Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 5.djvu/529

 V.JUNE so, i9oo.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

517

in the * Century Dictionary ' as " one who draws up official statements of law proceed- ings and decisions or of legislative debates," for which no illustrative quotation is given I would furnish an early instance from the it is recorded of a certain matter on 26 May, 1628, that " the Report, now made, [is] to be brought in Writing by the Reporters To- morrow Morning." ALFRED F. BOBBINS.
 * Commons' Journals ' (vol. i. p. 905), wherein

OMAR KHAYYAM. Can any reader tell me of a good book for a beginner in the study of Persian poetry 1 Also is there an edition of the Persian text of Omar Khayyam with a translation in English or French t

CHARLES J. PEARCE.

[An edition of the Persian text of Omar Khayyam, a facsimile of the Bodleian MS., with a transcript into modern Persian characters, a rendering into English verse, &c.-, by E. Heron-Allen, was published in 1898 by H. S. Nichols, Ltd.]

PEKIN OR PEKING. Which of these is the true English spelling for the Chinese capital ? It seems that all Chinese syllables end either with a vowel or one of the two consonants n or ng. As no European tongue has two letters (as Hebrew had) for these sounds, we variously express them. If Pekin in English gave the true sound, I fancy the French would be Pekine, or perhaps Pekinne. But as they write Pekin, I fancy the English must be Peking. E. L. G.

[See9 th S.i. 448,517.]

THE PLACE-NAME OXFORD. (9 th S. iii. 44, 309, 389 ; iv. 70, 130, 382, 479 ;

v. 69, 249.)

IT is irksome to have to waste more time and space over MR. SHORE'S fantastic theory that this name is derived from Eoccenford a theory, by the way, that is not new. Where others have been content to sur- mise that the Thames was once known as the Eocce (now the Ock, at Abingdon), MR. SHORE boldly collars a set of boundaries professedly relating to Abingdou ('Cart. Sax.,' iii. 67), and transfers them and the river Ock to Oxford. He complacently refers to the "stubborn facts" advanced by him, "which have been shown to be quite able to take care of themselves." The only fact perceptible in his papers is the existence of certain islands and watercourses in the mesh of islands and streams about Oxford. Some of these he arbitrarily identities, without a shred of evidence, with features mentioned in the

Abingdon boundaries. These are backed up by sweeping and illogical deductions, vague references to physical geology, ethnology, and " early archaeological research." So strong is " the evidence of Nature " thus obtained that philology must go to the wall, and Oxford must be derived from Eoccenford cotite que codte ! This is the more astonishing when it is borne in mind that, assuming MR. SHORE were right in his identifications, he would merely have proved that Eoccenford was one out of something like a score of fords about Oxford. The site of the original "ford of oxen" is unknown, and there are five or six possible sites for it. Any one of these would be much more likely than MR. SHORE'S imaginary Eoccenford to the west of Osney.

Fortunately it is not necessary to consider even this slight probability. MR. SHORE assumes, despite the explicit statement of the charter that the land was at Abingdon. that the boundaries relate to the abbey land north of Kennington, and that they describe the eastern boundary of the Hundred of Hormer. As I have shown (9 th S. iv. 70), the charter does relate to Abingdon, and the boundaries clearly start from the ford over the Ock at Abingdon, ascend that river for some little distance, and then proceed north- wards between Bayworth and Sunningwell to the boundary between Kennington and Hinksey. To complete the perambulation it is obvious that the line must eventually pro- ceed southwards from this point. Some little difficulty is caused by the mention of the Cearewylle, but, even if this be the Cherwell in its present position, it is clear that the line does proceed southwards from it that is, in the opposite direction to Oxford and Osney.

The Cherwell is really the keystone to MR. SHORE'S rickety structure. There are now two islands at the mouth of the Cherwell, and these islands, although on the Oxfordshire side of the Thames, are in the Berkshire Hundred of Hormer. This fact MR. SHORE hails as " the unchangeable and certain evi- dence of Nature " in his favour ! And he opines that the reader "will be unable to discover any beginning for this singular connexion except in the grant of Cead- wealla to the abbey of Abingdon." He finds, as he thinks, two islands mentioned in the charter at the mouth of the Cearewylle, and as there is now a " fork-shaped channel " at the back of these islands formed by the Cher- well, he, as there is an O.E. geafel, mean- ing a "fork," identifies this delta with the Geafling lacu of the boundaries. When I remark that this is an impossible translation of the name, he solemnly tells me that " the