Carol wrote: <And next door to both is Piddletown - and all three of them were originally named "Puddle........whatever", but the local councils - whether county or parish, I don't know - decided that Piddle was far more up-market than Puddle! >
It's the other way round. It used to be Piddletown, but now it's Puddletown. "Puddletown was originally known as "Piddletown", but with effect from 1 October 1929, following a request from the Post Office, it was changed officially to its present form. Despite many claims to the contrary the name change had nothing whatsoever to do with Victorian "sensibilties"; had they been a strong force then surely a more likely change would have been made to the Manor of Shitterton at Bere Regis, a few miles to the east of the village!" Above quoted from: http://www.communigate.co.uk/dorset/pudsoc/index.phtml which gives a whole lot more information about Puddletown for those who are interested including the fact that "piddle" means "marshy" and that Puddletown is known as "Weatherbury" in Thomas Hardy's 'Far from the Madding Crowd'. Jean in Poole, Dorset about 20 miles from Puddletown - not that we see much of it now since a by-pass road was built. To unsubscribe send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] containing the line: unsubscribe lace-chat [EMAIL PROTECTED]
