52 Harrow before the Conquest. 



such as Wembalea, the modern Wembley, Gedding, the modern 

 Yeading. But in the second place I wish to show that the word 

 Harrow is identical with the Saxon Herga. The earliest English 

 form of this word appears (as far as 1 have been able to discover) 

 to have been *Harewe or fHarevvays, so that it remains for us to 

 link the Saxon name with this. The Saxon name for Harrow was 

 spelt as Herga or Herges or Hearge or Hergas. Now, in the first 

 place, it must be borne in mind, that the Saxon E is frequently 

 changed to A. This, indeed, in the present instance, we see from 

 the intermediate form Hearge which we happen to possess, and we 

 may, therefore, justly assume the Hearge could, and most likely 

 would, by what may be called the lazy development of languages, be 

 changed into Harge. In the next place the Saxon word Herge, a 

 church, and also in the Saxon word Herge a host, there is also a varia- 

 tion formed by the insertion of a letter between the R and G Herige. 

 May it not then be plausibly urged that the same was the case with 

 Hearge, or, as we have now developed it, Harge, the place ? If 

 this was so we should have a form Harige, or perhaps more pro- 

 bably Harege. There we at once get the intervening link, and it 

 is easy to suppose that the G could have been changed into W, as 

 in Hergeard, the Saxon name for Hereward, a word much to the 

 point, as it gives us besides an example of Herge changed into 

 Herew. If any doubt still remained as to the direct derivation of 

 Harrow from Herge, there is one word which I think is almost 

 enough by itself to settle the question, namely, the Saxon word for 

 "to harrow,''' which is Hergian, so that " Ic Herige" is absolutely 

 " I harrow " in Saxon. 



If, then, this conclusion be correct, we have Harrow derived 

 from Herga in the following way: — 



Transition State. 

 Saxou EA changed to A. E added. Old English, W for G. Modem. 



HERGA \ ] \ \ 



HERGE HARGE HAREGE HAREWE , ^ HARROW 



HEARGE ) J J J 



HERGES 1 I^^^^^S 1 HAREGAS I HAREWAYS | 



It may be thought that this digression on the derivation of Har- 

 row is rather too elaborate, but the subject was discussed in Black- 

 wood,X and the name was there derived from Ar-rhiw, two Welsh 

 words, signifying " on the ridge," and the matter was afterwards taken 

 up by a writer in the Harrow School Ti/ro,^ who seriously states that 

 " in a lecture" (I quote his own words) " given by that great 



• Liber Albus Guildhalliae Londinensis (circ. a.d. 1450) etc., etc. 



+ Bond executed by Margeria, Prioress of Kilburn. 



t " Blackwood's Magazine," October, 1863. § " Tyro," November, 1863. 



