally floated in the Journal of Literary Onomastics 4 (2015) particularly concerning the genesis of “meaningful” or “cratylic” names for characters, so-called “sprechende/redende Namen”. I argue that literary naming fal... Read More about Meaningfulness in literary naming within the framework of The Pragmatic Theory of Properhood (TPTP).

Steps towards characterizing Bristolian (2018)
Book Chapter

Two lost place-names in the west Midlands: Gaia in Lichfield and The Gay in Shrewsbury (2018)
Journal Article

The purpose of this article is to note the existence of two, or probably three, related unexplained names, to present possible further examples of the element involved, and to review how far it is possible to explain them.

The meaning of names: A response in defence of The Pragmatic Theory of Properhood (TPTP) addressed to Van Langendonck, Anderson, Colman and McClure (2017)
Journal Article

In a number of interrelated articles, I have presented some ideas about the nature of proper names, and specifically about their meaning. A central concept of these papers has been subjected to criticism, I believe inappropriately, by several scholar... Read More about The meaning of names: A response in defence of The Pragmatic Theory of Properhood (TPTP) addressed to Van Langendonck, Anderson, Colman and McClure.

Welsh Lloegr 'England' (2017)
Journal Article

A new etymology is proposed for this controversial name, suggesting a Germanic origin.

Capel Soar-y-mynydd, Ceredigion (2017)
Preprint / Working Paper

A history, description, bibliography, set of texts and photo-gallery of a chapel in Mid-Wales.

Your City’s Place-Names: Bristol (2017)
Book

Bibliography of, and notes on, railways in Ceredigion (2017)
Other

As per title

Preparatory to A Dictionary of Sussex Place-Names: A,E,I,O,U (2017)
Preprint / Working Paper

First tranche of new popular dictionary entries.

Popular books on English place-names — a serious issue in onomastics (2017)
Journal Article

© 2017, Ural University Press. All rights reserved. This article reflects on a recent spate of books on English place-names produced by a nonprofessional writer, showing in considerable detail, for five counties, in what ways these books are deficien... Read More about Popular books on English place-names — a serious issue in onomastics.

The Oxford Dictionary of Family Names in Britain and Ireland (2016)
Book