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.

Saxon Street and Saxton Hall

Early-attested site in the Parish of Woodditton

Historical Forms

  • Sextuna 1086 ICC
  • Sextone 1086 DB
  • Sexton(e) 1208 Cur 1285 Ass
  • Saxton(e) 1236 Barnwell 1484 Pat
  • Saxton(e) cum Nouo Mercato 1336 SR
  • Saxston(e) 1331 1411 SR 1412 FA
  • Saxon 1570 SR
  • Saxum 1576 Saxton 1607 Kip
  • Saxham 1695 SN

Etymology

Ekwall (DEPN) would interpret this name and Saxton (PN WRY 162), with similar forms, either as 'Saxon farm' or as 'farm by the *seax or hill,' grouping the name in the latter case with Saxham (Sf), DBSexham , Saxham .

The difficulty about the first interpretation is that we should have expected ME  forms Saxeton , Saxeham , deriving from OE  Seaxatūn and Seaxahām (with gen. pl. Seaxa ), rather than Saxton and Saxham going back apparently to OE  Seaxtūn and Seaxhām . These can only be interpreted as 'tūn or hām of the Saxons' if we believe that direct compounds of the stem Seax - with tūn and hām could be formed to denote 'Saxon -tun ' and 'Saxon-ham .' There is apparently a parallel for such formation in Swaffham (C, Nf) infra 133 where we seem to have a similar direct addition of hām to the stem of the tribal name Swǣfe . Such a name applied to isolated Saxon settlements in Anglian areas is historically quite a likely one. Cf. further Sackbridge (lost) in Bottisham, found in Saxbriggemore 1391CartMisc , Saxbrugge 1429Ct , Sakebridge , Sackbridge 1655Terr , where we seem to have reference to a Saxons' bridge. The second explanation gets over the formal difficulty, but is not at all satisfactory from the semantic point of view.There are hills here and at Saxton and Saxham, but they are not of that rough or craggy character which one would have expected if there had been an OE  seax which could be used of a hill.