By the Rev. A. C. Smith, M.A. 337 



of a gate in a wall or otherwise ; but rather as a gateway or opening, 

 a road, an entrance, an approach, or way.^ Indeed the word gate 

 had originally both these significations. In the " Promptuarmnt 

 Parvulorum " we have it both as a way, " via," " iter " ; and as a 

 door, "porta," "fores," " janua " , the former probably derived from 

 the Icelandic gata, a way, a road, from gaa, to go : ^ the latter from 

 the Anglo-Saxon geat, " porta/' Hence the cause of no little eon- 

 fusion from confounding two independent etymologies.^ As early 

 as the tenth century geat had the common meaning of a roadway, 

 for in a charter of Eadred, A.D. 955, Wayland's Smithy is repre- 

 sented as situated on the west side of a wide road or opening {geat) 

 near the Ridgeway.* Even now too, gate in the sense of a " road,'' 

 is common enough in the South of England : Ramsgate, was so 

 called from the way here which leads to the sea.^ Margate again, 

 from there being here an opening or gate through which there was 

 an outlet into the sea.® Merk-yate Street, in Hertfordshire, now 

 Market Street, is another case in point, its ancient name in 1145 

 and 1290 having been Merkyate or Markyate, "in bosco."'' In the 

 Chronicles of Abingdon we meet with the names of Geatescum, 

 Gatecliffe, and Gatawic. Besides these there is in Kent Snargate 

 and Sandgate ; in Somerset Lanyatt and Donyatt and Skilgate ; in 

 Sussex Eastergate, &c., in all of which "gate" is a synonym for 

 " way.'' In the North of England " gate," which is still pronounced 



* Magazine, vol. v., p. 203. Speaking of Nain, Lieutenant Kitchener says, 

 " There are — ^as far as we could see — no traces of a wall, and I think we should 

 understand hy ' gate of the city,' the place where the road enters among the 

 houses, just as the word is often used in Greek, and in modern Ai-abic in such 

 expressions as ' gate of the pass,' ' gate of the valley,' and even ' gate of the city,' 

 where no wall or gate exists." (Palestine Exploration Fund Eeports for 1878, 

 p. 115.) 



^ See Journal of Archaeological Institute, vol. xx., p. 395. 

 ^ Rev. Mackenzie Walcott. 



* Magazine, vol. vii., p. 328. 



* Hasted's Kent, iv., p. 372. 



6 Ibid, p. 347. 



' Clutterbuck's Hertfordshire, iv., 157, 133, 348, 39. Dugdale's Monasticon, 

 iii., 373. 

 VOL. XVIII. — NO. UV. 2 S 



