Place Name
The road leading from Woodford to Chingford Hatch. There are at least two interpretations of the name Chingford. The first put forward by John Field is a shingle ford based on the very earliest existing spellings, from the Domesday Book of 1086, Cingefort. But it has also been suggested that a spelling from 1219, namely Chagingeford, could have been from a chronicler using a pre-Norman Conquest, Anglo-Saxon spelling. In which case the name may mean ford by the stumps, which could refer to pile dwellings, that were built in the marshland by the River Lea, the remains of which have been discovered in the area. The River Ching only got its name much later – it was originally the River Bourne.
