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Wombourne (also spelt Wombourn) is a very large village (sometimes claimed to be the largest village in England) and civil parish located in the district of South Staffordshire, in the county of Staffordshire, 4 miles (6 km) south-west of Wolverhampton and just outside the county and conurbation of the West Midlands. Local affairs are run by a parish council. At the 2001 census it had a population of 13,691. Due to its proximity to the county and conurbation of the West Midlands, it is, to some extent, an urban fringe settlement or dormitory village for the conurbation, although it also has a distinctive centre and a long history. ==Etymology and usage== The Old English word ''burna'' signifies a stream, and a stream is a notable feature of the village. Formerly the village name was thought to mean "Womb Stream", or stream in a hollow,〔W. H. Duignan, Notes on Staffordshire Place Names, Henry Frowde, London, 1902.〕 because this is a reasonable description of the situation. However, more recent scholarship explains the name as meaning a Crooked Stream,〔Margaret Gelling, Place-names in the Landscape, Dent, London, 1984, ISBN 0-460-86086-0, p.17-18, 325〕 which is at least as good a description. ''Burna'' was one of the terms for a stream used in the earliest Anglo-Saxon place names, and the stream was presumably itself called the Wom Bourn. However, today it is always distinguished from the village by the name Wom Brook, from another, slightly later, Old English term for a stream: ''brōca''. The Wom Brook, which has required considerable work to ameliorate its flooding, originates on Penn Common and is a tributary of the Smestow Brook, which it meets just south of Wombourne. The spelling "Wombourne" is now preferred for official use. However, the village is marked "Wombourn" on the 1775 William Yates ''Map of the County of Stafford'' and as late as the 1945-48 series Ordnance Survey maps.〔Viewed at (Staffordshire Past Track )〕 There has been considerable feeling about the issue and road signs were regularly amended unofficially with spray paint until the 1990s at least. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Wombourne」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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