Teynham

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Teynham
Teynham (Kent)
Teynham

Teynham shown within Kent
District Swale
Shire county Kent
Region South East
Constituent country England
Sovereign state United Kingdom
Police Kent
Fire Kent
Ambulance South East Coast
European Parliament South East England
List of places: UKEnglandKent

Coordinates: 51°20′N 0°48′E / 51.33, 0.8

Teynham is a large village, and civil parish in Kent, England, in the district of Swale. The parish spans the A2 some three miles west of Faversham, and extends north to include the hamlet of Conyer, on an inlet of the Swale, a channel that separates the mainland of Kent from the Isle of Sheppey. Barrow Green is also part of the village.

The village is served by Teynham railway station.

[edit] Origin of name

Charters of 798 to 801[citation needed] and Domesday Monachorum — a series of Domesday-related texts kept at Canterbury Cathedral — mention it as Teneham, Taenham, Tenaham and Tenham, and it is still pronounced "ten-am" with an accent on the first syllable. In Domesday Book the name occurs as “Therham” (probably a clerical error).

The historian JK Wallenberg suggests an Anglo-Saxon root, tynan, to enclose, followed by the Anglo-Saxon word “Hamm", a land drained by dykes. Another historian, Eilert Ekwall, suggests an early owner named Teona, whose name is found in Teonan­hyll in Berkshire.

J Harris, in his History of Kent (1719) calls it the “place of ten houses” (hams) but there must have been hundreds of places with 10 houses in Anglo-Saxon times.

It is also possibly "homestead of a man called Tena" or "homestead near the stream called Tene". Several other etymologies have been suggested but this one appears to be the most correct.

The "y" in "Teynham" was apparently added by the Roper family, who have been Barons of Teynham from 1616.

[edit] External links

[edit] Sources

  • Wallenberg, J K, Place-Names of Kent, Lundequistska Bokhandein, Uppsala, 1934.
  • Ekwall, Eilert, Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Place-Names, fourth edition (Oxford, 1960)
  • Harris, J, History of Kent (1719)