and Stamford), Leicestershire and (probably) the whole of Rutland (Stamford), as belonging to the Five Boroughs, and place-names confirm this evidence. The counties to the west and south answer none of the tests, and there is only a slight sprinkling of Danish names in Staffordshire and Warwickshire on their eastern borders. Northamptonshire furnishes a difficulty. Except in the extreme north-east it fails to pass our tests, but Danish place-nomenclature is strongly evident, though it shades off somewhat to the S.W. It resembles Danish Fast Anglia rather than the district of the Five Boroughs, and it is possible that the boundary of Guthru's kingdom, which is only carried as far as Stony Stratford in the peace of Alfred and Guthrum, really ran along Watling Street for a few miles, giving two-thirds of that county to the East Anglian realm[1]. While the judicial authority was in the hands of the Lawmen in the Five Boroughs, we hear at the same time of jarls in these towns and in Northampton and other places, who lead their forces to war and sign royal charters and documents. Probably to the Danes we owe the organisation of the modern counties of Derby, Leicester, Nottingham, Lincoln (and Stamford), Northampton, Bedford, Cambridge and Hertford.
In East Anglia the tests which we used for the Five Boroughs fail, and we are left with the boundaries of Guthrum's kingdom, certain evidence from place-names, and other miscellaneous facts. A few holmes in Bedfordshire, some holmes, biggins and tofts in Hertfordshire, Cambridgeshire, and Huntingdonshire, a "Danish" hundred in Hertfordshire, are almost all the evidence from place-names. Essex shews a few, Suffolk more traces of Danes on the coast, and the latter county has some traces inland, especially in the north. Norfolk is strongly Danish, even if we overlook the doubtful "thorpes," which are so abundant here. The Historia Eliensis and other documents tend to shew the presence of a strong Danish element in the population and social organisation of the district around Cambridge. As a whole, however, the Viking impress on East Anglia is much less deep than on Mercia. The difference rests probably on a difference of original organisation, but it is impossible now to define it.
Other features of interest in our social system due to Viking influence may be observed from a study of Domesday and other authorities. Attention has often been called to the number of freeholders in the Danelaw, and it would seem that Lincolnshire, Leicestershire and Norfolk more especially had not been feudalised to any great extent before the Norman conquest. In the other counties the influence of southern custom is more apparent. The "holds " of Northumbria, who rank next after the earls, and the "drengs" of Cumberland, Westmorland, Northumberland and Durham, are undoubtedly of Scandinavian origin. The
- ↑ The Welland is so natural a border that it is very unlikely English authority really came north of it. The hides must remain an unexplained difficulty.
