Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 5.djvu/321

 us. V.APRIL 6, 1912.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

261

LOXDOX, SATURDAY, APRIL >;, 1912.

CONTENTS. No. 119.

NOTES : A Runic Calendar, 261 Charles Dickens, 262 Americanisms, 264 Sugar Cupping at Easter 'Pickwick': Early Reference Archbishop Laud's Relations, 265 Ancient Terms English Bards and the Scottish Language The National Anthem, 266 Taking Tobacco : Women Smoking Vanishing London : The Sardinian Archway, 267.

"QUERIES : Drummond of Hawthornden, 267 Authors of Quotations Wanted Quotation from Emerson H.E.I.C.S. : Chaplains' Certificates Ralph Antrobus Portrait of Leland Tenterden Steeple and Goodwin Sands Byron and the Sidney Family De Quincey and Coleridge, 268 Register of Bacon's Birth An Epigram of Spenser Dr James of St. Bees School Arms for Identification Kroll's Hotel : Mysterious Crime Knell Book of Barking " Queer his pitch" James Brooke Belasyse " Sportsman " Hotels, 269" Sone " Hough Family James Mathews Penleaze Relics of London's Past Osmunderley Powell Dean Hearn Meaning of Nursery Rimes Thomas Wharton=Massey, 270.

REPLIES: Arithmetic among the Romans Register Transcribers of 1602, 271 Author of Song Wanted Mar- montel or Moliere Halfacree Surname The Levant Company, 272 Henry Blake Felicia Hemans Duchesse de Bouillon. 273 Whittington and his Cat Queen Anne's Children, 274 John Mildenhall Isaac Hawkins Browne Toasts and Good Stories "The St. Albans Ghost' St. Agnes : Folk-lore " De la " in English Surnames, 275 Mummers Beazant Family Skating in the Middle Ages Money-box Nottingham as a Surname, 276.

NOTES ON BOOKS :' Cambridge County Geographies' ' Benvenuto Cellini ' ' Fortnigntly Review.'

Booksellers' Catalogues.

Notices to Correspondents.

A RUNIC CALENDAR.

VICTORIA A>TD ALBERT MUSEUM. ROOM 132, No. 9014-' 63.

THE calendar which forms the subject of these notes has the appearance of a some- what lengthy walking-stick, made of china ; but a closer inspection shows that it is enamelled on a thin copper tube. Over the greater part of the length there are four rows of characters, and two rows of some- what crudely painted objects, largely agri- cultural. The crook handle is decorated with a dragon's head and lotus leaves, and a hole is provided in it for a tassel or for suspension.

The workmanship is said to be Chinese, and is known as " Canton Enamel " ; but there is not the slightest doubt that it is a copy of a carved wooden calendar that originated somewhere in Scandinavia or Denmark.

The characters alluded to above are called " runes," the earliest writing symbols

known to have been used by the Scandinavian race. The word " run : ' in Anglo-Saxon meant a " mystery," the name being given by those to whom the notion of being able to transfer thoughts, by means of mere scratches on wood, bone, stone, &c., ap- peared to be a kind of magic. Although subject to variations, there is one point on which all runic alphabets agree, and that is the order of the first six characters, of which the Latin values are F, U, Th, O, R, K, an arrangement which makes it customary to speak of a runic " futhork " instead of using the more familiar word "alphabet."

It is convenient to note here the " clog calendars : ' used in this country. The most usual form of these was a square prism ,of wood, on which the days were marked by notches cut on the four long edges, each edge corresponding to three months ; every seventh notch was made longer than the other six. The day of the month was not indicated, otherwise than indirectly from the saints' days and ecclesiastical festivals, which were denoted on the calendar by means of conventional symbols, or initials cut opposite and connected to the corre- sponding date. One defect of these calendars is that the day of the week is not clearly indicated.

The runic calendar is an improvement on the clog, but not necessarily developed from it. Instead of by notches, the days were represented by the first seven runes of the futhork, repeated as often as necessary. The immediate consequence of this arrange- ment is that during any one year, with a slight modification in leap years, the same day of the week is always represented by a perfectly distinct symbol. In order to calculate, it is sufficient, of course, to know the symbol of any one day of the week, and the day invariably chosen for this pur- pose is Sunday, its symbol being known as the Dominical or Sunday letter for the year.

In the calendar we are considering, the upper row of runes consists of the cha- racters

(F V ThO R K M)

repeated many times. The year begins near the handle, and goes as far as the end of June down one side, and from July to December down the other, the months being divided