Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 1.djvu/159

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S. I. FEB. 19,

NOTES AND QUERIES.

151

don in his history (1582), where, in his iescription of the island, he says :

" Insula priscorum Scotorum sermone Skianacha, loc est, alata, vocatur, quod promontoria, inter

Siae mare se infundit, velut alse se obtendunt. sus tamen obtinuit, ut Skia, id est, ala, vulgo iieeretur."

In the description of the Western Isles compiled by Dean Munro in 1549 it is said :

" This ile is callit by the Erishe Elian Skyane, that is to say in Englishe, the Wingitt ile, be reason it has maiiey Wyngs and points lyand f urth frae it, through the devydmg of thir loches."

On p. 131 of 'Description of the Western Islands of Scotland,' by Martin, 1703, is :

"Skie (in the ancient language Skianach, i,e., Wing'd) is so called because the two opposite Northern Promontories, Vaternis lying North-west, and Troternis North-east, resemble two wings."

Dean Munro and Martin were Highlanders, and conversant with the Gaelic language, in which sgiath means a wing or pinion, and the usual manner of speaking of Skye in Gaelic as Ant-eilean Sgiathanach literally means the Winged Island.

FEANCIS C. BUCHANAN.

Clarinish, Row, N.B.

THE LOKD OF ALLERDALE, CUMBERLAND (8 th S. xii. 127, 213, 451). That Kalph de Merlay married a daughter of an Earl Cos- patric we have distinctly asserted in the Newminster Charters, in a charter of King Henry to Kalph, giving the young lady and knds by treaty with her father (" per convent inter me et patrem suum "). I have not the charter by me, but it hardly seems pos- sible that the father of this lady, by name Juliana, was the Earl Cospatric, son of Earl Uchtred. Uchtreddied in 1016, and Cospatric I have always supposed in 1065. His brother Eadwlf was killed by Hardicanute's order ; and his niece, the wife of Earl Siward, died early enough for Siward to marry a second wife before his death in 1055. Cos- patric's great nephew, Earl Waltheof, was beheaded in 1075. The father of three mar- riageable (?) daughters, could this Cospatric too be great -great -grandfather of Robert, who claimed Whitton in 1290, two hundred years after his (Cospatric's) death 1 We have to remember there was a Cospatric, son of Maldred, son of Crynan, and that this Cos- patric had a son and grandson of the same name, dying respectively 1139 and 1147. Then, again, there is a Cospatric, son of Orm, son of Ketel, which Orm married Gunilda, daughter of Cospatric, son of Maldred.

Cospatric, son of Earl Uchtred, had himself a son Uchtred, father of Dolphin, father

of a Maltred, whose son Robert did homage 11 Henry III. and was ancestor of the great Nevilles, so I have always understood. In the Whitby Charters there are entries " ex dono Uchtred fil Cospatric" and "ex dono Torfin de Alistone (?) fil pdci Uchtredi fil Cospatric."

T. W.

Aston Clinton.

A BOOKBINDING QUESTION (8 th S. xii. 207, 292, 353, 452 ; 9 th S. i. 73). The reason for what MR. FLEMING terms the " upside down " lettering of book -backs is to be sought in the rule observed by printers with regard to matter laid sideways in a page, the top or head of such matter invariably appearing, when printed, on the left, so that the lines read from the bottom upwards. A very com- mon example of the same way of reading is seen also in the vertical headings of table columns. Printers consider this arrangement convenient to readers, and no one, so far as I know, has ever impugned their judgment : a departure from the time-honoured rule would be set down to craziness. So much for the inside of a book. With regard to printed covers for periodicals and other ephemeral publications, printers left to their own busi- ness notions treat the vertical lettering as matter placed sideways ; consequently the reading is in the same upward direction. I notice, however, several exceptions among the monthlies; but such exceptions are of recent origin and must be referred to outside interference. Your correspondents may, if they will, ponder the question whether the "upside down" reading against which they protest is connected with the fact that every line set by a compositor is placed " upside down " in his composing-stick, in which position he can read the type easily, without the least need for the performance of an " acrobatic feat." I do not believe, however, in any such connexion. Most likely the binder has adopted his lettering from the printer ; but my own binder is unable to give any other answer to the question why he letters upwards than that a binder invariably does so unless ordered by his customer to the contrary.

I prefer the upward reading, complaint against which, such as has appeared in your columns, seems to me frivolous for the following reasons. In the first place very few books are lettered vertically compared with those that are lettered transversely. Secondly, the greater number of books lettered vertically are periodicals and board- bound trifles like the shilling shockers, most, if not all, of which have the title repeated on