CASTERS AND CHESTERS. 281 



case of small towns or unimportant Eoman stations, 

 which would seldom need to be mentioned outside their 

 own immediate neighbourhood, the simple form is quite 

 common, as at Caistor in Norfolk, Castor in Hunts, and 

 elsewhere. At times, too, we get an added English ter- 

 mination, as at Casterton, Chesterton, and Chesterholme ; 

 or a slight distinguishing mark, as at Great Chesters, 

 Little Chester, Bridge Casterton, and Chester-le-Street. 

 All these have now quite lost their old distinctive names, 

 though they have acquired new ones to distinguish them 

 from the Chester, or from one another. For example, 

 Chester-le-Street was CondercTo in Eoman times, and 

 Cunega ceaster in the early English period. Both names 

 are derived from the little river Cone, which flows 

 through the village. 



Before we pass on to the consideration of those castra 

 which; like Manchester and Lancaster, have preserved 

 to the present day their original Eoman or Celtic prefixes 

 in more or less altered shapes, we must glance briefly at 

 a general principle running through the modernised forms 

 now in use. The reader, with his usual acuteness, will 

 have noticed that the word Ceaster reappears under 

 many separate disguises in the names of different modern 

 towns. Sometimes it is caster, sometimes Chester, some- 

 times cester, and sometimes even it gets worn down to a 

 mere fugitive relic, as ceter or eter. But these different 

 corruptions do not occur irregularly up and down the 

 country, one here and one there ; they follow a distinct 

 law and are due to certain definite underlying facts of 

 race or language. Each set of names lies in a regular 

 stratum; and the different strata succeed one another 



