Minor Queries Answered.
The Great Bowyer Bible.
—Can you afford me information respecting the Great Bowyer Bible, which, I believe, about twenty years ago was valued at 1000l., and disposed of by lottery?
Is it in private hands, or in a public library?
J. S.
[The Bowyer Bible was disposed of, in 1848, in Mrs. Parkes's Club Subscription.
The name of the gentleman who was so fortunate as to obtain it, for his subscription of one guinea, is Saxon; a gentleman farmer, residing near Shepton Mallett in Somersetshire. He received the Bible in an appropriate cabinet from Mrs. Parkes, who knows nothing further of its subsequent history.]
Orloff, Derivation of.
—What is the derivation of the word orloff, as applied to the deck of a ship of war? The "orloff deck" is, I believe, the first lower deck which runs flush frown stem to stern.
W. A. L.
[Falconer and others spell it Orlop, from the Dutch overloop, a running over, or overflowing. Dr. Ogilvie says, "In a ship of war it is a platform of planks laid over the beams in the hold, on which the cables are usually coiled. It contains also sail-rooms, carpenters' cabins, and other apartments. Also, a tier of beams below the lower deck for a like purpose. In three-decked ships the second and lowest decks are sometimes called orlops.">[
"A Captain bold of Halifax."
—Byron says, in a note somewhere, that many of the modern Greek poems are in the metre of the English ballad:
"A captain bold of Halifax, that lived in country quarters."
The same may be said of a metre much used Terence and Plautus.
Where is this ballad to be found?
ED. G. JACKSON.
Saffron Walden.
[Though we cannot point where this song, written by George Colman, and known as "Unfortunate Miss Bailey," is to be met with, we can refer our correspondent to a clever Latin version of it by the Rev. G. H. Glasse, printed in the Gentleman's Magazine for August, 1805, which commences—
"Seduxit miles virginem, receptus in hybernis,
Præcipitans quæ laqueo se transtulit Avernis."
There is also in the same magazine a French version which runs—
"Un capitaine hardi d'Halifax, demeurant à son quartier, Séduit une fille qui se pendit, un lundi avec sa jarretière," &c.]
Goblin, Gorgeous, Gossip.
—May I ask the derivation of the following English words,—Goblin, Gorgeous, Gossip?
J. G. T.
[Goblin is derived from the low Latin Gobelinus; see Ducange, who defines it, "Dæmon, qui vulgo Faunus, Gallis, Gobelin Folastre, German, Kobold," and quotes as his authority Ordericus Vitalis.
Gorgeous, according to Skinner, is from the French Gorgias, probably from Gorge, and transferred from the palate to the eye. No such word as Gorgias is, however, to be found in Roquefort's Glossaire.
Gossip is from the Anglo-Saxon God-sibbe, "cognatus in Deo." Nares in his Glossary furnishes the following apt illustration of it: "Our Christian ancestors, understanding a spiritual affinity to grow between the parents and such as undertooke for the child at baptism, called each other by the name of God-sib, that is, of kin together through God; and the child, in like manner, called such his godfathers and godmothers."—Verstegan, p. 223.]
Maheremium, Arc de Arbouin.
—In a survey of the castle of Launceston made in the 11 Edw. III., occurs the following passage: "Una p̱va capella quar pietes sunt de maheremio et plaustro et maheremiū inde fere disjungit."
Will any of your readers kindly inform an unskilled person the meaning of this description?
The same record contains some notable instances of jocular tenures, such as "ccc volucrs quæ vocr poffouns," from the holder of the Scilly islands; and "un arc' de arbouin," presumed to be a bow of laburnum wood, from the town of Truro.
S. R. P.
Launceston.
[The meaning of the first passage quoted by our correspondent is clearly, "una parva capella quarum parietes sunt de maheremio et plastro, et maheremium inde fere disjungitur," i.e. "one small chapel whose walls are of timber and plaster (or, as we say, built of lath and plaster), and the timbers thereof for the most part disjointed." Under the word Materia, Ducange gives Mæremium, Maheremium, and many other forms of the word, which is used for timber.
Un arc de Arbouin.—If our correspondent will refer to Ducange sub Arcus, he will find him, sub "Arcus de Aubour," citing Monast. Ang., tom. ii. p. 602., and explaining it, "arcus bellici species. Regestum Philippi Augusti, fol. 159. Habet sagittam et arcum de aubour cum corda." He next cites Le Roman de Garin (MS.):
"Arc d'Aubour porte et sajetes d'acier," &c.
A learned friend whom we have consulted reminds us that besides the common Laburnum, which it is obvious could not be the wood referred to, there is another sort known to our gardeners as "Cytisus Alpinus," Scotch Laburnum, which grows into an actual tree, and supplies the hard black wood used by the French as ebony, and called by them False Ebony. It is of notorious hardness, and would have done well for bows. It is a native of Dauphiné, and indigenous also in the Alps, and, even if unknown in England in the reign of Edward III., was probably used in the Alpine countries for bows, and possibly imported into England for the same purpose.]