Archaic England Part 22

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 137.--Ancient Pagan Altar on Tory Hill. From _Sketches of Irish History_ (Anon., 1844).]

Near Buxton are the sources of the river Wye, and by Wye in Kent, near Kennington, we find Olantigh Park, St. Alban's Court, Mount Pleasant, Little London, and Trey Town: by the church at Wye are two inns, named respectively "The Old Flying Horse," and "The New Flying Horse"; Wye races are still held upon an egg-shaped course, and close to Kennington Oval--which I am unable to trace beyond its earlier condition of a market-garden--stands a celebrated "White Horse Inn". At Kennington by Wye a roadside inn sign is "The Golden Ball," which once presumably implied the Sun or Sol, for in the immediate neighbourhood is Soles Court.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 138.--Iberian. From Akerman.]

The horse was a constantly recurring emblem in the coins of Hispania, and the object on the Iberian coin here ill.u.s.trated is defined by Akerman as "an apex": the appearance of this symbol, seemingly a spike or peg posed upon a teathill, on an Iberian or Aubreyan coin is evidence of its sanct.i.ty in West Europe. Theologians of the Dark Ages have been ridiculed for debating the number of angels that could stand upon a pin-point, but it is more than probable that the question was a subject of discussion long before their time: the Chinese believe that "at the beginning of Creation the chaos floated as a fish skims along the surface of a river; from whence arose something like a _thorn_ or _pickle_, which, being capable of motion and variation, became a soul or spirit".[309] The fairy sanct.i.ty of the thorn bush would therefore seem to have arisen from its _spikes_, and the abundance of these emblems would naturally elevate it into the house or abode of _spooks_: the burning bush, in which form the Almighty is said to have appeared before Moses, was, according to Rabbinical tradition, a thorn bush: the Elluf and the Alvah trees--the _aleph_ or the _alpha_ trees?--are described as large thorned species of Acacia; and the spiky acacia, Greek _Akakia_, is related to _akis_, a point or thorn.

One of the attributes of the Man-in-the-Moon is a Thorn Bush, whence Shakespeare puts into the mouth of Moons.h.i.+ne, "This thorn bush is my thorn bush; and this dog my dog". The Man-in-the-Moon being identified with _Cain_, it becomes interesting to note that the surname Kennett is accepted as a Norman diminutive of _chien_, a dog.[310] On p. 149--a mediaeval papermark--the Wanderer is surmounted by a bush; a bush is a little tree, and the word _bush_ (of unknown origin) is a variant of Bogie--also of _bougie_, the French for candle: bushes and briars were the acknowledged haunts of Bogie, _alias_ Hobany or Hob-with-a-canstick or bougie.

_Bouche_ used to be an English word meaning meat and drink, whence Stow, referring to the English archers, says they had _bouch_ of court (to wit, meat and drink) and great wages of sixpence by the day.[311] In Rome and elsewhere a suspended bush was the sign of an inn, whence the expression "Good wine needs no bush": the _bouche_ or mouth is where meat and drink goes in, similarly _mouth_ may be connoted with the British _meath_, meaning nourishment. _Peck_ is also an old word for provender, and we still speak of feeling peckish.[312]

The word _bucket_--allied to Anglo-Saxon _buc_, meaning a pitcher--implies that this variety of large can or mug was used for peck purposes: the ill.u.s.tration herewith, representing the decoration on a bronze bucket found at Lake Maggiore, consists of speck-centred circles, and dotted, spectral, or maculate geese, bucks, and horses.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 139.--Bronze from bucket, Sesto Calendo, Lake Maggiore. From the British Museum's _Guide to the Antiquities of the Early Iron Age_.]

It is unnecessary to dilate on the great importance played in civic life by inns: numberless place-names are directly traceable to inn-signs; and the brewing of church ales, considered in conjunction with facts which will be noted in a subsequent chapter, make it almost certain that churches once dispensed food and drink and that _inn_ was originally an earlier name for church. Among the inscriptions of the catacombs is one which the authorities believe marks the sepulchre of a brewer: but these pictographs are without exception emblems, and it is more likely that the design in question (Fig. 140) stands for "that Brewer,"[313] the Lord of the Vineyard, or the Vinedresser. The Green Man with his Still implies a brewer; the distilling of Benedictine is still an ecclesiastical occupation, and the word _brew_ suggests that brewing was once the peculiar privilege of the _peres_ or priests who brewed the sacred ales. The word _keg_ is the same as the familiar Black _Jack_, and under _jug_ Skeat writes: "Drinking vessels of all kinds were formerly called _jocks_, _jills_, and _jugs_, all of which represent Christian names. Jug and Judge were usual as pet female names, and equivalent to Jenny or Joan."

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 140.--From _Christian Iconography_ (Didron).]

The Hackney inn known as "The Flying Horse" may possibly owe its foundation and sign to the Templars, who possessed property in Hackney: the Templars' badge of Pegasus still persists in the Temple at Whitefriars, and the circular churches of the Templars had certainly some symbolic connection with Sun or Golden Ball. At Jerusalem, the ideal city which was always deemed to be the hub, bogel, or navel of the world, there are some extraordinary rock-hewn water tanks, known as the stables of King Solomon: Jerusalem was known as Hierosolyma or Holy Solyma, and that Solyma, Salem, or Peace was a.s.sociated in Europe with the horse is clear from the coin of the Gaulish tribe known as the Solmariaca (Fig. 141). The animal here represented is treading under foot a dragon or scorpion, and the Solmariaca, whose city is now Soulosse, were seemingly followers of Solmariak, the Sol Mary, or Fairy.

The aim of the _Free_masons is the rebuilding of the Temple of Solomon or Wisdom, and it is quite evident that the front view of a temple on Fig. 142 is not the representation of a material building such as the Houses of Parliament now depicted on our modern paper-money. The centre of Fig. 142 is a four-specked cross, the centre-piece of Fig. 143 is the six-breasted Virgin, and Fig. 144 is a very elaborated pantheon, hierarchy, or habitation of All Hallows: the inscription reads BASILICA ULPIA, _i.e._, _The Church_ Ulpia.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 141.--Gaulish. From Akerman.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 142.--Iberian. From Akerman.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 143.--From Barthelemy.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 144.--From Barthelemy.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 145.--Iberian. From Akerman.]

Abdera, now Adra, is a Spanish town on the sh.o.r.es of the Mediterranean, founded, according to Strabo, by the Tyrians, and the name thus seems to connote a _tre_ of _Ab_ or Hob. I have elsewhere endeavoured to prove that King Solomon, the Mighty Controller of the Jinns, was the Eye of Heaven or the Sun, and this emblem appears in the triangle or delta of Fig. 145: the corresponding inscription on Fig. 145 are Phoenician characters, reading THE SUN,[314] and the curious fish-pillars are almost certainly a variant of the _deddu_. In Ireland a Salmon of Wisdom enters largely into Folklore: the word _salmon_ is Solomon or Wisdom, as also is _solemn_: in Latin _solemn_ is _solennis_, upon which Skeat comments: "Annual, occurring yearly, like a religious rite, religious, solemn, Latin _sollus_, entire, complete: _annus_, a year. Hence _solemn_--returning at the end of a complete year. The old Latin _sollus_ is cognate with Welsh _holl_, whole, entire." The cognomen Solomon occurs several times in the lists of British Kings, and one may see it figuring to-day on Cornish shop-fronts in the form of variants such as Sleeman, Slyman, etc. Solomon may be resolved into the Sol man, the Seul man, the Silly[315] (innocent) man, or the Sly man, the Cunning man, or Magus. The "Sea horse" to the right, ill.u.s.trated by Akerman on Plate XX, No. 8, is a coin of the Gaulish Magusa, and bears the inscription Magus which, as will be remembered, was a t.i.tle of the Wandering Jew.

Maundrell, the English traveller, describing his journey in the seventeenth century to Jerusalem, has recorded that, "Our quarters, this first night, we took up at the Honeykhan, a place of but indifferent accommodation, about one hour and a half west of Aleppo". He goes on to say: "It must here be noted that, in travelling this country, a man does not meet with a market-town and inns every night, as in England. The best reception you can find here is either under your own tent, if the season permit, or else in certain public lodgments, founded in charity for the use of travellers. These are called by the Turks _khani_; and are seated sometimes in the towns and villages, sometimes at convenient distances upon the open road. They are built in fas.h.i.+on of a cloister, encompa.s.sing a court of 30 or 40 yards square, more or less, according to the measure of the founder's ability or charity. At these places all comers are free to take shelter, paying only a small fee to the khan-keeper (khanji), and very often without that acknowledgment; but one must expect nothing here but bare walls. As for other accommodations of meat, drink, bed, fire, provender, with these it must be every one's care to furnish himself."[316]

The main roads of Britain were once seemingly furnished with similar shelters which were known as Coldharbours, and the Coldharbour Lanes of Peckham and elsewhere mark the sites of such refuges.

The Eastern khans, "built in fas.h.i.+on of a cloister," find their parallel in the enclosed form of all primitive shelters, and the words _close_ and _cloister_ are radically _eccles_, _eglos_, or _eglise_. Whence the authorities suppose Beccles in Silly Suffolk to be a corruption of _beau eglise_ or Beautiful Church: but to whom was this "beautiful church"

first reared and dedicated, and by what name did the inhabitants of Beccles know their village? The surname Clowes, which may be connoted with Santa Claus, is still prevalent at Beccles, a town which belonged anciently to _Bury_ Abbey.

The patron saint of English inns, travellers, and cross-roads, was the Canaanitish Christopher, and the earliest block prints representing Kit were "evidently made for pasting against the walls in inns, and other places frequented by travellers and pilgrims."[317] Kit's intercession was thought efficacious against all dangers, either by fire, flood, or earthquake, hence his picture was sometimes painted in colossal size and occupied the whole height of the building whether church or inn. The red cross of St. John of Jerusalem was the _Christopher_; travellers carried images of Cuddy as charms, and the equation of St. John with Canaanitish Christopher will account for Christopher's Houses being ent.i.tled Inns,[318] or Johns, or Khans. Under the travellers' images of Christopher used to be printed the inscription, "Whosoever sees the image of St. Christopher shall that day not feel any sickness," or alternatively, "The day that you see St. Christopher's face, that day shall you not die an evil death". The emblem on page 262, was, I think, wrongly guessed by Didron as "the spirit of youth": it is more probably a variant of Christopher, or the Spirit of Love, helping the palmer or pilgrim of life.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIGS. 146 and 147.--Gaulish. From Akerman.]

Fig. 146, a coin of the Turones, whose ancient capital is now Tours, consists of a specky or spectral horse accompanied by an urn: this urn was the symbol of the Virgin, and the reader will be familiar with a well-known modern picture in which La Source is ambiguously represented as a maiden standing with a pitcher at a spring. _Yver_ is Norse for a _warm bubbling spring_, and on the coins of Vergingetorix we find the pitcher and the horse: the word _virgin_ is equivalent to _Spring Queen_, and as _ceto_ figures largely in British mythology as the ark, box, or womb of Ked, it is probable that Virgingetorix may be interpreted King Virgin Keto. In Gaul _rex_ meant King or Queen, but this word is less radical than the Spanish _rey_, French _roi_, British _rhi_: according to Sir John Rhys, "the old Irish _ri_, genitive _rig_, king, and _rigan_ queen would be somewhat a.n.a.logous, although the Welsh _rhian_, the equivalent of the Irish _rigan_, differs in being mostly a poetic term for a lady who need not be royal".[319] The name Maria, which in Spain is bestowed indiscriminately upon men and women, would therefore seem to be _Mother Queen_, and _Rhea_, the Great Mother of Candia, might be interpreted as _the Princess_ or _the Queen_.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 148.--Egyptian.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 149.--Etrurian. From _Cities and Cemeteries of Etruria_ (Dennis, G.).]

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 150.--British. From _A New Description of England and Wales_ (Anon, 1724).]

Among inscriptions to the Gaulish Apollo the most common are those in which he is ent.i.tled Albiorix and Toutiorix: these are understood by the authorities as having meant respectively "King of the World," and "King of the People".

With the Cornish Well known as Joan's Pitcher may be connoted the variety of large bottle called a _demijohn_: according to Skeat this curious term is from the French _damejeanne_, Spanish _damajuana_--"Much disputed but _not_ of Eastern origin. The French form is right as it stands though often much perverted. From French _dame_ (Spanish _dama_), lady; and Jeanne (Spanish Juana), Joan, Jane." In our word _pitcher_ the _t_ has been wrongly inserted, the French _picher_ is the German _becher_, Greek _bikos_, and all these terms including _beaker_ are radically Peggy, Puck or Big. Pitchers are one of the commonest sepulchral offerings, and we are told that the Iberian bronze-working brachycephalic invaders of Britain introduced the type of sepulchral ceramic known as the beaker or drinking cup: "This vessel," says Dr.

Munro, "was almost invariably deposited beside the body, and supposed to have contained food for the soul of the departed on its way to the other world."[320]

The German form of Peggy or Margaret is Gretchen, which resolves into Great _Chun_ or Great _Mighty Chief_: Margot and Marghet may be rendered _Big G.o.d_ or _Fairy G.o.d_ or _Mother Good_.

That the pitcher, demijohn, or jug was regarded in some connection with the Big Mother or Great Queen is obvious from the examples ill.u.s.trated, and the apparition of this emblem on the coins of Tours may be connoted with the female-breasted jugs which were described by Schliemann as "very frequent" in the ruins of Troy. Similar objects were found at Mykenae in connection with which Schliemann observes: "With regard to this vase with the female b.r.e.a.s.t.s similar vases were found on the islands of Thera (Santorin) and Thera.s.sia in the ruins of the prehistoric cities which, as before stated, were covered by an eruption of that great central volcano which is believed by competent geologists to have sunk and disappeared about 1700 to 1800 B.C.".[321] It is peculiarly noticeable that the dame Jeanne or jug is thus a.s.sociated in particular with Troy, Etruria, Thera.s.sia, Thera (Santorin), the Turones, and Tours.

The centre stone of megalithic circles const.i.tuted the speck or dot within the circle of the feeder or pap, and not infrequently one finds a Longstone termed either The Fiddler or The Piper. The incident of the Pied Piper is said to have occurred at Hamelyn on June 26th, 1284, during the feast of St. John and St. Paul. The street known as Bungen Stra.s.se through which the Piper went followed by the enraptured children is still sacred to the extent that bridal and other processions are compelled to cease their music as they traverse it: Bungen of Bungen Street may thus seemingly be equated with _bon John_ or St. John on whose feast day the miracle is said to have happened. The Hamelyn Piper who--

... blew three notes, such sweet Soft notes as never yet musician's cunning Gave to the enraptured air,

may be connoted with Pan or _Father An_, and the mountain now called Koppenberg, into which the Hamelyn children were allured, was obviously Arcadia or the happy land of Pan: the _berg_ of Koppenberg is no doubt relatively modern, and the original name, Koppen, resolves into _cop_, _kopje_, or _hill-top of Pan_. The Land of the Pied Piper was manifestly _Himmel_, which is the German for _heaven_, and it may also be the source of the place-name Hamelyn.

He led us, he said, to a joyous land Joining the town and just at hand, Where waters gushed and fruit trees grew, And flowers put forth a fairer hue, And everything was strange and new.

The story of the Piper and the children is found also in Abyssinia, and likewise among the Minussinchen Tartars: the word Minnusinchen looks very like small _Sinchen_ or beloved Sinchen, and with this _Sinchen_ or _bungen_ may be connoted the Tartar _panshen_ or pope, and also Gian Ben Gian, the Arabian name for the All Ruler of the Golden Age. That Cupid was known among the Tartars is somewhat implied by the divinity ill.u.s.trated on p. 699.

The Tartar story makes the mysterious Piper a foal which courses round the world, and with our _pony_ may be connoted _tarpon_, the Tartar word for the wild horse of the Asiatic steppes. _Cano_ is the Latin for _I sing_, and on Figs. 152 and 153 the Great Enchantress or Incantatrice is represented with the Pipes of Pan: among the wonders in the land of Hamelyn's Piper were horses with eagles' wings and these, together with the celestial foal and other elphin marvels, are to be found depicted on the tokens of prehistoric Albion. The tale of the Pied Piper may be connoted with the emblem of Ogmius leading his tongue-tied willing captives, and in Fig. 158 the mighty Muse is playing in human form upon his lute. In Fig. 160 the story of St. Michael or St. George is being played by a Pegasus, and in Fig. 158 CUNO is represented as a radiant elf. The arrow on Fig. 163 connects the exquisitely executed little figure with Cupid, Eros, or Amor--the oldest of the G.o.ds--and probably this particular cherub was known as Puck, for his coin was issued in the Channel Islands by a people who inscribed their tokens _Pooc_tika, _Buc_ato, _Pix_til, and _Pich_til, _i.e._, _Pich tall_ or _chief_(?).

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIGS. 151 to 158.--British. No. 151 from Whitaker's _Manchester_. No. 152 from Evans. Nos. 153 to 157 from Akerman. No. 158 from _A New Description of England and Wales_.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIGS. 159 to 163.--Channel Islands. From Akerman.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIGS. 164 to 167.--British. From Akerman.]

It is not improbable that this young sprig was known as the Little Leaf Man, for in Thuringia as soon as the trees began to bud out, the children used to a.s.semble on a Sunday and dress one of their playmates with shoots and sprigs: he was covered so thoroughly as to be rendered blind, whereupon two of his companions, taking him by the hand lest he should stumble, led him dancing and singing from home to home. Amor, like Homer, was reputed blind, and the what-nots on Fig. 167 may possibly be _leaves_, the symbols of the _living, loving Elf_, or _Life_--"this senior-junior, giant-dwarf Dan Cupid".

It was practically a universal pagan custom to celebrate the return of Spring by carrying away and destroying a rude idol of the old Dad or Death:--

Now carry we Death out of the village, The new Summer into the village, Welcome, dear Summer, Green little corn.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 168.--From _The Everyday Book_ (Hone, W.).]

In other parts of Bohemia--and the curious reader will find several Bohemias on the Ordnance maps of England--the song varies; it is not Summer that comes back but Life:--

We have carried away Death, And brought back Life.[322]

At the feast of the Ascension in Transylvania, the image of Death is clothed gaudily in the dress of a girl: having wound throughout the village supported by two girls the image is stripped of its finery and flung into the river; the dress, however, is a.s.sumed by one of the girls and the procession returns singing a hymn. "Thus," says Miss Harrison, "it is clear that the girl is a sort of resuscitated Death." In other words, like the May Queen she symbolised the Virgin or Fairy Queen--Vera or Una, the Spirit, Sprout, or Spirit of the Universe, the Fair Ovary of Everything who is represented on the summit of the Christmas Tree: in Latin _virgo_ means not only a virgin but also a sprig or sprout.

FOOTNOTES:

[255] _Fairy Mythology_, p. 298.