_ or _weald_, a wood. In
_Dun-bar-ton_, the Celtic word _dun_, hill, is explained by the Saxon
_bar_ for _byrig_, burg, _ton_ being added to form the name of the town
that rose up under the protection of the hill-castle. In _Penhow_ the same
process has been suspected; _how_, the German Hoehe,(77) expressing nearly
the same idea as _pen_, head. In Constantine, in Cornwall, one of the
large stones with rock-basins is called the _Men-rock_,(78) rock being
simply the interpretation of the Cornish _men_.

If, then, we suppose that in exactly the same manner the people of
Cornwall spoke of _Tshey-houses_, or _Dshyi-houses_, is it so very
extraordinary that this hybrid word should at last have been interpreted
as _Jew-houses_ or _Jews' houses_? I do not say that the history of the
word can be traced through all its phases with the same certainty as that
of Marazion; all I maintain is that, in explaining its history, no step
has been admitted that cannot be proved by sufficient evidence to be in
strict keeping with the well-known movements, or, if it is respectful to
say so, the well-known antics of language.

Thus vanish the Jews from Cornwall; but there still remain the _Saracens_.
One is surprised to meet with Saracens in the West of England; still more,
to hear of their having worked in the tin-mines, like the Jews. According
to some writers, however, Saracen is only another name for Jews, though no
explanation is given why this detested name should have been applied to
the Jews in Cornwall, and nowhere else. This view is held, for instance,
by Carew, who writes: "The Cornish maintain these works to have been very
ancient, and the first wrought by the Jews with pickaxes of holm, box,
hartshorn; they prove this by the names of those places yet enduring, to
wit, _Attall-Sarazin_ (or, as in some editions, _Sazarin_); in English,
the Jews' Offcast."

Camden (p. 69) says: "We are taught from Diodorus and AEthicus that the
ancient Britons had worked hard at the mines, but the Saxons and Normans
seem to have neglected them for a long time, or to have employed the labor
of Arabs or Saracens, for the inhabitants call deserted shafts,
_Attall-Sarazin_, _i.e._ the leavings of the Saracens."

Thus, then, we have not only the Saracens in Cornwall admitted as simply a
matter of history, but their presence actually used in order to prove that
the Saxons and Normans neglected to work the mines in the West of England.

A still more cir