The Names of Places in Wiltshire. 
“ wicodon,’ when they quit the camp it is “of wicum.” Tn 
Wright’s Vocabularies, Caste//um is thus explained (p. 94) : 
“wie vel lutel-port,’ that is, it means “a wick or a little 
town”? (fortified). Now the wie or lutel-port was a group of 
houses fenced round with a ditch and mound stockaded a-top. 
After the Conquest the military sense of wie was forgotten 
and it retained only the sense of residence. In Layamon 
(Anno 1200) we have wikien ( = to dwell) and wickinge or 
wickeninge (=a dwelling). Archzol. Journal, xvii., 103. 
It is, as has been already mentioned (§ 2) the Greek ‘ixos, 
the Latin views, the Celtic gwic, and the Anglo-Saxon wie, 
‘and it is difficult to assign the priority to any of them.! 
penis Burh, Byrig. These words commonly appear as the 
Beorh, 
terminational form dury, as in West-bury, Rams-dury, &e. 
The general sense of this word is what we now call a Town 
or Borough. Kemble considers that its source is to be sought, 
like that of the word that follows, in deorg-an (= to hide, 
or shelter). It would represent thus an inhabited place with 
more substantial fortifications than simple hedges or ditches. 
“T am inclined to believe,” says Kemble, “that the, modern 
sense of burg, viz., a fortress, was the original Saxon one 
also ; it would appear so from the name of a man frequently 
occurring in the composition: most probably the village 
grew up around the castle.” Cod Dipl., III., xix. 
Berg. These words also assume in composition the form 
of dury, asin Ry-dury (originally Ruge-berg), and sometimes 
of borough, as in Wood-orough (spelt in the charters Wédnes- 
beorg, Cod. Dipl., 1035). The meaning of the word isa 
hill. It is connected certainly with the verb deorgan { = to 
hide or shelter). "The fundamental signification of derg was 
ground that conceals, whether m respect of which may be 
1Tt may be observed that Wick in the Scandinavian languages means a 
‘“bay or recess,” and hence ‘the old fierce Vikings had their name. Like the 
Greek Pirates they issued from their winding bays to carry slaughter and 
rapine wherever they could. Old Norse v#k (= wik) ‘‘ recessus, sinus brevior 
et laxior.” The word wick in the North of England means a corner, 4.¢., 
bending. A Lancashire man will talk-of ‘‘the wicks of his mouth.” 

