Historic Facts,

RELATIVE TO THE

SEA PORT AND MARKET TOWN

OF

RAVENSPURNE,

IN

HOLDERNESS.

HULL:

PRINTED BY THOMAS TOPPING, LOWGATE.

SOLD BY W. DAWSON.

1822.

RAVENSPURNE.

THE NAME.

ETYMOLOGY has been denominated the Eruditio ad libitum, and not without some reason, from the use which has frequently been made of it; but of the name Ravensburg, Ravensrode, or Ravenspurne, an explanation may be given with more probability of truth than in many other cases in which etymology alone is the guide.

The Danes bore in their national standard, the figure of a Raven, and when, in their attacks on the people of Holderness, they landed at the first sea-port which they found within the Humber, they are supposed to have fixed their standard there, and to have called the place Ravensburg. Afterwards, in more Christian times, a cross was probably erected there, and the termination Burg, the ancient Saxon name for a city, town, or fortified place, might be changed to Rod or Rode, a cross; and thus the name would be Ravensrode. Subsequently, the termination Spurne, a place from which to explore, or look out, might be