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How Did “Barnstable” Get Its Name?

The short answer is that no one really knows. Or rather, it has been lost to time. For sure, Barnstable, Massachusetts is named after Barnstaple in Devon, England.  The pronunciation is the same, but the modern spelling differs. 


(Barnstable, Devon, England)

 

Who first named our town (and later county) “Barnstable” is unclear.  The explorer Captain John Smith—who first coined the name “New England”—is said to have invited Prince Charles (later King Charles I of England (1600-1649)) to assign English place names to new settlements, when he returned from a mission to map New England in 1614.  Interestingly, his 1616 map assigns the name “Bastable” (an old spelling of Barnstable) not to Cape Cod, but to Cape Ann(a), north of Boston.  Cape Cod was temporarily re-named Cape James (in honor of Prince Charles), with the Welsh place name “Milford haven” assigned to what is now Provincetown.  “Barwick” was assigned to the rest of the Cape—possibly after Captain Thomas Barwick, one of Captain Smith’s acquaintances.  


(Captain John Smith’s Map of New England c. 1616)

 

By the time the early settlers had left for Massachusetts, Barnstaple in England was a thriving river port that exported wool, pottery, and other goods, and imported tobacco, cod fish, wine and spices.  It has been a market town since for more than one thousand years, before written records began.  Current understanding is that “Barnstable” means “a post or pillar to mark a religious or administrative meeting place” (“bearde” (battle-axe) “stapol” (post or pillar)).  


(Barnstable 1740)

 

Back in the Domesday Book (the Great Survey of England of 1086), Barnstaple was spelt “Barnestaple.”  Other early spellings included “Bearstaple,” “Beardastapol,” “Bardenstapol,” even the latin ad Barnastapolitum, which was later abbreviated to “Barum”—a familiar reference still used in Barnstaple, England today. 


(Barnstable in the Doomsday Book)

 

Records suggest that a number of the early settlers to Barnstable (Timothy Hatherly, James Cudworth, Richard Callicott, and John Otis) knew the English town.  It is said that our Barnstable got its name because of the similarity of the marsh lands. 


(Barnstaple, Devon, England)


We would like to think that those early settlers gave our town (and later county) its name so that “Barnstable” would feel like home.  For sure, many of the first families living here would have spoken English dialects familiar to those back in Barnstaple, England.  Their family names would also have been familiar: Allyn/Allen, Crocker, Davis and Hanford to name a few.

 

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