Main photo and bottom right – Fenor in its familiar form, and (bottom left) one of the new signs on the Annestown approach to the village.                  | Photos: Liam de Paor

Main photo and bottom right – Fenor in its familiar form, and (bottom left) one of the new signs on the Annestown approach to the village. | Photos: Liam de Paor

Locals in Fenor, County Waterford are being driven round the bend by new road signage which has ame‘N’ded the name of the village.

Waterford County Council workers erected the directional signposts last week – which would ordinarily be welcomed were it not for the fact that several of them have Fenor spelt ‘Fennor’.

However, the assumption that it’s merely a mistake appears misplaced. It’s now emerged that ‘Fennor’ was the original spelling, similar to the Irish variant ‘Fionnúir’.

The new signage is located in the village itself and along the Copper Coast road, including one at Rocketts Cross, a kilometre towards Tramore, where fingerposts are spelt differently on opposite sides of the junction.

Whether rewriting or updating history at the stroke of a stencil, it’ll take some getting used to – not to mention the conflict with all manner of literature, documentation, logos and so on. The signs have even re-christened the area’s most famous asset ‘Fennor Bog’ (a National Nature Reserve).

While the modern ‘Fenor’ stood apart, there’s already a Fennor parish in Tipperary, and another place by that name near Slane in Co Meath.

But now the Waterford one, which has happily got by with just three consonants for years, could be going back to where it all began.