January 9, 2014, by Tara de Cozar

Ye olde football league….

We did a story a couple of issues ago on the Key to English Place Names (KEPN) — a resource developed by the University’s Institute for Name Studies. It’s a web resource and smartphone app which which gives the history of the place-names of more than 16,000 cities, towns and villages across England.

It’s great. Arranged by county, the Key takes the form of a map which users can click on to find the historical origins of their chosen place-name. A brief moment spent exploring the site reveals for example, that Kirkby Stephen in Westmorland is a village with a church (from Old Norse kirkju-býr) dedicated to St Stephen. Or that Godmanchester in Huntingdonshire means ‘Godmund’s Roman site’, probably referring to the Roman fortification south of the Ouse.

Big Heritage have done something really interesting with it — converted live football league tables using KEPN data. Can you work out the Premier League and Championship teams from the translations of their names?

The tables are live, so will change as the season progresses. Go Roman Fort of the Ligor Tribe! Or something…

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