NA TURE 



131 



THURSDAY, DECEMBER 1,1910. 



HISTORY IX BRITISH PLACE-NAMES. 



^,ritish Place-names in their Historical Setting. By 

 Edmund .McClure. Pp. 349. (London : Society for 

 Promoting Christian Knowledge, 19 10.) Price 55. 



THE loving labour of an average lifetime, "studies 

 in leisure hours extending over some thirtj* 

 ^ ears and more," this work is an eloquent testimony 

 ' the value of the science of philology in the elucida- 

 on of historical materials. It is both a history and 

 valuable guide to the philology of British place- 

 names "as they occur chronologically in authentic 

 historical documents from 54 B.C. until .a.d. 1154." In 

 his last paragraph, the author explains why he draws 

 a line at Stephen's death. 



"The consideration of later records containing place- 

 names is not worth pursuing, as the forms therein 

 presented vary but little from those now in use, and 

 the new terms introduced by the continental monastic 

 ■ lers, such as Beaulieu, Rievaulx, Jervaiilx, &c., 

 \plain themselves " (p. 304). 



The phrase "not worth pursuing" surely needs 

 ^me qualification, and the explanation offered implies 

 that the author is satisfied that later documents con- 

 tain no material additions to his list of historical 

 place-names. 

 Ver}- appropriately, "a short summary of the modern 

 ethods employed in linguistic research" is given at 

 the beginning, to " illustrate the statement in the text 

 and show the truly scientific character of comparative 

 philology" (p. 13J. The text is mainly a historj- of 

 Britain with the place-names worked in, the latter 

 iborately discussed in " notes " and footnotes. The 

 ■iroughness, as well as the duration, of the author's 

 adies are well attested by the numerous catenae of 

 name- forms. The best authorities on place-names are 

 cited. Yet the author exhibits throughout a com- 

 mendable critical independence, as well as personal 

 detachment from pet theories, or theories one would 

 have liked to press from personal conviction. \\'hen 

 he discusses rival theories, as in the case of the Picts 

 and their language, he gives a clear idea of the 

 situation. 



Considering the great advance made in philology 

 and historical criticism in the last thirty years, such 

 j a work as this is must have been periodically revised 

 to a large extent. Specialists in certain lines of in- 

 quiry' would have expected further revision of some 

 .of the information given. The author betravs a sus- 

 jpicion of the genuineness of Gildas's "Destruction of 

 Britain," the spuriousness of which has recently been 

 demonstrated by Mr. Wade Evans and others. In the 

 •iiscussion of sites of battles fought by Arthur, no 

 reference is made to Mr. Anscombe's clever elucida- 

 tion of the place-names. Sir John Rhys is, of course, 

 the most frequent witness in the author's court, but 

 vhile the latest edition of the classic "Celtic Britain " 

 las -been consulted, no reference is made to that 

 ^'nment scholar's contributions to the British 

 ademy and the Cymmrodorion Society within the 

 t seven years or so. The author's remark that 

 the nucleus of the work has already appeared in a 

 NO. 2144, VOL. 85] 



serial " sufficiently accounts for the belatedness, in 

 these expeditious days, of some sections of the work. 

 Finality in a work of such a comprehensive design is 

 out of the question, and such omissions as those noted 

 above affect only very slightly the unquestioned use- 

 fulness of the work as it is. 



The author seems to have a very firm grip of the 

 Scandinavian element in British place-names, a sub- 

 ject which is coming more and more to the fore. In 

 his discussion of the place-names of Shetland and 

 the Orkneys, which are "almost exclusively Scan- 

 dinavian " (p. 227), the author leaves an impression 

 that he is unwilling to go as far as his evidence goes, 

 and one's attention is arrested by a doubtful deduc- 

 tion. 



" As Orkn in Norse means a seal, Orkn-eyjar would 

 seem a natural designation for these islands, but the 

 term Ore in Orcades goes back to classical times, long 

 before a Northman had put his foot upon them, and 

 its meaning must be sought in the language of the 

 earliest inhabitants " (p. 225). 



The facts cited favour a theory of a very early 

 occupation of the Orkneys by Scandinavians, and 

 other evidence may be adduced to the same effect, but 

 all that evidence must be laid aside, because the 

 author is satisfied with some late date for such occu- 

 pation, and with "classical" spellings of place-names 

 in Britain. On general grounds, alleged dates of the 

 beginnings of great racial migrations are open to a 

 reasonable suspicion, and "classical" references to 

 places in Britain cannot be accepted as final as against 

 overwhelming local evidence. 



The perusal of this scholarly, yet readable, book, in 

 which history and philology are made to eludicate each 

 other, opens up a vast field of inquirj', in which 

 archaeology, anthropology, and astronomy should also 

 be requisitioned. We have given us an estimate of 

 the value of documentary place-names. A companion 

 volume on the documentar\- value of place-names in 

 current use, or unrecorded in the documents examined 

 by the author, would be ven,- acceptable. The book is 

 a marvel of compression, and an index of fortv-five 

 pages makes it a most welcome work of reference. 



John Griffith. 



THE CHEMISTRY OF THE ALKALOIDS. 

 Die Alkaloide. By Prof. E. Winterstein and Dr. 

 G. Trier. Pp. vii 4-340. (Berlin : Gebriider Born- 

 traeger, 1910.) Price 11 marks. 



SINCE Derosne and Sertiirner isolated morphine, 

 the crystalline principle of opium, about a 

 century ago, the separation of the natural bases from 

 plants has always taken a prominent place in chemical 

 research. To-day the number of these substances ex- 

 ceeds two hundred, and the list is probably far from 

 complete. The process of their isolation is usually 

 accompanied bv a study of their therapeutic value and 

 by the more difficult and fascinating task of discover- 

 intr their structure. Of the pioneers in this branch 

 of chemistry, A. \V. Hofmann stands in the forefront. 

 Following the earlier discoveries of Gerhardt on the 

 relation of the pyridine bases to the alkaloids, he was 

 able by the aid of new and ingenious methods of dis- 



