Alley, ginnel, what?

[lurker]

Just for fun.

What is a alley way called in your neck of the woods?

I believe ope is Cornish

 

[marcros]

ginnel in leeds, a word I had never heard before arriving here.

 

[Geoff_S]

A no go area

 

[lurker]

A friend has suggested urinal

 

[jeremyduncombe]

It’s an alley around here, but just down the road on the border with East Sussex it is called a twitten.

 

[Blockplane]

Drang

 

[Homers double]

I now live in Bedfordshire and they’re called an Alley around here, I originally hail from Northamptonshire and I recall my grandpa calling them Jittys.

 

[heronviewer]

Vennel in Scotland.

 

[Bm101]

Alley or lane in London historically.
Bit boring.
Luckily in the UK etc we have history on our side to spice it up.
worth a glimpse.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/londontopi ... ondon/amp/
I used to do a job that had half a rock buried into the side of a building in the City. No one saw it. It had a tiny plaque attache that said The London Stone.
Years later I read Peter Ackroyd on the history of London and later the Thames.
Turns out if you remove it, legend says London falls. It goes back years. Most rocks do. I think it was finally taken away a year or two back. The tiny corner of oolitic limestone was part of a far bigger rock which was maintained during removal.... can you imagine this happening in the states lol ?!?
Maybe they are keeping the removed rock on the square mile because no doubt ropey though the times, the city stands yet.

 

[Doug B]

Alley where I was born, gennul where I first moved to & Jitty where I live now :shock:

 

[doctor Bob]

Back passage ..........

 

[Andy Kev.]

On much of the continent an alley or allee is a tree lined country road.* In wide parts of the north of England they are called ginnels.

Which reminds me of the old joke:

Q. Why do the French plant trees on both sides of their country roads?

A. So the German Army can march in the shade. Boom, boom!

 

[loftyhermes]

If it's between terraced houses it's a gennel, otherwise it's a jitty.

 

[harryd]

In north and west Oxfordshire, both 'tuer ' and ' tewer' are found. I wonder if they might be related to 'tuyere' which is the nozzle through which air is forced into a forge - the idea of length and narrowness fits both.
I used to have a colleague from Liverpool-who called cats 'Jigger bunnies', a Jigger being the alley behind a terrace.
Fascinating things, dialect words.

 

[Racers]

Twichell in nottingham

Pete

 

[treeturner123]

Hi All

What a change from Cor...

Here in Tewkesbury, we have probably, for a town of this size, more of these passages left than anywhere else. They are either Alleys, Courts (which are alleys) or if they are more open, Walks.

for interest here is a link

https://tewkesburyhistory.org/Tewkesburys-Alleys
(you might have to copy & paste)

Some were destroyed when a modern (1960's of course) shopping block was built and some are private, but you can happily wonder up and down most of them.

Phil

 

[Woody2Shoes]

Twitten in west sussex

 

[Andy Kev.]

Twichell in nottingham

Pete

I would bet that that and Woody's "twitten" are related to the word "twixt" meaning "between" and so it would make sense.

 

[treeturner123]

Hi

Back to Tewkesbury and a little off the 'Alleys' discussion. In the town, there are two Pubs. The Black Bear one of the oldest in Gloucestershire and at present being refurbished, and the White Bear. The big manor house that stood between them was called...Twixtbears House. Long demolished, it was replaced by a small housing estate which was called Twixtbears.

Phil

 

[Doug71]

In York we have Snickelways, apparently these are neither snickets, ginnels or alleyways, but a mixture of all three!