Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 6.djvu/135

 9* s. vi. AUG. a, 1900.] NOTES AND QUERIES. 109 the river Thames : " It is only by a compara- tively recent arrangement that the boundary of Berkshire follows the delta of the Cher- well " (9th S. v. 518). By this we might infer some new arrangement about a century ago. What are the recorded facts ? In the Middle Ages the large island between the mouths of the Cherwell was called Astones ey te, and in a reference to it in A.D. 1439 it is mentioned as " Astones ey te in comitatu Berks, quod se extendit usque Thamisiam ex parte uiiii, et Shirelake ex parte altera."* I have based no argument on two islands at the mouth of the Cherwell. The new cut by which two have been made out of one, the " micclanige" of Cead walla's bounds and Astones eyte of 1439, is modern. ME. STEVENSON either knows this or he does not. If he does know it and writes as if he did not know it, what of his bona fides ? If he does not know it, what of his qualification to write on this subject at all ? ME. STEVENSON'S claim to know better than any one else which Anglo-Saxon char- ters are genuine, and which forgeries, has been fully recognized by himself. Most people, however, who are interested in Anglo-Saxon matters, prefer the opinions of Kemble, Thorpe, Joseph Stevenson, De Gray Birch, and other writers, who have done real work in this department of knowledge; and those whom I have mentioned have all recog- nized as genuine, or expressed no doubt on the genuine character of, all the charters I have quoted bearing on this question. Many examples exist which show the practice of our Anglo-Saxon and early English forefathers in turning the names of places into somewhat similar names of animals. Near Oxford we find Dudocbesford (Domesday Book) changed to Duxford; Coueley (Domesday Book. N.B.—Not the A.-S. CM) changed to Cowley; and Hoches- well (Hundred llolls) changed to Hawkswell. the last place being within the limits or Oxford itself. In other parts of England we find Catford, Bulford, Camelford, and many other corrupted names. In the face of many such instances ME. STEVENSON asks us to believe that the name Oxenford, among all these examples, is the earliest form ot an old name derived from a ford for oxen. By similar reasoning without reference to the most ancient forms of the names, we shall arrive at the extraordinary conclusion that the names Bulford, Duxford, Catford, and Camelford have been derived from fords for • ' Survey of the Antiquities of Oxford," by Anthony a Wood, edited by A. Clarke, i. 452. the special use of bulls, ducks, cats, and camels. In support of a similar derivation to such absurdities as these, the spectacle of MR. STEVENSON labouring to defend the ox etymology, turning the inflected O.E. adjec- tives "suthwearde" and " suthweardne," referring to the south side of the starting- place in the perambulation (Eadwy's charter, 955-6) into adverbs to suit his argument, is a sight for Anglo-Saxon scholars. Let him, if he can, give an instance, from Beowult downwards, of the inflected adjective " suth- weardne"(in this form) being used as an adverb in Anglo-Saxon literature. If he cannot do this what right has he to assume it can so be used as an idiom to suit his argument 1 About twenty years after the death of the chronicler Florence of Worcester a monk of that city named John apparently under- took to write a continuation of Florence's chronicle down to the year A.D. 1139. In narrating a march of King Stephen from Worcester, John tells us that the king crossed the Thames at Oxford, and here he felt in some difficulty about the name, for he says that is " the ford for oxen." As far as I know this is the earliest explanation of the meaning of this place-name. John evi- dently felt that this explanation was neces- sary, otherwise why should he have given it 1 He does not give the derivation of other place-names as a general part of his style of writing. His readers were monks, clerks, and such like, who had some knowledge of letters, who in the year 1139, the era of semi- Saxon, when the old language was fast dying out, had probably often been puzzled by the meaning of Anglo-Saxon words and expres- sions. Even in the time of the Conqueror Ingulf tells us that it was necessary for the younger monks to be instructed by the old monks in Anglo-Saxon, in order that they might be able to interpret and defend the charters of their abbey if they should be called in question. In any case the explana- tion John gave shows the probable existence of a doubt about the ox. Since John's time various writers have adopted his etymology, while others have disputed it. The spectacle of John the monk of the Dark Ages at one end of this chain of writers, and MR. STEVENSON at the other, quoting a charter to assist him in supporting John's view (9th S. iv. 382), a charter he now denounces as a forgery (S)th S. y. 519), at the same time freely casting his adjectives right and left about him, and raising a bogus argument on a grossly in- accurate or untrue quotation, in support of