English Place-name Society

Survey of English Place-Names

A county-by-county guide to the linguistic origins of England’s place-names – a project of the English Place-Name Society, founded 1923.

Marlake House

Early-attested site in the Parish of Boarstall

Historical Forms

  • Merlakebrugge 1298 VCHii.132
  • Merlake 1316 FA
  • Merlake, Marlake 1540 LP

Etymology

Marlake House is a public house actually in Oxfordshire, in Murcot parish, but it preserves the name of a lost Buckinghamshire manor, associated with Nashway Farm (infra ) in Feudal Aids. Merelake is also mentioned in a perambulation (temp. Edward I) quoted by Lipscomb (i. 52). It is clearly the boundary-stream (v. mære , lacu ) which divides the two counties here, running parallel to Boarstall Lane. Cf. VCHu. s .'to Merlakebrugge and so always by the bounds of the counties of Bucks and Oxon.'

Places in the same Parish