Page:History of Manchester (1771), Volume 1, by John Whitaker.djvu/166

Chap. V. OPMANCkESTER, 1 37 h nothing elfe (I apprehend) than a repetition of the fame name, Calunium and Gallunium being evidently (he fame word. And fuch repetitions are not uncommon in this inaccurate Chorogra- phy . — *° Particularly by Leigh by Gibfoh aiid by Baxter. — %t Offian's Poems vol. II. p. 219, Camden's Ireland c. 1354 and Shropfhire c. 646, and Richard Iter 14. One of the two rivers at Alcefter is ftill called the Alne, and the town which now itands upon the Arrow formerly flood upon the Alne : See ,Le- land vol. IV. p. 54. Hearne. In the volume published this winter by the Antiquarian So- ciety of London we have the two Lancaftiire antiquarians, Mr. Watfon and Mr. Percival, very bufily employed, as Mr. Percival had been employed before in the Phil. Tranf. vol. XL VII, in fixing a Roman ftation at the town of Bury and about nine fttf- tute-miles from Manchefter. But the one great reafon adduced by both is furely very incompetent to the occafion. The name of Bury, fays Mr. Watfon p. 69, denotes it to have been Roman'; and Mr. Percival had aflerted the fame before (Phi^ Tranf. vol* XL VII). Mr. Percival may ftand excufed for the aflertion*. He knew too little of the Saxon , language to be capable of judging. But what fhall I fay for my learned friend, a critic in the language ? Bury certainly carries no Roman fignature at all with it. Bury merely fignifies in the Saxon either a caftle or a market-town. And " the vifible marks of a ftation' * which Mr. Watfon and Mr. Percival imagine themfelves to have difcovered at Bury (Archaeologia p. 69. and Phil. Tranf. vol. XL VII) are merely the relicks of a more modern caftle. This is actually- mentioned in our Mancunian records; and tradition derives all the ftones of the prefent church from it. And this aftually lies more than a mile to the right of the road to Ribchefter. The not attending to the one only determinate character of a ftation, the Roman appellation of Cafter at the place or the coincidence of Roman roads at the point, has ftrangely feduced the generality of our antiquarians into a wildernefs of error. And upon the application of this ufeful teft we fee Bury, Blackburne (Archse- T ologia