Survey of English Place-Names

Historical Forms

• Zerdotalia 7th Ravenna

Etymology

Melandra Castle. “The name Melandra Castle …has not been traced further back than the year 1772. In that year the Rev. Mr Watson read before the Society of Antiquaries a paper which was subsequently published in Archaeologia , Vol. iii (1775), paper xxvi. There he says: 'The people call it Melandra Castle ; the area of it is called the Castle-yard, and eleven fields adjoining to it are named in old deeds the Castle Carrs .' The word Melandra has a curiously Greek appearance, and looks like the creation of a pedant.” (Melandra Castle , ed. R. S. Conway, p. 19). It is Zerdotalia (for Ardotalia ) 7th Ravenna, for which v. further Archaeologia xciii, 34.