From Bentley Pauncefoot to Yetts O’Muckhart, I’m obsessed with Britain’s weirdly named villages | Adrian Chiles

I was stuck in traffic when a road sign set me dreaming. If the places on it were people, what would they be like? Could Leigh Delamere be anything but the glamorous heiress to a biscuit-making fortune, asks Adrian Chiles

Stuck in traffic in the Wiltshire town of Chippenham, I chanced upon a road sign to Christian Malford and Sutton Benger. Placenames that could be people are dotted across our green and pleasant land – it’s charmingly British, somehow. Waiting to escape Friday night rush hour, I found a persona for Christian Malford taking shape. I had him down as a child actor in one of the early Harry Potters. Sutton Benger was more of a stretch, but I settled on a precociously talented young footballer of Anglo-Norwegian heritage. He signed for Chelsea with great fanfare, but never really made the grade. Poor chap.

The traffic moved on, but my mind didn’t. Once on the M4, I was soon passing Leigh Delamere, the glamorous heiress of an American biscuit-making fortune, now fallen on hard times.

Back home, I dug out my late dad’s AA road atlas of Britain (2019 edition). How I loved scouring the index in search of more imaginary friends peopling our placenames. Fun for a feeble mind? Probably. Deeply satisfying? Certainly.

First, a mention for the mononymous. Patrick on the Isle of Man, Paul in Cornwall – and then there’s Barry in the Vale of Glamorgan, as we all know. A warm wave as well to Kelly in Devon and, in the Highlands, to Kirk and, sweetly, Arabella. There are two Lees, in Devon and London, and Leighs aplenty. Countless Prestons, too. And Bradleys. I make it three Martins and four Hopes. I’m assuming, by the way, that Hope Bagot in Shropshire and Preston Bagot in Warwickshire are somehow related.

Many of the first-second name combos are almost disappointingly mundane – no offence to George Green in Buckinghamshire, Roy Bridge in the Highlands or any of the three Rose Greens. By the way, these things can hide in plain sight – I lived next to a place called Hayley Green for most of my life without once realising it would make a perfectly charming girl’s name.

Moving on to slightly more engaging names, there’s Ash Thomas and George Nympton, both residing in Devon. Also Nevill Holt in Leicestershire, Rodney Stoke in Somerset and Kirk Deighton in North Yorkshire, while I’ve developed a bit of a fancy for Edith Weston in Rutland. In Kent, we find Dean Bottom, who must have endured terrible stick when he was a kid.

I must give an honourable mention to Sandy Balls. Sandy, sadly, doesn’t make the grade, as she/he is not a village, but an area of woodland in Hampshire. That said, there is a Sandy Balls holiday village. What exactly goes on there I haven’t dared to check.

It’s in the more intriguing (that is to say unlikely) names that I’ve found the greatest joy: Clifford Chambers in Warwickshire, for example. Surely by now someone called Chambers should have moved there, begat a son called Cliff, raised him to be a lawyer and then opened a practice. “Hi, I’m Clifford Chambers of Clifford Chambers in Clifford Chambers …” C’mon, someone, do it!

In neighbouring Worcestershire we find Chaddesley Corbett, surely a philanthropic 19th-century educationist, and Bentley Pauncefoot, the friendly but clueless youngest son of a local landowning noble, nicknamed Paunstar (obviously) by his chums at boarding school. Over the border in Shropshire we can go for an audience with Cleobury Mortimer, a big star in restoration comedy. Staying with arts and culture, North Yorkshire is in good shape with Burton Leonard, the handsome but troubled early 50s Hollywood heart-throb, and Ainderby Quernhow, a fantasy novelist, latterly doing good business with her well-received Olde English Book of Spelles.

Elsewhere, there are many foppish-sounding coves. To name but three, Hertfordshire’s Furneux Pelham, Danby Wiske in North Yorkshire and, my personal favourite, Worcestershire’s Flyford Flavell. In sport, Buckinghamshire is strong. There’s the widely feared West Indian fast bowler Aston Clinton and the footballer Lee Clump, the holder of several non-league scoring records.

I puzzled awhile over Quadring Eaudike in Lincolnshire, but concluded he had to be a pioneering mathematician. As for Huish Champflower in Somerset, Yetts O’Muckhart in Clackmannanshire and Zeal Monachorum in Devon, I’m afraid I’m stumped. I simply can’t find the characters to do these places justice.

• Adrian Chiles is a broadcaster, writer and Guardian columnist

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