172 Gleanings from the Wiltshire Domesday. 
same fact, is supplied by the names of many of the places that are 
situated on the borders of the county. A large proportion of them 
are certainly old names and clearly of Anglo-Saxon origin ;—as 
such they give unmistakeable evidence as to the boundary-line of 
the county being much the same now as in the eleventh century. 
Thus, at the north-west corner we have SuErston, originally seér- 
stdn, i.e. the Shire-stone, or boundary. In the same vicinity, we 
have Rop-mar Ton, of which the Acman Street (or Roman road 
from Bath to Cirencester) forms the boundary, as also of the 
counties of Wilts and Gloucester,—and Top-mar-ton, a border- 
parish on the Gloucestershire side. Whatever the first syllable of 
these names may mean, we can have no doubt as to the meaning 
of the termination mar-ton. It designates a village on the boundary, 
the Anglo-Saxon mer, meaning a boundary. Again, at the point 
where our county projects into Somerset, between Limpley Stoke 
and Freshford, you have the name Suas-Ton, evidently a corruption 
of Shire-stone. At another point, where Westwood (Wilts) is 
divided from Freshford, (Somerset) you have Srapiz Hii, so called 
no doubt from the old séapol, a pillar either of wood or stone which 
so frequently marked points of boundary in ancient times. And then, 
at the extreme western point of Wilts, at the boundary of two 
counties and four parishes, you meet with Mip-Forp, which, it is 
presumed, means the ‘dividing ford.’ A few miles further to the 
south, near Maiden Bradley, there is SHer-RELL farm, so called 
most probably because close by flows the Shire-rili, the stream or 
rivulet which at that point separates Wilts from Somerset. Next 
we have Merz, a large parish which itself for some miles forms the 
south-west boundary of Wilts, and the name of which is simply 
the Anglo-Saxon me@r (boundary) of which we have already spoken. 
Then along the southern border we have Mar-ton (or Mar-TEN as 
it is sometimes spelt) which whether it means mer-tin (a village 
on the boundary) or mer-porn (a thorn planted to mark the bound- 
ary), indicates the same fact that it was on the borders. Next we 
come to STAPLE-ToN, a word which our previous remarks will have 
explained. At the south-west corner of Damerham you have 
CRENDEL, a term which recalls to Anglo-Saxon students the erun- 
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