cheapstead

English

Etymology

From cheap (“purchase, business, market”) +‎ stead (“place”), probably a translation of Old Norse kaupstaðr (“marketplace”). Compare Icelandic kaupstaður (“market town”), Swedish köpstad (“market town”), Old English ċēapstōw (“marketplace”).

Noun

cheapstead (plural cheapsteads)

1. (rare, historical) A marketplace.
   • 1879, Charles George Warnford Lock, Clement le Neve Foster, The home of the Eddas:

     […] three weeks of winter were employed in butchering, and more than an acre of field surrounding the cheapstead at Housewick was covered with knots of men and women decapitating and flaying their flocks.

   • 1900, Manchester Geographical Society, The Journal of the Manchester Geographical Society:

     Sleet showers continued until we reached the cheapstead of Akureyri (Acre Beach), at the south end of the fjord.

Anagrams

• deathscape