“Romney” is probably formed by the addition of the Saxon Ige, By, or Ea—island, to the earlier Celtic Ruim—marsh, and so gives an idea of what the district was before the Romans reclaimed much by building their great Rhee Wall. Certain names in Romney Marsh preserved the same history. Oxeney (still we have the Island and the Hundred of Oxney, containing Wittersham and Stone parishes) is even now insulated by two branches of the Rother, and here, in the ancient and now diverted channel, was found in 1824 an oaken ship buried deep in sand and mud. Its name is said to mean the isle of the fat beeves. On pagan altars discovered there oxen were carved, and still it is a great cattle-raising district. We should look now in vain for the three ferries by which it was once entered. In its centre is Ebony, no doubt originally a sort of island, once called “Ebeney in Oxney,” and in an early document it appears as Hibbene. It has been suggested that the first part of the word is the old Celtic Avon, _i.e._, water or river, and I find that a Saxon charter of 793 A.D. calls the Gloucester Avon by the name of Aben. The third syllable is, of course, the Saxon word for island. Scotney Court, Lydd, and Scotney Castle, Lamberhurst, no doubt preserve the name of the Barons de Scotini, who came from Scotigny in North France, and possessed, in the 12th century, much land, which they held until the reign of Edward the Third, while Scot’s Hall, near Smeeth, was the seat of Knights of that name down to the time of the Armada. But for this history one might have classed Scotney with Oxney and Ebony. Coming now to Sheppey, still an island, washed on the north by the estuary of the Thames, on the west by that of the Medway, and insulated by the Swale (Saxon Suala), crossed by a railway bridge and two ferries, the Celtic name is said to have been Malata, from Mohlt, a sheep, which the Saxon conquerors translated into Sceap-ige, Sheep Isle. It includes Elmley and Harty, once its little islands, and now peninsulas. An old name for Harty was Hertai, in which we may perhaps find the Saxon Heorat—stag, hart—as in Hartlip and Hartbourne, and ea—island. And Elmley, which island would simply denote the ley or glade in the forest in which elms were frequent, might here be Elm-isle. And another islet was Graven-ea, the grain island, on the opposite side of the Swale, now in the Faversham marshes.