Chapter XXXIII: The Gilds of Lincolnshire--(Continued) (6)

Let me take, as an illustration, a well-known passage, in which the “Chronicle” tells how the West Saxons, in 577, “took three ceasters, Gleawan ceaster and Ciren ceaster, and Bathan ceaster.” Now, each of these cities would be severally known as a “ceaster,” and, in due course, as _the_ “ceaster”--just as “forum” was developed by the Romans, and as “market” has been by ourselves (_vide ante_, v. 250)--but when, as here, mentioned together, they would have to be distinguished from one another. The _hams_ and _tuns_ which covered the land were so distinguished by prefixing to them the names of their English owners. This could not be done with the _ceasters_, which did not become the homesteads of English owners. The distinctive prefix was, therefore, sought in some existing (although, to the invaders), meaningless name, either that of the river on which it stood, as “Exan ceaster” (the Chester on the Exe), or that of the place itself, “Glewan ceaster,” a form which may be paralleled in the “Fort Chipewyan,” “Fort Winebago,” &c., of their descendants in North America.[47] It is often, of course, most difficult to say whether the prefix is derived directly from the river, or indirectly, through the original place-name. But, in any case, we must dismiss the hypothesis that the prefix was “the Romanised title” of the town, for the termination “an” (“Ex_an_,” “Gleaw_an_”) is found in cases where the Roman forms differed so widely as “Isc_a_” and “Glev_um_.” We must guard against the idea that such prefix was ever the “Roman name” itself, used in apposition to “ceaster.”

To resume, then, we have seen that there is no ground for supposing “_castrum_” to have ever formed part of the “Roman names” of those cities whose modern names end in “Chester,” &c. From this it has followed that the terminal in question is the result and badge of the English invasion, representing the English word “ceaster,” the invaders’ term for a walled town, and not the equivalent of a mere _castrum_, though etymologically derived from it in the first instance. We have also seen that the terminal in question was not a mere “addition” to the “Roman name,” but was itself the new name imposed by the conquering English, to which, when and where necessary, a prefix was in time permanently added, for the sake of distinction. It is not, surely, too much to say that if these conclusions were satisfactorily established, they must gravely modify, if not revolutionise, the view which has hitherto universally prevailed, and which is based, I think, on a too hasty induction from the resemblance between the English and the Latin words.

I shall not here pursue further the vicissitudes and the fate of “port” and “chester,” but shall content myself with noticing the instructive fact, that, while these words have come down to us, similarly, in compound forms alone, “chester” is a component in the names of _places_, and “port” in the names of _things_ (including, thereby, offices). Now, if “a walled town” was the meaning of _ceaster_, and “a trading town” the meaning of _port_, why should we find this marked difference in the use of words which, in sense, appear to have differed so slightly? Why does “chester” end words, and “port” begin them? Why is a town called a “chester,” when its governor is a “_port_-reeve,” and its court a “_port_-manmote?” The answer is to be found in this distinction: the _ceaster_ was the town _objectively_, that is, viewed as a natural object, a walled enclosure; the _port_ was the town _subjectively_, that is, relatively to trade, “in its character of a mart or city of merchants.”[48]

Thus it was that while _ceaster_ retained its sturdy objectivity, and was merely qualified, as a place-name, by the addition of a distinctive prefix, _port_, on the other hand, referring as it did to the town viewed in a particular aspect, was only strong enough to become itself a prefix, used, for the purpose of distinction, in a quasi-adjectival sense. In _port-mote_ it served to distinguish the moot held in the “port” from the _scir-mote_ and _tun-mote_; in _port-reeve_ it served to distinguish the reeve of the “port,” or trading town, from the _scir-reeve_, the _wic-reeve_, and reeves other innumerable.[49]

MESSRS. BURNS & OATES have announced the intended publication of a series of reprints of scarce ascetical books, many of which exist in the possession of private collectors, as heirlooms of old Catholic families, and in the libraries of religious houses. Among them are “Three Ways of Perfection,” (1663); “Sweet Thoughts of Jesus and Mary,” (1658); “Memorial of a Christian Life,” (1688), &c. The works will be edited by Mr. Orby Shipley, M.A.

The “Titurel” of Wolfram von Eschenbach.

TRANSLATED BY JULIA GODDARD.

(_Continued from p. 134._)