Malvern

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A historic town in Worcestershire, England, situated on the eastern side of the Malvern Hills, known for its spa waters and cultural heritage
2. A market town in the West Midlands of England famous for its natural mineral springs and its location near a range of ancient hills
3. An English town renowned for its therapeutic waters and its position adjacent to the Malvern Hills in the borderland between Worcestershire and Herefordshire

Etymology: Malvern is a place name, and its meaning is recorded in the Old English form "Mælfern," which was taken from a Welsh name that meant "bald hill." The Welsh element "moelfryn" combines "moel," meaning bald or bare, with "bryn," meaning hill. English speakers adopted the name during the Anglo-Saxon period and kept the Welsh description of the landscape, so the name of the Worcestershire hills describes the bare, treeless upland that the first Welsh-speaking inhabitants saw. The name then passed into Middle English as "Malverne" before settling into its modern spelling. Over the centuries the Welsh sense of "bald" was lost to ordinary speakers, and the name became simply a label for the hills and the towns around them, rather than a description anyone consciously heard.