Group 30: rivers of the east coast

The Cosmographer seems not to name any rivers on the north-western coast of Scotland; this may be a result of his source map being distorted and showing this part of the island in a very summary manner. On the other hand, we shall see that he lists a number of rivers in northwest Scotland among the island names, so he may have been confused by the locations of river names written ‘in the sea’ on his map source. He jumps straight from the Ayr to a conflation, the first part of which is perhaps the same as Ptolemy’s Καιλιος ποταμου εκβολαι (II.3, 4), to be identified with the River Deveron (Watson 1926, 49; Rivet & Smith 1979, 423), and the second part of which is probably the River Ness, the fluuium Nesam of Adomnan’s Vita Columbae (Watson 1926, 77; Ekwall 1928, 119; Rivet & Smith 1979, 423). The Cosmographer then appears to leap again; ignoring <Intraum>/Antrum, a clear doublet, the next identifiable name is *Tina, the Tyne (Ekwall 1928, 426; Rivet & Smith 1979, 473). The preceding name, of which Antrum is probably the better form (Rivet & Smith 1979, 375), does not look like a river-name and could be the name of a place or an island; only one island of any size can be found between the Rivers Ness and Tyne, Holy Island, a perfectly acceptable identification.

<Liar> is a problematical name. Rivet and Smith (1979, 391) give up on it and can suggest no emendations or identifications. It may represent *Tesa, the Tees (Ekwall 1928, 397), although the emendation is not easy. We may envisage a process of transmission thus: Tesa > Tisa > Tias > Tiar > Liar, although it is difficult to see how this might have happened. *Linda is unlikely to be a duplication of the place-name Lindum (Lincoln), which was given above at 106₅₅, and is probably therefore the Bedfordshire Ouse. The name survives in the place-name King’s Lynn (Ekwall 1960, 295): Rivet and Smith (1979, 392) have overlooked this clue to the river’s identity.

Viuidinis possibly related to Ptolemy’s Ειδουμανιος ποταμου εκβολαι (II.3, 4), which is certainly the Essex River Blackwater (Rivet & Smith 1979, 358), where the town of Witham appears to preserve an older name; the Romano-British form may have been *Vidumanis, meaning ‘flowing wildly’ (compare Ekwall 1928, 468). However, Ekwall (1928, 319) notes that Pant, still an alternative to Blackwater, is of Celtic derivation, *Panto-, meaning ‘valley’. It occurs as Penta in Bede (HE iii.22). It is likely that the name Pant arose from a misunderstanding between speakers of Old English and Primitive Welsh and that it is not relevant to the Romano-British name of the river. The final name in this section is the Duroleuo of the Antonine Itinerary Iter II, a settlement near Sittingbourne, misread as the name of a river.