The first thing which naturally engages our attention, in considering the Antiquities of Bridgnorth, is the origin of its name. This, as well as other names just as simple and intelligible, has afforded matter for the ingenious speculations of etymologists, who, by a sort of alchemy, of which they only are the masters, have transmuted it into a form totally different from its own. For instance, some have made it out that the name signifies the tower or castle on Morfe, and that it was originally _Burgmorfe_, the first syllable of which, “Burg,” being derived from the Greek word πυργος, ‘a tower’, the other being the Saxon name of the neighbouring forest, which extended over the large district still so called. But it is not easy to conceive, how “Burg” should have been transmuted into “Bridge,” and still less so, how “Morfe” should have been corrupted into “North.” The name is a very plain one, and just as plain is its etymology; _Bridgnorth i. e._ the north Bridge, or the bridge lying to the north of some other bridge. In every ancient record it is called “_Brugge_” or “_Brug_,” the Saxon form of the word “Bridge,” and there is no instance, I am informed, of the syllable “North” being added to it, at least in any public document, earlier than the reign of Edward I. Bridges in early times were not so common as they are now, and therefore a place, which had a bridge or bridges of any size, often took its name from this circumstance. Thus Bruges, a town in Flanders, was so named, from the numerous bridges over the canals, which intersect it; and Bridgetown, near which the famous battle of the Boyne was fought, was so called on account of the bridge, which there crosses the river. So our town received its first name of “_Brug_” from the bridge, which here spanned the Severn; and was afterwards called “_Bridgnorth_,” to distinguish it from a bridge lower down the Severn, at Quatford.[1] [1] There can be no doubt that there was in ancient times a bridge at Quatford, for it is called in old writers, “Cwatbridge.” It was very likely a wooden bridge, one pier of which stood on an islet in the stream. In the very ancient map of Bridgnorth, and of its immediate neighbourhood, which is in possession of the Corporation, (a copy of which will be found in the present volume) this islet is marked out, and called “Brugg Bylett,” or Island Bridge. The present Ferryman, Richard Turley, very well recollects this bylet, and his having played on it when a boy: it was nearly a quarter of an acre in size, and covered with alders and willows. An old villager told the late Mr. Smallman that he remembered beams of wood being raised from that part of the river.