MANY RELATIONS

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 77, Issue 148, 26 June 1934, Page 4

MANY RELATIONS

BRITISH TOWNS AND VILLAGES. tourists who pride themselves on | their knowledge of the British Isles 1 laugh at the suggestion that they do. not know where London is. Yet not many know the place. The London, of course, is known to everyone, but where is the London of the West? It is situated in the parish of Old Cleeve, near Watt het, in Somerset, and is not far from the beautiful Cleeve Abbey. There is another London near St. Albans, but it is called London-Colney because it is the Colney situated on th e London road. Londonthorpe is in Lincolnshire, and there are little Londons near Andover, near Basingstoke, near Bishop’s Stort- ■ ford, near Great Gnmsby, near Guild- j ford, near Leeds, near Thame, near Heytesbury, near Traxted, and near Uxbridge. The duplication of town names is a bewildering feature of the English countryside. As a rule with the larger town* there is no difficulty. To say that one is going to Birmingham indicates a journey to the Midlands, and no one would imagine that the reference was to New Birmingham in County Tipperary. Neither would a reference to Chester be taken to mean places ol that name in Durham or Derby. Other place-names always need some explanatory adjunct, as with Wellington, Salop; Wellington, Somerset; Wellington, Hereford; and Wellington, Stafford. Newcastles are even more numerous. There are 16 of them without any distinguishing additions. There are Lower and Little Newcastle besides the New-castle-under-Lyme of Stafford, the New-castle-upon-Tyne of Northumberland, and the Newcastle-in-Emlyn in Carmarthen. There arc 18 pure Burtons and a vast number of compounds, including Bur-ton-Goggles, Cherry Burton, Burton-Burton-Constable, Burton-Das-sett, Burton-Extra, Burton-in-Kendal, High Burton, Burton-in-Lousdale, Burton Lazars, Eurton-in-the-Wolds, Burton I’idsea, Burton-Salmon, Burton-upon-Stat her, Burton-upon-Tient, Burton* upon Ure. and West Burton. Luckily the majority of these places are not mportnnt, so that we avoid such confusion as we get with the We have the Newport, Isle of Wight; Newport Mor..; Newport, Salop; and Newport, Yorkshire—all fairly important. In addition there are dozens of ordinary or combined Npwports, any of which can easily become mixed up with the 60 odd Newtons, and the 150 odd Newtons which can be found in the British Isles. Mention Sutton to a Midiander and he thinks of the royal borough five miles north of Birmingham. Mention Sutton to a Londoner, and he thinks of the Sutton near Epsom. There are othe Suttons scattered over the <-obn»ry. 36 of them being pure Suttons, and 56 of them compounds, such as Sutton-Coldfield and Sutton-under-Whitstone-Cliffe. Other places which have many relations are Aston, Chesterton, Stanton, Stratford. Morton, Kirby, Houghton. Dean, and in Wale? LJaiifihange and Llansaintffraid.