J.M.B.

* * * * *

_Meaning of Finkle._--Referring to No. 24. p. 384. of your most
welcome and useful publication, will you allow me to say, touching
the inquiry as to the derivation and meaning of the word "Finkle" or
"Finkel" as applied to a street, that the Danish word "Vincle" applied
to an angle or corner, is perhaps a more satisfactory derivation than
"fynkylsede, _feniculum_," the meaning suggested by your correspondent
"L." in No. 26. p. 419. It is in towns where there are traces of
Danish occupation that a "Finkle Street" is found; at least many of
the northern towns which have a street so designated were inhabited by
the Danish people, and some of those streets are winding or angular.
Finchale, a place, as you know, of fame in monastic annals, is a
green secluded spot, half insulated by a bend of the river Wear; and
Godric's Garth, the adjacent locality of the hermitage of its famous
saint, is of an angular form. But then the place is mentioned, by the
name of Finchale, as the scene of occurrences that long preceded the
coming of the Danes; and the second syllable may be derived from the
Saxon "alh" or "healh," as the place was distinguished for a building
there in Saxon times.

W.S.G.

Newcastle, May 4. 1850.

* * * * *