THE ITNE, THE LOUT BUEN, THE SKEENE. 305 



the Nuns, under the Higli Bridge, and the lower part of Grey 

 Street, Mosley Street, and Dean Street, under the Low or Nether 

 Dean Bridge, the Side, and the east part of Sandhill, to the 

 Tyne. 



Brand, Yol. I., p. 331, says, "Lort or Lork Burn, up which 

 for a considerable way the tide flowed formerly, made a division 

 anciently in the lower part of the Side. This runner of water 

 was covered over with stone A.D. 1696," and, in a note against 

 that date, states that it "was arched over and paved from the 

 foot of the Side Pant to the Keyside Wall." Grey's MSS., 4to. 

 No. 3 Dorse. 



And in Vol. I., p. 29, note, "There is a tradition that the 

 town's waits or musicians stood and played on a small bridge 

 thrown over this Lork Burn, opposite to a house called at present 

 Katy's Coffee House, while Oliver Cromwell was entertained at 

 dinner." This was on the 19th of October, 1648, on the general's 

 return from his expedition into Scotland, and when Thomas 

 Bonner, Esq., Mayor, had been newly elected, Cromwell stayed 

 three days in- Newcastle on that occasion. 



The name Zorf Burn is the conjunction of a Scandinavian and 

 an Anglo-Saxon word. Lort is Scandinavian, and Burne A.-S., 

 both old words ; the former having been lost, whilst the latter 

 and more ancient one has been preserved. 



In the Suio-Gothic dialect, Ihre, in his Dictionary, lets us 

 know that ^^lort means sordes, stercus, in Aleman ord est sordidus, 

 et Gall, ordure sordes denotat. 



In Icelandic it is lortr. Verisimile est nos I proposuisse uti 

 id s8epe fieri suo loco docetur. Angii d litera in vocem eandem 

 auctiorem redidisse videntur in suo durt, dirt. Belg. tort^ torde. 

 Ad nos vero quam proxime accedunt Itali, quippe quibus lordare 

 est inquinare lorde%%a, immundities, lor dura, sordes." Ihre. 



Lort does not occur in A.-S., German, Dutch, Flemish, Span- 

 ish, or Portuguese dictionaries, but in those of the Danish and 

 Swedish tongues. 



It may be concluded that the bum was called Lort Burn first 

 in the Danish period. on account of its being the receptacle of filth 

 of every abominable kind, cast out from the backs, and probably 



