Place Name
John Stow in his Survey of London of 1598 says the name comes from a former owner of the wharf called Puddle or to the puddling caused “where horses use to water, and therefore being defiled with their tramping and made puddle”. David Mills in A Dictionary of London Place Names writes: “From Middle English puddle ‘a small dirty pool’, no doubt a derogatory name for the original wharf,” which may have served as a sewer outlet at this point.
