138 



MARTIN L. ROUSE^ ESQ., ON 



descended to the Danube and to the Scordistian Kelts, and 

 then had fallen upon the Teuristai and Tauriskai, Keltic tribes 

 also ; and, while the abode of the Tauriskai has been fixed by 

 geographers as in N"oricuni, the Scordisci have been located in 

 in Pannonia (or Hungary). 



And what of our stronoer evidence ? The names of rivers 

 and large streams in the Old World must clearly be all ancient 

 and mostly primeval. Long before a conquering tribe had 

 time to reflect upon a change of name for a river in their 

 newly-won territory, even if they cared to change it, they 

 would have used it so often in transactions both warlike and 

 peaceful with the conquered tribe, that they would insensibly 

 have adopted it, although in some cases, regarding what 

 was really a descriptive name as a proper name, they 

 would have added a word for Oliver, brook, or tvater thereto, 

 which in due time in the mouths of after-generations would 

 coalesce with the first into a single name once more. Thus, if 

 we find the river-names of Central and Eastern Europe some- 

 times to be identical in form with common river-names of 

 countries certainly Keltic, and if we further find them nearly 

 always to be made up of apposite Keltic words (modified indeed 

 in many cases through the careless repetition of many 

 generations, but still perceived by comparison with one another 

 to have had that origin), we shall be sure that the Kelts once 

 dwelt over the whole vast area, and that they were its first 

 reclaimers and cultivators. Xow this is just what we do find : 

 or rather — to make our case stronger still — we mostly find the 

 ancient river-names of that great region to have their origin 

 and significance in that form of Keltic speech which is still 

 known as Kumric. Selecting from the admirable compilation 

 and argument of Isaac Taylor some of his most salient 

 evidences, I now proceed to prove this by a sufficient number 

 of illustrations, leaving the reader, if perchance he be still 

 dissatisfied, to peruse the vast number of tabulated names by 

 which Taylor establishes his case.* 



And, first, let us examine the land of the Kumri and of its 

 next neiglibours, along with the ancient home of the Kiinmerioi 

 in Southern Eussia. In Welsh, or Kumric, rhe, and in Gaelic 

 rea, means sivift ; and accordingly in England there is a stream 



* Isaac Taylor, Words and Places, chap, ix, his aim is not quite the 

 same as that of the present writer ; he says nothing of Gonier, the 

 Kinnnerioi, or the Kiiiihri, but shujjly proves that the Kelts were the first 

 race to pass through middle Europe from east to west and to colonise it. 



