Cripp’s Laws of the Church, p. 634.—“Before the time of Pope Innocent III. there was no solemnization of marriage in the Church: but the man came to the woman’s house and led her home to his own house, which was all the ceremony then used. By the customs of the Anglo-Saxons the marriage ceremony was commonly performed at the house of the bridegroom, to which the bride had been previously taken.” (p. 638) “It was formerly the law of this country that marriages celebrated by licence, when either of the parties was under the age of twenty-one years (not being a widow or widower), without the consent of the father, or if he were not living, of the mother or guardians, should be absolutely void.” They must proceed either by publication of banns or by license. The word banns is of Saxon origin, and signifies publication or proclamation (Rogers, E. L. 509). This publication for three several Sundays or holidays, unless a license or faculty had been obtained, was enjoined by Canon Law and by the rubric “in the time of divine service” (p. 650). . . . For the avoiding of all fraud and collusion, before such license shall be granted it shall appear to the judge by the oaths of two sufficient witnesses . . . that the express consent of the parents or parent is thereunto had and obtained (Canon 103).” It is singular we find in Francis Bacon’s life, that he tried to break off the match with Sir John Villiers and Lady Hatton’s only daughter and heiress, because the mother opposed it, “he strongly advises that the match be not proceeded in without the consent of both parents required by religion and the law of God” (Campbell’s Life of Lord Bacon, p. 138).

“Spurrings” they are still called in the North of England, where old customs and our fore-elders’ language linger long. I myself in a parish in Wensleydale, where they until recently “raced for the garter,” heard the Clerk, to my astonishment, after I had finished the “spurring” for the last time of asking, stand up and in broad accent and loud voice sing out, “God speed them well!” and all the people answered, Amen! It was not any way ludicrous, but really sounded solemn and a beautiful benediction from their fellow-parishioners.—(See Atkinson’s Glossary of Cleveland Dialect, “Spurrings, sb. The publication of banns of marriage: the being ‘asked’ at Church, an immediate derivative from speer, speir, even if not directly from Old Norse spyria.”)

The name of Shakespeare, Laborer, in the neighbourhood of Stratford is spelt as above in George I.

“Walter Shakespeare, of Tachbrooke, in the county of Warwicke, laborer, aged forty yeares or thereabouts, being sworne and examined, deposeth as follows:

“To the fourth interrogatory this deponent saith that the cure of the parish has been neglected by the complainant, and in particular this deponent’s wife was put by being churched, there being no Divine Service at Tachbrooke one Sunday since the complainant’s institucion and induction; and this deponent further says that notice was given that his wife was to be churched that Sunday, and that this deponent was then and now is an inhabitant of the parish of Tachbrooke.”—Record Office, 41st Report, p. 555, 7 George I. Warwick and Stafford Exchequer.