The words usque hodie—Jutarum natio nominatur constitute contemporary and unexceptionable evidence to the existence of a people with a name like that of the Jutes in the time of Beda—or A.D. 731.
The exact name is not so certain. The term Jutnacyn from the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle is in favour of the notion that it began with the sounds of j and u, in other words that it was Jut.
But the term Geatum, which we find in Alfred, favours the form in g followed by ea.
Thirdly, the forms Wihtware, and Wihttan, suggest the likelihood of the name being Wiht.
Lastly, there is a passage in Asserius[[11]] which gives us the form Gwith—"Mater" (of Alfred the Great) "quoque ejusdem Osburgh nominabatur, religiosa nimium fœmina, nobilis ingenio, nobilis et genere; quæ erat filia Oslac famosi pincernæ Æthelwulf regis; qui Oslac Gothus erat natione, ortus enim erat de Gothis et Jutis; de semine scilicet Stuf et Wihtgur, duorum fratrum et etiam comitum, qui acceptâ potestate Vectis insulæ ab avunculo suo Cerdic rege et Cynric filio suo, consobrino eorum, paucos Britones ejusdem insulæ accolas, quos in eâ invenire potuerant, in loco qui dicitur, Gwithgaraburgh occiderunt, cæteri enim accolæ ejusdem insulæ ante sunt occisi aut exules aufugerant."—Asserius, "De Gestis Alfredi Regis."
Now, Gwith-gara-burgh means the burg or town of the With-ware;[[12]] these being, undoubtedly, no Germans at all, but the native Britons of the Isle of Wight (Vectis), whose designation in Latin would be Vecticolæ or Vectienses.
This being the case, how can they be descended from German or Danish Jutes? and how can we reconcile the statement of Beda with that of Asser?
[§ 11]. The answer to this will be given after another fact has been considered.
Precisely the same confusion between the sounds of w, j, g, io, eæ, u, and i, which occurs with the so-called Jutes of the Isle of Wight, occurs with the Jutlanders of the peninsula of Jutland. The common forms are Jutland, Jute, Jutones, and Jutenses, but they are not the only ones. In A.D. 952, we find "Dania cismarina quam Vitland incolæ appellant."—"Annales Saxonici."[[13]]