What's in a Name?
What's in a Name ?
by Lorraine
Sencicle
by kind permission of the Dover Mercury, (KMG )
published :
August 2010
A reader of the Dover Mercury wrote and asked me about the origin
the name Dover and how it had spread around the World. Briefly, I told him, there are
at least two likely origins of the word Dover, the Latin - Dubris, meaning waters
and was the name given by the Romans.
On the other hand, some believe that
Dover comes from the old Scandinavian meaning a ravine, gap, gorge or a crevasse
between cliffs. This would put the origin of the word to the days Vikings - who
came to Kent after the Romans, by which time our town was called Dubris. Perhaps the
Vikings changed Dubris to Dover?
Of interest, Douvres as in
Douvres-la-D élivrande, Calvados, France, probably comes from the Celtic
Dubras, also meaning ‘waters’. Further south, in France and in northern Italy, there
are more Dovers of various spellings, these may derive from Dubris or the Gaulish
Dubron, again meaning ‘waters’. However, in Turkey, where there are two Döver's
pronounced Doeuver, it means 'to beat or hit a person', for instance the boxer beats /
hits his opponent!
As spelling tended to be phonetic in old manuscripts, up
until the 18th century Dover, England, was sometimes spelt with an ‘o’, i.e. Dovor. In
some documents Dover and Dovor are used, however, in more recent times the spelling
Dovor has been used, in my opinion, for affectation.
To date I have been able
to identify some 87 Dover’s around the World. Originally there were 88 but by a
referendum the folks of Dover, Ocean County, New Jersey, changed their name to Toms
River, a couple of years back! However, of note, the State Capital of Delaware is
called Dover, after Dover, England. Actually, most Dovers derive their name from
Dover, England. This is mainly due to émigrés who set up homes in places where there
were high cliffs. Scandinavian émigrés have also influenced the names of some of the
Dovers for similar reasons. However, those places where the original émigr
és came from Dovre, Norway, have spelt it the Norwegian way. Later, most changed
this to Dover but Dovre, Wisconsin, US, has maintained its Norwegian origins.
A
further influence on the spread of Dover in the US and Canada, comes from émigr
és who first settled in or near Dover, New Hampshire, which was originally named
after Dover, England. One account of a Dover in the mid-west US, tells that the
origin is attributed to the founding father coming from Dover - Somerset! Further
research, on my part, revealed that the original inhabitant had come from Somerset,
but on arrival in the US lived for awhile in Dover, New Hampshire!
My Dovers
Around the World project was begun in 2006 and as it has developed three distinct
parts. The original project was, and still is, to research and make contact with at
least one respondent in each of the different Dovers for a local perspective. The
resulting article to be published in a loca
Once published, the second part,
is to reproduce the articles on the Dover Society website: to enable other people,
throughout the World, to read about the different Dovers. website
The third part is to develop
the relationship with the different Dovers for civic and educational
purpose
Although making contact with a respondent is not always easy, getting
photographs of sufficient resolution to be published in a newspaper is very difficult.
Nonetheless, to date I have managed to cover over 40 Dovers!
The Dover Society,
like the Mercury editorial, are very keen to support the project, so the second part
of my project has not produced any problems. When they articles are reproduced on the
Dover Society website I inform all of the respondents. I am told by Mike McFarnell,
who runs the Dover Society website, that Dovers Around the World is very popular and
certainly we have had a lot of positive feedback.
Sadly, the final phase of
the project, developing the relationship of different Dovers with Dover England for
civic and educational purposes has not been so successful. Although, many of the
different Dovers have been keen to foster this, except for Dover Grammar School for
Boys, the enthusiasm here in Dover England, has been minimal.
Albeit, over the
period I have been covering the different Dovers I have made friends with numerous
other 'Dovorians' throughout the World and have learnt lot about their
countries, localities, society and politics. It is amazing how we all share the name
of Dover but how different we are from each other.
Castle Street,
Dover
Captain Webb
Dover Marina and
White Cliffs