‘Nash’ is but put for ‘atten-Ash,’ or as some of our Rolls records it, ‘atte-Nash;’ ‘Nalder’ for ‘atten-Alder,’ ‘Nelmes’ for ‘atten-Elms,’ ‘Nall’ for atten-Hall,’ while ‘Oven’ and ‘Orchard’ in the olden registers are found as ‘atte-Novene’ and ‘atte-Norchard’ respectively. That this practice, in a day of an unsettled orthography, was common, is easily judged by the traces that may be detected in our ordinary vocabulary of a similar habit. In the period we are considering ‘ale’ was the vulgar term for an ‘ale-house.’ We still talk of the ‘ale-stake,’ that is, the public-house sign. Thus ‘atten-ale’ got corrupted into ‘nale.’ Chaucer, with many other writers, so uses it. In the ‘Freres Tale’ we are told how the Sompnour—
Maken him gret festes at the nale.
An old poem, too, says—
Robin will Gilot
Leden to the nale
And sitten there togedres
And tellen their tale.
Thus our forefathers used to talk alike of ‘an ouch,’ or ‘a nouch,’ for a jewel or setting of gold. Gower has it—
When thou hast taken any thynge
Of love’s gifte, or nouche, or rynge.