It originally consisted of two distinct hundreds: Sexpena and Hanlega.
[1] Sixpenny Handley Hundred contained the following parishes: Sixpenny Hundred took its name from its meeting place at Sixpenny, now a farm, in the south west of the parish of Fontmell Magna.
[2] Sixpenny was first recorded in 932 as Seaxpenn, and means "hill of the Saxons" (from Old English Seaxe and Brythonic penn).
Its meeting place is not known, but a possible location is a neolithic long barrow known as Wor Barrow, 1 km east of Handley.
When the barrow was excavated by Augustus Pitt Rivers in 1893–94, execution burials were found at the site.