From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Camberwell is a district of south London, England, and forms part of the London Borough of Southwark. It is a built-up inner city district located 2.7 miles southeast of Charing Cross. To the west it has a boundary with the London Borough of Lambeth.
Camberwell appears in Domesday Book as Cambrewelle. The name may derive from the Old English Cumberwell or Comberwell, meaning 'Well of the Britons', referring to remaining Celtic inhabitants of an area dominated by Anglo-Saxons. An alternative theory suggests the name may mean 'Cripple Well', and that the settlement developed as a hamlet where people from the City of London were expelled when they had life-threatening diseases like leprosy, for treatment by the church and the clean, healing waters from the wells. Springs and wells are known to have existed on the southern slope of Denmark Hill, especially around Grove Park.