Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 2.djvu/471

 W8.ii.Nov.i2.i9w.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

to 1865 are in the possession of Messrs. Wright, Brown & Strong, solicitors, Carlisle, who will (for a consideration) make searches and give certified copies of entries. Registers covering years from 1783 to 1894 (but apparently in- complete) are in the possession of Mr. Simon Lang (not Long), 72, High Street, Felling, Newcastle, who will also make searches. The marriage register in the possession of Mrs. Armstrong, Greenbrae, Dornock, near Annan, is that of "Gretna Hall," but in her letter that lady did not mention the period which it covers.

BERNARD P. SCATTERGOOD. Moorside, Far Headingley, Leeds.

"TOMAHAWK": ITS ORIGIN. One is sur- prised to find this described as " Modern " in the latest edition of Prof. Skeat's large dictionary. It is, on the contrary, one of the very oldest of our borrowings from the North American Indian. It belongs to the Vir- ginian and Carolinan stratum, otherwise called Southern Algonquin. Capt. John Smith gives the Virginian form as tomahack (Arber's ed., p. 44), and we know from other authorities that the Pamptico or North Carolinan form was tommcwick. I see that most of our dictionaries Ogilvie's being the honourable exception make the mistake of deriving this term from ""Mohegan tumnahegan, Delaware tamoi- hecan" To these might have been added "Abnaki tamahigan, Micmac tumeegun, Passamaquoddy tumhigen" These five dia- lects make up the group called Eastern Algonquin, but none of them can be the source of our English tomahaivk : firstly, because the quotation from Smith proves that we had acquired it before we came into contact with them ; secondly, because the nasal termination -an, -en, -un, never occurs in any English form of it.

JAMES PLATT, Jun.

DUNSTABLE THE MUSICIAN. A mural tablet, erected by the London section of the Incorporated Society of Musicians, was un- veiled on 8 October in the church of St. Ste- phen, Walbrook. John Dunstable was born at Dunstable, in Bedfordshire ; died on Christ- mas Eve, 1453 ; and was buried in the former church of St. Stephen, Walbrook, which was destroyed in the Great Fire of 1666. Very little is known of his life, but in an address delivered by the rector of St. Stephen's, the Rev. K. S. do C. LaiFan, at the unveiling ceremony, it was stated that Johannes Tinc- toris, the celebrated musician of the Nether- lands, who published in 1745 the first lexicon of musical terms, recorded in the preface to

his * Proportionale ' that England was in his time the source and origin of a development of music which had made it appear almost a new art, and that of the English musicians with whom this development originated John Dunstable was the chief. His reputation was not merely English, but European. Specimens of his work are preserved at the British Museum, the Bodleian Library, and in the Library of Trinity College, Cambridge. Thanks to the skill of Dr. Maclean, the original reading of the inscription has been restored. The monument is a beautiful speci- men of glass mosaic, the lower panel contain- ing the restored inscription, while in the upper there are three figures of angel musi- cians against a starry sky, symbolizing the greatness of Dunstable, both as a musician and an astronomer.

FREDERICK T. HIBGAME.

WE must request correspondents desiring in- formation on family matters of only private interest to affix their names and addresses to their queries, in order that the answers may be addressed to them direct.

' ASSISA DE TOLLONEIS,' &c. In the 'Acts of the Parliaments of Scotland,' published by authority in 1846, are three documents, of which I am anxious to know the dates. The first bears the title which heads this note, with the sub- title "parva custuma que dicitur le tpl," and is further described as " Assisa Regis David Regis Scottorum facta apud Nouum Castrum super Tynam per totam communitatem suam Scocie tarn Baronum Burgensium quam aliorum." This occupies two leaves, paged (in red) 667-670.

The second is titled ' Custuma Portuum, and occupies one leaf, paged (in red) 671-2. It is prefaced by a statement that in some books it is written in French, but for better understanding it is transcribed into Latin in this manner :

"Sciant omnes quod anno gratie millesimo

[&c.] facta fuit hec inquisitio in abbathia de ualcow de precepto illustris regis Scocie Dauid primi huius nominis."

The editor thus deliberately and of malice prepense deprived his readers of the date when these rates of customs were originally imposed. I do not remember an instance of a more gratuitous suppression of fact in any book professing to be of practical use.

The third document is paged (in red) 673-4, and is titled 'Assisa Regis David de Mensuris et Ponderibus.'

I shall be most grateful for information as