32 Bath under West Saxon Dominion. 



represented now by the counties of Worcester and Gloucester, 

 may have made a small beginning without any considerable 

 effect. I think we shall be more in the true path of his- 

 tory if we follow the historian and allow two centuries for the 

 silent interval of the desolations of Bath. 



Not that the place was, or could be, utterly wiped out of 

 knowledge ; — such a thing was impossible for a spot which 

 possessed healing waters. We cannot suppose that the use 

 of these waters can ever have been absolutely suspended, for 

 the English learnt their virtues from the " Welsh " around 

 them, and spoke of them in a new phrase of their own " at 

 tham hatum bathum " at the hot baths ; and it was from this 

 colloquial phrase that the place got its new name, The Hot 

 Baths, and at length, Bath. And it was from "bathum," 

 •otherwise " bathon," the dative plural in the Saxon phrase, 

 that the medieval Latin name, "Bathonia," derived its 

 authority. 



But while the city within the walls was ruinated and de- 

 serted, we must still suppose a lingering remnant of popula- 

 tion not far off, who would be the cultivators of the nearest 

 fields, and who would also supply the guides and attendants 

 for the visitors to the waters, the succession of which could 

 not entirely cease. Such a lingering population would be 

 of the remnant of the " Walas," whom the Saxons had driven 

 out of Akeman, and the hamlet of these poor people would 

 in English have been naturally called Wala cotu, the cots 

 of the Walas ; and this reconstruction seems to be counten- 

 anced by the suburban " Walcot " in the very situation re- 

 required, close outside the Roman city. At Pevensey, this 

 arrangement has become fixed ; the Roman city is still deso- 

 late, with a modern town contiguous. This view is favoured 

 by the extent of the parish of Walcot, and by the dedications 



