Plompton (Harrogate)
[[File:|thumb|right|500px|Harrogate Road, Plompton / David Howard, 22 Apr. 2018, Creative Commons, via Geograph.]]
By Henrik Thiil Nielsen, 2013-09-06. Revised by Henrik Thiil Nielsen, 2019-04-05.
In the Gest of Robyn Hode, King Edward is exasperated at noticing the scarcity of deer in Plumpton Park after Robin and his men have been poaching there during their stay with the knight (see Quotations below). We should almost certainly take this to be in Lancashire, but it could just possibly be some place King Edward was meant to have visited after his progress in Lancashire, and in that case a possible locality is Plompton, c. 6 km ESE of Harrogate. There is no indication there was ever a park there in the medieval sense of a fenced-in area, but intriguingly there is or was a place named Loxley (first mentioned in 1402) in Plompton, and Loxley is a place-name connected with Robin Hood from at least as early as c. 1600 (in the Sloane MS Life of Robin Hood). Plompton is first recorded, as "Plontone", in Domesday Book (1086). The meaning of the name is the usual one of "plum-tree farmstead".[1] This Plompton is where the famous Plompton Rocks are located. See further Loxley (Plompton).
Quotations
[Gest; c. 1500:]
All the passe of Lancasshyre
He went both ferre and nere
Tyll he came to Plomton Parke
He faylyd many of his dere.[2]
Gazetteers
- Not included in Dobson, R. B., ed.; Taylor, J., ed. Rymes of Robyn Hood: an Introduction to the English Outlaw (London, 1976), pp. 293-311.
Sources
- A Gest of Robyn Hode, st. 357.
- Smith, A.H. The Place-Names of the West Riding of Yorkshire (English Place-Name Society, vols. XXX-XXXVII) (Cambridge, 1961-63), pt. V, pp. 30-31.
Maps
- 6" O.S. map Yorkshire CLXXI.NE (1894, surveyed 1888-89.)[3]
- 6" O.S. map Yorkshire CLXXI.NE (1910, rev. 1907.)
Background
Notes
- ↑ Smith, A.H. The Place-Names of the West Riding of Yorkshire (English Place-Name Society, vols. XXX-XXXVII) (Cambridge, 1961-63), pt. V, pp. 30-31.
- ↑ Gest, st. 357.
- ↑ Map 171, which would have been the first O.S. map of the areas in question, is not found at NLS: Ordnance Survey Maps - Six-inch England and Wales, 1842 - 1952: Yorkshire.