Giroardus, Girfridis, Gertrudis, Ermena, and Ermengardis, three of the names connecting with that of the father, and two with that of the mother. In the case of a man called Ratgaudus and his wife Deodata, the names of four of the children are Ratharius, Ratgarius, Ratrudis, and Deodatus, the names of two other children being different. Many other instances might be given of this sort of yearning for some kind of a connecting-link in the names of a family. Now the people by whom these names were given were common peasants and serfs, so that the case was not one like that of the Anglo-Saxon kings of Northumbria, among whose names the prefix _os_, signifying "semi-deus," and expressive of a claim to a divine lineage, was of such frequent recurrence. It may be a question then whether, while the former word of the compound connected with the father or the mother, the latter part did not sometimes connect with some other relative whose name it was desired to commemorate, giving the effect that is now frequently expressed by a Christian name and a surname. Again, when we look at the remote origin of these names, when we find in the opening century of our era, and who can tell for how many centuries before, precisely the same names that have been current in all these centuries since, we can hardly doubt that some of these names, derived from words that had long died out from the language, must have been used even in ancient times without any more thought of their meaning than parents have now when they call a child Henry or John. I desire, however, to put forward the above theory as to the origin of compound names rather with a view of raising the question than of expressing a definite conclusion. The vowel ending in _a_, _i_, or _o_, to which I have referred as in general use in the case of simple names was not used in the case of compounds, unless indeed it happened to be an original part of the second word as in Frithubodo, from _bodo_, messenger. Only in the case of women, to mark the sex, the ending in _a_ was given. And in the case of some names, such as _Gertrud_, in which the second part is a word that could only be given to a woman, as no vowel-ending was required, so none was given. I now proceed to give a list of the principal compounds occurring in English names, with the ancient forms corresponding. I have been obliged, as a matter of necessity, to compare our names more frequently with Old German than with Anglo-Saxon equivalents, on account of the former having been collected and collated--a work which it remains for some one of our well qualified Anglo-Saxon scholars to do with regard to the latter.