A spelling mistake set in stone on a village landmark is to be re-carved after a dictionary publisher admitted the error was all its fault.

A war of words broke out in Eldwick, near Bingley, last year after villagers spotted the word 'millennium' on their special commemorative stone had been spelt with one 'n' rather than two. At the time Alan Mirfield, historian and member of Eldwick Village Society who organised the wording and funded the project, insisted he had checked it in the Longman New Generation Dictionary and had literally taken its word for it. Other dictionaries had the correct spelling, with two 'n's.

But after the subject hit the Telegraph & Argus headlines, Mr Mirfield, of Grange Road, decided to take up issue with Longman.

He said: "I wrote and told them that paying for the correction was the least they could do as a respected publisher.

"I'd waited so long for a reply that I thought about leaving the spelling as it was so it would be a talking point for future generations."

Mr Mirfield was thrilled when Longman sent a copy of its latest dictionary, as well as a CD version.

Now he is thinking of donating the dictionary to either the local school or the village's social club The Birches.

Della Summers, director of Longman Dictionaries, said: "We felt we had to cover the cost of the correction because it was our fault.

"Obviously it's not very good for a dictionary publisher to get the spelling of a difficult word wrong but the dictionary Mr Mirfield used was a very old one."

Donald Lyons, of Keighley-based M & G Stone, who originally carved the words on the landmark stone, said a special tool with a head made of diamonds would be used to polish down the error and start again from scratch.

"We're just waiting for a fine, sunny day to get on with the job. Once it's done no one should notice the difference - except for the extra 'n' of course," he said.