Northern Weekly Gazette. — 1916-05-06 (Stockton-on-Tees, Cleveland, England)

HERBERT WHITE, 8.A., Author of '45 111.• •I'4, "Place Names and Roman Sites," etc, ..• _ ;yr MP 01 Ili! InVIEW I i JHI I'l I CR Under theheading, °Middlesbrough—Young or. Old," in last • week's issue. reference was made to the ancient history of Middlesbrough and the surrounding. distrivt as proved by the vestiges of historic remains and the place names still remaining. The importance of the Word 'castra' was dismissed, and the author continues:— These castra must have been planted in thousands over the land of conquered Britain. Now, conditions being equal, the most permanent of human erections is an earthwork. The most massive castles have a life of comparatively short duration. Wind and weather play havoc with the most compact masonry, while the hands of the spoilers hasten what the elements have begun. The oldest monuments in the country, not excepting the monoliths and clusters of stone pillars, are probably' the banks and barrows of preliiStoric man. Accordingly long after the departure. of. -the Roman legions to the defence of Rome against:Attilla, that great prototype of Kaiser Wi!liam, the Ruthless, their castra I would remain as. well defined monuments, markiug in every direction their hold upon the soil, and it would be along those other monuments of Roman genius, the line oid roads connecting them, that. the invading Northmen would travel in their murderous expeditions through Cleveland. It would also be in the viciaitv of these camps, with their choice military positions and their advantages of water and shelter, where they Would plant, their homes when they decided to settle. And seeing them and reeOgnising them as of one common type, whas more natural than to give them some definite and distinct name? It they were familiar with the same class of fort in their own country the ,name would be on their lips ready for application. A parallel case occurs' with reference to the names given and handed down by tradition to the original Norman earthworks, whioh are often discoverable, simply by the aid of the tides that have clung to them for nearly a thousand years. And it requires no great knowledge to deteet the site of an old church in places whose names contain the word kirk or Han in Wales). What, then. was the name which those ancient German invaders gave to the old Roman relics? Is it. possible to recover their designation or -:ranslation of this Latin name of castra? Almost exactly at the period when the Roniaus were retirilig from Britain, there lived (A.D. 386) a Latin writer Vegetius, bearing the'interesting surname of "Born agYairt " who wrote a book entitled Of Things Military," in which occurs the following notable passage : " Oastelltun parr uluni quem Burgum vocant.'' which may be rendered A small rostra which they (the Germans) call a butigh.•' We. find ..alSo that an Old Spanish writer, Isidore Bishop of Seville, who died A.n. (336, in a work ea lied " Origins" has this relerence.:— - Orebro per limites habitacula constitute Burg es viilgo votlAnt which may be tranelated : Those habits tieus which are built, thickly along the frontiers, they (the Germans) call mn their common speech burghs." In the system of laws, promuh:aied in the teigu of the Emperor Theodosius in A.D. 438. the defenders of a castra were called Burgarit or •Burithera