4 



place has now become " Chaceley," while the other remains 

 14 Chaddesley." So, again, the " Biselege " of Domesday has 

 become " Bisley," in Gloucestershire, while in Worcestershire, 

 some ten miles off, it has become " Bushley," a fact which, 

 even now, proves confusing to students. It is obvious that 

 no philological " law " can account for name-developments so 

 different as these. 



Cognate to the process of folk-etymology is that marked 

 tendency of our people to introduce the syllable "ing" into 

 place-names which did not contain it. In the Paper to which 

 I have alluded I dwelt on the enormous importance attached 

 by such scholars as Kemble, Stubbs, Green, and Canon Taylor, 

 to the existence of ing in place-names as evidence of clan- 

 settlement, and I pointed out that, even apart from other 

 possible criticisms, the scientific study of our place-names 

 would prove that in many cases the ing was a mere corruption. 

 A curious instance came before me only the other day. The 

 City of Hereford appears in Domesday as "Hereford port," 

 but a Worcestershire Hereford, by the addition of " tun," 

 becomes Herefordtun, and in Domesday " Herferthun," and 

 finally by a process of corruption " Harvington." Nothing at 

 first sight could be less likely than the true derivation of the 

 name, and Kemble accepted its present form as proof that the 

 place was the home of the Harvings, or as he termed them the 

 Horfingas. By a no less strange corruption the "Widemonde- 

 fort" of Domesday, the " Withermundeford " of charters, 

 became our Essex Wormingford. The name, of course, was 

 claimed by Kemble as evidence of its settlement by a Worming 

 clan, but we have got beyond the clan now ; we have discovered 

 the totem, and we run him for all he's worth. The Wormings, 

 therefore, are claimed as totemists, sons of the Worm, and as 

 you must never eat your totem, we discover that this interesting 

 clan cannot have lived on a diet of worms. You may think 

 that I am jesting, but Mr. Grant Allen, under the auspices 

 of the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, included 

 Wormingford among the place-names leading to " the almost 



