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.

Baynard's Green

Early-attested site in the Parish of Stoke Lyne

Historical Forms

  • Bayards Green 1724 Bodl 1794 EnclA 1797 Davis

Etymology

Baynard's Green is Bayards Green 1724Bodl , 1794EnclA , 1797 Davis. This is probably identical with the Bayard's Green in Evenley Nth, where Richard I held a tournament in 1194 (Kennett i, 213) and Henry III in 1249 (Matthew Paris, Chronica Majora s.a. 1249).The Nth place is not marked on the O.S. maps, but the Vicar of Evenley informs us that a field called Bayard 's Green is shown on a map of 1780, lying along the north boundaries of Cottisford and Mixbury, and the VCH places it (“now known as Bear's Green”) where the Bicester and Banbury roads divide. It is mentioned by two 17th-century writers, in 1645 in a document quoted in Beesley's History of Banbury 408, and in 1646 in Richard Symonds's Diary of the marches of the Royal army during the great civil war (ed. E. Long, Camden Soc. Pub. 1859). In the latter reference it is described as “a large greene or downe…where often is horse-raceing, six myle long,” and the writer adds a foot-note “More anciently renowned for its tournaments.” On Davis's map the name is printed across a fairly large area in the north of Stoke Lyne parish. It was probably applied to a large piece of ground partly in O and partly in Nth. Bayard is, of course, the stock name for a bay horse, found also in Bayswater Brook (5–6). v. Introduction xxvii.

Places in the same Parish