#bearda

September 2nd - The Roaches, the Staffordshire Moorlands, Dane Valley and Macclesfield Forest really were beautiful.

Bearda is a short form of an Anglo-Saxon masculine name containing beard (beard).

Variants:

Bearda [Henry Wild 1911 The place names of Lancashire, page 65].

Berda [John Gover, Sir Allen Mawer, & Sir Frank Stenton 1931 English Place-Name Society 8: 25].

Beard(a) [Percy Reaney 1935 English Place-Name Society 12: 141].

Beard [Patrick Hanks & Flavia Hodges 1988 A Dictionary of Surnames, page 40].

B(e)arda [Keith Briggs 2021 An index to personal names in English place-names, 1st edition, page 52].

Stem:

beard = beard [Henry Sweet 1886 The Oldest English Texts, page 487].

Suffix:

— a = “termination of pet names, such as Cutha for Cuthwine or Cuthwulf” [William Searle 1897 Onomasticon Anglo-Saxonicum, page 1].

Evidence:

April 18th - It was a beautiful but tough ride. Only 91 miles, so shorter than a usual dayride, but with over 2000m of vertical climb. I came from Macclesfield to Sutton Common, looped through Allgreave to Wildboarclough, then back to Wincle. Through Bearda to Gun, then down to Meerach and Tittesworth. After Lunch, back through Leek, then onto the Caldon Canal into the Churnet Valley. 

From the end of the canal at Froghall, out of the valley and back in to Oakamoor, along Dimminsdale to Alton then the cycle trail to Denstone, and home via Uttoxeter and Armitage.

We know you all can grow beards. We get it. You've gone through puberty. We can see it. Now please shave before you start looking like Duck Dynasty.

Enough is enough.