Box, or byxe (derived from the Latin buxus) names many places, and early forms in Bex, Bix, Bux, are found both as to Boxley and Bexley, as with Boxhill and Bexhill in other counties.
Holegn = holen, adj. of holly, survives in Hollingbourne and Holborough; Per (pear) in Perhamstead; Cherry in Cheriton; Plum in Plumstead; Elm in Elmley, Elmstone, Elmstead, but only the wych-elm was indigenous, and called Wice by the Saxons. Thorn we find in Thornham.
Haga, a Saxon name survives in our Hawthorn, and may help us to understand the meaning of Eythorne, near Dover, and the Hundred of Eyhorne, in which Detling is situated. The early name of Eythorne is Hegythorne, i.e., Hawthorn, and the Hundred of Eythorde or Eyhorne (so from 1347 A.D.) might well be the same, and named from the hamlet of Iron Street is Hollingbourne, where Iron is plainly a late corruption of an old word.
The Rev. E. McClure, in his British Place-Names, gives (p. 207 et seqq.) a list of words in old Saxon glossaries, ranging from the 7th to the 9th centuries, which appear in British place-names. I extract those which seem to apply to place-names in Kent.
Bodan = bottom, common in Kent for a narrow valley, e.g., East Bottom at Kingsdown, near Walmer.
Hœgu-thorn = hedge-thorn, hawthorn, whence our Eythorne (anciently Hegythe Thorne), Hundred of Eyhorne (Haythorn, temp. Henry III.), and Iron Street, a hamlet in Hollingbourne in that Hundred.
Mapuldur = maple-tree, in our Maplescombe, i.e., the bowl-shaped valley where maples abound.
Holegn = holly. Our Hollingbourne, and perhaps Hollandon.
Holt-hona = woodcock, or more exactly woodhen, like moorhen. Worhona is Saxon for pheasant. So our Henhurst, Henwood, and Hengrove are the same.
Boece = beech. So our Mark Beech and Bough Beech, near Chiddingstone. This derivation is also one of those suggested for Bearsted, whereof the Saxon name is Beorhham-stede, and the first syllable would be either Beorg-hill or Beorc-beech.