It was the same with our beasts of burden or animals of the chase. In these days their hides almost invariably furnished forth their current designations. Thus we find the horse familiarly known by such titles as ‘Morell,’ from its moorish or swarthy tan, or ‘Lyard,’ that is, dapple-grey, or ‘Bayard,’ bay, or ‘Favell,’ dun, or ‘Blank,’ white. The dark hide of the ass got for it the sobriquet of ‘Dun,’ a term still preserved in the old proverb, ‘As dull as Dun in the mire,’ while again as ‘Burnell’ its browner aspect will be familiar to all readers of Chaucer. Thus, also, the fox was known as ‘Russell,’ the bear as ‘Bruin,’ and the young hind, from its early indefinite red, ‘Sorrell.’ How natural that the same custom should have its effect upon human nomenclature. How easy for a country community to create the distinction between ‘John le Rouse’ and ‘John le Black,’ ‘William le Hore’ and ‘William le Sor’ or ‘Sorrell,’ if the complexion of the hair or face were sufficiently distinctive to allow it. Some of these adjectives were applied to human peculiarities of this kind till within recent times. Burns uses ‘lyart’ for locks of iron grey, and Aubyn, in his ‘Lives,’ describes Butler, author of ‘Hudibras,’ as having ‘a head of sorrell haire.’ We ourselves talk of ‘brunettes’ and ‘blondes,’ of ‘dark’ and ‘fair.’ Thus it was then such sobriquets as ‘Philip le Sor,’ ‘Adam le Morell,’ ‘William le Favele’ or ‘Favell,’ ‘Walter le Bay’ or ‘Theobald le Bayard,’ ‘Henry le Dun’ or ‘Thomas le Lyard,’ arose. Thus was it our ‘Rouses’ and ‘Russells,’ our ‘Brownes’[[475]] and ‘Brunes,’ with the obsolete ‘Brunman,’ or ‘Brunells’ and ‘Burnells,’ our ‘Whites’ and ‘Whitemans,’ our ‘Hores’ and ‘Hoares,’ our ‘Greys’ and ‘Grissels’[[476]] sprang into being. Nor are these all. Our ‘Reeds,’ ‘Reids,’ and ‘Reads’ are all but forms of the old ‘rede’ or red, once so pronounced;[[477]] while ‘Redman,’ when not a descendant of ‘Adam’ or ‘Thomas de Redmayne,’ is the bequest of some ‘Robert’ or ‘John Redman’ of the thirteenth century. Our ‘Swarts’ are but relics of the old ‘John le Swarte,’ applied no doubt to the tawny or sunburnt face of its original owner. The word was in common use at this time. In ‘Guy of Warwick’ we are told:—
His nek is greater than a bole,
His body is swarter than ani cole.
The darker-hued countenances of our forefathers are immortalised also in such entries as ‘Reyner le Blake’ or ‘Stephen le Blak,’ now found as ‘Blake’ and ‘Black,’ or ‘Elias le Blakeman’ or ‘Henry Blacman,’ now ‘Blakeman’ and ‘Blackman’ respectively. ‘John le Blanc’ and ‘Warin Blench’ find themselves in the nineteenth century supported by our ‘Blanks’ and ‘Blanches;’[[478]] while the descendants of such people as ‘Amabilla le Blund,’ or ‘Walter le Blunt,’ or ‘Reginald le Blond,’ or ‘Richard le Blount’ still preserve a memorial of their ancestry in such familiar forms as ‘Blund,’ ‘Blunt,’ ‘Blond,’ and ‘Blount.’ ‘Blanket’ and ‘Blanchet,’ as fuller forms, we shall notice shortly, and ‘Blondin,’ ‘Blundell,’ and the immortalised but mythic ‘Blondel’ are but changes rung upon the others. Our ‘Fallows’ are but relics of the ‘Fales’ and ‘Falemans’ of the Hundred Rolls. The somewhat pallid yellow they represented we still apply to park deer and untilled earth. We find it, however, used more personally in the ‘Knight’s Tale,’ where it is said of Arcite that he began to wax lean—
His eye hollow, and grisly to behold,
His hewe falew, and pale as ashen cold.
‘Scarlet’ doubtless was a sobriquet given, as may have been some of the above, from the colour of the dress, this being a very popular complexion of cloth in early days. Tripping it—
In skerlet kyrtells, every one,
would be a familiar and pretty sight, no doubt, as the village maidens went round to the tune of the fife and tabor at the rural feast or ingathering, nor would umbrage be taken at the title. Several ‘Blues’ are recorded in the more Norman-French form of ‘le Bleu.’ Whether they still exist I am not quite sure, nor are we helped to any satisfactory conclusion by the epitaph which Mr. Lower wisely italicises, when he says it is said to exist in a church in Berkshire—
Underneath this ancient pew