the distances between its
stations. Unfortunately it is quite otherwise; and of the whole number
barely fifty can be at all certainly identified, while more than half
cannot even be guessed at with anything like reasonable probability.
To begin with, the text of every one of these authorities is corrupt
to a degree incredible; in Ptolemy we find _Nalkua_, for example,
where the 'Itinerary' and Ravenna lists give _Calleva_; _Simeni_
figures for _Iceni_, _Imensa_ for _Tamesis_. The 'Itinerary' itself
reads indiscriminately _Segeloco_ and _Ageloco_, _Lagecio_ and
_Legeolio_; and examples might be multiplied indefinitely. In Nennius,
particularly, the names are so disguised that, with two or three
exceptions, their identification is the merest guess-work; _Lunden_ is
unmistakable, and _Ebroauc_ is obviously York; but who shall say what
places lie hid under _Meguaid_, _Urnath_, _Guasmoric_, and _Celemon_?
And if this corruption is bad amongst the names, it absolutely runs
riot amongst the numbers, both in Ptolemy and the 'Itinerary,' so that
the degrees of the former and the distances of the latter are alike
grievously untrustworthy guides. Ptolemy, for example, says that the
longest day in London is 18 hours, an obvious mistake for 17, as the
context clearly shows. There is further the actual equation of error
in each authority: Ptolemy, for all his care, has confused
Exeter (_Isca Damnoniorum_) with the more famous _Isca Silurum_
(Caerleon-on-Usk); and there are blunders in his latitude and
longitude which cannot wholly be ascribed to textual corruption. Still
another difficulty is that then, as now, towns quite remote from each
other bore the same name, or names very similar. Not only were two
called _Isca_, but three were _Venta_, two _Calleva_, two _Segontium_,
and no fewer than seven _Magna_; while _Durobrivae_ is only too like
to _Durocobrivae_, _Margiodunum_ to _Moridunum_, _Durnovaria_ to
_Durovernum_, etc. The last name even gets confounded with _Dubris_ by
transcribers.

B. 3.--In all the lists we are struck by the extraordinary
preponderance of northern names. Half the sites given by Ptolemy lie
north of the Humber, and this is also the case with the Ravenna list,
while in the 'Notitia' the proportion is far greater. In the last case
this is due to the fact that the military garrisons, with which the
catalogue is concerned, were mainly quartered in the north, and a like
explanation probably holds good for the ea