The fact that the scribes were Normans may perhaps account for the form under which Wibtoft appears in the Survey. The termination-toft signifies a homestead or inclosure, and is usually considered, like the suffix-by, to be a distinctive mark of Danish colonization. It is frequently met with in the Danish districts of the country, but is unknown in Cumberland and other parts where Danish colonization did not take place. In Normandy the termination is also well known.(1) In that district of France there are about a hundred examples, as Yvetot, Plumetot, Prétot, and so forth, but it will be noted that the termination which in England takes the form of-toft, in Normandy occurs as-tot. It was, doubtless, the latter form of the suffix with which the Domesday scribe was familar and Wibtoft therefore appears as Wibtot (D.6) in Domesday Book.

Before leaving this question of spelling I should like to draw your attention to the evident dislike which the Domesday scribes had to the letter K which does not occur once in the whole of the Domesday Book. This is the more remarkable because although in modern French K is a letter very rarely met with (I doubt if there are more than three words in every day use which begin with it), (2) yet it was not so rare in the Norman dialect, for in Kilham's Dictionary (3) I find a fair proportion of words of which it is the initial. The cause may be found, probably, in the fact that the scribes were Latin scholars and wrote in Latin, and as K is an unknown letter in that language they carefully avoided making use of it. And in fact there was no need for them to use it as at the end of the eleventh century C still retained, in all its positions, its primitive sound now often represented by K, so that wherever we meet with C in the Domesday Book we must bear this in mind and never give it any other sound. This is proved to us, if proof were needed, in the fact that many names which the Domesday scribes wrote with C or the diagraph CH are now written with K alone as, for example, Cinton, now Kineton; Berchewelle, now Berkswell; Bichemerse, now Bickmarsh; and Rocheberie, which afterwards became Rokby and has now been softened down to Rugby.

To return to the map. The sites of the early settlements which have since developed into villages and towns were not chosen by our predecessors in any haphazard fashion; there was always some good reason for the choice, one of the chief, leaving aside the question of defensibility, being the presence of water. Bearing this in mind the first thing I did, after having drawn the boundaries of the county, was to carefully lay down all the rivers. These group themselves into two distinct systems: the Tame in the north, and the Avon in the centre and south. The Tame, perhaps the more familiar to us as inhabitants of a town situated upon one of its tributaries, rises in the west of the county and flows at first in an easterly direction until it receives the waters of the Cole and Blyth, near Merston (C.3). Here its course changes to a northerly one as far as Tamworth, Tameworde on the

(1) See Canon Isaac Taylor's "Words and Places." London, 1865, p. 185.
(2) Those three words being kilométre, kilogramme (kilo), and kepi.

(3) A Dictionary of the Norman or Old French Language," by Rob. Kilham. London, 1779 (?).

map (A.3), where it is augmented by the Anker. Near this point it quits the county and, following a north-easterly direction, falls at length into the Trent. The Avon, the Warwickshire river par excellence, flows in an exactly opposite course. Entering the county near Clipton (E. 7), it receives the Leam near Moitone (G. 4), the Stour near Milecote (H. 3), and the Arrow at Salford (H. 1). Near here it enters Worcestershire and, still following a south-westerly course, falls at length into the Severn at Tewkesbury.

After showing the course of the rivers the next thing to do was to lay down, as far as I was able, the lines of communication, or in other words, the roads, which were in existence when the Commissioners of the Conqueror made their visit. This was a much more difficult matter than laying down the rivers. We must believe that there were many roads in existence at that time, especially in the thickly populated valley of the Arrow; but this is a subject which, as far as I am aware, has been but little studied and as I had neither the materials at hand nor the time at my disposal to go into the question, I was content, after showing the great roads which form part of the legacy the Romans have left us, to leave the matter. Three of these Roman roads run through Warwickshire. On the north-east the Watling Street forms, for many miles, the boundary between the counties of Warwick and Leicester. The Fosse Way enters the county near Stratone (K.3) and, following for some distance a course roughly parallel to the Avon, crosses the Watling Street near Wibtot (D.6) at a place. now known as High Cross, the site of the Roman Bennones. The third Roman road is the Icknield or Rycknield Street. This enters Warwickshire near Bichemerse (J.2) and follows the course of the Arrow to Epeslei (F.1), where it enters Worcestershire. At Celboldestone (D.1) it again enters Warwickshire for a short distance and, after marking the county boundary across the moorland of Sutton Chase, crosses the Watling Street at Wall, between Sutton Coldfield and Lichfield, the site of the Roman Etocetum.

Having thus got together the construction lines of the map, the next thing to do was to fill in the villages and towns which, I judged, ought to bear some relation primarily to the rivers and then to the roads which I had drawn. As will be seen by the map my supposition was a correct one. The great majority of the names are to be found in the river valleys; some, such as Celboldestone (D.1), Wibetot (D.6) and Aderestone (B4) are on the Roman roads, and very few, as Brailes (K.4) Donecerce (F.6) or Sutone (B.2) are at a distance from a river or a Roman road.

In the fourteen pages of the Domesday Book devoted to the Survey of Warwickshire reference, more or less detailed, is made to between two hundred and sixty and two hundred and seventy different places. The position of more than two hundred and forty of these has been identified (1); of the remainder some have

(1) In the identification of the places I have generally followed Sir William Dugdale who, as is well known, made great use of the Domesday Book in his monumental " Antiquities of Warwickshire." The edition I used was the second, in two volumes, revised and augmented by William Thomas, D.D. London, 1730, but I had the first, 1656, edition always at hand and in some cases found it the better of the two.

become obsolete and no trace of them can now be found, and others are the names of places now outside the boundaries of the county but which have been entered under Warwickshire in error or, if ever within the county, have been mised out of it into some other since the end of the eleventh century. There can be no doubt, for instance, that Eseningetone and Biscopesberie, which appear among the Warwickshire manors held by William fitz Ansculf (XXVII.), should have been entered among his Staffordshire manors. The hundred in which they are said to be, namely Cudulvestan, is the Staffordshire hundred now known as Cuddlestone, and these two places have been identified by Eyton (2) with Essington and Bushbury, both in that county and hundred. It is noteworthy that the name of the hundred has evidently been added after the rubrication had been finished.

Cillentone, which appears among the Warwickshire manors held by William fitz Corbucion (XXVIII.), is another example of a wrong entry. It is singular that it appears on the same page in Domesday (243A) and is said to be in the same hundred of Cuddlestone, in this case spelt Colvestan and properly rubricated, as Esseningstone and Biscopesberie. It has been identified by Eyton with Chillington in Brewood, in Staffordshire.

Earl Roger (XII.) is said to hold in Warwickshire the following manors:— Quatone, Rameslege, Rigge and Sciplei. No particular hundred is written against them but as they follow Ulvestone (E.6), which is said to be in Stanlei hundred, we should suppose that they would be found somewhere in the Avon valley not far from Wolstan. But we might search for them in that district for ever, should I say till Doomsday, and never find them, for they are miles away in Shropshire, and are, in fact, the Domesday equivalents of Quat, Romesley, Rudge, and Shipley.

The Church of Worcester (III.) is said to hold in Warwickshire one hide in Lochesham and ten hides in Spelesberie, both, nominally, in the hundred of Pathlow. Whether they were, at the time the Conqueror's Commissioners visited them, considered to be within the county of Warwick and have since been mised out of it, or whether the leaf or rotulet on which the original report was made became misplaced at the time the reports were being codified at Winchester I cannot say, but there is no doubt that these two places are now in Oxfordshire and are known as Bloxham and Spilsbury.

Having now weeded out of the county those places which are wrongly included in it we must take note of such others as properly belong to it but are entered under some other county.

Of these there seem to be but very few, in fact I have only been able to find one place which I can be certain is now within the borders of Warwickshire and which is recorded by the Domesday Commissioners under another. This is the village of Sawbridge, spelt Salwebridge (F. 7), which is to be found among the manors held by Turchil of Warwick in Northamptonshire.

(2) "Domesday Studies, an Analysis and Digest of the Staffordshire Survey." P. W. Eyton. London, 1881, p. 4 and Tab. V.