In the old histories of York, most surveys of Walmgate ward start with a small mystery : Drake (Eboracum, 1736) says 'At the east end of Ouse Bridge is a place that must not be omitted in this work; it is a hole which many believe to run underground, arched as far as the minster’. This is ‘Salter Greces’ or ‘Salt-hole Greces’. ‘Greces’ or ‘grees’ means ‘steps’ in medieval English, and Hargrove (Ancient City of York, 1818) is able to quote ‘a later antiquary’ who actually explored the place. He wrote ‘The entrance was by a door which opened on the steps and led through a short passage into a neat, square room or chapel, the walls of which are faced stone, and appear well-built; but there is no light into it. What this has originally been intended for, I cannot discover, but imagine it to have been a cell for some begging hermit before the reformation.’ Hargrove adds that soon the steps add some of the buildings adjoining were to be removed ‘to effect the improvements in contemplation at the bridg’, so we will probably never now solve this historian's puzzle.

Kings Staithe, ‘strongly walled and paved by the eighteenth century, was part of a large length of water front in this area devoted to York's river trade. Drake bemoans a depression in the trade here about twenty years before writing, but then says that ‘business of this kind seems to mend apace in York’.

There were several small lanes leading up to Castlegate (then much narrower and further to the N.E.) from the Staithe:Kergate, Thursgayle and Hertergate. 'Kergathe', later Carrgate, finds its origin in the old Scandinavian ‘kiarr’, and the Northeastern English dialect ‘car’, meaning a marsh, a name clearly reflects its damp position near the river. Thurs gayle or Thurcelane was eventually corrupted into Thrush Lane, but it originally derives, according to Lindkvist (A Study of Medieval York, 1926) from the old Scandinavian ‘thurs’, a giant - the relevance of which to such a small lane still escapes me! Hertergate also takes its name from the old Scandinavian word for a stag or hart, 'hiortr' (gen. hiartar). However, by Drake’s time these three lanes were called the Water Lanes, or First, Second and Far Water Lane (today Friargate). 'Castelgate' or 'Castillgate' originally ran from the interior of the town, behind Clifford's Tower to the Castle; in the 19^th century the castle contained the courts and the gaol. Just by this building, Postern Lane used to lead off to a small city gate; it was bordered by several cottages, and in the garden of one of these, below the city wall could be found a pool of stagnant water and the York ducking stool: here in the Middle Ages minor felons and nagging wives received a very ignominious and watery punishment, to the amusement of the city at large! However, although the contraption remained in existence beyond 1607, Davies (Walks through the City of York, l880) was able to comment chivalrously, 'We may think ourselves happy that we live in more gallant times, when ladies are privileged to indulge their loquacity to any extent, without fear of the ducking stool’...

Tower Street ran round the southern side of the tower; this present tower is the last of a succession of buildings on the mound, constructed c.1250-75. It was burnt in 1684 and was so disliked by the citizens of York, according to Hargrove, that toasts were drunk in that year river to the ‘Demolishing of the Mince Pie’! The same historian, writing in the early 19^th century, also says ‘The upper part of Tower Street, near Castlegate, being quite open to the meridian sun, whose rays are reflects from the white walls of the tower to the opposite side of the street, the heat, so intense between the hours of one and three, that the causeway under the wall has thence been termed ‘the York West Indies’!

Moving back into the city itself, the name Coopergate, or Cuppergate, is not in fact an indication of the former presence of copper workers, but of joiners and turners, 'koppari’, in Old Scandinavian. Nessgate, standing on a high rise of ground, derives from the Anglo Saxon ‘ness’, meaning a cape or headland; until this section of street was widened in 1767, it was so narrow that two carriages could not pass each other in it. Usegate, better know today as Ousegate, very obviously draws its name from its geographical position; however, there is one interesting clue here to outside influences, in the variation ‘usagate’ - the first ‘a’ was probably slipped in by Scandinavian inhabitants to modify the name: in old Scandinavian, the word ‘a’ means ‘a river’, making the name into 'Ouse-river-gate’. The distinctions ‘High’ and ‘Low’ Ousegate were very much more apt at one time, Hargrove reminds us, since the slope down to the river was very steep in his time, although ‘soon to be remedied’. Branching off from Ousegate there seems once to have been a Pope's Head Alley’, but unless this possibly refers to a statue which might have stood there, or to a pub of that name, now disappeared, this odd come remains a mystery. There is no such problem about Spurriergate, the street of the 'sporyers’ or 'the spurriers, which were a great craft formerly, when our warriors wore spurs of a most extraordinary length and thickness’ (Drake) .

Parliament Square did not exist until the 19^th century, and Coppergate and Ousegate ran straight into the broad thoroughfare, called the Pavement, without a break. The church of All Hallows stands at this junction, notable for its very fine gothic tower ‘at the top finished lanthorn-wise'; Drake continues, ‘tradition tells us that anciently a large lamp hung in it, which was lighted in the night time as a mark for travellers to aim at, in their passage over the immense forest of Galtres to the city.’ The 18^th century historian does not seem certain whether the Pavement was so-called because it was the first or last paved street of the city; if either, the former seems more likely since this area, in the parish of St. Crux (‘vulgarly called St. Crouse Church’) had always been an affluent business and trading area. Davies notes that in 1322, in ‘one of the first instances of direct taxation’, this pariah contained very many names rich tradesmen, and contributed more than a quarter of York's total tax of £78 7s 9¾d! And as far back as 1641 a Mr. Marmaduke Rawden, London merchant born in York, gave a large sum for a cross to be erected in the Pavement; this was described in ‘Eboracum’ to be ‘a square dome, ascended into by a pair of winding stairs, and supported by twelve pillars of the Ionick order, but ill executed’... Hargrove in the 19^th century speaks of markets here for grain, wild fowls, sea fish, butter, eggs, herbs, and ‘various other articles’. Apparently the inspector of the cornmarket would ascertain the average prices of the grain sold here each week and would present the results to the Lord Mayor; he was ‘thereby enabled to regulate the price of bread in the city’. Davies, in his study of the area, devotes most of his space to a huge and detailed survey of the affluent families, mostly those of merchants, who lived in the Pavement in the 19^th century.

Fossgate leads off from the Pavement to the River Foss described by Drake as a ‘black river’, which ‘creeping along enters the city, washes the castle walls and somewhat further loses itself in the Ouse’. Although the historian of 'Eboracum' mentions that it it must once have been navigable as far as Layerthorpe Bridge, since ‘pieces of boats and anchors’ had been found there, even in his time the river was choked up. The complaints lodged by the fisheries of the Foss in 1428 to the effect ‘that many roots of seggs and other weeds, with old mud and other rubbish gathered together did annually increase and destroy great numbers of fish in the vivary ...' (Drake) were not unique. However the fisheries survived to the 19^th century along with several large mills; this trading area was so packed that Fossbridge itself was covered with houses, making it difficult in the 17^th century to tell that you were crossing the river at all!

Walmgate was in the 18^th century ‘a long, broad street, extending from the bridge to the bar’, but whose name is even today something of a puzzle to etymologists. ‘Some fondly conjecturer’ says Drake, that Walm or Weambgate is derived from 'the wombs or bellies of beasts, carried formerly there to be dressed into tripe, bowstrings etc.’ He adds, ‘after all, it is absurd to think that so spacious a street should owe its name to so filthy an original as the former etymology alludes to!’ So he understands the name as a corruption to Watlinggate, the Roman road from York to Lincoln; Hargrove derives it from a hypothetical ‘vallumgate’, as the street leads to the fortifications. But Lindquist, referring to the most early versions of the name, such as Walbegate, considers the street named after an inhabitant called Walbi or Walbe, common abbreviations of the old English name Weahlbeorht. He says that already by the 12^th century ‘the sense of true form and meaning of Walba - had been obscured, and Walme, a word of uncertain origin, substituted.’

Finally we come to Noutgate or Neutgate, (now St. George Street, leading from palmate to Fishergate Postern); this takes its name from the Medieval English word ‘nout’ meaning cattle or oxen. It seems likely that cattle were brought in from the country through the postern and down this lane to avow congesting the main bar of the quarter; they may even have been sold here. Certainly Walmgate bird would have been the obvious site of town to enter by, since there is a straight route up to the shambles and the butchering districts of York. However, it is still impossible to totally dispell the erroneous, but traditional derivation for Neutgate: surely the lane took its name from the marsh newts which mull have abounded here, thus ‘proving’ (Hargrove) that the lane, despite its distance from the river, was damp, watery and unpleasant!

And so Neutgate brings me to the end of Walmate ward, the fourth and final section of my series on the street-name etymologies of York. In researching for these articles I have learnt a great deal. In almost every road sign above our heads there is some clue to the history that we tread upon in all city streets; the clues do not only lead us to valuable historical and archaeological fact, but also to the curious manner in which language and etymologies develop or become distorted and even to a varied and often amusing view of the art of chronicling itself. Every generation comes armed with new data and tools with which to tackle old problems, ready to reinterpret the information passed on by those indefatigable historians of former centuries. The theories may be superseded, but there is always the pleasure of rediscovering the anecdotes and odd details - indications of past attitudes, habits and traditions. Only in this wide assimilation from many sources can we hope to bring historical settles into a full and vivid perspective, and try to understand just a little bit more clearly what old York must have been like!

Nicky Zeeman