Run that by me again - how did Harringay end up with two spellings?

On another thread recently there was a throwaway comment about the use of the double-'r'-'ay' spelling of Harringay in the early 20th century. Before I knew it, I found myself checking to see whether I could add any more breadth and depth to my previous jottings on the development our neighbourhood's name. Whilst I think I pretty much already had the basics in place, I’ve been able to uncover more texture and detail.

We already knew that with a Muskian-style stroke of the pen, in 1792 wealthy Tottenham-born linen merchant Edward Gray, the builder of Harringay House, decided on the 'Harringay' spelling when naming his new edifice. That possibly arbitrary choice led to the variant being bequeathed to the neighbourhood that developed in Victorian times around the site of his mansion. With a handful of exceptions, there was no question about the correct spelling of the neighbourhood that grew up both sides of Green Lanes between Finsbury Park and Wood Green.

The nineteenth century exception most widely noticed in the present was the Ordnance Survey map of the 1863-73 which showed Harringay House as 'Haringey House'. Almost certainly based on it, two Hornsey Local Board maps¹ showed the same spelling and James Wyld's 1872 New Topographical Map of the Country In the Vicinity of London showed it as 'Harringhay House'.

After Harringay House was demolished, records show that with the exception of Hornsey Council, the Harringay variant was used for almost everything by almost everybody else in the neighbourhood as it developed, both sides of Green Lanes.

In order that there's no mistaking what I'm referring to when I use Harringay to describe the present-day neighbourhood, below is a map I drew up about 15 years ago. Derived from both modern historical data and more contemporary interviews, the map shows what have been Harringay's borders since the area was first built up.

1. Harringay and it's sub-neighbourhoods (Map: Author).

How the name began and the confusion started

For those who haven't read me (or someone else) on this before, digging back further into the depths of time, the names Harringay, Haringey and Hornsey are thought originally to have been derived from the Saxon, 'Haering's Hege' — the enclosure of Haering's people. During the following several hundred years, spellings were rarely fixed and the name went through 156 recorded variations. The machinations of time have produced three names that once had indistinguishable meanings but are now refer to three distinct but related entities – Haringey (the borough), Hornsey (a neighbourhood in the borough) and Harringay (a neighbourhood in the borough). The 'Harringay' variant was first recorded in 1569. The variant for the nearby area of Hornsey appeared in 1525. But oldest of all 'Haringey' was first recorded about 45 years either side of 1340.²

Historians stir the pot

The Harringay spelling controversy has been the subject first of observation and later of controversy for approaching half a millennium. At least the essentials of the toponymic story of were being considered from as early as the Elizabethan period. In 1593 historian John Norden referenced the different spellings in his Speculum Britanniae: the First Parte: an Historicall, & Chorongraphicall Discription of Middlesex - the first volume of a projected, but unfinished chorography of Britain. Below is the book’s passage on Hornsey.

2. Extract from Speculum Britanniae: the First Parte: an Historicall, & Chorographicall Discription of Middlesex. Published in 1593.

The book also contains a finely drawn map which, like the text shows Hornsey as 'Harnsey'. On the map, shown in Fig 3 below, you can also see 'Cruch ende' and quite prominently, 'Duccat'. I assume this refers to the site of Duckett's Manor.³ It is perhaps a little odd to be seeking evidence for spelling-related issues in the Elizabethan period, since spelling at this time was rather a mess!⁴ As if to underline the point, in addition to the different spellings  Norden gave for Hornsey on map and in the descriptive text, in another part of the book, he added a third, 'Harnesey'. Moreover, the spellings Norden used for both Lodge Hill and Crouch End on the map also differed from those he wrote in the text.

3. An extract from John Norden's 1593 Middlesex map in a version engraved by William Kip and William Hole for the 1610 edition of William Camden's Britannia.

There's a whole treatise to be written on how during this period spelling changes followed pronunciation and in particular the London dialect - but not by me! If this aspect interests you, listen to a nineteenth century Middlesex accent to get just a hint of what the accents of our Harringay/Hornsey/Haringey forebears may have sounded like.

Some two centuries after Norden, in 1795 Daniel Lysons rehearsed some of the discussion about the variants of Hornsey in hisEnvirons of London. Then another half-century later, Frederick Prickett⁵ in his 1842 Antiquities of Highgate reflected the orthographic confusion of his forebears. On a single page he referred to the Bishop of London's park in Highgate as 'Harringay Park', 'Harnessey Park' and 'Hornsey Park'. In a later passage, he quoted from John Stow's 1631 Annales of England and John Speed's 1611 History of Great Britain and in the course of his quotations on another single page used 'Haringey', 'Harringey', 'Harringay' and 'Harnessey'. Later in the century, John Lloyd wrote about the toponymy of Hornsey in a short section of his 1888 book about the history of Highgate and nearby areas.

4. Excerpt of Map Highgate and Hornsey Park from 10th to 17th Century, George Prickett, 1842 from Frederick Prickett History and Antiquities of Highgate 1842.

Whilst early historians got the ball rolling, it wasn't until Sidney Madge, using ancient deeds, court rolls and church records, made his exhaustive three decades long study of the development of the name of Hornsey that we had something approaching a definitive answer to its origins. The Origin of the Name of Hornsey, published in 1936, offered an exhaustive archivist's-view of its subject.

 

The nineteenth century rebirth of ‘Haringey’

Beyond the grounds of Harringay House,  the 'Haringey' variant was picked up elsewhere in the borough in the mid-nineteenth century. When Haringey Park was developed in the early 1850s as the first residential road in Crouch End, judging by newspaper records, its developer chose the older spelling. There is no direct evidence as to why the developer chose that name and that particular spelling, but the map shown below, drawn within a few years of the road being laid out, may give some clue. The line drawn between the bottom of Crouch Hill and Harringay House and marked "Valley to Harringay Park" (the land around Harringay House) follows the line of Haringey Park (the road) very closely indeed. There's no suggestion that the developer followed this particular map, but it does open up the possibility of there having been a general understanding that the route the new road followed was along the Harringay Park Valley; reason enough for the name.

As to the developer's supposed choice of spelling, we can only guess. Perhaps he was guided by Prickett's book published just a few years earlier which blackened the Harringay name, referring to "... treasons, and ... the armed insurrection of Harringay Park" and 'traitorous attempts against the king'.

5. Map of the watercourses in the districts around Hornsey drawn by the Surveyor to Highgate, 1856. (© The Trustees of the British Museum. Shared under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial-Share Alike 4.0 Interna... From the Potter Collection, Museum No: 1927,1126.1.22.3).

Later in the century, Haringey Park bequeathed its name to the nine shop-houses that formed Haringey Terrace, a row of shops running from Crouch End Broadway to Haringey Park, now 132 - 146 Crouch Hill. Although there was a scattering of other uses of the -ey name variant elsewhere through the nineteenth century far, as I'm able to discern, reference to the road and this terrace were very much the primary nineteenth centiry uses for it, until 1894. 

Enter into the fray the Council

From 1894, under the Local Government Act of that year, the government of Hornsey changed its status from that of a 'local board' to being an urban district council. In the same year, the newly constituted body decided that the Harringay name should be spelt 'Haringey', but rather oddly perhaps not in every instance.

There are hints that the Board had been using the -ey spelling prior to 1894 (which may account for the 1873 map), but it is probable that changes associated with the body's new status were the catalyst for the Council formalising the practice.

Chief among the direct causes seems to have been Middlesex County Council's request that the district council divide the borough into wards for electoral purposes. In what is referred to as the Hornsey Division Court, barrister Mr. Harper made recommendations about the shape of the areas. In doing so, he referenced a plan adopted by the Board which included the wards 'North Haringey' and 'South Haringey'⁶. Those ward names were adopted by the new Council for all of that area of the Harringay Ladder which fell within Hornsey. They remained the same until the early 1960s.

Reviewing how widely the Council enforced its chosen spelling in the electoral registers, doesn't offer a clear picture of its thinking.  Under the control of the Town Clerk, they ought to reflect the Council's view of the world. So, not surprisingly, we had 'North Haringey' and 'South Haringey' wards from 1894 onwards. However, beyond these administrative divisions, things seem less clear. Haringey Park, which all residents and estate agents seemed to have spelled with the -ey form was spelt in the nineteenth and early twentieth century electoral registers as 'Harringay Park'. Harringay Road (off Middle Lane), and Harringay Grove (off Turnpike Lane) were also spelt in the electoral record with the -ay form. All three roads were occasionally also listed with the 'Haringay' (sic.) spelling but never the -ey variant. Even more strangely, from about 1900, all Harringay addresses in North Haringey ward were given in the registers with 'Hornsey' after the road name. For South Haringey ward, 'Harringay' followed the street name.

The Harringay Passage, a footway running between the houses of the Harringay Ladder for its entire length, was subjected to the same lack of consistency. The result still raises an eyebrow or draws a smile today when locals or visitors notice that some stretches bear a sign showing 'Haringey Passage' and others 'Harringay Passage'.

The confused application of the Council's naming policy also applied to the the schools on the Ladder. The first to open, in 1893, was the board school between Falkland and Frobisher roads. This escaped unscathed in council publications as the 'Harringay Board School'. From 1903 it was renamed 'North Harringay' school. In 1904 a new elementary school between Pemberton and Mattison Roads was opened as 'South Harringay School', although next door the higher elementary school was named 'Hornsey County School'.⁷

From the early 1960s, both the 'Haringey' wards disappeared never to return. The choice of 'Turnpike' to replace 'North Haringey' and 'South Hornsey' to replace 'South Haringey' strongly suggests that the Council was determined not to allow 'Harringay' to appear in the ward names at any cost. Quite why they took such an inflexible position can only be guessed at.

The local press makes its verdict clear

Few voices were raised locally to support the Council's adoption of the 'Haringey' variant, but many spoke out in opposition. Chief amongst those were the voices of the local press who were perhaps the most strident in their resistance to council diktat.

As one sign of their opposition, nearly all local newspapers continued to use the -ay form, even when reporting on election results.

6. Local election reporting in the Holloway Express, 8 April 1898.

In an early editorial piece on the matter on in the spring 1894, the Hornsey and Finsbury Park Journal made its position clear,

" 'Harringay' or 'Haringey,' which is it to be? Just when we have become accustomed to 'Harringay' the Local Board comes with its ward divisions, and calls one of them 'Haringey.' This may have been the way the word has been spelt for some time in the documents of the Board, ... but who should give way, the Board or the inhabitants? This is the day of "we, the people," and therefore the authorities should yield with what grace they may, or it may become necessary to and them if they cannot be mended." (24 March, 1894)

In its last of several commentaries on the matter in the same year, the paper wrote,

"Some of the Harringay candidates for the District Council object to the way the Local Board has chosen to spell the name of their district. Now that the whole area has grown into knowledge as "Harringay" it is foolish to create complications by making the official name "Haringey". There is no need for it. In times past there have been so many changes in the spelling of the word that the Local Board cannot claim exclusive ancient usage for that which it has selected, and it savours of pedantry rather than common sense to force upon the inhabitants a word which they will refuse to accept, and for which there is no occasion" (24 November 1984).

Neither the Journal nor the other local papers quickly forgot the change or abandoned their opposition. Four years after the change, the Journal carried the following,

"... the sooner the official announcements are brought into line with popular usage the better. An air of affectation attaches to "Haringey" now that everywhere else the word is spelt "Harringay". (30 April 1898)

In 1901, seven years after the name change was introduced, the Islington Gazette cautioned,

"The, County Council and the Urban District Council always spell the name of the district "Haringey," but seeing that it is for all other purposes spelt "Harringay," surely these two bodies might now drop the older form of spelling. It serves no social purpose ..." (24 May 1901)

A decade later, with scant regard for the council's sensibilities, the Holloway Press adopted a cumbersome new name to encompass the 'forbidden' Harringay spelling.

7. New name for the Holloway Press on 20th October 1911.

The London North Mercury and Crouch End Observer was similarly insouciant and created a section called "The Harringay Mercury".

The absurdity of the situation is wonderfully characterised by a page in the Hornsey Urban District Council Review of the Years 1896-1900 by the Chairman of the Council. In reporting the results of the 1896 election, the publication uses the -ey spelling form for the ward names but then three different ones when listing the residential addresses of candidates living in Harringay.

8. The absurdity of the spelling issue writ small in the Hornsey Urban District Council Review of the Years 1896-1900 by the Chairman of the Council. On the same page, the -ey spelling is used for ward names and one of three different versions for the candidates residential addresses. (Haringey Archive Service at Bruce Castle Museum).

In seeking to understand why the Council took the decision they did, the Tottenham and Edmonton Weekly Herald attributed the choice to the fact that 'Haringey' was thought to be the older form (5 October 1910). In several reports, the Hornsey and Finsbury Park Journal, seemed to support this explanation. I don't disagree.

Beyond the Fourth Estate

Most other local opinion seemed to side with the press. On the other side of Green Lanes, Tottenham Council followed local usage and spelt their Harringay ward with the -ay form.

9. Boundary Commission map for Tottenham constituency, 1917, apparently using the 1896 Ordnance Survey map. The map shows that Tottenham Coucil continued to use the -ay form of Harringay. (Private Collection).

Kelly's Directories took a different stance and for their Hornsey directory they towed the Hornsey Council line. However, on the Tottenham side their directory used the -ay form, for example for 'Harringay Road' and 'Harringay Villas'.

In the 1890s, the Ordnance Survey gave us 'Harringay Park', off Crouch Hill, 'Harringay Road' off Middle Lane and 'Harringay Grove' off Turnpike Lane. Nonetheless, by the time they published their new maps in 1915, the Survey too had been whipped into line and all three roads had been changed to adopt the -ey spelling.

The railway companies were not be to cowed. Harringay station on the Great Northern line has always been 'Harringay' (for a time Harringay West) and the station on Green Lanes, despite its four name changes always included 'Harringay' in the name. Tram and bus companies made the same choice, continuing to use the -ay spelling on their destination boards and timetables.

In this majority Conservative borough, even the local Conservative Association continued to use the -ay form.

10. Advertisement about forthcoming elections in the North Middlesex Chronicle, 12 August 1899.

Local custom also almost universally stuck with the -ay form. As advertisements attest, all local businesses used it without exception and small ads and letters in local newspapers as well as surviving letters and postcards show that local people almost universally made the same choice.

The Journal's 24 November 1894 editorial finished with the insightful conclusion that,

"The people have named their district "Harringay," and not all the king's horses and all the king's men, much less the Hornsey Local Board, will make it "Haringey" to them in their everyday life.

And so it proved for most of the following century.

The Creation of Modern Haringey

The organisational memory of the Council was apparently strong. In the early 1960s as it was preparing for the reorganisation of London's boroughs, it was faced with finding a name for a new borough to be formed by the amalgamation of Hornsey, Tottenham and Wood Green. The name chosen was 'Haringey'.⁸

A letter from a council officer in 1983 provided some background on the selection process. "When Tottenham and Hornsey were joined to form the new borough in 1964, the choice of name rested with a special panel which, after public consultation, opted for one of the spellings of the modern Borough of Hornsey. We are not aware of the reasons for that choice".⁹

The Deputy Town Clerk D. B. Cooper offered his explanation in a 1963 article in the Daily Express:

"Haringey is the old, original spelling of the word Harringay. It is used in two wards and also in three or four roads in Hornsey."¹⁰

In fact the statement may have been partially misreported since by the early 1960s, North and South Haringey wards had been replaced with Turnpike and South Hornsey wards. It is possible that the new names were occasioned by the government reorgamisation. The London Government Act of 1963 conferred on the Secretary of State the power to alter name of any ward.¹¹ It may well be that Hornsey Council took quick advantage of this power and requested that the two Haringey wards be renamed so as to leave unencumbered their chosen name for the new borough.

The 'Harringay' name owes its survival in everyday usage to Edward Gray. Ironically the name chosen by this super-wealthy merchant for his private pleasure palace was the one adopted and championed by the inhabitants of the terraced housing that replaced his great white house and its expansive park. The name has continued to be besieged by Haringey Council in the 70 years since 1965 and at the start of this century its survival seemed unlikely ... but that's a story for another time.

NOTES

1. The two maps were a map inA Scheme of Sewerage and Sewage Utilization (sic.) for Hornsey, 1869 and the Plan of the District of Hornsey for the Local Board, 1882.

2. The date of 1387 is given in Madge's Origins. A date of 1294 is provided by William McBeath Marcham on p. 315 of "The Court Rolls of Hornsey", pp 314 - 321, Transactions of LAMAS, Vol, 6, 1929.

3. It is interesting to note that the symbol next to the name is shown in the map key as meaning 'parrrish' which may signify only that the area of the manor matched that of the parish were, or it may reference the decline of the medieval manorial system.

4. David Crystal, ‘Think on my Words’: Exploring Shakespeare’s Language, Cambridge University Press, 2008.

5. Frederick Prickett was the son of second generation Highgate surveyor John. The family still trade as property dealers under the name of Prickett and Ellis. See "The History of Prickett and Ellis", Bulletin, No. 58, Hornsey Historical Society, 2017)

6.Hornsey and Finsbury Park Journal, 2 June 1894.

7. North Harringay School was listed as the 'Harringay Board School' in the Forty-Sixth Report of the Department of Science and Art of the Committee of Council on Education, 1899. The 1903 renaming is referenced to the "Hornsey education committee minute book  ii. 40", in A P Baggs, Diane K Bolton, M A Hicks, R B Pugh, "Hornsey, including Highgate: Education'", in A History of the County of Middlesex: Volume 6, Friern Barnet, Finchley, Hornsey With Highgate, ed. T F T Baker, C R Elrington (London, 1980) via British History Online and that to the new school opening in 1904 is in the same publication.

8. Pupis in local schools at the time were taught that the new borough's name should be pronounced with the same ending as Finchley, Hackney and Hornsey - Valerie Crosby, Archivist, Bruce Castle Archives, London Borough of Haringey, 2007.

9. Richard Pout, "Getting the name right: should Haringey rhyme with Finchley, Hackney and Hornsey … or do we pronounce it Harringay, rhyming with hay, lay or Bungay?", Bulletin 45, Hornsey Historical Society, 2004).

10. "Nine New Names for Super London", Daily Express, 13 September 1963.

11. London Government Act, Part III, 1, legislation.gov.uk.