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Holand

Discussion of the name

The masculine name Holand has been regarded as Continental Germanic, the second element land ‘land, country’ being diagnostic of Continental origin. If it is CG, its precise source is unclear: von Feilitzen (1937: 291) canvassed as possibilities the unrecorded name Hō(h)land, or Autland (variants Otlant and Ollant) with an inorganic initial H–. A Norman source is possible, since –land was used as a name-element in eleventh-century Normandy, settlers after 1066 including men called Amerland (Staffs. 14:1), Moriland (Leics. 16:6), and Roland (Beds. 21:12; Cornw. 2:10; Norf. 24:2; Northants 42:2–3; Suss. 11:17, 81, 100), as well as Scotland, abbot of St Augustine’s in Canterbury 1070–87 and earlier a monk of Mont-Saint-Michel (Heads: 36).

Conceivably the name was an English coinage of a type novel in the eleventh century and drawing inspiration from Continental names. It is striking that two of the three pre-Conquest instances of names with –land as the second element (Holand and Waland) come from Worcestershire. The elements which went into the name were available in England, since the monothematic name Hōl, Hōla appears in place-names, probably including one in Worcestershire (Ekwall 1960: 244–7), and the element land ‘land, province’ appears (though infrequently) as the first element in what are undoubtedly OE names (von Feilitzen 1937: 308–9 note 4).

Bibliography

Ekwall 1960: Eilert Ekwall, The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Place-Names, 4th edn (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1960)

Heads: The Heads of Religious Houses: England and Wales, 940–1216, ed. David Knowles, C. N. L. Brooke, and Vera C. M. London (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1972)

von Feilitzen 1937: Olof von Feilitzen, The Pre-Conquest Personal Names of Domesday Book, Nomina Germanica 3 (Uppsala: Almqvist and Wiksells, 1937)

Forms of the name

Spellings in Domesday Book: Holandus

Forms in modern scholarship:

  von Feilitzen head forms: Holandus

  Phillimore edition: Holland

  Alecto edition: Holand

Distribution map of property and lordships associated with this name in DB

List of property and lordships associated with this name in DB

Holder 1066

Shire	Phil. ref.	Vill	DB Spelling	Holder 1066	Lord 1066	Tenant-in-Chief 1086	1086 Subtenant	Fiscal Value	1066 Value	1086 Value	Conf.	Show on Map
Shire Worcestershire	Phil. ref. 23,14	Vill Bellington	DB Spelling Holandus	Holder 1066 Holand 'of Bellington'	Lord 1066 -	Tenant-in-Chief 1086 William fitzAnsculf	1086 Subtenant -	Fiscal Value 2.50	1066 Value 0.00	1086 Value 0.00	Confidence A	Map
Totals								Fiscal Value	1066 Value	1086 Value

People of this name

• Holand 2 - Holand ‘of Bellington’ (Worcs.), fl. 1066