Apparently the last recorded instance of the Hobby-Horse dance occurred at Abbot’s Bromley, on which occasion a man carrying the image of a horse between his legs, and armed with a bow and arrow (the emblems of Barry the Sovereign Archer), played the part of Hobby: with him were six companions wearing reindeer heads (the emblems of the Dayspring) who danced the hey and other ancient dances. Tollett supposes the famous hobby horse to be the King of the May “though he now appears as a juggler and a buffoon with a crimson foot-cloth fretted with gold, the golden bit, the purple bridle, and studded with gold, the man’s purple mantle with a golden border which is latticed with purple, his golden crown, purple cap with a red feather, and with a golden knop”.[601]
Figs. 314 to 317.—British. From Akerman.
Fig. 318.—British. From Camden.
Fig. 319.—Head Dress of the King (N.W. Palace Nimroud). From Nineveh (Layard).
A knop or knob means a boss, protuberance, or rosebud—originally, of course, a wild rosebud which precedes the hip—and it is probably the same word as the Cunob which occurs so frequently in British coins. In Fig. 314 Cunob occurs alone, and I am not sure that Figs. 315 and 318 should not be read Elini Cunob. The knob figured not only on our Hobby Horse, but also as a symbol on the head-dress of Tyrian kings, and there is very little doubt that the charming small figure on the obverse of Cunob Elini is intended for King Ob, or Ep. There is a Knap Hill at Avebury, a Knapton in Yorkshire, and a Knapwell in Suffolk: Knebworth in Herts was Chenepenorde in Domesday, and the imaginary farmer Cnapa or Cnebba, to whom these place-names are assigned, may be equated with the afore-mentioned farmer Heppo of Hepworth.
Knaves Castle (Lichfield), now a small mound—a heap?—is ascribed to “cnafa, a boy or servant, later a knave, a rogue”: Cupid is a notorious little rogue, nevertheless, proverbially Love makes the world go round, and constitutes its nave, navel, hub, or boss: with snob Skeat connotes snopp, meaning a boy or anything stumpy.