Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 10.djvu/424

 346 NOTES AND QUERIES. [12 S. X.MAY 6, 19L-2. There are many place-names in England beginning with Blanch, some of which may take their names from the white stone of which they were built, e.g., Blancminster (cf. Whitechurch, &c.), and Blancheflower, the alleged old name of Norwich Castle (cf. also the White Tower in the Tower of London, White Hall, &c.). But there are others, of which Blanch - applet on is one, which are probably so called from some place or family, e.g. : 1. Blanchbuling (Pipe Roll, 20 Hy. III.). 2. Blanch.gern.on (Documents relating to France). 3. Blancagnel (ibid.). 4. Blanchland (ibid.). 5. Blanquefort (ibid.). 6. Blanchfrount (Feudal Aids) and Blaunfront (Ancient Deeds). 7. Blankpeyne (Feudal Aids). 8. Blaunchville (Ancient Deeds). 9. Blaunchard (ibid.). Of these (1) may be Blanch Boulogne, (2) Blanch Gernon and (3) Blanche Agnel, while (7), Blankpeyne, may be an old reading of Whitebread. Blanche may after all be the same as the Scotch " blanch holdings " which, according to Tomlins's ' Law Dictionary,' is a tenure in which the duty payable was nominal and only payable if required, the tenants being practically " whitewashed " of liability. " Quit " rent may be another reading of " white " rent. Of course " white " or " deal- bated" silver is a totally different thing. A sub-question and an interesting one is, when do we find the " Whitechapel " as a district in East London. I do not see how " White Chapel " can get its name except from a mistaken reading of this Blanche Appleton. I can trace no chapel, white or otherwise. The name of Whitechapel itself occurs first in 1321/2, when Wm. de White Chapele sold old clothes in Cornhill (London Letter Book E, p. 157). It occurs again in 1354 (32 Ed. III.) in con- nexion with John de Stodey as to premises in the parish of St. Mary de, Whitechapel without Aldgate (Feet of Fines, London and Middlesex, No. 158). This, I take it, is St. Mary Mat felon. As late as 18 Hy. VII. (1502/3), in the Inq. p.m. (No. 357) of Thos. Pygot, we find mention of a messuage in the parish of St. Mary Matfelon, otherwise called White Chapel parish of the Bishop of London. In 1568 (11 Eliz.) Whitechapel is said to be within the Lordship of Stepney (A. Deed, No. 12,811). The Pygots had held of Blaunchapelton Court in 1296. WALTER RYE. TWO FLEET STREET TAVERNS. I. THE KING'S HEAD TAVERN. MR. BELL'S description of this house, in his ' Fleet Street in Seven Centuries,' at p. 496, runs : The King's Head, near Chancery Lane, by its swinging signboard displayed to all Fleet Street the large features, full-faced, of King Henry the Eighth, which are repeated on the landlord's token. . . . The tavern has been assumed to be the old timber-framed and carved house that stood at Chancery Lane's western corner. After giving his reasons for not accepting " the antique corner house made familiar by J. T. Smith's print, and represented in substantially all editions of Walton's ' Com- pleat Angler,' as being the King's Head Tavern at all, Mr. Bell concludes : I feel confident that the popular ascription is wrong, and that the King's Head stood a little farther west towards Temple Bar. If it be generally supposed as stated in Beresford Chancellor's ' Fleet Street,' p. 259, and Shelley's ' Inns and Taverns,' p. 92 that the King's Head was at the western corner of Chancery Lane that is, where Messrs. Attenborough's premises stand Mr. Bell is fully justified in not accepting this locus, because the map of Fleet Street in Rocque's ' Survey ' marks " King's Head Tavern " in the plainest of lettering as at the eastern corner that is, on the site of Messrs. Partridge and Cooper's show- rooms with entrances both from Fleet Street and from Chancery Lane. Rocque scarcely needs confirming, but the following advertisement of 25 years earlier emphasizes the fact that the King's Head stood at one corner or the other : Daily Courant, Nov. 19, 1720. Left in a Hackney Coach which took up a gentleman next door to the King's Head in Pall Mall, about a quarter after 3 on Tuesday the 1st instant, and set him down in Broad Street near the Pay Office, a large scarlet cloak. If the coachman or who ever will bring it to Mr. Coulthurst, perfumer, next door to the King's Head Tavern, the corner of Chancery Lane, Fleet Street, shall have half a guinea reward. In the face of these two records it seems hopeless for Mr. Bell to attempt to locate the King's Head "a little farther west towards Temple Bar." I am not prepared to contest Mr. Bell's view that J. T. Smith's print is some ancient house other than the I King's Head. Certainly as produced it appears to represent a house at the western corner ; at the same time, if the print be held obliquely to a mirror, the reflected