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APPENDIX.
stoin batter.
222 THE SCANDINAVIANS, AND
Mary's, on the north bank of the Liflfey, alleged to have been
built in 948, and the arches under Christ Church built on
the south bank at as early a date) or whether this tocher
led to the old "bothyr," or road, now anglicise*! into
" Stonybatter ;
" l or had occupied the site of that which
long continued to be called the
O
1
["A remarkable instance of this
hardening process
occurs in some
of the Leinster counties, where the
Irish word bothar [boher] a road
is converted into batter. This
word "batter," is,
or was well
understood in these counties to
mean an ancient road; and it was
used as a general term in this sense
in the patents of James I. It
signifies
in Wexford a lane or
"
narrow road. Bater, a lane lead-
ing to a high road." (" Glossary
of the dialect of Forth and Bargy,"
by Jacob Poole ; edited by
William Barnes, B.D.") ''As for
the word Bater, that in English
purpozeth a lane bearing to an
highway. I take it for a meere
Irish word that crept unawares
into the English through the daily
intercourse of the English and Irish
inhabitants." (Stanyhurst, quoted
in same.) ''The word occurs in
early Anglo-Irish documents, in
the form of bothir or bothyr, which
was easily converted into hotter or
batter. It forms part of the follow-
ing names : Batterstown, the
name of four townlands in Meath,
which were always called in Irish,
Haile-an-bhothair, i.e., the town of
the road . . . Near Drogheda,
there is a townland called Green
Batter, and another Yellow Batter,
which are called in Irish, Boherglas
and Boherboy, having the same
old bridge " 2
although
meanings as the present names,
viz., green road and yellow road.
We have also some examples, one
of which is the well known name of
Stonybatter. Long before the
city had extended so far, and while
Stonybatter was nothing more
than a country road it was as it
still continues to be the great
to Dublin from the
thoroughfare
districts lying west and north-west
of the city, and it was known by
the name of Bothar -na-gcluch
[Bohernaglogh], i.e., the road of
the stones, which was changed to
the modern equivalent, Stoney-
batter, or Stony -road." The origin
and history of Irish Names of
Places, by P. W. Joyce, LL.D.,
M.B.I.A., pp. 43-45. 1 2mo. Dublin,
M'Glashan& Gill, 1871.]
2 " In the year 1 428, the Friars
Preachers of this convent of St.
Saviour's had a school in an old
suburb of Dublin, now called
Usher's Island, with a large recourse
of scholars of philosophy and
theology. As the professors and
students from Ostmantown could
not conveniently come and go
because of the river Lifley, a bridge
of four arches, still standing,
built at the cost of the Friars'
Preachers, being the first of the six
bridges of Dublin, called everywhere
to this day, the Old Bridge.
To repay the cost, a lay Domini-