Fig. 336.—Stonehenge. From The Celtic Druids (Higgens, G.).
As this monument was without doubt a national centre it is probable that as I have elsewhere suggested Stonehenge meant also the Stone Hinge: the word cardinal means radically hinge; the original Roman cardinals whose round red hats probably typified the ruddy sun, were the priests of Janus, who was entitled the Hinge, and there is no reason to suppose that the same idea was not equally current in England.
That the people of Cardia associated their angel or ange with cardo, a hinge or angle is manifest from the coin illustrated in Fig. 336.
According to Prof. Weekley, “Ing, the name of a demi-god, seems to have been early confused with the Christian angel in the prefix Engel common in German names, e.g., Engelhardt anglicised as Engleheart. In Anglo-Saxon we find both Ing and Ingel. The modern name Ingoll represents Ingweald (Ingold) and Inglett is a diminutive of similar origin. The cheerful Inglebright is from Inglebeort. The simple Ing has given through Norse Ingwar the Scottish Ivor.”[637] But is it not possible that Ivor never came through Ingwar, but was radically a synonym—fairy = Ing, or fire = ingle? Inga is a Scandinavian maiden-name, and if the Inge family—of gloomy repute—are unable to trace any cheerier origin it may be suggested that they came from the Isle of Man where the folk claim to be the descendants of fairies or anges: “The Manks confidently assert that the first inhabitants of their island were fairies, and that these little people have still their residence amongst them. They call them the ‘Good people,’ and say they live in wilds and forests, and mountains, and shun great cities because of the wickedness acted therein.”[638]
As there is no known etymology for inch and ounce it is not improbable that these diminutive measures were connected with the popular idea of the ange’s size and weight: Queen Mab, according to Shakespeare, was “no bigger than an agate stone on the forefinger of an alderman,” and she weighed certainly not more than an ounce. The origin of Queen Mab is supposedly Habundia, or La Dame Abonde, discussed in a preceding chapter, and there connoted with Eubonia, Hobany, and Hob: in Welsh Mab means baby boy, and the priests of this little king were known as the Mabinogi, whence the Mabinogion, or books of the Mabinogi.
Whether there is any reason to connect the three places in Ireland entitled Inchequin with the Ange Queen, or the Inchlaw (a hill in Fifeshire) with the Inch Queen Mab I have had no opportunity of inquiring.
The surnames Inch, Ince, and Ennis, are all usually connoted with enys or ins, the Celtic and evidently more primitive form of insula, an island, ea or Eye.
The Inge family may possibly have come from the Channel Islands or insulæ, where as we have seen the Ange Queen, presumably the Lady of the Isles or inces, was represented on the coinage, and the Lord of the Channel Isles seems to have been Pixtil or Pixy tall. That this Pixy tall was alternatively ange tall is possibly implied by the name Anchetil, borne by the Vicomte du Bessin who owned one of the two fiefs into which Guernsey was anciently divided. It will be remembered that in the ceremony of the Chevauchee de St. Michel, eleven Vavasseurs functioned in the festival; further, that the lance-bearer carried a wand 11¼ feet long. The Welsh form of the name Michael is Mihangel, and as Michael was the Leader of all angels, the mi of this British mihangel may be equated with the Irish mo which, as previously noted, meant greatest.