
Names denoting ancient Clans or Families. 93 
Beaces-uitmw. This is named among the land-limits of Chalk 
' (Cod. Dipl., 436). Among those for Bedwin (Cod. Dipl., 
1266) we have Beocces-heal—we cannot at all, as far as I know, 
identify this name, but it seems at all events to have been 
once known in Wilts. The more modern name BREECH may 
be its counterpart. 
- CzoriEs-HLzw. This name is not of infrequent occurrence. We 
meet with it in in the charter for Downton (Cod. Dipl., 698), 
and no doubt can from it explain the meaning of CHARLTON 
(in the charters spelt cedri/a-tém), which is included in the 
parish. It may be open to question whether the reference 
be to a personal name, or to a class. The term ceord designated 
a class of free peasants in ancient times. 
- 57. Then we have allusions not unfrequently to tumuli which 
had been injured. There were “spoilers of tombs,” in ancient as in 
modern times. Thus we often read in an ancient charter “to dam 
brocenan beorge,” 7.e., “to the broken barrow” (Cod. Dipl., 763), 
and in one case we have the fact stated yet more explicitly in the 
words: “to be westan Sam beorge Se adolfen wes,” 7.¢., “to the 
west of that barrow that was dug (or delved) into,” (Cod. Dipl., 
1038.) These are interesting extracts as explaining to us the name 
of BroxenzsorouGH, near Malmesbury. It appears in the charters 
as Brocene-berg, and was no doubt so termed from some “ broken,” 
or rifled, sepulchral “‘ barrow,” on or near the spot. 
' 58. There is one other form in which personal enter into the 
composition of local names, on which a few words must be said. 
They are those which may be called patronymics, and which denote 
elans or families who derive their designation from that of some 
chieftain or head of the tribe or settlement. 
' These local denominations are to a great extent irregular com- 
_ positions, of which the former portion is a patronymic ending 
generally in -ing, and declined in the genitive plural -inga, when fol- 
lowed by some other name descriptive of the special locality, such as 
meare,—hiém—wic—tin—dic, and the like. In a few cases the 
patronymic stands alone in the nominative plural, the termination of 
which is -izgas. Thus Cannunas, the name of two parishes in Wilts, 
