Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 2.djvu/223

 9 th S. II. SEPT. 10, '98.]

NOTES AND QUERIES.

215

According to the arrangement of the golden numbers in the Julian calendar, the golden number of a year in which the new moon fell on that day would be III. As it is stated that 16 October fell on a Sunday, the Sunday letter was B, and it is stated in the document that the indiction was VII. In the year 1009 the golden number was III., the Sunday letter B, and the indiction VII. ; this coinci- dence had not happened before since the commencement of the Julian calendar, and it will not occur again until the year 3574. Thus the names of witnesses point to the earlier part of 994, before 28 October, on which day Archbishop Sigeric died ; the calendar indications can only refer to 1009 ; and the document gives its own date as 996. It is evident that we are dealing with a " confection " of later times, the compiler of which was not up to his work. He seems to have obtained a list of prelates which would fit the summer of 994, and also from another source the correct calendar figures for 1009, and then, for some reason best known to him- self, to have devised the date 996 ; and as all three dates fall within the reign of Ethelred it may not have struck him that anything was wrong. In fact, he must have possessec a fair share of the " unrsed " of the hapless king whose name he used.

As the document is printed in Dugdale's ' Monasticon,' it must have been well known both to Kemble and Thorpe, yet neither of these scholars thought it worth printing in his collection of ancient documents, and

Freeman used to denote the site of the deci- sive contest called the battle of Hastings by previous historians. In the fourteenth cen- tury we should get Santley, a form familiar to us as a topographic surname. I have

treated this more at nceum for 27 August.

length in the Athe- ISAAC TAYLOR.

there can be no doubt that in its present form it is not what it professes to be, though it is likely enough that valuable historical matter is incorporated in it.

CHARLES S. TAYLOR. Banwell Vicarage.

LEIGH : LEA (9 th S. ii. 84). In Hasted's 'Kent' (published in 1797), vol. iii. p. 258, the parish of Lyghe is thus described :

"The next, parish eastward from Penshurst is Lyghe, called also in writings Leigh and West Leigh and La Lye, in the Textus Rossensis, Leaga, which in Saxon signifies a feeding or pasture."

The name of the parish is now spelt always Leigh, but pronounced Lye. The village Leigh in Lancashire is pronounced as if spelt Lee. HENRY TAYLOR.

Birklands, Southport.

The hypothetical A.-S. word sandledh (f.), meaning a " sandy forest glade," would make the dative singular sandledge. This in the eleventh century became Sandlache, and in the twelfth century is called by Orderic Vitalis S'enlac, a term which the late Prof.

Do the different origins of these words account for the various ways in which they are pronounced? I was surprised to hear Leigh-upon-Mendip called Lie; and a late President of the Royal Academy was spoken of as Leeton, Laton, and Liton.

ST. SWITHIN.

"HousTY" (9 th S. ii. 127). I have heard this word both as noun (= sore throat) and adjective (= hoarse), but each time in the mouth of an old person who seemed to think it natural to be compelled to explain it. This in the north of Ireland. The Dutch word housten means sore throat. H. H. S. Vezelay.

In Cornwall a sore throat or cough is called a hosy or hozey (spelling unknown), probably derived from hoarse. G. K. PIERSON.

The adjective hoasty is in Nottinghamshire and housty I have never heard.

in common use Lincolnshire, but C. C. B.

WILD FOREST BULLS (9 th S. ii. 108, 171). No doubt MR. WALLACE is well acquainted with the late Mr. Storer's 'Wild White Cattle of Great Britain ' (London, 1879) ; but many persons interested in this subject may not be aware of it. There is abundant evidence, from the days of Hector Boece (1526), to show that these animals were white ; but at the same time it seems possible that this evi- dence needs more critical investigation than that awarded to it by Mr. Storer. Boece, or Boethius, states I quote from the edition published at Paris in 1575 (the first edition not being accessible to me) of the great Caledonian forest :

"Gignere solet ea sylua boues candidissimos in Formam Leonis iubam ferentes, caetera mansuetis jimillimos, verum adeo feros indomitosque atque lumanum refugientes consortium." ' Scotorum Regni Descriptio,' fol. 6 verso.

This passage is probably the source of Bishop Lesly's statement in 1578, already quoted in part by MR. BOUCHIER. That /hese forest Bulls were the descendants of the Urus described by Csesar, and scientifically known as Bos pmmigenius, is generally ad- mitted by zoologists, and within the last few years a great deal of attention has been devoted to the subject by Prof. Nehring, of Berlin, whose notices in Globus and other