150 THE DOVER ROAD 



probably have never existed. Of course, in the utter 

 absence of all evidence, save that of the places them- 

 selves so named, no statement can be proved correct ; 

 but these mystic Soedingas may almost certainly be 

 dismissed to the realm of fairy-tales, and if there ever 

 was a tribe of Newingas, they took their name from the 

 village which they built and where they lived, instead 

 of giving it to the place. Where others have come to 

 grief, it would be rash to seek new derivations ; but it 

 seems evident that Ospringe derives its name from the 

 stream flowing through the village, and that the name 

 of Sittingbourne is nothing other than " seething 

 burn," or " the bubbling brook," a poetic name which 

 the place no longer merits. Place-names of Roman 

 origin may be sought in the several Vigos that exist, 

 some now the names of fields, marshes, roadsides, 

 and commons where there is not a house to be seen, 

 but which were originally the sites of Roman villages, 

 the name of " Vigo " — the Latin vicus — having been 

 traditionally handed down to the present day many 

 centuries after the last traces of those settlements have 

 disappeared. 



Many fields, too, here and in different parts of the 

 countr^^, are named " Wliitehall." How did they 

 get that name ? The answer is sought in the Roman 

 word " aula,^' the residence of a magistrate or a chief 

 man in authority. When the Saxons came, they found 

 these grand aulas, built of stone, dotted about the 

 country, some ruined, others tolerably perfect ; and 

 they must have made a strong impression upon these 

 barbaric Pagans, used at that early period of their 

 history only to wooden dwellings of the rudest 

 construction. They would ha^ e demanded the names 

 of these places from the Romano-British, who would 

 tell them they were aulas ; and they would have 

 called them " hwit aulas," from the stone of which 

 they were built. It was thus that the many villages 

 called " Whitchurch " got their name, from the stone 

 (or " white ") churches that were so remarkable as 



