18 THE ROMAN PLACE-NAMES 



The name Aquae was given by tlie Romans to several 

 watering-places more or less famous for their baths or 

 medicinal springs. Thus Aquae Sulis is the modern Bath, 

 Aquae Aureliae is Baden-Baden, and Aquae Mattiacae is 

 Wiesbaden. The warm springs and baths of Buxton were 

 known to the Romans, as the remains of a bath-house 

 which have been discovered are sufficient to show. It was 

 only natural — one may say it was inevitable — that the 

 name Aquae should be applied to such a place, and it is 

 unreasonable to doubt that the fort of that name mentioned 

 by Ravennas after Anauio is that of Buxton. Whether 

 any epithet was added to distinguish this Aquae from 

 others we cannot tell, but it is very probable. If one may 

 claim the antiquaries' privilege of making rash guesses, 

 it might be suggested that AmeTneza, the next name given 

 in Ravennas, a name about which nothing is known, did 

 not designate another place, but was separated from 

 Aquis by a natural and common mistake. We should 

 then read Aquis Arnemezae. Arnevieza may represent the 

 name of a deity associated with the springs or with 

 the district; we may covn^dire Aquae Afollinares ("Apollo's 

 springs ; Phoebi uada, Martial, vi. 42, 7) in Etruria. 



But the suggestion at the end of the last paragraph may 

 justly seem to be " a wild and uncritical guess." These 

 are the words used by Dr. Haverfield of a conjecture made 

 by Mr. Watkin as to the ancient name of the fort now 

 known as Melandra Castle.^ Mr. Watkin identified this 

 place with the Zerdotalia mentioned by Ravennas next to 

 Arnemeza. He also thought " that, like numerous other 

 misspellings in the work, Zerdotalia should be Zedrotalia, 

 and that the name of the station was preserved in the river 

 which flows beneath it, the Edrow, as it was styled to the 



9. Derb. Arch. J own., vii., pp. 86-7; also Watkin's i?omo!?i C/iesAw-e, 

 p. 24. 



