Strange Survivals: Some Chapters in the History of Man

NOTES

[1] Sacrifices of the same kind were continued. Livy, xxii. 57: “Interim ex fatalibus libris sacrificia aliquot extraordinaria facta: inter quÆ Gallus et Galla, GrÆcus et GrÆca, in Foro Boario sub terra vivi demissi sunt in locum saxo conseptum, jam ante hostiis humanis, minime Romano sacro, imbutum.”

[2] Jovienus Pontanus, in the fifth Book of his History of his own Times. He died 1503.

[3] These cauldrons walled into the sides of the churches are probably the old sacrificial cauldrons of the Teutons and Norse. When heathenism was abandoned, the instrument of the old Pagan rites was planted in the church wall in token of the abolition of heathenism.

[4] There is a rare copper-plate, representing the story, published in Cologne in 1604, from a painting that used to be in the church, but which was destroyed in 1783. After her resurrection, Richmod, who was a real person, is said to have borne her husband three sons.

[5] Magdeburg, Danzig, GlÜckstadt, DÜnkirchen, Hamburg, NÜrnberg, Dresden, etc. (see Petersen: “Die PferdekÓpfe auf den BauerhÄusern,” Kiel, 1860).

[6] Herodotus, iv. 103: “Enemies whom the Scythians have subdued they treat as follows: each having cut off a head, carries it home with him, then hoisting it on a long pole, he raises it above the roof of his house—and they say that these act as guardians to the household.”

[7] The floreated points of metal or stone at the apex of a gable are a reminiscence of the bunch of grain offered to Odin’s horse.

[8] Aigla, c. 60. An Icelandic law forbade a vessel coming within sight of the island without first removing its figure-head, lest it should frighten away the guardian spirits of the land. Thattr Thorsteins Uxafots, i.

[9] Finnboga saga, c. 34.

[10] Hood is Wood or Woden. The Wood-dove in Devon is Hood-dove, and Wood Hill in Yorkshire is Hood Hill.

[11] See numerous examples in “The Western Antiquary,” November, 1881.

[12] On a discovery of horse-heads in Elsdon Church, by E. C. Robertson, Alnwick, 1882.

[13] “Sir Tristram,” by Thomas of Erceldoune, ed. Sir Walter Scott, 1806, p. 153.

[14] See an interesting paper and map, by Dr. Prowse, in the Transactions of the Devon Association, 1891.

[15] Two types, the earliest, convex on both faces. The later, flat on one side, convex on the other. The earlier type (Chelles) is the same as our Drift implements. Till the two types have been found, the one superposed on the other, we cannot be assured of their sequence.

[16] In the artistic faculty. The sketches on bone of the reindeer race were not approached in beauty by any other early race.

[17] “The Past and the Present,” by A. Mitchell, M.D., 1880.

[18] The author found and planned some hut circles very similar to those found in Cornwall and Down, on a height above Laruns. There was a dolmen at Buzy at the opening of the valley.

[19] Hor. Sat. ii. 8.

[20] Fornaldar SÖgur. iii. p. 387.

[21] Heimskringla, i., c. 12.

[22] I have given an account of the Carro already in my book, “In Troubadour Land.”

[23] Roman and Greek ladies employed parasols to shade their faces from the sun, and to keep off showers. See s. v. Umbraculum in Smith’s Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities.

[24] A good deal of information relative to umbrellas may be got out of Sangster (W.). “Umbrellas and their History.” London: Cassell & Co., Ltd.

[25] The first Englishman who carried an umbrella was Jonas Hanway, who died in 1786, but it was known in England earlier. Beaumont and Fletcher allude to it in “Rule a Wife and Have a Wife”:

“Now are you glad, now is your mind at ease;

Now you have got a shadow, an umbrella,

To keep the scorching world’s opinion

From your fair credit.”

And Ben Jonson, in “The Devil is an Ass”:

“And there she lay, flat spread as an umbrella.”

Kersey in his Dictionary, 1708, describes an umbrella as a “screen commonly used by women to keep off rain.”

[26] CastrÉn, Nordische Reisen, St. Petersburg, 1853, p. 290.

[27] “The Beggynhof,” London, 1869, p. 68.

[28] Ed. Viger, IV., p. 161.

[29] So Grimm and others following him; but I am more inclined to see in Herodias, Herr-raud the Red Lord, i.e., Thor.

[30] “A Dyalogue describing the orygynall ground of these Lutheran facyons,” 1531. A later work on the excesses of sectaries is Featley’s (D.) Dippers Dipt, 1660.

[31] Quoted in Westminster Review, Jan., 1860, p. 194.

[32] “Autobiography of Peter Cartwright.” London, 1862 (7th ed.)

[33] “The Epidemics of the Middle Ages.” London, 1859.

[34] The word is, of course, derived from Instrumentum.

[35] See “Fretella,” in Ducange, “FistulÆ species.”

[36] M. Gilbert prints, “As the dew flies,” etc.; this is a mistake—“doo” is dove.

[37] Possibly we may have this in the still popular Cornish lament, “Have you seen my Billy coming?”

[38] On December 14, 1624, as many as 128 ballads were licensed, the names of which are given. “The Blind Beggar (of Bethnal Green);” “Maudline of Bristowe (The Merchant’s Daughter of Bristol);” “Sweet Nansie I doe love thee;” “The Lady’s Fall;” “My minde to me a kingdom is” (Sir Edward Dyer’s famous song); “Margaret, my sweetest;” “In London dwelt a merchantman;” “I am sorry, I am sorry;” “In May when flowers springe;” “I am a poore woman and blinde;” “The Devil and the Paritor (Apparitor);” “It was a Lady’s daughter;” “Roger’s Will;” “Bateman (Lord);” “Bride’s Good Morrow;” “The King and the Shepherd;” “As I went forth one summer’s day;” “Amintas on a summer’s day;” “Ah me, not to thee alone;” “Sir John Barley Corne;” “It was a youthful knight;” “Jane Shore;” “Before my face;” “George Barnwell;” “From Sluggish Sleepe;” “Down by a forrest;” “The Miller and the King;” “Chevie Chase;” “How shall we good husbands live;” “Jerusalem, my happie home;” “The King and the Tanner;” “Single life the only way;” “The Lord of Lorne;” “In the daies of old;” “I spide a Nymph trip over the plaine;” “Shakeing hay;” “Troy Toun;” “Walking of late abroad;” “Kisse and bide me welcome home;” “The chirping larke;” “John Carelesse;” “Tell me, Susan, certenly;” “Spanish Lady;” “When Arthur first in Court;” “Diana and her darlings;” “Dear love, regard my life;” “Bride’s buryal;” “Shakeing of the sheets;” “A rich merchantman;” “Gilian of Bramfield;” “Fortune my Foe;” “Cripple of Cornwall;” “Whipping the catt at Abingdon;” “On yonder hill there springs;” “Upon a summertime;” “The Miser of Norfolk.”

[39] Friedrich (J.B.) Geschichte des RÄthsels, Dresden, 1860.

[40] “Le Dieu Gaulois du Soleil,” Paris, 1886.

[41] “Scriptores rer. German. Frankof.,” 1718, p. 508.

[42] “Eckhard, Monument. Jutreboc,” p. 59.

[43] “Anton, Versaml. uber Sitten d. alten Slawen,” II. p. 97.

[44] The date on this stone is only 1807, so that the practice must be very modern.

[45] Other dolmens with holes at Trye-le-ChÂteau, Presles, les Mauduits, in Seine et Oise; at Vic-sur-Aisne; at Bellehaye, and at Villicor—Saint SÉpulcre (Oise); and others are in the Morbihan, Charente, etc.

[46] What we in England term cromlechs, the French more correctly call dolmens.

[47] The building up of part of the circle round a cairn was probably to block the way of the spirit in the direction of the village occupied by the living.

[48] Bull. de la Soc. d’anthropologie de Paris, t. ix., p. 198.

[49] Reinsberg DÜringsfeld. “Trad. et Legendes de la Belgique,” 1870, T. II., p. 239.

[50] Journal of the British ArchÆological Association, vol. xxxviii., 1882.

[51] They are found, for instance, on tombstones near Inverness.

[52] The majority of these vessels, which abound in the West of England, were unquestionably measures of corn. But all were not so; those that have rounded hollows like cups, and not square cut, were for holy water.

[53] “Heimskringla,” Saga III., c. 8.

Transcriber’s Notes:

Variations in spelling and hyphenation remain as in the original unless noted below.

Caption Fig. 17, “BO H” changed to “BO’H”.
Page 130, comma changed to period after “the stick of the umbrella.”
Page 173, period added after “a dancing or jumping mania.”
Page 210, “th” inserted in “they” (“they do not wholly agree”).
Ads section, punctuation and format regularized.
Note 35, single quotation mark changed to double after “Fretella.”

Original scans of this book can be found here.

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