Wooburn
Major Settlement in the Parish of Wooburn
Historical Forms
- Waborne 1086 DB
- Wauburn 1200 Cur
- Woburne 1201 Cur 1227 FF 1242 Fees 1262 Ass 1282 Ch
- Wouburn c.1218 WellsL 1229 WellsR 1262 Ass 1299 Ch 1301 Ipm
- Wburne 1227 Ass
- Wuburn 1231 Bract 1232 Cl 1237–40 Fees 1241 Ass 1247 Ass
- Woburne 13th ADvi
- Wyburne 1284 FA
- Woubourne 1316 FA 1341 Misc 1360 1370 Pat
- Woburn in Chilterne 1331 Cl
- Woghburne 1331 ADvi
- Woweburn 1393 Pat
- Bishops Woburne 1402 Pat
- Woborn Deyncourt 1442 Pat
- Owborne 1484 ADiii
- Oborn 1487 BM 1490 Ipm
- Ouburne 1489 Ipm
- Obornes 1675 Ogilby
Etymology
This name offers serious difficulties. The two earliest forms with an a -vowel and the isolated form Wauburn , cannot be reconciled with the later forms which would point to a compound of burna and the OE woh, applied appropriately enough to the winding stream on which Wooburn stands. Such a stream-name has its parallel in Woburn (Beds), for which we have the OE form Woburningagemære (BCS 1229). It seems impossible to reject the earliest forms, consistent as they are with one another, on the score that they do not fit in with the later evidence and one must therefore suggest a definite discontinuity in the history of the name, due to the replacing of a name which conveyed no meaning by an intelligible name, a common process of folk-etymology. The forms of Weybourne (Nf) offer a curious parallel to the early forms of Wooburn.They are as follows: DB Wabrunne , 1177 P Wabrun , 1275 RH Waborne , Wauburn , 1281 FF Waburne , 1291 Tax Waubrun . If the parallel is a genuine one, then, since the later history of Weybourne seems to point to an original short a , we must believe the vowel in Waburne similarly to have been short.Beyond that we cannot go. 'Bishop's' from the Bishop of Lincoln's manor.