Leicestershire
name ·Rare ·Advanced level
Definitions
- 1 An inland county of England bordered by Nottinghamshire, Lincolnshire, Rutland, Northamptonshire, Warwickshire and Derbyshire.
"Rutland (and some of the bordering ‘Notswolds’ counties of Lincolnshire, Leicestershire and Northamptonshire) have the same mellow, creamy limestone as the Cotswolds and boast beguiling market towns and villages that are every bit as attractive, but without the tourists or hefty prices."
Synonyms
All synonymsExample
More examples"Rutland (and some of the bordering ‘Notswolds’ counties of Lincolnshire, Leicestershire and Northamptonshire) have the same mellow, creamy limestone as the Cotswolds and boast beguiling market towns and villages that are every bit as attractive, but without the tourists or hefty prices."
Etymology
From Old English Lægreċeastresċīr. The middle and last element are ceaster (“town, city”) and scir (“district”), common in placenames. The first element is probably from the former name of the river Soar, *Ligora, *Ligera, of Celtic/Brythonic origin, from Proto-Celtic *legyā (“sediment”), from Proto-Indo-European *legʰ- (“to lie”), similar to the French river Loire. By surface analysis, Leicester + -shire.
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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.