In a family Bible (black letter, 1634), I find the following MS. note on 2 Sam. xiv. 26.: "And when he polled his head ... he weighed the hair of his head at two hundred shekels after the king's weight;" which suggests a solution of the difficulty which has puzzled many commentators, who, to make Absalom's hair of the full weight, have to suppose that it was plastered with pomatum and sprinkled with gold dust:
"Ye lesser shekel weighed a quarter of an ounce, ye greater half an ounce. We cannot therefore suppose yt ye loppings of Absalom's hair weighed either 50 or 100 oz. But yt wn it was cut off his servts might have sold it for 12lb 10s or 25lb to ye Ladys of Jerusalem, who were ambitious of adorning yr heads wth ye Hair of ye beautifull Absalom: wth ye locks of ye Ks son...."
It is recorded that when Absalom was buried "they laid a very great heap of stones on him." Was this in detestation and abhorrence (cf. Joshua vii. 26., viii. 29.), or in honourable memory of a prince and chief? If the former, did it give rise to the custom of flinging stones in the graves of malefactors?
CUTHBERT BEDE, B.A.
Bowbell (Vol. v., pp. 28. 140. 212.).
—Several of your correspondents have pointed out instances of the use of the word Bowbell as nearly synonymous with Cockney. The following lines are, I believe, of earlier date than any which have been quoted on this subject; but it is not quite clear in what sense the word Bowbell is there used.
They are from a satirical poem by John Skelton, who died in 1529; and the subject of them is Sir Thomas More.
"But now we have a knight
That is a man of might,
All armed for to fight,