portions led to such impoverishment that the ‘Minorat succession’ was in modern time established so that the youngest son was constituted by law heir to the father’s farms and lands, it being considered that the father was better able to portion off his elder children in his lifetime.[1] A community of mixed descent in contact with another which had the junior right custom might have adopted it in ancient time, as it was by German law in modern time.
The place-names in Sussex ending in the word -mer are suggestive. Grimm tells us that the older Slavs called the world mir and ves’mir.[2] Mir is also the name for peace, and seems akin to mira or mera, a measure. Among all the counties of England Sussex is remarkable for its place-names terminating in this word -mer, in some cases -mere. It appears to refer to a boundary or limit rather than to a marsh, for some of the names which have this ending are situated on high ground, such as Falmer—the Domesday Felesmere. Keymer, Angermer, Stanmer, Jonsmer, Cuckmere, Ringmer, Udimore (commonly pronounced Udimer), Tangemere, Linchmere, and Haslemere, on the county boundary, are other examples of the name. Some of these, like those of other ancient places and hundreds in Sussex, probably refer to people.
Among Domesday names of significance in reference to Frisians of the Chaucian tribe are Cochinges and Cochehā. As in some other counties in which there are traces of Wendish settlers, we find a place-name containing the root sem, probably derived from the old Slavonic word for land. It occurs in the Domesday place-name Semlintun.
The number of places in Sussex whose names bear a resemblance to Frisian names is remarkable. The terminal pronunciation of some of them in -um and -un also resembles the Frisian. In Friesland we find Dokkum,
