Rude Britain

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Rude Britain (subtitled 100 Rudest Place Names in Britain) is a 2005 book of humour and toponymy. The book (ISBN 0-7522-2581-2) is written by Rob Bailey and Ed Hurst, and published in the United Kingdom by the Pan Macmillan imprint Boxtree.

Each of the 100 names chosen by the authors are accompanied by a photograph and a placename etymology. The etymologies are often due to the island's history of repeated invasion, occupation, and assimilation, combined with a human predilection for double entendres.

[edit] Top 20 (and a few others)

The following is the list of the top twenty names from the book, many of which are street names and most of which incorporate body part or sexual slang:

Turkey Cock Lane Copford Colchester Essex
Cocks, Cornwall
Minge Lane, Worcestershire
Bell End, Birmingham
Twatt, Orkney and Shetland
Sandy Balls, a long-established holiday centre in New Forest Hampshire with a name dating back to Henry VIII
Muff, Northern Ireland
Fingringhoe, Essex
Back Passage, City of London, an alleyway in the EC1 postal district
Shitterton, Dorset
Slag Lane, Merseyside, a residential street in Haydock
Hole of Horcum, North York Moors
Fanny Hands Lane, Lincolnshire
Inchinnan Drive, Renfrewshire
Cock Head, North York Moors
Cockshoot Close, Oxfordshire
Fanny Avenue, Derbyshire
Beaver Close, Surrey
Dick Court, Lanarkshire
Lickfold, West Sussex
Mearse Lane, Worcestershire
Twatling Road, Worcestershire
Rimswell, East Riding of Yorkshire
Spanker Lane, Derbyshire
Upper Twatt, Shetland
River Piddle, Dorset
Hawsker Cum Stainsacre, North York Moors

Other entries include North Piddle (from the Old English word pidele, meaning marsh), Pratt's Bottom, Ugley, and Spital-in-the-Street (a hamlet in Lincolnshire with a name based on the Middle English spitel, meaning hospital). GropeCunt Lane in Oxford has been renamed "Magpie Lane".