Place Name
A reference to the village of East Bedfont, where this road is sited. The name itself was originally written as pre-Norman Conquest Bedefunt and by the Domesday Book of 1086 was recorded as Bedefunde. By 1198 it was Bedefont and a few years later Estbedefont. It is made up of two Old English words byden or beden and funta means a “spring in a hollow”. It has also been suggested the name comes from an Anglo Saxon personal name Beda – so Beda’s spring. It may have been a settlement much earlier, since funta meaning spring was a Celtic term which was adopted in Old English. David Mills in A Dictionary of London Place Names explains its importance: “The ‘spring’ may have been a natural one or a well sunk into the gravel. The situation of this place on the old Roman road from London to Silchester is significant: early travellers would have been able to replenish their water supplies here. In medieval times it was also sometimes known as Chirchebedfounte (as in 1405), with reference to the 12th century church of St Mary here.”
