The Hall of Waltheof/Chapter XI

EAR the spot where the burial urn described in the first chapter was found, and between Crookes and Clough Field, is a well called St. Anthony's Well. The adjoining hill, too, is known as St. Anthony's Hill. The word "saint" denotes the sacred character which the hill and well once possessed, and it is evident that these places have not derived their names from former owners. St. Anthony was the patron saint of swineherds, but his name is of rare occurrence in old English literature. There is a field called Anthony Field in Dore, and Bateman mentions a barrow in which he made excavations upon "an eminence called Anthony Hill." In this neighbourhood Tant is the pet form of Anthony. As late as 1535 "Sant Antony moneye" is mentioned in the churchwardens accounts of the adjoining parish of Ecclesfield. It was usual to vow one of the pigs of a litter to this "saint," and the youngest pig has been popularly called Anthony. All this is a relic of the times when sacrifices were made to appease the spirits of ancestors or the local gods. The Anthony pig has also been called the Tantony pig, and this may give us a key to the true form of the word, and show what pagan deity the Christian St. Anthony superseded. Tacitus mentions a deity known as Tanfana, and a celebrated temple dedicated to her, and this word, says Grimm, "is certainly German."Whatever the sex of this divinity may have been, there is a strong likeness between Tanfana and Tantony, which might be Tanthony. The letters f and th will readily interchange, and do interchange in the dialect of this district. But it is not at all necessary to suppose that Anthony is a verbal descendant, if I may use such a phrase, of Tanfana. The similarity of sound might well lead the Christian priest to substitutethe name of a sacred personage in his own calendar for that of a heathen divinity, and so make a compromise with heathenism. And hence the "St. Anthony money" of the Ecclesfield churchwardens may only be the descendant of offerings once made, in the shape of young pigs or otherwise, to a deity known as Tanfana. St. Anthony's Well, which is shown in the drawing, has been divided by a stone wall, so that the spring is on one side of the wall, and stone troughs on the other. The appearance of the well has therefore been considerably altered. Forty years ago I am told that the inhabitants of Crookes believed that its waters would cure various diseases. The supply of water never fails in the driest summer.

About the year 1280, John the son of Thomas del Holm granted to Peter de Bernis, amongst other things, a piece of land lying near "the Helrinuelle;" and by another deed of about the same date the said John granted to the said Peter a piece of land lying near "the Olrinwelle." This well called the Helrin Well or the Olrin Well was at Bradway in the parish of Norton and county of Derby, just outside the boundary of Hallamshire. In mentioning it I feel that I am rather poaching on foreign preserves, but the name is too interesting to be passed by. Grimm observes that the Old Norse name Ölrún belongs to a wise woman. Tacitus mentions a famous German prophetess or sorceress whom he calls Aurinia, and Grimm thinks that the true form of the word may have been Aliruna, or Alioruna. Grimm also mentions the wise women whom Jornandes calls aliorunas, and Alarûn, Alerûna, names of women in Old High German. "But," he observes, "I have never seen Elirûn, the form we should expect from ali." Have not we got something very much like it in our Helrin? There is, or was, a well at Dore which adjoins Bradway, called Sparken Well, and this I take to mean "prophetess well," from the Old Norse spákona. Judging from this analogous instance it seems to me that Helrin Well and Sparken Well both mean prophetess well, or sorceress well, and that our Helrin or Olrin is connected with the wise women mentioned by Jornandes, if not with the Aurinia of Tacitus.

In the neighbourhood of Sheffield the holy well is not yet quite forgotten, and a recent topographical writer has mentioned the "discovery" of such a well near a house on the road between Sheffield and Owlerton. "Close behind this house," he says, "are the remains of a stunted plantation which occupies the side of a steep hill. Here was discovered, some twenty years since, what was called a well of 'holy water,' and pretended to possess wonderful medicinal virtues. The good people of Sheffield rushed by thousands to partake of its potent waters, carrying off in cans and stone bottles what they could not swallow upon the spot." It only needs some sorceress, saint, or "blessed lady," as genius of the well, to complete the picture.

There is a well at the Tofts in the Rivelin Valley which bears the singular name Matty Well. One may fairly guess that Matty is the name of some mythological being now lost or too much disguised to be identified.

The drawing below shows a "wishing well" near Whiteley Wood, Sheffield. In German mythology one of the names of the god Wuotan or Odin was Wunsch or Wish. "In Wuotan," says Grimm, "I have produced the god of song, and as Wish he may have been a god of longing and of love."