CASTERS AND C HESTERS. 285 



form ought, therefore, to be Deechester. But it would 

 seem that in certain places the neighbouring rustics 

 knew the great Eoman town of their district, not by 

 its official title, but as the legion's Camp Castra Legionis. 

 At least three such cases undoubtedly occur one at 

 Deva or Chester ; one at Eatae or Leicester ; and one at 

 Isca Silurum or Caerleon-upon-Usk. In each case the 

 modernisation has taken a very different form. Diva was 

 captured by the heathen English king, JEthelfrith of 

 Northumbria, in a battle rendered famous by Baeda, who 

 calls the place ' The City of Legions.' The Latin com- 

 pilation by some Welsh writer, ascribed to Nennius, calls 

 it Cair Legion, which is also its name in the Irish 

 annals. In the English Chronicle it appears as Lege 

 ceaster, Laege ceaster, and Leg ceaster ; but after the 

 Norman Conquest it becomes Ceaster alone. On midland 

 lips the sound soon grew into the familiar Chester. 

 About the second case, that of Leicester, there is a slight 

 difficulty, for it assumes in the Chronicle the form of 

 Laegra ceaster, with an apparently intrusive letter; 

 and the later Welsh writers seized upon the form to fit 

 in with their own ancient legend of King Lear. Nennius 

 calls it Cair Lerion ; and that unblushing romancer, 

 Geoffrey of Monmouth, makes it at once into Cair Leir, 

 the city of Leir. More probably the name is a mixture 

 of Legionis and Eatae, Leg-rat ceaster, the camp of the 

 Legion at Eatae. This, again, grew into Legra ceaster, 

 Leg ceaster, and Lei ceaster, while the word, though 

 written Leicester, is now shortened by south midland 

 voices to Lester. The third Legionis Castra remained 

 always Welsh, and so hardened on Cymric lips into Kair 



