本文試圖從「地方意識」和「銘文」的角度來討論威廉．渥滋華斯的<為地方命 名之詩 >。詩共六首，皆為渥滋華斯一七九九年移居湖區後隔年所寫。這些詩顯現詩人在定 居之初，欲在新環境中營造安居生根之氣氛，並建立「地方意識」，故試圖將「作詩」和「 成家」結合起來。「命名」這個舉動可視為一種「銘刻」，詩人藉「命名」將自己和家人「 刻」在這片土地的景物草木上, 一方面達到紀念之目的，另一方面則透過此舉而產生「地方 意識」。從這個角度來看，在 < 為地方命名之詩 > 這些詩裡面，渥茲華斯翻新了傳統的「 銘文」。他將傳統「銘文」中經常出現的「地靈」轉變成了「詩魂」，以詩人替代了神靈， 如此不但將神靈人形化，而且將地方收為己有，自我與新環境得以互相融合。

　　　　　This paper discusses William Wordsworth's 'Poems on the Naming of Places' from the perspectives of the sense of place and the inscription. I argue that the group of poems, which were written shortly after Wordsworth's move to Grasmere in 1799, demonstrate the poet's attempt to combine poetry-making with homemaking as he settled in and felt the need to strike root and to establish a sense of place in the new surrounding. The act of 'naming,' I suggest, is a form of inscribing through which the poet 'inscribes' himself and his family on the landscape, not only for commemoration reasons, but also in an attempt to achieve a sense of place. the 'Poems on the Naming of Places,' however, are not traditional inscriptions carved onto gravestones. In writing these poems, Wordsworth has innovated the genre and transformed the genius loci common in the inscription into genius poeticus; and in turning the poet into the 'spirit' that guards th place, he has not only humanised the genius loci, but also metaphorically 'possessed' the place, so that the place becomes part of the self.