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names to places. In Somersetshire we have a Nettlecombe, and 

 there is a Nettlebridge near Eadstock, and if it is really so 

 named from the plant, it is an additional proof of the value 

 attached to the nettle by our forefathers as the chief fibre plant. 

 You will recollect in the churchwardens' accounts of St. Michael's, 

 read to us by Mr. Pearson, one entry pro urticis, and the plant 

 is often mentioned in the old cookery books as a good vegetable. 



I know of no place named after flowers, strictly so called.* 

 Our ancesters had to look after something more materially useful 

 than roses and gilly flowers, when they chose their settlements, 

 (it required a more advanced state of civilisation to name an 

 " habitation " after a " primrose.") Bat there is one place near 

 Bath for which a flower derivation has been claimed ; this is 

 Claverton, and on this name I should like to speak a little more 

 at length and so conclude. There are many places in England 

 compounded of Claver, and it is quite possible that in some of 

 these (as in Claverham, Clavermead), the word may mean Clover, 

 of which the old form is Claver, thereby preserving its connection 

 through the French Clceffre with the Latin Clava, a club, a connec- 

 tion which we now preserve by calling the trefoils on our cards 

 clubs. [But in Claverton we are prevented from applying this 

 derivation, because in the Saxon codex the name is certainly 

 written Clat-ford-tun,t and on this name it has been decided, 

 chiefly by Professor Earle, that Clat is the same as Clote, and that 

 Clote means the Water Lily, and so the whole name means the 

 village by the ford of the Water Lily. Professor Earle calls this 

 " a pretty example." I entirely agree with the prettiness, but 

 I venture to doubt its correctness, and for these reasons : — 



Supposing that Clat could be converted into Clote (which is 



* Flax Bourton is so named, not from the Flax plant, but from 

 having belonged to Flaxley Abbey — (Butter). 



t Charter of Wulfwarn, 694, and ic geaun Wulfmoere mynum 

 yldrad suna thces landes cet Clatfordtune mid mete and mid mannum 

 and mid eallre tilthe. 



