294 CASTERS AND CHESTERS. 



would slowly become Wrok ceaster, Wrok-cester, and 

 Wroxeter, by the ordinary abbreviating tendency of the 

 Welsh borderlands. Wrexham doubtless preserves the 

 same original root. 



Having thus carried the Castra to the very confines of 

 Wales, it would be unkind to a generous and amiable 

 people not to carry them across the border and on to 

 the Western sea. The Welsh corruption, whether of 

 the Latin word or of a native equivalent cathir, assumes 

 the guise of Caer. Thus the old Eoman station of 

 Segontium, near the Menai Straits, is now called Caer 

 Seiont ; but the neighbouring modern town wl ich has 

 gathered around Edward's new castle on the actual 

 shore, the later metropolis of the land of Arfon, became 

 known to Welshmen as Caer-yn-Arfon, now corrupted 

 into Caernarvon or even into Carnarvon. Gray's familiar 

 line about the murdered bards — ' On Arvon's dreary 

 shore they lie ' — keeps up in some dim fashion the 

 memory of the true etymology. Caermarthen is in like 

 manner the Eoman Muridunum or Moridunum — the fort 

 by the sea — though a duplicate Moridunum in South 

 Devon has been simply translated into English as 

 Seaton. Innumerable other Caers, mostly representing 

 Eoman sites, may be found scattered up and down over 

 the face of Wales, such as Caersws, Caerleon, Caergwrle, 

 Caerhun, and Caerwys, all of which still contain traces 

 of Eoman occupation. On the other hand, Cardigan, 

 which looks delusively like a shortened Caer, has really 

 nothing to do with this group of ancient names, being a 

 mere corruption of Ceredigion. 



But outside Wales itself, in the more Celtic parts of 



