Laverstock Road, Salisbury

Laverstock Road is the road that runs from Salisbury to Laverstock, obviously enough. It starts at the top of Milford Hill and runs down to Laverstock itself, where it turns into Riverside Road.

Laverstock is a village to the east of Salisbury¹.

The word ‘Laverstock’ has two elements.

The ‘stock’ means ‘fenced or enclosed settlement’ ² or ‘homestead’ ³. I would guess it’s related to the word ‘stockade’.

The ‘Laver’ seems to mean ‘larks’ or ‘skylarks’⁴ in this context. Another meaning is based on the French, and perhaps Norman, ‘laver‘ meaning to wash, and has to do with the religious washing of feet, but I’ve seen nothing to suggest that this has anything to do with Laverstock.

So, Laverstock means ‘enclosed settlement where there are larks’⁵

If you’re interested in the history of the village, I would recommend this short book:

• Larks on Cockey Down: a History of Laverstock by Ken Grist

Ian McLennan runs a Laverstock website which is very informative, although at the time of writing, there are elements of it which don’t always display correctly in my browser:

• Laverstock

Footnotes

1. although there was a fairly heated article recently claiming that it was more suburb than villageWiltshire Council – Wiltshire Community History Get Community Information [↩]
2. Wiltshire Council – Wiltshire Community History Get Community Information [↩]
3. Projects 2010 [↩]
4. Wiltshire Council – Wiltshire Community History Get Community Information [↩]
5. The Dictionary of British Place-Names says: Laverstock Wilts. Lavvrecestoches 1086 (DB). ‘Outlying farmstead or hamlet frequented by larks’. OE l?werce + stoc. A. D. MILLS. “Laverstock.” A Dictionary of British Place-Names. 2003. Encyclopedia.com. 28 Jun. 2010 . [↩]