Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 9.djvu/185

 9" S. IX. MARCH 1, 1902.) NOTES AND QUERIES.

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in Mr. Conway's 'Demonology arid Devil- Lore,' vol. ii. chap. xxvi. Mr. Con way, relying apparently on Dr. Wuttke (with whose work I am not acquainted), takes it for granted that St. Walpurga, the original May Queen is really one with the Bertha or Mother Rose of Teutonic mythology. C. C. B.

It is probable that the information PRESBYTER is seeking may be found in E. L. Rochholz's 'Drei Gaugottinnen, Wai- burg, Verena, und Gertrua, als deutsche Kirchenheiligen.' M. P.

WILLIAM GERARD HAMILTON (9 th S. ix. 109). " Single-Speech " Hamilton was un- doubtedly a Wykehamist. He was a pupil at Winchester of Dr. Burton, and his name appears as a Commoner on the annual school lists (or " Long Rolls," as they are called) of the college for September, 1740-4, as will be seen some day, I hope, in a second series of these documents from 1723 onwards, which I have in preparation for the press. He matriculated at Oriel College, Oxford, 4 March, 1744/5, then aged sixteen ; con- sequently, if he was also at Harrow it must have been before September, 1740. In after years Hamilton identified himself with Winchester by attending the gather- ings of the " Wykehamist Society," founded in 1758, whose meetings were held at the " Crown and Anchor Tavern " in the Strand. A letter of his to Dr. Joseph Warton, then head master of Winchester, dated 16 April, 1765, printed in Wooll's ' Memoirs of Warton,' 1806, p. 306, gives further proof of his associa- tion with some distinguished members of his old school. C. W. H.

FILBERT (9 th S. ix. 125) May I be allowed to make a personal observation with respect to this matter, as my name is cited in the article at the above reference ?

I wish to say, in particular, that philology, especially as regards English, is a progres- sive science, and that the rate of progress is very fast. New facts turn up literally every week, even within my own knowledge. And this is why the last edition of my ' Concise English Etymological Dictionary ' had to be almost rewritten.

As to this very word filbert, I found two new facts myself. Of these, the former was printed in 1891, eleven years ago, and is obviously material. It is, that the word is not English at all, but Anglo-French so that the remark upon the strangeness of deriving " the English name of the nut from a French saint" has, obviously, no point at all. I gave the reference in 1891 (as said above),

and it is now reprinted in my ' Notes on English Etymology ' at p. 97. Perhaps it is worth while to quote the passage in full.

In Britton, ed. Nichols, vol. i. p. 371, we have the following sentence : ** Et ausi est pasture un noun commun a herbage, et a glan, et a pesson, et as noiz " ; and a foot-note tells us that another MS. adds at the end "e a philbers." The translation is: "Pas- ture likewise is a general name for herbage, acorns, mast, and nuts, and philberts." Of course, the A.-F. philbert loses its * (as usual) before the plural suffix -s, in accordance with grammar, though the earlier form would have been philberz, with z for ts.

The allusion is unmistakable, and this shows that the A.-F. name for " filbert " was certainly philbert in the thirteenth century.

My second find was that the word is still known in France. In Moisy's dictionary of the Normandy patois we are told that the actual name of the nut is still noix de filbert. This note was printed in 1888, and is given in the last (rewritten) edition of my 'Concise Dictionary,' and in no previous one.

I need not point out to an expert in chronology the improbability that a name already current before 1300 should be derived from that of a duke who was alive in 1482.

The statement that the "nut of Philbert " is connected with St. Philibert's Day is only a guess ; but I shall be much obliged to any one who will make an obviously better one. WALTER W. SKEAT.

ENGLISH CONTINGENT IN THE LAST CRUSADE (9 th S. viii. 343 ; ix. 55). The Patrick Cha worth mentioned by MR. JOHN RADCLIFFE seems to have done as did the younger De Montforts after the Crusade, and taken office under Charles I. of Anjou-Naples. His name appears as Chevalier de I'Hdtel in the 'Reg. Angev.,' 25, fo. 211 ; 26, fo. 292 b ; 44, fo. 89. He became Justice de la Terre d'Otrantoin 1280, and so remained until 1282, when, I think, his death took place. His heiress, if I mistake not, was Maud de Cadurcis, Chaurs, otherwise Chaworth, who became ward to the king, and eventually ancestress to the Dukes of Lancaster, which royal duchy still owns some of her Gloucestershire estates.

ST. CLAIR BADDELEY.

AERONAUTICS (9 th S. ix. 84). Bishop Lesley, in his ' History of Scotland,' gives the follow- ing account of the attempt of Damian, the abbot of Tungland, to fly. The story forms 'The Fenyeit Frier of Tungland.' The in- genious explanation of the failure was uot
 * he subject of Dunbar's satirical poem of