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 The Thames

Berkshire. One may say roughly that all the "hams" were Teutonic save where one can put one's finger on a probable Celtic derivation such as one has, for instance, in the case of Witham, which should mean the settlement upon the " bend " or curve of the river, a Celtic name with a Teutonic ending.

One may also believe that the termination " or " or " ore " is Teutonic ; Cumnor may have meant " the wayfarers' stage," and Windsor probably " the landing place on the winding of the river."

Hythe also is thought to be Teutonic. One can never be quite sure with a purely Anglo-Saxon word that it had a German origin, but at least Hythe is Anglo-Saxon, a wharf or stage ; thus Bablock Hythe on the road through the Roman town of Eynsham across the river to Cumnor and Abingdon, cutting off the great bend of the river at Witham ; so also the town we now call " Maidenhead," which was perhaps the " mid- Hythe " between Windsor and Reading. Some few certainly Celtic names do survive : in the Sinodun Hills, for instance, above Dorchester ; and the first part of the name Dorchester itself is Celtic. At the very head of the Thames you have Coates, reminding one of the Celtic name for the great wood that lay along the hill ; but just below, where the water begins to flow, Kemble and Ewen, if they are Saxon, are perhaps drawn from the presence of a " spring." Cricklade may be all Celtic, or may be partly Celtic and partly Saxon.

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