Survey of English Place-Names

Historical Forms

• Redinges 1086 DB

• Gedelinge 1086 DB

• Geddinge 1086 DB 1147 BM 1166 P 1193,1208 FF 1227 Ass 1237 FF

• Magna Geddinge 1252 FF 1276 RH 1316 FA 1340 Ipm 1385,1399 IpmR

• Geddinges 1168 P 1207 P

• Gedinges 1185 Templars c.1200

• Guedding 1198 Fees9

• Gydding 1253 FF

• Parva Gydding E1 BM 1297 Ipm 1304 SR

• Geddingg Prioris 1276 RH

• Geddingg Engayne ib.

• Gidding, Giddyng 1285 FA 1304 Ch 1316 FA 1323 1328 Ch 1341 FF

• Great Gedyng 1549 Pat

Etymology

'Gydel's people' v. ingas . Of the three DB forms, Redinges is clearly a scribal error resulting from the confusion of the late OE letters g and r . The Gedelinge form cannot be dismissed so briefly. It occurs in the record of disputed claims to land which forms an appendix to the Hunts DB and it so happens that, occurring at the end of a line, it is divided Gede-linge . It is difficult to see how this can be an example of scribal confusion between dd and dl , quite apart from the fact that this confusion, very common in later records, is not likely to occur in 11th cent. handwriting. It is therefore probable that Gidding contains a pers. name of diminutive type, Gyd (e )la rather than the Gydda to which Ekwall refers in his discussion of this name (PN in -ing 74, 88, 160). Great Gidding is Gidding Prioris , so called from the holding of the Prior of Huntingdon (FA ii. 472), Little Gidding is Gidding Engayne (FA ii. 470, 471, 475) (VCH ).