Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 12.djvu/116

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NOTES AND QUERIES. [10 s. xn. JULY 31, im

seven impediments, which have to be removed before one can begin to explain.

1. Botterwort is ^iven as "an ancient spelling." Yes ; but it is a Norman spelling, and has to be set aside. The Norman scribes wrote a French t for an English th.

2. We are told it was formerly Botwerth and Botesworth. The final -werth has e miswritten for o, as often. Hence Botwerth must be set aside. It is further obvious that the slight curl, so common for er, has been disregarded. Hence the form really meant is Boterworth, which is quite right. So also Botesworth is an error for Boteres- wdrth, which is also quite right.

3. Next we have the statement that buthor is Norse for " bittern." But " bittern " is mere French, and the " Norse " form was borrowed from it, and is worse than value- less. Neither is Butterworth connected with bittern in any way.

4. Next comes the assertion that worth is the same word as garth !

5. Next we come to the Norse Christian name Buthar. But Butter- is English ; and I suspect that this " Norse " name is merely an English name done into Norse.

6. Next, " it was often spelt Bot- or Bed- worth " ; and *' in Cheshire it was Bud " ! And originally it was " Bodder, meaning a messenger." But the d is merely a voiced form of the older t ; and one would like to know in what language this precious bodder occurs. The A.-S. for " messenger " was boda (with no -er} ; and it is totally irrele- vant.

7. Then we are referred to an obsolete book by Ferguson, the value of which can be seen by his quoting " Bod, Bud," as " an envoy " ; but the A.-S. was boda, and never buda at all.

And now let us get back to common sense, and drop, all misleading guesses.

We have Derbyshire Butterley ; Wilts (as well as Cumb.) Buttermere ; and Line. Butterwick. The Wilts name is much more likely to be English than Norse. One of the Line. Butterwicks (near Boston) is inland ; so that the -wick is the English wick, not the Norse one. And -worth is English. So there is no reason why all the names should not be English. After all, England is a likely place in which to find English names.

In the Inquisitiones post Mortem, which often supply better spellings than the Anglo-French forms in Domesday Book, I find Boterley, &oterwike, Boterwyk, Buter- wike ; also Butterley, But termer, Butter- wike, Butterworthe.

The riddle is not difficult. Searle's ' Onomasticon * tells us that Buterus is a (Latinized) personal name in List B in Ellis's ' Introduction ' to Domesday Book ; and that Boterus (Latinized form of Bot- here) occurs in List C in the same.

Hence the sense is simply " Bot-here's farm." I have already explained worth three times. See my ' Place-Names ' of Cambs, of Herts, and of Hunts.

Bot is mod. E. boot, profit. Here is the A.-S. here, an army. The former appears again in Bot-wine, B5t-wulf, &c. ; and the latter in Wulf-here, Here-weard, &c.

Bot becomes " But " in popular pronun- ciation. Botulph Lane, Cambridge (from Bot-wulf), is called Buttle Lane.

The -es in the genitive is often preserved, but was sometimes dropped, as I have shown already. Cf. Botefesworth above. WALTER W. SKEAT.

PIG GRASS: FIONING GRASS (10 S. xii. 49). See the * N.E.D.,' vol. iv. p. 237, col. 3, under " fiorin," where the first quotation is from W. Richardson, 1809. For an account of him and his introduction of the grass see ' D.N.B.,' xlviii. 253.

W. C. B.

See Britten and Holland, ' Plant Names/ 1886, p. 183 :

seedsmen under this name. Prior, p. 78.'

For pig or swine's grass see pp. 224 and 229. S. L. PETTY.

HOLT CASTLE AND THE BEAUCHAMP FAMILY (10 S. xi. 308, 395, 490; xii. 56). Will TERTIUS kindly say where the history of Holt Castle under the Beauchamps, which he writes that he is now aware of, is to be found ? I should be glad to have details of the family beyond those pieced together in my communication at the penultimate reference.

FREDK. A. EDWARDS.

BEEZELY (10 S. ix. 269, 338 ; xi. 475 ; xii. 57). Probably the explanation of the discrepancies is to be found in the following.

Stephen Whatley's ' England's Gazetteer ' was published over 150 years ago (1751).

I find in the map of Southampton (i.e., Hampshire) in Samuel Lewis's ' Topogra- phical Dictionary of England,' 1835, vol. iv., that there was, when that map was drawn, a detached part of Hampshire within the borders of Sussex, about 8 miles long from north to south, varying in breadth from