Survey of English Place-Names

Historical Forms

• Bluberh(o)usum 1172 YCh511 1173–85,1203–15 ib

• Bluberhus(e), Bluberhous 1172,1195–1210 YCh511–12 1226 FF 1244 Ass3 1270 RegAlbiv,14

• Bluberhuses 1279–81 QW

• Bloberhous, Bloberhouse(s) 1299 BltComp47 1303 Ebor 1322 YDvi 1636 LdsRL2

• Bloberhowse 1564 YDii

• Blubberhowse, Blubberhouse 1579 WillY 1617 FF

• Blubrus 1750 PROt

• Walter Bluber in 1229 Pat

Etymology

Cf. also a hill in Nesfield called Blubber Fell 1771, 1817 M, and Blubber Lane 1771 M in Fewston. One explanation of this p.n. is a byname Bluber with hūs 'house' (originally in the dat.pl. hūsum ).The byname occurs in Y as that of Walter Bluber in 1229 Pat, and it is without doubt connected with e.ModE  blub 'swell', ME  blober , bluber 'foaming of the sea, a bubble of foam', blubere vb. 'to bubble, to weep', etc. But it is also possible that ME  bluber was used to denote a spring (lit. 'that which bubbles out' or the like); there are several springs in the immediate vicinity. It is hardly likely to be the name of a river (which here is the Washburn) nor of 'the lake' Ekwall refers to (which is of course the modern waterworks of Leeds).Blubber Fell , some 3 or 4 miles west, may contain the same byname or represent an independent use of bluber in the sense 'spring '; it is in the neighbourhood of Popple Well 67supra , also the name of 'a bubbling spring', v. Addenda.