Chapter IX

). From slough we get the names Slow, Slowley, and Sloman (also perhaps a nickname), with which we may compare Moorman and Mossman. This seems to be also the most usual meaning of Slack or Slagg, also used of a gap in the hills

"The first horse that he rode upon, For he was raven black, He bore him far, and very far, But failed in a slack."

(Ballad of Lady Maisry.)

Tye means common land. Platt is a piece, or plot, of level country--

"Oft on a plat of rising ground I hear the far-off curfew sound"

(Penseroso, 1. 73);

and shape is expressed by Gore, a triangular piece of land (cf. Kensington Gore), of which the older form Gare, Geare, also survives. In Lowndes we have laund or lound--

"And to the laund he rideth hym ful right, For thider was the hart wont have his flight

(A. 1691)--

a piece of heath land, the origin of the modern word lawn. In Lund and Lunn it has become confused with the Old Norse lundr, a sacred grove.

Laund itself is of French origin--

"Lande, a land, or laund; a wild, untilled, shrubbie, or bushie plaine"

(Cotgrave).

Its relation to land is uncertain, and it is not possible to distinguish them in such compounds as Acland (