Why is Portsmouth called Pompey? Every theory, and the one that is wrong

You have probably called it Pompey your whole life and have no idea why. Do not worry, nobody does. The honest answer to "why is Portsmouth called Pompey?" is that it is a mystery, and a dozen or so explanations have been put forward. Here are the five best known, and the one we can rule out.

What the experts say

A 2012 post on the American Dialect Society mailing list by Goranson counted about a dozen published proposals and found none of them persuasive. Green's Dictionary of Slang says the etymology is unknown, and the Oxford English Dictionary records the origin as unknown too. So when someone tells you they know the answer, be kind but sceptical.

Theory one: the logbooks

Portsmouth Point, the old harbour-mouth quarter, was commonly shortened to "Po'm. P." when handwritten in ships' logbooks, according to Wikipedia's Portsmouth Point article. Say that fast and you get Pompey. It is neat, and the sort of explanation that sounds right, but we have not found a logbook that proves it.

Theory two: a French warship

The Pompee was a French ship of the line that came into British hands at Toulon in 1793. It fought at Algeciras in 1801 under Captain Charles Stirling, and later served as a guard ship and prison hulk in Portsmouth Harbour. The suggestion is that the nickname started with the ship.

Theory three: Pompey's Pillar

One historian says that around 1781, sailors based at Portsmouth climbed Pompey's Pillar in Alexandria, Egypt, and were known afterwards as the "Pompey Boys". Again, it is a lovely story with one historian behind it.

Theory four: Bombay

Catherine of Braganza arrived at Portsmouth on the evening of 13 May 1662. The theory says her Portuguese sailors likened low-lying Portsea to Bombay, and that their word for it ("Bom Bhia") was heard by locals as "Pompey". This has the weakest sourcing of the five, resting on two secondary web pages, so we keep it as a theory only.

Theory five: Aggie Weston

In 1904, Agnes Weston, the sailors' friend, was giving a talk about the Roman general Pompey the Great. When she described his murder, a sailor is said to have shouted "Poor old Pompey!", and the name stuck. This is the one that is definitely wrong.

Why Aggie Weston cannot be right

The dates do not work. The Oxford English Dictionary's first citation for Pompey as a football team is 1899, and Goranson's research also turns up the Portsmouth Evening News in October 1899 and the Hampshire Telegraph on 9 December 1899. Green's Dictionary of Slang gives 1898 as the earliest clear use for the town. A talk in 1904 is at least five years too late.

There is more. According to Wikipedia, an army team, Royal Artillery (Portsmouth), was already nicknamed Pompey before Portsmouth Football Club was founded in 1898. That detail comes from a single source, but it points the same way. Sorry, Aggie.

So which is it?

The other four theories are still in the race. Nobody has proved any of them, not even the dictionary. A few other explanations circulate, including a Shakespeare line, a French word for firemen and a link to "pomp and ceremony". We have not weighed those up here.

More Pompey words

While you are here: Portsmouth Point is nicknamed Spice Island, from a seedy reputation as the "spice of life", and a "dinlo" is slang for a fool, from the Romani word dinolo. The five bells of Portsmouth Guildhall are nicknamed the Pompey Chimes because they inspired the football chant. They fell silent in 2003 because sea salt in the air had corroded the tower, and the restoration was finished for the Queen's visit in 2009.

Watch the reel

We asked which of these you would back in the comments. Watch the Pompey reels on the Waterlooville.co Facebook page, and follow us there for a new local history story every day.