Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 6.djvu/286

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NOTES AND QUERIES. tn s. vi. SEPT. 21, 1912.

A marriage -broker, for instance, belongs to a popular profession. The broker receives a barakah, literally a blessing, but in practice a gift or douceur. In Spain, Arabic words, the survivals of the Moorish dominion, are far from uncommon. An Alcalde = al-qddhi, an Algua,zi\=al-wazir, an alcoba (Eng. alcove ) = al-qubba, and so on ; hence alboroque would naturally equal al-barakah. From alboroque could easily be derived the Latin word for an agent or middleman, abrocator, whence the Provenal abrocador and the French abrocour. I think, therefore, that, leaving the Jews out of the question, MB. MAYHEW is probably right in suggesting the Semitic origin of the word " broker." W. F. PBIDEAUX.

MR. MAYHEW'S explanation is most inter- esting. When I was a lad, I frequently accompanied my father on a Sunday morning, to the " Coffee House " an old jewellery mart, near Duke's Place Synagogue. After a deal of chaffering on both sides, the seller would grasp my father's hand and utter the pious benediction, " Mozzel and berocha to you, Mr. Breslar " ("Luck and prosperity, Mr. Breslar "), on clinching my father's final offer for a parcel of gold watches, rings, or what not. No doubt that fine old courtesy in Hebrew mercantile life was imported from Holland, whither many of the highest families fled from Spain in 1492. Baruk is still the exact mode in which the Spanish Hebrew pro- nounces our word boruch.

M. L. R. BRESLAR.

CLEOPATRA'S PORTRAIT (11 S. v. 88, 176). In ' Egyptian Obelisks,' by Henry H. Gorringe, Lieutenant - Commander United States Navy (London, 1885), facing p. 72, is a portrait of Cleopatra

" photographed directly from her coins, and finished as any other portrait would be by an artist, who has endeavoured to be faithful to the original. The four coins reproduced below the portrait were found under the obelisk in Alexandria very much defaced and corroded. These coins, struck from different dies, mani- festly give us a true representation of Cleopatra's profile." P. 73.

Inscribed on the portrait is " L. Mounier, fecit 1881." The " Artotype " appears to have been done by E. Bierstadt, N.Y. Here Cleopatra appears as a very handsome woman of rather a Jewish type.

Lieutenant-Commander Gorringe under- took the removal of " Cleopatra's Needle " from Alexandria to New York. His book was first published in New York, 1882.

ROBERT PIERPOINT.

DETACHED PORTIONS OF COUNTIES (11 S. vi. 69, 156). There is no doubt that the inclusion in Worcestershire of the parishes referred to is due to their past ownership by the Bishop, or the abbeys of Evesham and Pershore. Old Barrow is now known as Oldberrow. It has been transferred to Warwickshire for administrative purposes, and more recently the benefice has been united to that of Morton Bagot, one of the adjoining Warwickshire parishes.

Nash in his ' History of Worcestershire ' made considerable use of the earlier labours of Habington of Hindlip, who, because of his complicity in the Gunpowder Plot, was condemned to remain within the area of the county of Worcester. To this circum- stance, and the difficulty of visiting places like Oldberrow, Alderminstef, and the large parish of Tredington, owing to their detach- ment from the rest of the county, may be due the comparatively scant attention given to them, until recently, by historians of Worcestershire.

Much additional light has been thrown on the early history of the two last named by the Rev. J. Harvey Bloom, as the result of discoveries made during the progress of the work of sorting and indexing for the Dean and Chapter of Worcester the huge collection of documents removed in April last from the Edgar Tower to the new Diocesan Registry. This is in St. Michael's Church, rendered available for the purpose by a rearrangement of the ecclesiastical parishes in the centre of the city.

A. C. C.

POWDERED ALABASTER (11 S. vi. 129, 175). Alabaster has never had a place, so far as I know, in the London or British Pharma- copoeia, but it is included among the simple medicines of some of our older Dispensa- tories. It appears also in Lemery's ' Traite Universel des Drogues Simples' (1723), in which its virtues are thus stated :

" II est propre pour amolir [sic] les duretez & pour les resoudre ; il appaise les douleurs de 1'estomac, 4tant appliqu6 dessus, il absorbe comme Alkali, I'acrete qui tombe sur les gencives dans le scorbut ; il raffermit les dents en les nettoyant."

C. C. B.

The following extract from lolo Mor- ganwg's Diary, when that eminent bard and antiquary travelled through Wales in 1802, may prove of interest :

" Leave Cardigan, take the road to Llanfernach. Bridell Church .... Meet a man who carries a stone about the country, which he calls Llysfaen.