Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 2.djvu/279

 us. vm. OCT. 4, MS.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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gives to the Great Court of Trinity, where the eye, after contemplating the divers attractions of that vast enclosure, is re- freshed and renewed as it rests upon so admirable a centre-piece, which binds the work of different ages and differing minds into one composition. A. R. BAYLEY.

ROLANDS AULEN (11 S. viii. 145). I know such monuments at Halle an der Saale, Calbe an der Saale, Zerbst in the Duchy of Anhalt, Llibeck, Nordhausen, Frankfurt on the Oder, all of which towns belong to the Low German territory. The translation of the inscription quoted by ST. SWITHIN is :

"Here I testify to your freedom, which Charle niagne and many another prince forsooth gave to this town ; my advice is that you should thank God for it."

G. KRUEGER. Berlin.

Dr. Richard Beringuier in his 'Die Rolande Deutschlands. Festschrift zur Feier des 25jahrigen Bestehens des Vereins fiir die Geschichte Berlins am 28 Januar, 1890,' gives a brief description, w r ith an illustration in each case, of the remaining Rolandssaulen in Germany, some of w r hich are in a highly fragmentary condition. They are arranged in geographical groups as follows : Brakel, Obermarsberg, Bremen, Bederkesa ; Bramstedt, Wed el ; Halber- stadt, Quedlinburg, Kalbe, Stendal, Buch bei Tangermiinde ; Nordhausen, Neustadt unterm Hohnstein, Questenberg, Erfurt ; Perleberg, Zerbst, Halle an der Saale, Belgem bei Torgaii, Burg bei Magdeburg, Brandenburg an der Havel, Prenzlau in der Ukermark, Potzlow, siidlich von Prenzlau, Zehden twenty -four in all. Besides these he includes two statues popularly known as Rolandssaulen, those at Posen and Neu- haldensleben, and the arm and sword on the Rathhaus at Miinster in Westfalen.

'The Encyclopaedia Britannica,' ed. 11, under 'Roland, Legend of,' repeats with- out any \varning the statement that a " statua Rolandi " is mentioned in a Privi- legium granted by Henry- V. to the towTi of Bremen in the year 1111. This has been generally discredited. Beringuier points out that this and other forgeries were made soon after 1404, and that a Burgermeister of the time, Johann Hemeling, was probably responsible for the fraud.

The copy of the inscription in ' N. & Q.' varies in several particulars from two others that I have seen, but the form of the German words is so obligingly like our own (if one

can forget international differences in spell- ing, " ju " is good English enough), with, the Low-German " openbar," "ghegheven," and " Gode " coming halfway to help one,, that something more than " a vague guess " is easy. Is not the meaning " I proclaim unto you Liberty that Charles [the Great] and many a Prince, in truth, have granted to this town. So thank God is my advice " ? EDWARD BENSLY.

RED HAND OF ULSTER (US. vii. 189, 175,. 334, 373, 434 ; viii. 14, 95, 154, 217). I am sorry that my allusion to the " old heralds " was so vague as to mislead B. B. I meant to refer to mediaeval heraldry, being under the impression that the Red Hand of Ulster was much older than the order of baronets. If B. B. will refer to the article from which I quoted, he will see that it constantly emphasizes the differences between mediaeval heraldry and the new Tudor school to which Guillim belonged, a school addicted to elaborate description of details.

The Fanes and Vanes descend from a common ancestor, Henry Vane of Ton- bridge, living in the first half of the fifteenth, century ; and if one branch bears right -hand gauntlets, and the other left-hand, it cer- tainly looks as if the difference W 7 ere once considered immaterial. If the Fane gaunt- lets have changed from left to right since 1638, it would seem that the question of left or right was still treated as of little importance as late as the seventeenth cen- tury, notwithstanding the efforts of heralds like Guillirn. No doubt there is an alterna- tive explanation : that the two families deliberately decided to difference their arms ; but this does not seem so likely.

G. H. WHITE.

St. Cross, Harleston, Norfolk.

DIVINATION BY TWITCHING (11 S. viii, 187, 237). This superstition was widely dis- seminated in antiquity. A Greek treatise on the subject, the Tre/H TraAa/xwv fj.avTiKtj of the Pseudo-Melampus, is extant. An account of the work, with references to various allusions to the practice, will be found in the ' Catalogue of the Greek Papyri in the John Rylands Library,' vol. i., Literary Texts, ed. by A. S. Hunt, 1911, in the Intro- duction to No. 28, which is a papyrus containing sixteen pages of a treatise similar to, but different from, the work of the Pseudo-Melampus. Yet another treatise of the kind is contained in a papyrus published by Vitelli in Atene e Rama, 61-2, pp. 1 32 ff., 1904. Hunt in his Introduction refers