Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 6.djvu/201

 us. vi. AUG. si. 1912.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

161

LOXDOX, SATURDAY, AUGUST !!, 1912.

CONTENTS. -No. 140.

TfOTES : The Breton Origin of the Noble House of Ormonde, 161 A Relic of John Bunyan, 162 Calcutta Statues and Memorials, 163 Liverpool Academy Ancient Leather Collection, 165 " Chattelization " ffairbanck and Rawson Families A French Counting- out Rime, &c., 166 Signs of Old London Double Meanings, 167.

QUERIES: 'Memoirs of Scriblerus,' 167 Col. Cockburn, R. A. German Proverb : Silks in the Kitchen, 168 Mary Tyrrell "The devil owed him a service" References Wanted Robert Denton Sir Edward Boteler, Kt., of Danbury, Essex, 169 Woodville Family Third Pennies Biographical Information Wanted Serjeant Pengellyand Richard Cromwell Murder of Lord William Russell " Nevermass," 170.

iREPLIES : Ballad of Lord Lovel Nottingham as a Sur- name, 171 Peveril Casanova and Carlyle Authors of Quotations Wanted Coffee, Chocolate : First Advertise- ment No Twin ever Famous Names terrible to Children, 172 Bagenal Family Londres : Londiniuin Mary Seymour, 173 Copper Mine in Devonshire References Wanted Oxford Jacobite Plot Edward Boate, M. P. Regent's Circus The English Participle Present and Gerund, 174 Van Dyck with the Sunflower Thomas Pretty, Vicar of Hursley Powdered Alabaster " Airplane," 175 Col. Lowther Henry Hunt Piper " According to Cocker " The Royal George : Name of Durham Weather Rime, 176 Chained Books Hanwell : Brewerne Abbey H.M. Barque Endeavour Brodribb of Somerset, 177.

Ts'OTES ON BOOKS : -Calendars of Fine Rolls, Close Rolls, and Patent Bolls ' The Cornhill Magazine.'

^Notices to Correspondents.

THE BRETON ORIGIN OF THE NOBLE HOUSE OF ORMONDE.

THE account of this great and historic family in ' Burke's Peerage ' used to begin thus :

" Its origin is not clearly established. The surname ' Butler ' is not, however, dubious, toeing derived from the chief Butlerage of Ireland, conferred by Henry II. on Theobald Walter in 1177.... the eldest son of Herveius Walter, one of the companions of the Conqueror."

This passage has been altered in later editions, and the last statement, which dates make impossible, properly omitted.

The Hervey Walter above mentioned, the grandfather of Theobald, had held a third of a knight's fee in Belaugh in Norfolk and Boxted in Suffolk. Domesday Book (ii. f. 147) shows that in 1086 this land in " Belagh " was held by one " Gingom " of Earl Alan. This unusual personal name is so clearly written in the original judging

from the photo -zincograph that there can be no mistake about any of the letters, but the scribe had evidently made an error. The word was " Guigon," a Breton name more familiar to us as " Wigan." We may reasonably suspect this property had been inherited by Theobald's grandfather from this Domesday tenant. We see that Guigon held " Belagh " of the great Breton Count Alan, made Earl of the East Angles. The Earl was already a greater landholder in North Yorkshire, evidently under the con- dition that he built a castle (Richmond) and maintained it always garrisoned like Dover ; and some of his military tenants, we shall see, bore variations of the Butler coat of arms.

Alan fitz " Flaud " granted the church of Sporle in Norfolk, with lands there and at Mileham, to the abbey of St. Florent at Saumur in the presence of the monks Guihenoc, Guigon, and William (' Cal. Docs, in France,' edited by Dr. Round, i. 414). The first named had been the grantee of Monmouth, but had taken the cowl before 1086, and Guigon, if the landholder in Belagh, 1086, must have followed his example. It is curious that one of the churches in Hope in Herefordshire, which had been given by this " Wihanoc " to the same abbey, was then known as " Hope Gingani " (ib., p. 403) but I would read this Guigani.

So long ago as 1878 I wrote in ' N. & Q.,' under the heading ' Fleance ' (5 S. x. 402), that it is remarkable to find the descendants of Alan, the Seneschal of Dol, as seneschals or stewards to the Kings of Scotland,

"and no less so that Hervey the Butler should be the progenitor as he no doubt was, although the fact has not been remarked before of the great Butlers of Ireland and the most noble house of Ormonde."

This Hervey " Butelarius " witnessed three or four Dol charters with Alan the Seneschal, and a Walter fitz Hervey, with another Walter and Hervey his son, one of Alan himself. Walter and Hervey were common names in Brittany, but not often found together like this. One of these, it may be reasonably suspected, was the Walter de Dol who had forfeited land acquired by him at Ashfield in Suffolk (Dom. Book, ii. f. 377) ; and the other, the ancestor of the Butlers of Ireland, either was the heir of Guigon, or married his daughter and so inherited Bylaugh. Dona- tions to the abbey of St. Florent were made by John (de Dol) and Geldwin in the presence of William the abbot, their brother, and, among others, of these laics :