Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 11.djvu/576

 NOTES AND QUERIES, no s. XL JUNE 12, 1909.

remarks concerning these : " The robe is invariably confined in long swaddling bands wound about the body." In two or three of the earlier cases he mentions a cross upon the forehead. I much desire to learn whether any of the later ones are also marked with a cross. I have understood that after the Reformation the oil was omitted, and MB. HAKBY POLLARD at 10 S. viii. 377, states that the use of the chrisom garment was discontinued in 1552.

On the Burgoyne monument in South Tawton Church, dated 1651, the whole family are portrayed in incised outline, those who had already died being distin- guished by a skull below them. Among these are a child in a cradle, and another child in a sheath-like shroud, showing only the face, and tied round near to the ends, so that these form a sort of tassel at head and foot. There are no swathing bands, and no cross on the brow, yet I suspect the garb, differentiating this figure from the others, to indicate that this child's age at death was under one month. I should be glad of others' opinions on this point.

ETHEL LEGA-WEEKES.

GOWEB, A KENTISH NAME (10 S. xi. 10, 94). The personal name of Guer or Goher in one case at least was the origin of the family name of Gower. Guer, the ancestor of the owners of Stitenham in Yorkshire, must have been a contemporary of King Stephen, for his son " Willielmus filius Gueri " witnessed a charter of Eustace fitz John, who died 1157 ('Mon. Angl.,' ii. 798). The " fitz " seems to have been dropped in the next generation, and the spelling of Guer changed to Gower about 1270 ; but the pronunciation of the name has been tra- ditionally handed down to the present day as " Goer." The manor of Stitenham has come down in the male line to the present Duke of Sutherland. This personal name was very uncommon, but occurs once in Domesday Book : " Gueri [sic] canonicus S. Pauli" then held two hides in Twyford (Middx., vol. i. fo. 127s).

As the poet, though a Kentish man, spelt his name Gower, he may, for that reason, have been of the Yorkshire family, but this personal name occurs in Kent, and his arms on his monument in Southwark Cathedral are quite different from those of the Stiten- ham Gowers. Henry II. gave to the nuns of the Minster in the Isle of Sheppey land in Holt which one Goher had held (' Mon. Angl.' \ 153 )- Richard I. confirmed (1198/9) to Woodham Priory in Essex lands given by

William Goer and Richard Goer (ib., i. 889). In the case of the poet and the well-known London street this name is always pro- nounced as power is, and not as lower, which would be more correct.

Perhaps Gore, and the West of England surname Gyer, Guyer, or Gwyer, are but various spellings of Guer. A. S. ELLIS.

Westminster.

In one compartment of the massive screen separating the nave of St. David's Cathedral from the choir may be seen the tomb of Bishop Henry Gower (1328-47), who did so much for the fabric of the cathedral. Murray's ' Handbook of the Welsh Cathedrals,' p. 238, says :

" He was also the founder of a hospital at Swansea ; and it is probable as his surname seems to indicate that he was a native of that town or of its neighbourhood. Little is recorded of him, although he has ' left, on the whole, more extensive traces of his mind at St. David's than any bishop who has occupied the see, either before or since ' (Jones and Freeman, p. 303)."

JOHN PICKFOBD, M.A.

LONDON SHOP FRONTS : " CHAPZUGAR CHEESE " (10 S. xi. 407, 455). The com- moner form is Schabzieger, the German name of a special sort of cheese, made from the second caseous deposit to which blue melilot has been added ; the German word of unknown origin has been Englished into sapsago, a corruption to which the idea of sap and sago has probably contributed.

G. KBUEGEB.

Berlin.

"LEAGUES" (10 S. xi. 386). In that invaluable storehouse of British folk-lore, the ' English Dialect Dictionary,' will be found some assistance in the understanding of this word. A leaguer-lady is a camp-lady, and an Aberdeen phrase (also " ligger ") for a soldier's wife, one who follows a camp, a term used in contempt :

I maun hae my gown made Like ony ligger lady Side an' wide aboot the tail.

' Reminiscences of Aberdeenshire,' by Wm. Paul, 1881.

In 'All 's Well that Ends Well ' (Act III. sc. vi.) one of the young French lords in the camp before Florence says : " We will bind and hoodwink him so that he shall suppose no other but that he is carried into the leaguer of the adversaries." The word is said to be of Dutch origin. Nares in his ' Glossary ' says that a " leaguer " is the camp of the assailants in a siege, not a camp in general ; whence a besieged town