Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 1.djvu/78

72

NOTES AND QUERIES. [12 s. i. JAN. 22, me. regularly represents the name of Trent as Dr. Bradley divined, although he and Prof. Rhys wrongly read "Trisanton"; cp. 'Celtic Britain,' 1904, p. 80. We now turn to O.E. In that Germanic dialect exotic ă regularly became æ͏̆; cp. Æbbercurnig, Kælcacæstir, Cænt, Sæfern, &c. This postulates *Træsænt-on or *Træhænt-on. I assume that British s had become h before the North and South Mercians seated themselves upon the Trent; cp. Bede, 'H.E.,' III. xxiv. (p. 180). Now intervocalic h, and medial h preceding a vowel, disappeared from O.E. words at an early date; cp. Sievers-Cook, 'Grammar of O.E.,' 1887, p. 118, and Prof. Wright, 'O.E. Grammar,' 1908, §329, 4. A few instances survive in the Epinal Glosses, written early in the eighth century. This failure postulates *Træænt- with a or e for the final syllable -on. This form does not appear, but in Mercian and in Kentish there was an irregular treatment of œ͏̆ which reduced it to ĕ. This was independent of i-infection, and yielded such forms as deg, feder, fet, where we expect to find the normal and West Saxon dæg, fæder, fæt; cp. Wright, u.s., 54, note 1. For this reason we may look for Treenta, and that we actually find in the passage in the ' Historia ' (II. xvi. p. 117) in which Bede quotes Deda, abbot of Partney in Lincolnshire, as the ecclesiastic who told him what he knew about the baptism of the Mercians, in 627, by Paulinus, " in fluuio Treenta." Here, I take it, Bede was copying his informant's dialect. In two other places Bede wrote " Treanta," and that may well be Northumbrian ; cp. III. xxiv. p. 180, and IV. xxi. p. 249. The West Saxon form was " Treonta " ; cp. Saxon Chronicle (Winchester MS.) at annal 924. This annal was written by a contemporary scribe. In the Peterborough Chronicle (scr. c. 1120) we find " Trenta " on each of the three occasions when the river is named. This East Midland form eventually prevailed.

The suggestion that there is a verbal connexion between the Welsh " Annwn " and the scribal Hannon is quite uncritical.

In a paper on ' English Place-Names ' contributed to Essays and Studies by Members of the English Association,' 1910, p. 24, Dr. Bradley speaks of the names of rivers mentioned by Roman writers, and warns us that their meaning and etymology are very obscure, because they " belong to too early a stage of the (Welsh) language to be interpreted at present with any certainty." ALFRED ANSCOMBE. 30 Albany Road, Stroud Green, N.

<THE VICAR OF BRAY ' (11 S. xii. 453; 12 S. i. 12). In my note at the first refer- ence I asked for proof that there was a CoL Fuller's regiment in the reign of George I.,. in view of the assertion that the song was written by an officer of a regiment bearing that name in that reign.

Undoubtedly there was one 7 ' Francis Fuller who was Colonel of the 29th Regi- ment, date of commission Aug. 28, 1739, as given by COL. FYNMORE (ante, p. 12) ; but the date of that commission is in the thirteenth year of George II.

In ' George the First's Army, 1 714-2 7/ by Charles Dalton, 1910, 1912, only two Fullers appear in the indexes, viz., Francis Fuller, captain 1st Regiment of Foot Guards, March 30, 1710/11 (sic), and John Fuller* ensign 4th Foot, June 11, 1720. It is possible that the former was the Fuller who became Colonel of the 29th Foot in 1739. According to old Army Lists, e.g., that of 1777, there were two colonels of the 29th Regiment in the reign of George I., viz.,. Lord Mark Kerr and H. Desney. They were followed in the reign of George II.. by the Earl of Albemarle, G. Read, Francis Fuller, &c.

There is a good deal about ' The Vicar of Bray ' in 6 S. xi. 167, 255, much of which is incorrect. Several of the correspondents have trusted Chappell's version of what Nichols wrote. In J. Nichols's ' Select Collection of Poems,' 1780-82, vol. viii. p. 234, is a note concerning the mention of the song ' The Vicar of Bray ' in a poem

' To H Y M N, Esq. on his refusing

a Christmass dinner,' &c. In this note Nichols says :

" This [' The Vicar of Bray '] is said to have been written by an officer in Colonel Fuller's regiment in the reign of K. George the First."

Chappell writes :

" Nichols in his ' Select Poems ' says that the song of the Vicar of Bray ' was written by a soldier in Colonel Fuller's troop of Dragoons, in the reign of George I." ' Old English Popular Music,' by William Chappell, a new edition, revised by H. Ellis Wooldridge, 1893, vol. ii. p. 123.

Thus Chappell, using inverted commas for a very incorrect quotation, makes Nichols state as a fact what he mentions as merely a report or tradition, and changes " an officer in Colonel Fuller's regiment " into " a soldier in Colonel Fuller's troop of Dragoons." More or less consequently this alleged author of ' The Vicar of Bray ' appears in ' N. & Q.' as " an officer in Col. Fuller's regiment " (so described by Nichols) ; "a soldier in