48 



II. Descrifi'ive Name8. — Other places, as we know, were 

 named from their characteristics, or from their association with 

 particular facts. For example, Beer-Sheba (the well of the 

 oath), was so called from the oath which confirmed the agree- 

 ment between Abraham and Abimelech ; Bethel (the house of 

 God), from the vision of Jacob ; Jehovah-jireh (the Lord will 

 provide), for there God provided a lamb in place of Isaac ; 

 and at Gilgal (a rolling), the Hebrews rolled away the reproach 

 of Egypt. The marginal references in a good copy of the 

 Scriptures, are sufficient to show to an ordinary reader that 

 almost every place had a meaning of this kind in its name, 

 though the translation of every one is not given. There was 

 apparently so little caprice exercised in such matters, that we 

 can excuse the general expression of a writer on names, " Urns 

 les noms propres sont originairement significatives/' In one 

 of the early examples, we find two relations giving to a place 

 the same name, but expressing it at the same instant in their 

 respective languages. Laban, using the Syriac language, 

 called " the heap of the witness" Jegar-sahad/utha ; and Jacob, 

 using the Hebrew, called it Galeed. * 



The best examples of English names derived from Charac- 

 teristics, are furnished as before, by the United States. In Eng- 

 land and in the other portions of the British Islands, the name 

 of a place is usually enveloped in a little mystery. It is perhaps 

 expressed in old Saxon, or in altered Latin, or in some of the 

 Celtic dialects ; and there is quite enough of difficulty con- 

 nected with the explanation to create an interest in our minds, 

 or to afford us pleasure when the meaning is clearly ascer- 

 tained. But this fact has given us ideas which are very 

 incorrect, and which do not exist in other countries of the 

 world. Thus, we do not expect quite to understand a name; 

 and we are apt to imagine that there must be something 

 absurd about it, if it be expressed in plain modern English. 



* (jcnriii^ xxxi. -17. 



