street

The element 'street', and forms derived from it, were the specific or first element in certain major place-names, the element ‘street’ and forms derived from it were the specific or first element, evidence of an ancient paved way, especially a former Roman road, e.g. Strafforth, Sturton. That use of the word persisted long enough to feature in minor names such as Tong Street, and The hye Street in Lindley, on a Robert Saxton map in Kirklees archives: both these are on the line of Roman roads. It was used also of a paved way between buildings in a town or village, with examples from the eleventh century, for example: c.1090 Nordstreta

1150-61 Cuningesstrete, York

1318 strete in front of the Friars Preachers, Beverley

1415 Fynkelstrete, Hull

1557 in every of the three stretes in Wakefelde. Even though ‘gate’ was the usual word for a way or street in Yorkshire, ‘High Street’ has a long history there, recorded in Hull as le Heighe Streete in 1321 and subsequently over a wide area: 1536 his movable guddes and howssehold stuffe dyd cast forth of the sayd howsse into the Hygh Strett, Whiston

1563 one common Street commonly called the hieghe streate, Aldborough

1585 They lay in pain that Henry Nayler do remove his maner and donnge which he hathe laid in the hie streete, that others may leade there, Dewsbury

1609 le Highestreete in Earlesheaton. In some individual cases it is not certain how High Street should be interpreted, whether as a highway or as a major street in a town. Nor can we ignore the influence of clerks who were not local men, especially from the seventeenth century when ‘town street’ began to feature in the records, replacing the regional word ‘town-gate’: 1654 those of Crathorne and Yarm for not repairing their town streets or gates

1730 the Town Street in Hallifax. The history of ‘kirk’ and ‘laithe’ is evidence of how certain important regional words were being relegated to the status of dialect terms from the sixteenth century.