Survey of English Place-Names

Historical Forms

• Wivordebie 1086 DB

• Wivordeby 1241 Fine 1242 Fees 1244 RGros 1258 Nichols

• Wiuordeby m.13 Laz 1404 CroxR 1259 WoCart Edw1 1303 1449

• Wyvordebi 1244 RGros

• Wyvordeby 1242 Fees 1248 RGros 1304 Pat 1306 Ass 1392 Banco 1415 Ass

• Wyuordeby e.14(1449),1309(1449),1310(1449) WoCart 1352 LCDeeds 1354 WoCart 1449 1433(1449),1449 et freq

• Wyuordebia 12 1449 ib

• Wyfordebia c.1130 LeicSurv

• Wyfordeby 1220 MHW 1209×35 RHug 1335(1449),1380(1449) WoCart

• Wifordeby 1236 Fees

• Wivordesb' 1236 Fees

• Wyuordby e.14(1449),1307(1449) WoCart 1441(1449),1449 et passim

• Wyvordby 1402 Pat 1402 Inqaqd 1428 FA

• Wivordby 1445,1447 Nichols

• Wiwordeby 13 Laz 1404

• Wywordeby Hy3 Crox

• Wywordby Hy3 ib

• Wiworthebi e.13 Laz 1404

• Wyfordby 1279 RGrav 1316 FA 1526 AAS 1535 VE

• Wyforby 1433 Pat

• Wyforbie 1576 LibCl

• Wyuerdeby 1318(1449),1406(1449),1446(1449) WoCart

• Wyuerdby 1336(1449),1446(1449),1449 ib

• Wyuerby 1361(1449),1449 WoCart

• Wyverby(e) 1456 Nichols 1535 Ipm 1535 VE 1547 Fine 1559 Pat

• Wiuerb(y)e 1576 Saxton 1604 SR

• Wiverby 1610 Speed 1628 Fine 1710 LML

• Wyfordby or Wyverby 1925 Kelly

Etymology

'The farmstead, village at Wigford', v. bȳ . Wyfordby is a hybrid p.n. with Scand  bȳ 'farmstead, village' added to a pre-existing English topographical name *Wīg -ford . OE  wīg (wīh ) could signify either 'a battle' or 'a military force, an army' or 'an idol, a holy place, a shrine' (cf. OSax wih , ODan wī 'holy place, temple'). The ford over the narrow R. Eye at Wyfordby may once have been a strategic one because of surrounding marsh and thus a place near which a significant early battle could have been fought. There are the earthworks of a rectangular fortified site south-west of the church and only some two hundred yards from the river. Onomastic evidence for a stronghold here to defend the ford is the lost Castelgate 'the road to the castle' which ran somewhere in the north of adjoining Burton Lazars and the f.ns. Castell Close in Wyfordby and castle hades 'the headlands near the castle' in both Wyfordby and adjacent Brentingby. The location of this fortification near the ford is an indication of its once having been an important crossing point, although there is no surviving evidence for a pre- Conquest long-distance military route leading to it. Neither is there any concrete evidence for a pagan Anglo-Saxon sanctuary at the ford. There was possibly a St Anne's Well in Wyfordby, if the late form Annie Well of c.1638 indicates a sacred spring (and if this is not the St Anne's Well of Burton Lazars), and it has been argued that holy springs with this name may predate the arrival of the Anglo-Saxons and relate to a Celtic mother goddess such as Anu (v. J. Scherr, 'Names of springs and wells in Somerset', Nomina 10 (1986), 85–7). Continuity of such names through the early Anglo-Saxon period would suggest some continuity of pagan religious association. One must also take into account a significant pagan English population hereabouts, judging from the extensive late 6th cent. cemetery less than two miles away between Saxby and Stapleford. Even so, the exact interpretation of wīg in *Wīg - ford as either 'battle' or 'army' or 'holy place, shrine' must as yet remain unresolved, v. wīg 1 , wīg 2 , ford . For discussion of p.ns. recording pagan Anglo-Saxon religious sites, v. M. Gelling, 'Further thoughts on pagan place-names', Otium et Negotium , ed. F. Sandgren, Stockholm 1973, 109–28 (with particular notice of Wyfordby at 113–14 and 127).