What's Hantshaving??

[goggy]

G,Day ALL,
well well!Just another day at the keyboard,and look what we have.Fancy forgetting old King Whosisname,and the very first English navy!
Sorry for the limpid bit,I imagined it would be accepted as intended,clear,crystal,pellucid.Howsomever,shall we say sabres for two,brandy for me?
                Cheers,Goggy.

[Arranroots]

Yikes!

That's the sound of me heading for the hills of Hantshaving!!  I'd cut my own head off with a sabre, for sure! 

I'm guessing that the county coat of arms and official regalia aren't emblazoned with the term "Hantshaving", then?

Maybe the residents are being undemocratically renamed!?  I think we should be told!

 

[goggy]

Arran roots,dinnae fash yersel',medication makes brandy for me taboo,boo,hoo!As for the Citizens being left in the dark,t.was ever thus,what would we knuckleheads do with such high falutin' info??
                   Cheers,Goggy.

[Arranroots]

I found this link, which I found interesting:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_generic_forms_in_British_place_names

Also e-mailed the English Place Name Society to request their views!  Will post any reply.

 

[Arranroots]

Here's what the English Place Name Society said:

I have never before come across 'Hantshaving', and I can find no evidence to support the notion that it is 'the old name for the county'.  Hants. certainly, but not Hantshaving.  It is possible that the word means something in the context of the 1891 census, but I have no means of ascertaining what that might be.  I think it is likely to be an invention: the Oxford
English Dictionary has no record.
Good wishes,
paul cavill

Dr Paul Cavill
Principal Research Fellow
English Place-Name Society
School of English
University of Nottingham