the Old English barbar, a heathen, or foreigner.[1] The word is used nearly in the same sense as Welsh. It is remarkable that these words occur on cold and cheerless moorlands, or in places where other adjacent local names make it clear that barbar is not a personal name, but a designation of a whole people—a people who were neither Anglo-Saxons nor Danes, but who were called 'foreigners,' 'heathens,' and 'slaves' in their own country by their proud conquerors. The whole district between Ringinglow and Fox House contains proofs of early British settlements, and the mythology and religion of the oldest inhabitants of Great Britain. Nor can we fail to see in such local names as Castle Dyke on the road to Ringinglow, Barber Balk and Scotland Balk—the two last being the names of earthworks or ridges, sometimes called the Roman Rig—evidences of tribal or national hostilities. There are fields near Ringinglow called Annis Fields, annesse being Old English for a 'wilderness.' We may ask why did this ancient people live in the wilderness, on bleak and barren moorlands so far removed from the rich pastures of the valleys? This question is answered, in part at least, on a previous page,[2] but it should in addition be said that the tendency of conquest is to drive people into the 'wilderness,' or to leave the wilderness in the occupation of the aboriginal settlers, or conquered inhabitants.
In this district it is clear that the few local names which probably belong to the 'Celtic' languages are to be found on moorlands, in the names of streams, or in places where the land has not been cultivated. Such names as Lenny Hill and some others on the moorlands west of Dore and Totley seem to relate to a period anterior to the coming of Anglo-Saxons and Norsemen. The cultivation of land, it need hardly be said, would remove most of the old local names, which would naturally, in a few cases, remain unchanged on the hills and heaths.
It is pleasing to see that the subject of local names—which I
- ↑ See the word Barber in the Addenda. I shall be told, of course, that a family called Barber lived and owned land at Barber Nook; indeed I was personally acquainted with Mrs. Barbara Barber of that place. But the family did not give their name to the place. They may have taken it from the place. The surname Barber must in many instances mean 'foreigner.'
- ↑ Page liii.
