[29] Bethia still lingers in certain families, but its origin has manifestly been forgotten. In Notes and Queries, February 23, 1861, Mr. W. A. Leighton deems the name an incorrect version of the scriptural Bithiah (1 Chron. iv. 18); while “G.,” writing March 9, 1861, evidently agrees with this conclusion, for after saying that his aunt, a sister, and two cousins bear it, he adds, “They spell it Bethia and Bathia, instead of Bithiah, which is the accurate form”! Miss Yonge also is at fault: “The old name of Bethia, to be found in various English families, probably came from an ancestral Beth on either Welsh, Scots, or Irish sides.” She makes it Keltic.
The latest instance of Bethia I have seen is the following, on a mural tablet in Kirkthorpe Church, York:—
“Bethia Atkins, ob. Ap. 16th, 1851, aged 74.”
[30] “But the ridicule which falls on this mode of naming children belongs not to these times only, for the practice was in use long before.”—Harris, “Life of Oliver Cromwell,” p. 342.
[31] This child was buried a few days later. From the name given the father seems to have expected the event.
[32] From 1585 to 1600, that is, in fifteen years, Warbleton register records more than a hundred examples of eccentric Puritanism.
[33] This name crept into Yorkshire after Accepted Frewen became archbishop. “Thornton Church is a little episcopal chapel-of-ease, rich in Nonconformist monuments, as of Accepted Lister, and his friend Dr. Hale.”—Mrs. Gaskell’s “Charlotte Brontë,” p. 37.
[34] Faith-my-joy was buried June 12, 1602. While the name was Puritan in the sense that it would never have been given but for the zealots, it was merely a translation of the Purefoy motto, “Pure Foi ma Joi.” Antony turned it into a spiritual allusion.
[35] “On Jan. 28, 17 James I., William Foster ... together with Sir Henry Burton, Susan Mowne, and James Bynde, and Sanctia or Sence his wife, joined in conveying to Robert Raunce and Edward Thurland ... a house and land in Carshalton on trust to sell.”—“Bray’s Surrey,” ii. 513.
[36] Erasmus became a popular baptismal name, and still exists: