The study of the Scandinavian component in the English lexis makes use of literary 1 and place-name source material, 2 with additional evidence as to the degree of acculturation being provided by personal name data. 3 The county of Suffolk has a particular importance for the associated questions of dialect geography, arising from its position at the southern limits of the Danelaw; a recent survey of the Scandinavian elements in the medieval microtoponymy of the county has shown more penetration of the language than previously recognized, 4 but Scandinavian place-names are virtually absent from Essex. Given this background of existing comprehensive surveys, it is quite unexpected to find multiple examples in Suffolk of a topographical term Snavergate, incorporating as first element a word unknown in either Middle English literary sources or in place-names from any other part of Britain. 5 The instances (each attested in more than one document) are in the parishes of Kirton, Mellis, and Stanton. In Kirton, feoffments of 1296 and 1428 record a way (via) called Snauergateweye and Snaregateweye, respectively. 6 In Mellis, there is reference to Snaueregate c.1240 and Snaueregatemedwe (i.e. ‘meadow’) c.1230–40 in two charters from Eye Priory. 7 The Stanton case is the best recorded, appearing as Snavyrgate or Snawyrgate in charters from 1347 to 1420; in later records, there is confusion of fricative and stop, a typical indication of a toponym becoming opaque as to meaning, and the name is written Snapyrgate, Snapirgate, or Snapurgate, until the last mention in 1544. 8 An exact parallel in Denmark is Snævergade, a town street (now Bispegade) in Haderslev in southern Jutland, which was Snøffregaade in 1638, with the meaning confirmed by a Low German record von der engenstraten in 1540. 9 The etymology of all these examples is Old Danish snævergata ‘narrow way’. 10 The element snæver (Old Norse snæfr, with -r part of the stem) is common Scandinavian but not found with certainty in other branches of Germanic. It is also found in Danish place-names such as Snevris and Sneverholt. 11 In England, apart from the three Suffolk examples of Snavergate, the word has been reported only in Yorkshire and Lancashire dialect, in the form snever or snether. 12 Further investigation may be fruitful; it is possible that other instances of place-names taking the modern form Snaregate have developed from an earlier Snauergate, 13 and Great Snare Hill 2.5 km south of Thetford in Norfolk has a long narrow spine extending to the southwest. 14