which is principally drawn up for the use of those readers who have not a comprehensive map of England at hand, will, with all its deficiencies, clearly and incontestably prove the correctness of the historical accounts, which state that the new population of Danes and Norwegians that immigrated into England during the Danish expeditions, settled almost exclusively in the districts to the north and east of Watlinga-Stræt, and there chiefly to the west and north of the Wash. Norfolk, Northampton

shire, and Lancashire, have each only about fifty names of places of Scandinavian origin; Leicestershire has about ninety; Lincolnshire alone, nearly three hundred; Yorkshire above four hundred; Westmoreland and Cumberland each about one hundred and fifty. The colonization has clearly been greatest near the coasts, and along the rivers; it had its central point in Lincolnshire (the Northmen's "Lindisey"), and in the ancient Northumberland, or land north of the river Humber. Yet it was not much extended in Durham and the present Northumberland, each of which contains only a little more than a score of Scandinavian names.

The same table still further shows that the names ending in by, thorpe, toft, beck, næs, and ey, appear chiefly in the flat midland counties of England; whereas, farther towards the north, in the more mountainous districts, these terminations mostly give place to those in thwaite, and more particularly to those in dale, force, tarn, fell, and haugh. This difference, however, is scarcely founded on the natural character of the country alone; it may also have arisen from the different descent of the inhabitants. For although in ancient times Danish and Norwegian were one language, with unimportant variations, so that it would scarcely be possible to decide with certainty in every single case whether the name of a place be derived from the Danes or from the Norwegians; yet it may reasonably be supposed that part at least of the lastmentioned names are Norwegian; namely, those ending

indale (as Kirk-dale, Lang-dale, Wast-dale, Bishopsdale); in -force (as Aysgarth-force in Yorkshire, Highforce, and Low-force, in the river Tees, and in the stream called "Seamer Water"); in-fell (old Norwegian, fjall; Mickle-fell, Cam-fell, Kirk-fell, Middle-fell, Cross-fell); in

-tarn (Old Nor., tjörn, or tjarn, a small lake); and in -haugh (as in Northumberland, Red-haugh, Kirk-haugh, Green-haugh, Windy-haugh). Exactly similar names are met with to this day in the mountains of Norway; whilst they are less common, or altogether wanting, in the flat country of Denmark. That Norwegians also immigrated into England, even in considerable numbers, both history and the frequently occurring name of Normanby in the north of England, clearly show; but they appear to have betaken themselves chiefly to the most northern and mountainous districts, which not only lay nearest to them, but which in character most resembled their own country. In this respect it deserves to be noticed, that places whose names end in tarn, and are consequently pure Norwegian, are found only in the most northern counties; and that those in haugh-although there are names of places in Denmark ending in höi (hill)-must also, from the form, be Norwegian. They are found exclusively in the present Northumberland, and within the Scotch border.

We may, however, venture to set down the greater part of Scandinavian names of places in England as Danish. The terminations in thwaite and thorpe, indeed, are to be met with in Sweden, Norway, and Iceland, as well as in the Saxon and Frisian districts of North Germany; yet as the corresponding English names are for the most part composed of pure Scandinavian or Danish words, and as they seldom appear either in the tracts conquered by the Norwegians in Scotland and Ireland, or in the southern and south-western, originally Anglo-Saxon, districts of England, but keep strictly within the same boundaries as the rest of the Danish names of places, and particularly of

E

those in by (Danish for town or village), these are valid reasons for regarding them in general as Danish.

The names of places in England ending in by are only to be found in the districts selected by the Danes for conquest or colonization. With the exception of a single Kirby, or Kirkby, in Kent, not far from London, they are nowhere to be found to the south of Watlinga-stræt (for Tenby, formerly Tenbigh, in Pembrokeshire, is from a different derivation); whilst towards the north, they cease in the most north-eastern county of England, the present Northumberland; in the south-westernmost part of Scotland (Locherby in Dumfries, Sorby in Wigtonshire); and in the Isle of Man (Sulby, Jurby, Dalby). If we except Duncansby in Caithness, and Oreby in the Isle of Lewis, as well as some few villages in Orkney and the Shetland Isles, they do not appear among the many pure Norwegian names of places in the north and west of Scotland, and in Ireland; which, as will be explained in its proper place, have generally quite a different character from the Scandinavian (chiefly Danish) names of places in England. It can hardly be said that this was solely owing to the natural character of the country in England being more favourable for the building of villages than in those districts in Scotland and Ireland which were occupied by the Northmen: first, because the Norwegians seem to have dwelt closely together in many places there, doubtless in order to resist the attacks of the natives; secondly, because the land there, though often separated by nature into many districts, as for instance in Caithness and the Orkneys, by no means prevented them from assembling together in villages; and lastly, because by originally denoted only a single estate or farm. In Norway, the Faroe Isles, and Iceland, many names of places are to be found, which indicate the existence both of single farmhouses and collections of them, or villages; but they have this peculiarity, that they generally end in bar or bö, far

more rarely in býr or by; whilst, on the contrary, this last form is essentially Danish. Names of places ending in by are spread over the peninsula of Jutland quite down to Danevirke and the Eyder; are found in great numbers in the southern boundary of South Jutland, or Sleswick; as well as in the islands and old Danish countries of Skaane, or Scania, Halland, and Bleking; whence they extend themselves over a great part of Sweden, and far into Finland. From the most ancient times down to the present, this difference between the Norwegian form bær, and the Danish býr or by, seems on the whole to have clearly prevailed; and thus that, as early as the eleventh century, the English towns and villages are written in William the Conqueror's "Domesday-book," with the Danish ending by or bi, and not with the Norwegian form bær or bö, is certainly no slight corroboration of their assumed Danish origin. Besides, as by is not found in the names of places south of the Eyder, in Holstein or North Germany, and as it is wholly unknown in the Saxon or German languages, there is consequently so much the greater probability that in England it was derived from the Danes.

For the same reasons, towns whose names end in by are most numerous in the counties situated on the coast opposite Jutland; viz., in Leicestershire, 66; Lincolnshire, 212; and the North Riding of Yorkshire, 100. In the two other Ridings, there are altogether about 70 names of places ending in by; in Cumberland, 43; and in Westmoreland, 20. For the rest, this termination occurs so frequently throughout the old Danish part of England, that, of 1370 Scandinavian names of places, above 600 (as the tabular view given at page 71 shows) end in by, whilst no other names exceed 280; and even this number is reached only by the ending thorpe, which also is certainly pure Danish; whilst the most numerous after thorpe fall down to 140.

This remarkable preponderance of Danish endings in by, will of itself sufficiently prove the important and

wide-extended influence of the Danes in the midland and northern counties of England.

The not inconsiderable number (1370) of Scandinavian names of places collected together in the preceding tabular view, could be much increased if we were to include all the Scandinavian appellations used by the common people in many parts of the north of England. A hill, or small mountain, is there called hoe or how (Höi in Jutland: Höw or Hyv); a mountain ridge, rigg; a ford, wath; a spring, kell; a holm or small island, holm; a farm (Dan., Gaard), garth, &c., &c. We might thus, on a very low calculation, compute in round numbers the clearly recognisable Scandinavian names of places in England at one thousand five hundred.

That they should have been preserved in such numbers for more than eight centuries after the fall of the Danish dominion in England, and that they should have retained, as it has been shown, the original Scandinavian forms, and that often in a highly striking degree, completely disproves the opinion that the old Danish-Norwegian inhabitants of the country north of Watlinga-Stræt were supplanted or expelled after the cessation of the Danish dominion (1042), first by the Anglo-Saxons, and afterwards by the Normans from Normandy; for if such had been the case, the names of places would naturally have become altogether changed and impossible to recognise. As the matter stands it is sufficiently proved that Danes as well as Norwegians must have continued to reside in great numbers in the districts previously conquered by them, and particularly in the north; and consequently that a very considerable part of the present population in the midland and northern counties of England may with certainty trace their origin to the Northmen, and especially to the Danes.