Place Name
The name of Wanstead is Anglo-Saxon. Written as Wænstede sometime around 1050, it means a settlement by a hillock or mound, although others suggest it may mean a wain or wagon. Sometime around the Norman Conquest of 1066 it was written Wenstede and in the Domesday Book of 1086 as Wenesteda’. It is made up of two Old English words wœnn meaning lump and stede, an enclosed pasture. The reference to the park means part of the former grounds of Wanstead House which was knocked down in 1824.
