Lancashire, England : Place names

Names from historical writing:

The following appear as names for Lancashire. Follow the links for what the author actually said:

NB: These variant names come from our collections of historical travel writing and descriptive gazetteers:

• The above links take you to the first reference to this particular version of the name within a book of travel writing, or to the relevant gazetteer entry.
• Some names may derive from research by antiquarian writers such as William Camden and Thomas Pennant into the Roman, Saxon and medieval names of places. Their claims are not always supported by modern place-name researchers.
• References by travel writers to the place using its "normal" name are not included. Descriptive gazetteer entries are included only if the name does not appear anywhere else.

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Names for administrative units:

These names were used for units associated with Lancashire. Click on the links for details of the units and their names:

Name	Unit Type	Source
CENTRAL LANCASHIRE	New Town	London Gazette, No. 45079, p. 4187, 14 April 1970; Central Lancashire New Town (Designation) Order, 1970.
E14001033	Constituency (CCon)	House of Commons Library, Boundary review 2023: Which seats will change in the UK?
E14001577	Constituency (CCon)	House of Commons Library, Boundary review 2023: Which seats will change in the UK?
EAST LANCASHIRE	Nuts Unit Level 3	Office for National Statistics, Open Geography Portal (NUTS, level 3 (January 2018) Boundaries UK)
LANCASHIRE	Administrative County	F. Youngs, Local Administrative Units: Northern England (London: Royal Historical Society, 1991), p. 676.
	Ancient County	F. Youngs, Local Administrative Units: Northern England (London: Royal Historical Society, 1991), p. 139.
	Constituency (PCon)	Richard H.A. Cheffins, Parliamentary Constituencies and their registers since 1832 (London: The British Library, 1998)
	Modern (post 1974) County	Census of Population (2001 Key Statistics)
	Poor Law/Registration County	F. Youngs, Local Administrative Units: Northern England (London: Royal Historical Society, 1991), p. 139.
LANCASHIRE COUNTY	1841 Occupation reporting area	1841 Census of Great Britain, Table [1], 'Occupation Abstract'.
LANCASHIRE NORTH EASTERN	Constituency (PDivCon)	F.W.S. Craig (ed.), British Parliamentary Election Results 1832-1885 (London: The Macmillan Press Ltd, 1977)
LANCASHIRE NORTHERN	Constituency (PDivCon)	Richard H.A. Cheffins, Parliamentary Constituencies and their registers since 1832 (London: The British Library, 1998)
	Constituency (PDivCon)	F.W.S. Craig (ed.), British Parliamentary Election Results 1832-1885 (London: The Macmillan Press Ltd, 1977)
LANCASHIRE SOUTH EASTERN	Constituency (PDivCon)	F.W.S. Craig (ed.), British Parliamentary Election Results 1832-1885 (London: The Macmillan Press Ltd, 1977)
LANCASHIRE SOUTHERN	Constituency (PDivCon)	Richard H.A. Cheffins, Parliamentary Constituencies and their registers since 1832 (London: The British Library, 1998)
LANCASHIRE SOUTH WESTERN	Constituency (PDivCon)	F.W.S. Craig (ed.), British Parliamentary Election Results 1832-1885 (London: The Macmillan Press Ltd, 1977)
LANCASTER	Administrative County	F. Youngs, Local Administrative Units: Northern England (London: Royal Historical Society, 1991), p. 676.
	Ancient County	F. Youngs, Local Administrative Units: Northern England (London: Royal Historical Society, 1991), p. 139.
	Poor Law/Registration County	F. Youngs, Local Administrative Units: Northern England (London: Royal Historical Society, 1991), p. 139.
MID LANCASHIRE	Nuts Unit Level 3	Office for National Statistics, Open Geography Portal (NUTS, level 3 (January 2018) Boundaries UK)
NORTHERN LANCASHIRE NORTH EAST LANCASHIRE	Constituency (PDivCon)	Richard H.A. Cheffins, Parliamentary Constituencies and their registers since 1832 (London: The British Library, 1998)
NORTHERN LANCASHIRE NORTH LANCASHIRE	Constituency (PDivCon)	Richard H.A. Cheffins, Parliamentary Constituencies and their registers since 1832 (London: The British Library, 1998)
NORTH LANCASHIRE NORTH	Constituency (PDivCon)	Great Britain Historical GIS Project
NORTH LANCASHIRE NORTH EAST	Constituency (PDivCon)	Great Britain Historical GIS Project
NORTH LANCASHIRE NORTH EAST LANCASHIRE	Constituency (PDivCon)	Richard H.A. Cheffins, Parliamentary Constituencies and their registers since 1832 (London: The British Library, 1998)
NORTH LANCASHIRE NORTH LANCASHIRE	Constituency (PDivCon)	Richard H.A. Cheffins, Parliamentary Constituencies and their registers since 1832 (London: The British Library, 1998)
SOUTH LANCASHIRE SOUTH EAST	Constituency (PDivCon)	Great Britain Historical GIS Project
SOUTH LANCASHIRE SOUTH EAST LANCASHIRE	Constituency (PDivCon)	Richard H.A. Cheffins, Parliamentary Constituencies and their registers since 1832 (London: The British Library, 1998)
SOUTH LANCASHIRE SOUTH WEST	Constituency (PDivCon)	Great Britain Historical GIS Project
SOUTH LANCASHIRE SOUTH WEST LANCASHIRE	Constituency (PDivCon)	Richard H.A. Cheffins, Parliamentary Constituencies and their registers since 1832 (London: The British Library, 1998)
UKD45	Nuts Unit Level 3	Office for National Statistics, Open Geography Portal (NUTS, level 3 (January 2018) Boundaries UK)
UKD46	Nuts Unit Level 3	Office for National Statistics, Open Geography Portal (NUTS, level 3 (January 2018) Boundaries UK)
WEST LANCASHIRE	Constituency (CCon)	Richard H.A. Cheffins, Parliamentary Constituencies and their registers since 1832 (London: The British Library, 1998)

NB: These are all the names of all the administrative units which we have associated with Lancashire, and you must judge whether all or even any of them are variant names for the place. They may well include the names of other locations or areas:

• For cities, the associated administrative units will usually include parishes, especially ecclesiastical parishes, one of whose names is the name of the city followed by a saint's dedication, with just the saint's name as another variant. Parish names will sometimes also include "places" within towns.
• Districts usually contain more than one settlement, and some districts had their names changed to take the name of a completely different settlement. As we link each administrative unit to just one of our "places", usually the last place the unit was named after, in these cases the name for a completely different place will appear on this page.
• Similarly, a unit may sometimes be named after a particular settlement it contains and sometimes to indicate its location within a higher level unit. This was very common among British parliamentary constituencies in rural areas, one name referring to their main town and another indicating that they were in, say, the southern part of the relevant county.



Every name listed here is linked to the particular historical source in which it appears, but we cannot claim that these are all the historical names of Lancashire, or that our references are to the first usage of the names. Similarly, we have tried to ensure that names included here are not transcription errors by ourselves, but it is possible they are the result of errors made when the historical sources were printed, or the result of visiting authors or census officials mis-hearing local names.