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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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means plain . Field is a cleared space where the timber has been felled . Worth most probably means property , or possession . Bury , borough , and burgk , are synonymes with burrow , * i . e . a place of security . Burn and brook are synonymes . Stowe means store , as Chepstow , \ i . e . market-store . Mond is mound , or mount . Hithe means quay . Stoke probably means stock , a market-cross or pillar set up as a mark . Den indicates a spot which has been the resort of robbers or wild beasts . Del and dale are synonymes . Stone bridge , mouth , wood , heath , wall , castle , are sufficiently familiar terms . Font is either fountain , or place of baptism . fVade is equivalent to ford . Lowe signifies a
J ? re , as a smith ' s forge . Beach is the converse of cliffi as a boundary for water . Ness , i . e . nose , means a point projecting into the water . Try and tree are synonymes . Ridge , moor , grove , stairs , yard , wash , fold , end , port , stable , church , cot , all explain themselves . Sey and mere are synonymes , indicating a lake , or pool of water . Creech seems to be the synonyme of creek . Holl means a knoll covered with trees . Lake , mill , head ,
grave , gate , need no explanation . Coin , or colne , as Lincoln , Colney-Hatch , the river Colne , are probably equivalent to the German cologne , meaning colony , i . e . settlement or patch of dwellings . These examples comprise nearly the whole of the terminations of English localities , of Saxon and Roman origin .
They have been cited to show how much historic knowledge lies in mere names . Where the meanings are difficult of attainment , the simple process is , to take a number of places whose termination is similar , and then compare the localities ; a result will then be got at , just as Napoleon succeeded in striking a required object , by bringing many pieces of cannon to bear on it at once .
In most countries , the ancient local names will be found indicative of the localities . In Spain and Spanish America it is so . In Germany it is so . In England it has been so . In Greece it was so , witness Thermopylae . But amongst the modern Anglo-Saxons the practice has been disused . We are accustomed to laugh at the Americans , but if we look at the strange names given
to country residences , especially in the neighbourhood of London ; if we look at the strange names given to rows of houses , fantastically called groves and terraces , we shall find that the Americans may easily retort upon us . In settling new towns o \ er the surface of a level , and for the most part wooded country , where there is little variety of natural objects , the Americans have , to distinguish one from another , been accustomed to give them names formed by adding the French word ville to the surname of the founder .
* Burrow is , it is true , a place of security underground . The original bur gut , a tower , was also a place of security . In this case it is the purpose , not the locality which gives the name . \ Chep is synonymous with cheap , or market . Thus wo have East Cheap , Cheap side * Sir John Falstaff went to East Cheap to buy a saddle . To cheapen it to market . A chapman is a marketer or buyer or seller .
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388 Proposal for a National College of Language .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), June 2, 1833, page 388, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2616/page/28/
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