Tūn: From rustic fence to urban sprawl

Tedious tūns?

Names in tūn (modern -ton) are so extremely common that they might seem tedious, but they can reveal a great deal about what was important to people in the past, and how places and resources were used. The fact of being a tūn must in itself have been significant. As Ros Faith has noted, places with tūn names, whether villages or minor farmsteads, and whether estate centres or dependent outposts, would typically have been quite focused, with a sense of ‘buildedness’. In their distribution and their nature they contrast with places named using lēah ‘wood pasture or clearing’, which tend to be more scattered and diverse, ‘an area, not a specific place’. The lēah names often appear as –ley today, for instance the many north and west of Leeds, such as Ilkley, Otley, Keighley, Bingley and Shipley. (Letters such as ū and ē denote long vowels.)

Tūns with special functions

Tūn became what a fence encloses, such as a lēac–tūn, a ‘leek enclosure’ or vegetable garden, as at several places called Leighton, or an orchard, as at Appleton (in several counties) or Pirton (in Hertfordshire and Worcestershire). Most tūn places, however, were farmsteads or hamlets (such as Bartons or Lintons, growing barley or flax), or centres with special functions such as timber production at the many places called Wootton or Witton (containing Old English wudu, widu ‘wood’) or Acton (āc ‘oak’). Some tūn names may have guided wayfarers by advertising facilities: Strettons or Strattons, often on Roman roads (Old English strǣt or strēt), may have been staging posts, and some of the places called Merton or Marton may have had a mere or pond and other facilities for travellers and their animals.

Still other tūn names point to estates owned by individuals (Brihthelm at Brighton, Sussex, probably Lēofa at Luton near Broadhembury, Devon) or groups (Bishopton, Monkton, Preston in various counties), or managed for their benefit. The Kingstons are thought to have been judicial centres, or staging posts for royal messengers rather than royal residences. Many a tūn may have been a ‘dependent settlement’, or part of a divided estate, and the numerous Nortons, Suttons, Astons/Eastons and Westons may suggest a bureaucratic mindset and top-down land management.