Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 5.djvu/554

 NOTES AND QUERIES. [11 s. v. JI-NE s. i 9 j<-'.

Jennens bought Acton Place, Suffolk, be- cause the Eastern Counties were believed by him to be the first home of his Danish ancestors.

Of course, any story of Canute would be received with caution by a writer of 1631, and, like Herodotus, he would safeguard himself in the way instanced ; but this does not disprove the legend, which Burke thought worthy of insertion in his genealogical work. If there were any family relics preserved by Robert Jennens at Acton, they too, pro- bably, are preserved in the Howe family. The family mansion there, after the death of William the Rich, who died intestate, was deserted, and no one put in a claim ; but one fine morning Charlotte Howe took, forcible possession so tradition says on behalf of her infant son Augustus. Their descendants, on the ground that they belong to one branch of next-of-kin, still retain the estates.

In addition to pedigrees which I possess, Mr. David Jennings, of the Staffordshire line, has a pedigree of the Bloxwich line, with copies of registers. &c., eleven pedi- grees bearing on the Warwickshire and Stafford Jennenses, and three pedigrees of the Howe family. I have also pedigrees of the Hanmer and other families who came after Humphrey Jennens's time.

In 1835 a petition was presented by John Jennings regarding the property, but, as I have stated previously no one of the name of Jennings has any claim, as Charles Jennens was the last of the male line. The heading of the claim is as follows :

" Family estates date back something like 000 years. About the tenth century they were introduced into this county by Canute. His royal residence was Beaudesert, about 4 miles N.E. of the town of Cannock, which town was named after him."

There is no part of England where the ruins of Danish fortifications are more numerous than in Staffordshire. The prin- cipal defence was the mound on which Stafford Castle stands. In later times the castle was in charge of Robert Jennings, who was created a baron. 'SYDNEY HERBERT.

Carlton Lodge, Cheltenham.

C. L. CHRISTINECKE (11 S.'v. 329). This probably is Charles Louis Christinec, painter and copperplate engraver. He practised portrait painting, &c., at St. Petersburg, where, in 1785, he was admitted to the rank of Academician. The St. Petersburg Aca- demy possesses a half-length portrait of the Russian Court architect, J. M. Felten, painted by Christinec, and signed " Ludwig

Christinec, 1786." Numerous other por- traits by him were exhibited in 1905 in the Taiirian Palace at St. Petersburg. Hei- necken, ' Diet, des Artistes,' Leipsic, vol. iv. p. 104, mentions an engraved portrait by Christinec of Thomas Dimsdale, the eminent physician (1712-1800). It will be remem- bered that Dimsdale was invited by the Empress Catharine in 1768 to visit St. Petersburg to inoculate her and her son against smallpox, and no doubt on this visit Christinec painted the portrait referred to. Besides the very brief reference in Heinecken, fuller particulars of the artist may be found in Baron N. N. Wrangel's- Catalogue of the Art Collections of the Imperial Academy at St. Petersburg ; Petroff in ' Khudozh Novosti,' 1890 ; ' Collection of Materials for the History of the Petersburg Academy,' i. ; and Ulrich Thieme's ' Lexikon der bildenden Kunstler,' vol. vi. p. 544 (Leipsic, 1912).

A. L. HUMPHREYS. 187, Piccadilly, \V.

HERALDIC CHARC4E : ITS MEANING (US. v. 330). In the case of Spanish coats of arms which contain a Moor's head, arm, and dagger, it is usually claimed that an ancestor had overcome a Moor in battle. For in- stance, Barranco : -

" Vencio y inato a un r^gulo 6 alcaide moro en un barranco en tiempo de Don Alonso VI., y tomo el apellido Barranco ; y entonces tom<> esta familia las armas que usa, que son : en campo verde la cabeza de un rey moro con tur- bante y media hina de plata, entre dos colina* que forman barranco del color de las piedras, y sobre la cabeza un brazo armado con e.spada levantada."

LEO C.

" STATIC BENE FIDA CARINIS " (11 S. v, 369). This is the municipal motto of the City of Cork, on a scroll beneath a full- rigged ship between battlemented towers- What these latter represent I am unable to say, neither do I know the history of the adoption of the former. Its pertinence, however, is indisputable.

J. B. McGovERN.

St. Stephen's Rectory, C.-on-M., Manchester.

Miss HOWARD AND NAPOLEON IIL (11 S. iv. 347, 430, 473, 535). I well remember being told that Louis Napoleon was anxious to marry the daughter of Sir John Kirkland, who was the squire of my father's Sussex parish in the fifties ; and I think I have since heard the assertion confirmed. This may interest your corre- spondents. E. L. *H. TEW.

Upham Rectory, Hants.