Arundel

[rockfordill]

Having just moved into this area I was interested to learn that
the town of Arundel got its name from the French for swallow, hirondelle,
that came over with the Normans. I thought it would have had something to do with the River Arun on which it sits. Can anyone confirm the swallow connection?

[boxtops]

It's one of several possible options http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arundel

[Buenchico]

The Oxford Names Companion gives the name in the Doomsday Book as 'Harundel' meaning 'valley where the plant horehound grows', from the Old English 'hârhûne' + 'dell', with the name of the river being a 'back formation' from the name of the settlement.

[rockfordill]

Very interesting and thank you both

[jno]

birds don't need to follow people, they can fly over the channel for themselves; so I wouldn't think they came with the Normans.

[bhg481]

On top of that JNO, the battle of Hastings was fought in October and swallows are summer visitors, so that makes it even less likely they came over with the Normans.

[Peter Pedant]

BC is my fave and always right....
but

The names of rivers and trees are remarkably invariant ( In English anyway ) and I was taught in the sixties when I visited that Arun was a variant of Avon ( Celtic for river - using Celtic to describe the language ancient britons spoke before the Romans came )
and -dle was the hill

The thing about Sussex - is that after 1066 it was the only county to reorganised in an admin sense. The anglo-saxon admin was scrapped and the land was re-organised into North-South strips called 'rapes' were nt they ? It represents the importance of Sussex as a way from gay paree to London. It would then make sense for a new Norman fief holder to say Arundel - oh it must come from Hirondelle - oo look there is one !

[Svejk]

quite posh, aint it? john Dunlop trained his horses there.

[boxtops]

It's a nice place, a long time since I've been there

[jno]

the Normanss didn't come from gay Paree, though, they came from gay Normandy (well, William Rufus did, the others came from straight Normandy)

[brionon]

Do you ever go down to L/'A ?