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.

Pinslade

Early-attested site in the Parish of Knaptoft

Historical Forms

  • Pynslad(e) 1154×89 Dugd 1328 Banco c.1530 Dep 1535 VE 1539 MinAccts 1551 Pat
  • Pineslade 1156 Ch 1318
  • Pinselade 1301 Ch
  • (grangiam nostram de) Pinselade 1467×84 LTD
  • Pinslade 1467×84 LTD 1477 Charyte e.16 Nichols 1650

Etymology

Probably 'valley with an enclosure or pound', v. pynd , slæd , cf. Pynslade in Thurmaston (Lei 3242). It is unlikely that the specific in either case is pinn 'a peg, a pin', which A. H. Smith (Elements 265) suggests could refer to a particular type of fencing. That a grange of Leicester Abbey was established at this location suggests that the slæd here was a significant topographical feature such as a valley or a broad stretch of grassland between woods rather than simply a breadth of greensward in ploughed land. Pinslade lay at the boundaries of Knaptoft, Husbands Bosworth and Mowsley (v. Lei 4125 and 200 for additional forms presented in the Gartree Hundred parishes).