On Proper Names. 277 



ing people had probably never much more than a sort of mili- 

 tary possession of the country, it is not very likely that they 

 left behind them many of their family names. I have, in- 

 deed, met with a few English sirnames of Roman formation, 

 chiefly in the northern part of the kingdom, such as Faustus, 

 Felix, Cornelius, Carus, Sartorius, mostly Latin praenomina 

 ♦t*-but these are, in all probability, of late introduction, 

 ^o The universal spread of the names, language, manners, and 

 institutions of the Saxons, who, in the fifth and subsequent 

 centuries, obtained forcible possession of the country, indicates 

 a more sudden and entire change of inhabitants, than ever 

 before, perhaps, took place in any nation. The extirpation or 

 expatriation of the Britons must have been nearly universal, 

 to account for so radical a mutation. The Danes, who after- 

 wards obtained a partial footing, left but few traces of their 

 names, except in particular districts, chiefly along the eastern 

 coast ; and the Normans, who, at a subsequent period, seized 

 the government, diffused their names, manners, and language 

 chiefly amongst the higher classes of society. The country 

 remained substantially Saxon, in all its general features : in 

 addition to this, it may be remarked, that the Saxon, Danish, 

 and Norman languages possessed many points of identity, es- 

 pecially the two former. The language of the Normans, 

 though, like the others, a Teutonic race, had become mixed 

 with the French, and indeed assimilated to it by their long 

 proximity. Our present list of English sirnames, therefore, 

 jjs principally Saxon or Teutonic, with some British, partly in a 

 simple, and partly in a compounded state — a few French, and 

 a few foreign names, imported by occasional settlers. 

 s>>The Saxons appear to have derived and conferred their sir- 

 iiames principally from the five following sources : — 



1. From the place of a man's birth, residence, or property, 

 as Wales, Cheshire^ Ireland, French, Ley land, Worth, Lee, 



.-.■> V'i^.'ll./l ,.'Vii:l , 



exciept to the Romans, and that only after the league of union with the Sabiueg. 

 These were afterwards called nomina genii/ilia, and coffnomina, as the others were 

 called prcenomina. This opinion has been controverted, but probably without 

 foundation, as it appears certain that the sirnames imposed by the Hebrews and 

 Greeks, though various in kind and origin, were affixed to individuals, and not 

 to families, and were altered with each successive race. 



