Dorset’s unusual place names

Like many parts of the UK, Dorset has its fair share of strange, and sometimes amusing, place names.

Here are a few of the most memorable:

Happy Bottom near Corfe Mullen, Wimborne

Scratchy Bottom, a cliff-top valley near Durdles Door. Scratchy Bottom is one of the locations in the 1967 film Far from the Madding Crowd.

Shitterton near Bere Regis. In 2010, residents of Shitterton got so frustrated with their village sign being repeatedly stolen that they replaced it with an enormous stone sign weighing over a tonne.

Piddletown (changed to Puddletown), a parish and town on the river Piddle. There’s even a Piddle Ale brewed by the Dorset Piddle Brewery in Piddlehinton. Could you muster the courage to ask for a pint of Piddle in the Piddle Inn? In Old English, ‘Piddle’ was the word for a marsh or fen.

Droop – a hamlet in mid Dorset.

Lilliput, a district of Poole

Ryme Intrinseca, a village in the north west of Dorset, near the border with Somerset. The village has a 13th century church.

Wool, a village in the Purbeck area of Dorset. The 17th century Woolbridge Manor House is where Thomas Hardy’s Tess of the D’Ubervilles stayed on her honeymoon.

If you’re planning to visit some of Dorset’s wonderfully-named locations and villages this summer, don’t forget to book your bed and breakfast accommodation in Dorset or self catering accommodation in Dorset as soon as possible. We look forward to welcoming you here.