Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 7.djvu/450

 442

NOTES AND QUERIES. p* s. vn. JUNE s, iwi.

Latin texts provide the alternative readings Porcensetene and Portensetene. and thus we arrive at Worcen ssetna or Worten saetna as the possible original. In East Leicestershire is Wartnaby, which appears as Worcnodebie in Domesday Book. The prefix gives the form required. But if Worten or Worcen was the old name for Central England, one would have expected more abundant traces of it, in spite of the changes wrought by the Danish devastations and settlements. Is it not possible that Worten is the English pro- nunciation of the tribal name called Coritani by the Romans? Compare Watling and Catyeuchlani.

3. Westerna. Having given the central people, the compiler takes a circular tour, west, north, east, and south. The western peoples here recorded without details would include the Mercian conquests from the West Saxons, Welsh, and Northumbrians, from Gloucestershire to Lancashire, more especially the tribes west of the Severn (Hecani, &c.).

4. Pec scetna.The 1,200 hides assigned to these tribes would include not merely the Peak district of North Derbyshire, but probably parts of the adjacent country.

5. Elmed scetna. The village of Barwick- in-Elmet, near Leeds, fixes the position. It was in the same district that Perida was slain in 655, when he was beginning a cam- paign against the Northumbrians : a proof this was on the northern boundary of Mercia. Councils were usually held on the borders of the states concerned, as, for example, St. Augustine's conference with the British Churches in 603, or the Council of Hertford in 673, and the Field of the Cloth of Gold in later times, so that the council by the Nidd (705), at which St. Wilfrid was restored to his northern bishopric, probably took place on a borderland. Kernble quotes from Asser (Alfred, anno 867) a passage which calls the Yorkshire Ouse the Humber, showing the boundary of North-humbria.

6. The very large district assigned to the people of Lindsey and Hatfield seems to require that we should include most of the modern Nottinghamshire in it. In King Penda's time all this was Mercian territory^ but the Northumbrians made great conquests after his death, Oswy becoming supreme for a time. Under Wulfhere, however, the Mer- cians "recovered their liberty and their lauds," and this king was able to give St. Chad land for a monastery at Barrow- on-Humber, and at the same time Lindsey received a bishop under Lichfield (Bede, iii 24 ; iv. 3, 12) ; but before the death of Wulf- here (675) the Northumbrians again overran

the northern part of Mercia, the Bishop of Lindsey became subject to York, and Notting- ham also became a part of this great diocese. As the diocesan boundaries became fixed soon after the Council of Hertford, it seems clear that about 700 the Mercians had lost their northern dependencies, such as Elmed and Hsethfeldland, at least for a time. Hence it is probable this table must be dated before the death of Wulfhere.

7 and 8. The Gyrwas are several times mentioned by Bede. They occupied the Fen- land and its western shores in Lincolnshire, Northamptonshire, and Cambridgeshire, Peterborough being in their country (Bede, iv. 6). The Suth Gyrwas are placed first, and were probably the more important. There is no need to suppose that these tribes occupied compact blocks of territory ; they may have had a number of detached settlements.

9 and 10. East and West Wixna. This name does not seem to have survived, but from its position in the table these tribes may have occupied the Oundle district, east and west of the Nen. This, however, is con- jecture. There is a Wicken in South North- amptonshire. Exning (formerly Ixning), the birthplace of St. Etheldreda, is another pro- bable site.

11. Herstina. This name has been restored from one of the Latin copies ; the 600 hides are wanted to complete the 30,000. The position seems fixed by the hundred of Hurstingstone in East Huntingdon (D.B. Herstingestan). South Cambridgeshire may be included.

12. Spalda seems to point to Spalding in South Lincolnshire ; there are also Spald wick, near Huntingdon, and Spalford on the Trent, north of Newark (D.B. Spalling, Spaldeuic, and Spaldesford). From its position in the table it may be inferred that the second of these was then the headquarters of the tribe.

13. Wigesta is preserved in the hundred of Wixamtree in East Bedfordshire (D.B. Wichestanston). The Mercian part of Hert- fordshire may have been included in the 900 hides they held.

14. Fwrpinga.In the manuscripts this name occurs in the second column, but a marginal note is affixed stating that " Fser- pinga is in Middle England." It has there- fore been transferred to this column, and completes the total of 30,000. Its position is unknown. Bede (iii. 21) states that Diuma, one of St. Chad's predecessors, "died among Feppingum." If this be the same district, we may have a clue to its position in the
 * he Midland Angles in the country called

act that Charlbury in Oxfordshire (in a