Mr. DowNEs on the Norse Geography of Ancient Ireland. 95 



the presumed change of st into the x in Wexford, it is borne out by that of Ost- 

 mentown into Oxmantown, a local name in this city. 



Wicklow appears to have been at least partially a northern settlement, its 

 Ostmen inhabitants being mentioned in history. Its present name is, however, 

 Saxon, and a modification of Winchiligillo, or Gwykingelo, as Cambrensis writes 

 it : as an actual Norse locality, the name would terminate in wick (vik). 



I shall briefly advert to another class of names, likewise of Norse origin, which 

 are scattered about all the coasts of the British Islands — I mean those terminating 

 in ey, " island" (or one of its orthographical variations), which is found in the 

 Irish aoi, and i, and even in the Hebrew >N, but perhaps in its most extensive 

 sense of a maritime district. Two examples of this class have been already no- 

 ticed, namely, the Copeland Islands, and Lambay, or " Lamb Island" — a proba- 

 ble modification of its earlier Norse name, with ey annexed, and which occurs in 

 a plural form among the islands of Greenland {Lambeyjar) : to these may be 

 added the Saltees. The names Dalkey and Dursey are doubtful, being likewise 

 found far inland. That of a maritime parish, in the northern part of the county of 

 Dublin, is derived from another Norse word for " island" — I mean Holmpatrick, 

 a translation of the name of the neighbouring island of Inispatrick. The word 

 holm implies covering, or concealment, and is usually applied to small uninhabited 

 islands, as being best suited to such purposes. It is considered cognate with 

 hialmr, "helmet," and is derived from the verb hylia, "conceal." The consist- 

 ent first-fruits of the introduction of Christianity into Iceland, in the year 1000, 

 was the legislative abolition of duelling ; and some desert island was thencefor- 

 ward chosen as the scene of conflict by individuals, who were too feebly imbued 

 with the spirit of the mild religion to eschew sanguinary encounters : hence 

 holmgangr, literally " island-going," became tantamount to "single combat." 

 In the parish of Holmpatrick is a town, to which a neighbouring cluster of islets 

 has given the name of Skerries, which in Norse means rocks in the sea, espe- 

 cially covered ones, and is probably found in the first syllable of the Norman lo- 

 cality Cherbourg, but which is equally derivable from the Irish f ceip, " sharp 

 sea rock." Kalfr, "calf," in modern Danish kalv, is a third Norse word for 

 " island." It is applied to a small object in juxtaposition with a comparatively 

 large one — for instance, to a hill beside a mountain, or an islet beside an island. 

 Off the coast of Kerry are three islets — the Bull, the Cow, and the Calf. The 



