An eloquent modern writer has declared, with a good reason, that even if all other records had perished, "anyone with skill to analyse the language, might re-create for himself the history of the people speaking that language, and might come to appreciate the divers elements out of which that people was composed, in what proportion they were mingled, and in what succession they followed one upon the other." From a careful analysis of the names of the more prominent features of the land; of its divisions, its towns and villages, and even its streets, as well as the nomenclature of its legal, civil, and political institutions, its implements of agriculture, its weapons of war, and its articles of food and clothing,—all these will yield a vast fund of history.
The place-name Liverpool has been the greatest puzzle to local etymologists. From the earliest known spelling—recorded in a deed of the time of Richard I. 1189–99, where the form is Leverpool—to the present, it has gone through more changes than any other local name. As the Norse element in the vicinity of Liverpool has been very great, we may assume the original derivation to come from "hlith," the old Norse for a "slope." The north dialect also contains the word "lither" meaning sluggish. It is an adjective bearing the same meaning as the modern English "lithe," pliant, or gentle. The names Lithgoe, Lethbridge, Clitheroe, and Litherland may be derived from it.
From the peaceful reign of Canute, or Knut, we derive the nautical term, some place-names—Knuts-ford, Knott End, Knot Mill, Knottingley. Knot, from old Norse "Knutr," and "Knotta," a ball, was the name given to the measurement of speed of a ship. Fifty feet was the distance allowed between the knots on the cord, and as many as ran out in half a minute by the sand-glass indicated the speed of the ship. And thus we speak of a 10 knot breeze blowing.[B]
Hope, as a place-name, is common from the Orkneys to the Midlands, and is derived from an old Norse word "hoop," for a small land-locked bay, inlet or a small enclosed valley, or branch from the main dale. Hope is a common place-name, as well as a surname. In compounds we find it in Hopekirk, Hopeton, Hapton, Hopehead, Dryhope.
From "Trow," a trough, we derive Trowbridge, Troughton, Trawden, and probably Rawtenstall.
The battle of Brunanburg, which took place in the year 937, is supposed to have been fought on the site of the modern Burnley, on the river Brun. King Olaf brought his men over in 600 ships, many containing over 100 men each. He was defeated by Athelstane and his brother Edmund. There was until recently pulled down in Burnley a house called Danes-house. Though the Danes lost this battle, the northern bards recorded its bravery in their war songs, of which their Sagas or legends still preserve some remains.
Among the chief followers of King Athelstane in 931, who subdued the Danish kingdom in England, we find the names of the following Jarls: Urm, Gudrum, Ingrard, Hadder, Haward, Healden, Rengwald, Scule, and Gunner. It is not difficult to recognise modern surnames from this list, such as Urmston, Guthrie, Hodder, Howard, Holden, Heald, Reynolds, Scholes, and Gunning.
"Northumbria was the literary centre of the Christian world in Western Europe," says John Richard Green; and the learning of the age was directed by the Northumbrian scholar Baeda, the venerable Bede.
Yorkshire.
The population of Yorkshire, after the retreat of the Romans, was composed of Angles.