The Romance of Names Part 32

Tredgold seems to have been conferred on some medieval stoic, for we find also Spurnegold. Without pinning our faith to any particular anecdote, we need have no hesitation in accepting Turnbull as a sobriquet conferred for some feat of strength and daring on a stalwart Borderer. We find the corresponding Tornebeuf in Old French, and Turnbuck also occurs. Trumbull and Trumble are variants due to metathesis followed by a.s.similation (Chapter III), while Tremble is a very degenerate form. In Knatchbull we have the obsolete verb knatch, which in Mid. English meant to strike on the head, fell. Crawcour is Fr. Crevecoeur, breakheart, which has also become a local name in France. With Shacklock, shake-lock, and Sherlock, Shurlock, shear-lock, we may compare Robin Hood's comrade Scathelock, though the precise interpretation of all three names is difficult. Rackstraw, rake-straw, corresponds to Fr. Grattepaille. Golightly means much the same as Lightfoot (Chapter XIII), nor need we hesitate to regard the John Gotobed who lived in Cambridgeshire in 1273 as a notorious sluggard compared with whom his neighbour Serl Gotokirke was a shining example. [Footnote: The name is still found in the same county.

Undergraduates contemporary with the author occasionally slaked their thirst at a riverside inn kept by Bathsheba Gotobed.]

Telfer is Fr. Taillefer, the iron cleaver, and Henry II.'s yacht captain was Alan Trenchemer, the sea cleaver. He had a contemporary named Ventados, wind abaft.

Slocomb has a.s.sumed a local aspect, but may very well correspond to Fr. Tardif or Ger. Muhsam, applied to some Weary Willie of the Middle Ages. Doubtfire is a misspelling of Dout-fire, from the dialect dout, to extinguish (do out), formed like don and doff. Fullalove, which does not belong to the same formation, is also found as Plein d'amour--

"Of Sir Lybeux and Pleyndamour" (B, 2090)--

and corresponds to Ger. Liebevoll. Waddilove actually occurs in the Hundred Rolls as Wade-in-love, presumably a nickname conferred on some medieval Don Juan.

MISCELLANEOUS

There is one curious little group of nicknames which seem to correspond to such Latin names as Piso, from pisum, a pea, and Cicero, from cicer--

"Cicer, a small pulse, lesse than pease" (Cooper).

Such are Barleycorn and Peppercorn, the former found in French as Graindorge. The rather romantic names Avenel and Peverel seem to be of similar formation, from Lat. avena, oats, and piper, pepper. In fact Peverel is found in Domesday as Piperellus, and Pepperell still exists. With these may be mentioned Carbonel, corresponding to the French surname Charbonneau, a little coal.

CHAPTER XXII. ADJECTIVAL NICKNAMES

"The man replied that he did not know the object of the building; and to make it quite manifest that he really did not know, he put an adjective before the word 'object,' and another--that is, the same--before the word 'building.' With that he pa.s.sed on his way, and Lord Jocelyn was left marvelling at the slender resources of our language, which makes one adjective do duty for so many qualifications."

(BESANT, All Sorts and Conditions of Men, ch. x.x.xviii.)

The rejection by the British workman of all adjectives but one is due to the same imaginative poverty which makes the adjective "nice"

supreme in refined circles, and which limits the schoolgirl to "ripping" and her more self-conscious brother to the tempered "decent." But dozens of useful adjectives, now either obsolete or banished to rustic dialect, are found among our surnames. The tendency to accompany every noun by an adjective seems to belong to some deep-rooted human instinct. To this is partly due the Protean character of this part of speech, for the word, like the coin, becomes dulled and worn in circulation and needs periodically to be withdrawn and replaced. An epithet which is complimentary in one generation is ironical in the next and eventually offensive. Moody, with its northern form Mudie, which now means morose, was once valiant (Chapter I); and pert, surviving in the name Peart, meant active, brisk, etc.--

"Awake the pert and nimble spirit of mirth."

(Midsummer Night's Dream, i. 1.)

ARCHAIC MEANINGS

To interpret an adjectival nickname we must go to its meaning in Chaucer and his contemporaries. Silly, Seeley, Seely

"This sely, innocent Custance" (B, 682)--

still means innocent when we speak of the "silly sheep," and happy in the phrase "silly Suffolk." It is cognate with Ger. selig, blessed, often used in speaking of the dead. We have compounds in Sillilant, simple child (Chapter X), and Selibarn. Seely was also used for Cecil or Cecilia. Sadd was once sedate and steadfast

"But thogh this mayde tendre were of age, Yet in the brest of hire virginitee Ther was enclosed rype and sad corage"

(E, 218);

and as late as 1660 we find a book in defence of Charles I. described as--

"A sad and impartial inquiry whether the King or Parliament began the war."

Stout, valiant, now used euphemistically for fat, is cognate with Ger.

stolz, proud, and possibly with Lat. stultus, foolish. The three ideas are not incompatible, for fools are notoriously proud of their folly and are said to be less subject to fear than the angels.

St.u.r.dy, St.u.r.dee, once meant rebellious, pig-headed--

"St.u.r.dy, unbuxum, rebellis, contumax, in.o.bediens." (Prompt. Parv.)

Cotgrave offers a much wider choice for the French original--

"Estourdi (etourdi), dulled, amazed, astonished, dizzie-headed, or whose head seemes very much troubled; (hence) also, heedlesse, inconsiderate, unadvised, witlesse, uncirc.u.mspect, rash, retchlesse, or carelesse; and sottish, blockish, lumpish, lusk-like, without life, metall, spirit"

Sly and its variant Sleigh have degenerated in the same way as crafty and cunning, both of which once meant skilled. Chaucer calls the wings of Daedalus "his playes slye," i.e. his ingenious contrivances.

Quick meant alert, lively, as in "the quick and the dead." Slight, cognate with Ger. schlecht, bad, once meant plain or simple.

Many adjectives which are quite obsolete in literary English survive as surnames. Mid. Eng. Lyle has been supplanted by its derivative Little, the opposite pair surviving as Mutch and Mickle. The poor parson did not fail--

"In siknesse nor in meschief to visite The ferreste in his parisshe, muche and lyte."

(A, 493.)

We have for Lyte also the imitative Light; cf. Lightwood. With Little may be mentioned Murch, an obsolete word for dwarf--

"Murch, lytyl man, na.n.u.s."

(Prompt. Parv.)

Lenain is a fairly common name in France. Snell, swift or valiant, had become a personal name in Anglo-Saxon, but we find le snel in the Middle Ages. Freake, Frick, also meant valiant or warrior--

"Ther was no freke that ther wolde flye"

(Chevy Chase);

but the Promptorium Parvulorum makes it equivalent to Craske (Chapter XXII)--

"Fryke, or craske, in grete helth, cra.s.sus."

It is cognate with Ger. frech, which now means impudent. Nott has already been mentioned (Chapter II). Of the Yeoman we are told--

"A not hed hadde he, with a broun visage."

(A, 109.)

Stark, cognate with starch, now usually means stiff, rather than strong--

"I feele my lymes stark and suffisaunt To do al that a man bilongeth to."