Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 2.djvu/23

 9 th S. II. JULY 2, '98.]

NOTES AND QUERIES.

15

Similarly, there is a provision for this in Canon 19, which enjoins :

" The Churchwardens or Questmen and then assistants shall not suffer any idle persons to abide either in the churchyard or church porch, during the time of Divine Service or Preaching ; but shall cause them either to come in or depart?'

It seems from these canons that they have an equal authority with the churchwardens. Their appointment is at the same time with that of the churchwardens by Canon 90, the title of which is ' The Choice of Sidemen, and their Joynt Office with the Churchwardens. Consistently with this character of the office, in the Articles of Visitation in the ' Appendix to the Second Report of the Royal Commis- sion on Ritual ' the sidemen, or sworn men, are classed with the churchwardens, as p. 436, " The oath of the churchwardens and sidemen " ; the same, p. 446. At p. 438 there is, "We, the churchwardens and sidemen, present." In 1686 Archbishop Bancroft, in his ' Metropolitical Visitation at Lincoln,' delivers a " Charge to the Churchwardens and Sidemen," with a form of oath which he enjoins to be taken " before their minister." ED. MARSHALL, F.S.A.

THE TERMINATION " -HALGH " (9 th S. i. 345). The Lowland Scotch and Northumberland termination -haugh or -h<i uck, and the Lanca- shire -halffh or -haigh, representing an old Northern -halgh or -hale, exhibits one of the most remarkable dialectical variations in existence. It corresponds to the Southern -hall, the Mercian -ill, and the Yorkshire -all, which are all descended from the W. Saxon healh, a " slope," and not, as Kemble and Leo supposed, from the A.-S. heall, a "stone house." Thus we have Kirkhaugh in North- umberland (formerly Kirkhalgh) ; Great Haughton and Little Haughton in Durham, called Halctona and Halghtona in the Boldon Book ; and Haighton in Lancashire is Hale- tun in Domesday : while Willenhall in Staf- fordshire is callea Willanhalch in a charter, and Holton in Somerset is A.-S. Healhtun. We have also Humshaugh on the Tyne, and Braimhaugh and Pepperhaugh, both on the Coquet. From healh we have A.-S. Iddes- healh (probably Iddinshall in Cheshire); Ticknall in Derbyshire, and Tichenall in (Staffordshire ; Ludgershall in Wilts, Buxhall in Suffolk, Breadshall in Derbyshire ; and in Yorkshire Crakehall, Strensall, Birdsall, Upsall, Ricall, Roall, and Elmsall. It appears as a prefix in Hawick in Roxburghshire and Haignton in Lancashire, Holton in Somerset and Halton in Bucks. But the Northumbrian -heugh, as in Keyheugh or Ratcheugh, is the West Saxon hogh or h6h, which is now usually

Hoo or Hu, as Cliffe-at-Hoo in Kent, or in the common names Hutton and Houghton.

ISAAC TAYLOR.

MR. PLATT takes exception to the members of the Keighley family persisting in calling themselves Keithley. As a native of the parish of Keighley, W.R. Yorks, perhaps I may be allowed to state, for the informa- tion of MR. PLATT, that the inhabitants of the town and neighbourhood always call it Keethley. In all documents of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries that have come under my notice the name is written Kighley, and even down to the early part of thepresent century it was generally so spelled. Further, I believe the gh in this name had formerly a

uttural sound, and that it has been softened own to its present form during the last hundred and fifty years or so by a process of evolution. In support of this hypothesis I may say that an ancestor of mine, who died over forty years ago aged eighty, and who lived all his life in this parish, used to pro- nounce the name something like KisAley (the sh as a soft guttural).

Probably many of the rjh terminations in place-names in the north of England had originally a guttural sound, which has gradu- ally been melted down to a variety of forms, according to dialectic idiosyncrasies rather than by rule of grammar or orthography.

A. S.

The name Dunkenhalgh is pronounced as Dunkenhalge. There are in this neighbour- hood families named respectively Ridehalgh and Greenhalgh. These are here pronounced each as with the termination -halge. That this has not always been the case seems probable, as there are also in the near neigh- bourhood one or more families with name pronounced and spelt Redihoff or Ridehoff.

B. T. G Accrington.

I take the terminations -halgh, -haulyh, and -hough to be variants of some old form, probably meaning field. Halgh is pro- nounced }uilch, Juiff, and huff. Haulgh is pronounced hoff; and hough, is sounded by some as hoff and huff, and by others as hoo. Greenhough, which I take to be a form of Greenhalgn, has become in some cases Greenup, and Harrop seems to be a form of Hare- hough. There is near Bolton-le-Moors a place called Tonge-with-Haulgh, the haulgh here being by some pronounced hoff and by others huff. In the locality of Bolton there is a name Fernihough, called or pronounced as Fernihuff and Ferniho. Close to Chorlton- um-Hardy there is an old hall, formerly a