Will always upvote this, love this as a view of London, seeing how certain words have stuck around and then been twisted by Norman French first and later by Modern English is always fascinating.
never knew there used to be a mini forest in the fulham/hammersmith area and that the overground train line that sits on the border of fulham and chelsea was built on top of a river. Cool
Clopton made me chuckle.
Why can’t I see that bit between Camberwell and Lambeth?
That’s fantastic, amazed at the number of areas of London whose names have Anglo-Saxon orogins
looks like canary wharf used to be a swamp as well
I vote for a return to the spelling of “Uuluuich”
Big up, the Crogdene Massive! Again.
Is that genuine lol. The names are similar almost comically.
How most of the roads in the map exist practically with the same exact routes today (e.g. Uxbridge road, Edgware Road, Kingsland Road)
Wemba Lea apparently means Wembas meadow/clearing, with Wemba possibly being a Saxon chieftan. The dune/dun endings mean “hill” and became Downs in modern English. Interesting because in Willesdune och Neasdun should then have become Willesdown and Neasdown. The change appears to have been different with place names for some reason but in a way that appears to preserve the older pronounciation of the word. Nees-dun, Wills-dun. Just some musings, very cool map either way.
Edit: spelling
Are those… trees???
This is great, I’d love to see a bigger version to see the whole of the country.
Part of the problem is tidal marshes don’t suit maps well as they generally favour a binary “land” vs “water” distinction.Â
This absolutely awesome. I’ve always been interested in the origin of place names and it appears London has had its areas named back to these times. It’s great to see that Walthamstow, Peckham and Clapton (amongst others) have been named since times of old.
Are the streets accurate? If so it looks like Edgware Road is ancient!
Has it really been a road from Saxon times?
This is so good. I love that I can recognise so many place names.
Thats really nice. I briefly lived in “Stanmere” (lol), cool to see places I recognise
Absolutely delighted that the football song pronunciation ‘Wemba Lea’ turns out to be historically accurate.
Biggest regret not buying my flat at this time
Borough of bixle is still called all the exact same names
These guys must be minted now with London prices
Wow this is amazing, thanks! I didn’t realise how old our districts names went back, its fascinating.
25 comments
Will always upvote this, love this as a view of London, seeing how certain words have stuck around and then been twisted by Norman French first and later by Modern English is always fascinating.
I found the full resolution version here https://londonist.substack.com/p/mapping-anglo-saxon-london-a-big
never knew there used to be a mini forest in the fulham/hammersmith area and that the overground train line that sits on the border of fulham and chelsea was built on top of a river. Cool
Clopton made me chuckle.
Why can’t I see that bit between Camberwell and Lambeth?
That’s fantastic, amazed at the number of areas of London whose names have Anglo-Saxon orogins
looks like canary wharf used to be a swamp as well
I vote for a return to the spelling of “Uuluuich”
Big up, the Crogdene Massive! Again.
Is that genuine lol. The names are similar almost comically.
There is an even better, fully annotated version on the other end of this link:
https://assets.londonist.com/uploads/2025/12/anglosaxonlondon.jpg
How most of the roads in the map exist practically with the same exact routes today (e.g. Uxbridge road, Edgware Road, Kingsland Road)
Wemba Lea apparently means Wembas meadow/clearing, with Wemba possibly being a Saxon chieftan. The dune/dun endings mean “hill” and became Downs in modern English. Interesting because in Willesdune och Neasdun should then have become Willesdown and Neasdown. The change appears to have been different with place names for some reason but in a way that appears to preserve the older pronounciation of the word. Nees-dun, Wills-dun. Just some musings, very cool map either way.
Edit: spelling
Are those… trees???
This is great, I’d love to see a bigger version to see the whole of the country.
Part of the problem is tidal marshes don’t suit maps well as they generally favour a binary “land” vs “water” distinction.Â
This absolutely awesome. I’ve always been interested in the origin of place names and it appears London has had its areas named back to these times. It’s great to see that Walthamstow, Peckham and Clapton (amongst others) have been named since times of old.
Are the streets accurate? If so it looks like Edgware Road is ancient!
Has it really been a road from Saxon times?
This is so good. I love that I can recognise so many place names.
Thats really nice. I briefly lived in “Stanmere” (lol), cool to see places I recognise
Absolutely delighted that the football song pronunciation ‘Wemba Lea’ turns out to be historically accurate.
Biggest regret not buying my flat at this time
Borough of bixle is still called all the exact same names
These guys must be minted now with London prices
Wow this is amazing, thanks! I didn’t realise how old our districts names went back, its fascinating.
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