Honing – Name Origin

On a little meander around North Norfolk churches we visited Honing, a village with a population of around 300 people. So, on my theme of establishing where these names come from, The Concise Oxford Dictionary Of English Placenames says:

Honing, Norfolk. Hanninge in 1044, Haninga in Domesday Book, Haninges in 1150. Old English Haningas, the people at the han or rock. Very likely han here means hill and refers to the small hill at the place.

As an aside, the ‘han’ here is the derivative of what became the word honing, as in improving and sharpening skills. The word ‘han’ could mean hill or rock, in this usage of the word it became used as meaning a whetstone where razors were sharpened. So, although they’re pronounced differently, Honing (the place, Hon rhymes with Bon as in the French word) and honing (the skill, honing rhymes with boning) have the same origins.