286 CASTERS AND CHESTERS. 



Leon or Caerleon. Nennius applies the very similar 

 name of Cair Legeion to Exeter, still in his time a 

 Damnonian or West Welsh fortress. 



Equally interesting have been the fortunes of the three 

 towns of which Winchester is the type. In the old 

 Welsh tongue, Gwent means a champaign country, or 

 level alluvial plain. The Eomans borrowed the word as 

 Venta, and applied it to the three local centres of Venta 

 Icenorum in Norfolk, Venta Belgarum in Hampshire, 

 and Venta Silurum in Monmouth. When the first West 

 Saxon pirates, under their real or mythical leader, Cerdic, 

 swarmed up Southampton Water and occupied the 

 Gwent of the Belgae, they called their new conquest 

 Wintan ceaster, though the still closer form Waentan once 

 occurs. Thence to Winte ceaster and Winchester is no 

 far cry. Gwent of the Iceni had a different history. 

 No doubt it also was known at first as Wintan 

 ceaster ; but, as at Winchester, the shorter form 

 Ceaster would naturally be employed in local collo- 

 quial usage; and when the chief centre of East 

 Anglian population was removed a few miles north 

 to Norwich, the north wick then a port on the 

 navigable estuary of the Yare the older station sank 

 into insignificance, and was only locally remembered as 

 Caistor. Lastly, Gwent of the Silurians has left its 

 name alone to Caer-Went in Monmouthshire, where 

 hardly any relics now remain of the Eoman occupation. 



Manchester belongs to exactly the same class as 

 Winchester. Its Eoman name was Mancunium, which 

 would easily glide into Mancunceaster. In the English 

 Chronicle it is only once mentioned, and then as Maine- 



