Re: The name "Kelsi/Kelsey"
in reply to a message by Norah Namenerd
There's no OE name Cenel that I can find, and the place names are not recorded in that form. That again is early antiquarian speculation. The extant forms in the Domesday book imply that the earliest form was Coleseg (g pronounced as |j| as in Jaeger), later Colesei, but that by the founding of North Kelsey the |o| had been leveled to |e| by umlaut, with resulting palatalization of the |c|, hence the spelling Nortchelsei (ch still pronounced as k, but palatal rather than guttural k). Cola, Cole and Col- are recorded in OE names, with a sense of "coal-black". It's part of a thematic class which seems to refer to hair color (various words for red, brown, black or dark are recorded). The recorded forms of Ceol are Ceol, Ciol, Cel or Ceal, not Col, so do not explain the earliest recorded spelling of Kelsey. O shifts to e by umlaut, not the other way round.