by Nick Corcos

The name ‘goldhoard' for example. This can only be a quite literal reference to the discovery of a cache of treasure, probably Roman coins, but this is by no means certain, just as it is unclear whether we should accept at face value the implication that the metal involved was actually gold; although the occurrence of field-names containing explicit references to silver hoards would tend to support that view. Field, J, 1993, A History of English Field-Names, Harlow: Longman, 34. For a Shapwick example, located suspiciously close to a known Roman site which was itself initially targeted because of its field name, see Gerrard, C; Aston, M (eds), 2007, The Shapwick Project, Somerset: A Rural Landscape Explored, Society for Medieval Archaeology, Monograph 25, 94-95.

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