Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 7.djvu/577

 10 s. VIL JUNE io, 1907.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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In Upton Church, and a window with the initials C. P. and C. R., which are by another hand. JOHN HEBB.

MAGDALEN COLLEGE SCHOOL AND THE " D.N.B.' (10 S. vii. 383). For "the Decani and Cantores," in the first para- graph of the second column, read " the pars Decani and pars Cantoris " the south and north sides of the chapel. A. R. BAYLEY.

[The REV. COMPTON READE, an old chorister at Magdalen, sends a similar correction.]

' A SHORT EXPLICATION ' OF MUSICAL TERMS (10 S. vii. 409, 454). I possess a copy, which I shall be happy to show your correspondent if he will call on me at the Guildhall School of Music.

WILLIAM H. CUMMINGS.

JEisallaimrus.

NOTES ON BOOKS, &o.

A Tragedie of Abraham* Sacrifice, By Theodore Beza. Translated by Arthur Golding. Edited by M. W. Wallace, Ph.D. (Sonnenschein & Co.) THE 'Abraham Sacrifiant' by the Reformer Theo- dore Beza, published at Geneva in 1550, has been pronounced by a modern critic to be " The first French tragedy that shows a trace of true talent." It found a translator in Arthur Golding, who produced a faithful and spirited version of it in 1577- Only a single copy of this scarce work is known to exist that in the Bodleian which formerly belonged to Malone ; and it is here re- printed for the first time in a luxurious volume illustrated with facsimiles of the original woodcuts. The strong situation and dramatic pathos of the tragedy in which the father felt constrained to sacrifice his only son made the story a favourite with the early playwrights, and it finds a place in all the well-known cycles of mystery plays.

Beza on the whole kept close to the narrative in Genesis, with the exception of introducing Satan among the dramatis perxonce : not, indeed, as the customary Vice Beza was far too serious a moralist to treat the subject with levity but rather in the role of Chorus, as supplying an element of irony which alternately instigates and condemns a deed which, in its natural aspect cruel and barbarous, was as a spiritual act a marvellous exhibition of faith and self-surrender.

Dr. Wallace, of University College, Toronto, has supplied a copious apparatus in the way of notes .and introduction. \\ e have observed one instance where he has neglected an opportunity of pointing out a curious and interesting illustration of a passage in Chaucer. Beza represents Satan as saying (11. 165-8) :-

Tous ces paillars, ces gourmans, ces yurongnes Qu'on voit reluire auec leurs rouges trongnes, Portans sapphirs, & rubis des plus fins, Sont mes supposts, sont mes vrais Cherubins.

This Golding renders (11. 170-73) : 'These lechours, drunkards, gluttons ouerfedd, Whose noses shine faire tipt with brazell redd,

Which wear fine precious stones uppon their

skinnes, Are my upholders & my Cherubins.

Closely parallel to this is Chaucer's description of the red pimpled face of the Somnour :- A Somnour was ther with us in that place, lhat hadde a fyr-reed cherubinnes face. For sawcefleem he was, with eyen narwe. As hoot he was, and lecherous, as a sparwe.

Cant. Tales,' ' Prologue,' 11. 623-6 (ed. Skeat).

It seems that the cherubim, being depicted as red the symbolical colour of love in the Middle A<W were made a byword for rubicund visages. Francis Thynne in his ' Debate between Pride and Lowli- ness says of a " Vintener " "his face was redd as any cherubyn" (Shaks. Soc. Ed., p. 30). This favourite simile speaks volumes as to medieval art.

AConcMe Dictionary of the Assyrian Language. By

W. Muss-Arnolt. (Williams &Norgate.) THIS important work essential to any one who wishes to study Assyrian began to be published so tar back as 1895, when it was expected that it might be completed in seven or eight parts. As a matter of fact, owing to the immense accession of new material in recent years, the work has so grown under the hands of the editor that it has taken nine- teen parts, the last of which has now been issued The words registered have full references given to published texts, with definitions in English as well as German.

The only fault we have to find is that in some instances derived usages are separately entered as substantive words; e.g., ummii, capital, stock, investment, has an article to itself, whereas it is merely a tropical use of ummu, mother capital in many languages being regarded as the parent of the interest which it produces as its offspring.

The Yorkshire Archaeological Journal. No. 74.

(Leeds, Whitehead & Son.)

THERE are but two papers in the present issue ; both are, however, of considerable value as in- dicating original research pursued with great industry.

Gilling Castle is one of the most important mediaeval buildings in the North of England Mr Bilson furnishes a sketch of the lives of the various owners thereof from an early period, and also a careful account of the building accompanied by excellent engravings. The Mowbrays possessed Gilhng soon after the Norman Conquest; when they were divested of it does not seem certain, but it is probable that it was forfeited on account of the rebellion of 1106. The Ettons were sub-tenants, and Mr. Bilson finds them there in the latter half of the twelfth century. Pedigrees of this family are furnished which, so far as we can test them, are accurate. They seem on the whole to have been a quiet race. Though connected in blood or by friend- ship with some of the higher families of the county, they took little part in the rebellions and blood- feuds which so long disturbed the northern shires. Thomas de Etton the younger was perhaps an ex- ception. He was careless, violent, or very un- fortunate ; perhaps, too, he was a spendthrift. He certainly became deeply indebted to the York Jews. He also slew, as the Meux Chronicle records, a certain Jordan de Raventhorpe " propter sororem suam Ceciliam." About the middle of the fifteenth century the male line of Etton came to an end, and