290 South Wilts in Romano-British Times. 



But if the derivation of Scratchbury suggested in Wilts Arch. Mag., 

 xxxiii,, 114, may stand (Skratt's-bury), it may be compared with 

 Locks well, between Chippenham and Devizes, which Canon Jackson 

 thinks is possibly Loki's well.^ Loki was one of the deities of nature, 

 always connected with water. If so, these last two are further 

 illustrations of Mr. Stevenson's remark, in the English Historical 

 Review, xiv., p. 47, n., that " no part of England has preserved so 

 many traces of Germanic myth and sagas as Wessex, and Wilts 

 would seem to have been a great centre of Germanic paganism." 

 Mr. Stevenson doubts the meaning of Mere = boundary,^ and 

 decides for the sense of " standing water " But local conditions 

 do not favour this. He also rejects the meaning of Devizes as 

 " marches." The name Long Ivor, at Longbridge Deverell, has not 

 been quite cleared up liitherto. It was suggested in Wilts Arch. 

 Mag., vol. xxxiii., 124, n., that it represents "coUem Eferbeorh, 

 collem aprinum" of an ancient document. Anyone who saw the hill 

 behind it for the first time, long and curving down symmetrically 

 at each end, would admit that it could not be described more 

 graphically than by "Lang Eoforbeorg," "Long boar's hill," or 

 " Long Hog's Back." 



In the laws of the ale-feast given in Wilts Arch. Mag., vol. 

 xxxiii., p. 126, "provided they do not sit on the bench" is the 

 correct translation of " siqjer scammum." W. W. Capes, Rural 

 Life among the Manors of Bramshot, p. 65, is apparently referring 

 to the document. 



Appendix on Egbert's Stone. 



As the road which we have traced affords a way from Hampshire 

 to the coast, we are justified in assuming that along it came the 

 " men of Hampshire " who marched to join Alfred when he raised 

 his standard at Ecgbryhtes-stan against the Danes. And it may 

 help us to locate the much-discussed situation of this meeting- 

 place. My friend, Mr. W. H. Stevenson, in his recent edition of 



' /indent Chapels of Wilts, p. 40. 

 * English Historical Seview, xvii., 625, sq. 



