The Romance of Names Part 35

(Cotgrave), is a dialect name for the bittern, called a "b.u.t.ter-b.u.mp"

by Tennyson's Northern Farmer (1. 31). Culver is Anglo-Sax. culfre, a pigeon--

"Columba, a culver, a dove"

(Cooper)--

hence the local Culverhouse. Dove often becomes Duff. Gaunt is sometimes a dialect form of gannet, used in Lincolns.h.i.+re of the crested grebe. Popjoy may have been applied to the successful archer who became king of the popinjay for the year. The derivation of the word, Old Fr. papegai, whence Mid. Eng. papejay--

"The briddes synge, it is no nay, The sparhawk and the papejay, That joye it was to heere"

(B, 1956)--

is obscure, though various forms of it are found in most of the European languages. In English it was applied not only to the parrot, but also to the green woodp.e.c.k.e.r. The London Directory form is Pobgee.

With bird nicknames may be mentioned Callow, unfledged, cognate with Lat. calvus, bald. Its opposite also survives as Fleck and Flick--

"Flygge, as byrdis, maturus, volabilis."

(Prompt. Parv.)

Margaret Paston, writing (1460) of the revived hopes of Henry VI., says--

"Now he and alle his olde felaws.h.i.+p put owt their fynnes, and arn ryght flygge and mery."

HAWK NAMES

We have naturally a set of names taken from the various species of falcons. To this cla.s.s belongs Haggard, probably related to Anglo-Sax. haga, hedge, and used of a hawk which had acquired incurable habits of wildness by preying for itself. But Haggard is also a personal name (Chapter VIII). Spark, earlier Sparhawk, is the sparrow-hawk. It is found already in Anglo-Saxon as a personal name, and the full Sparrowhawk also exists. Ta.s.sell is a corruption of tiercel, a name given to the male peregrine, so termed, according to the legendary lore of venery--

"Because he is, commonly, a third part lesse than the female."

(Cotgrave, )

Juliet calls Romeo her "ta.s.sell gentle" (ii. 2). Muskett was a name given to the male sparrow-hawk.

"Musket, a lytell hauke, mouchet." (Palsgrave.)

Mushet is the same name. It comes from Ital. moschetto, a little fly.

For its later application to a firearm cf. falconet. Other names of the hawk cla.s.s are Buzzard and Puttock, i.e. kite--

"Milan, a kite, puttock, glead"

(Cotgrave);

and to the same bird we owe the name Gleed, from a Scandinavian name for the bird

"And the glede, and the kite, and the vulture after his kind." (Deut.

xiv. 13.)

To this cla.s.s also belongs Ramage--

"Ramage, of, or belonging to, branches; also, ramage, hagard, wild, homely, rude"

(Cotgrave)--

and sometimes Lennard, an imitative form of "lanner," the name of an inferior hawk--

"Falcunculus, a leonard."

(Holyoak, Lat. Dict., 1612.)

Povey is a dialect name for the owl, a bird otherwise absent from the surname list.

BEASTS

Among beast nicknames we find special attention given, as in modern vituperation, to the swine, although we do not find this true English word, unless it be occasionally disguised as Swain. Hogg does not belong exclusively to this cla.s.s, as it is used in dialect both of a young sheep and a yearling colt. Anglo-Sax. sugu, sow, survives in Sugg. Purcell is Old Fr. pourcel (pourceau), dim. of Lat. porcus, and I take Pockett to be a disguised form of the obsolete porket--

"Porculus, a pygg: a shoote: a porkes."

(Cooper.)

The word shoote in the above gloss is now the dialect shot, a young pig, which may have given the surname Shott. But Scutt is from a Mid.

English adjective meaning short--

"Scute, or shorte, curtus, brevis"

(Prompt. Parv.)--

and is also an old name for the hare. Two other names for the pig are the northern Galt and the Lincolns.h.i.+re Grice--

"Marca.s.sin, a young wild boare; a shoot or grice." (Cotgrave.)

Grice also represents le gris, the grey; cf. Grace for le gras (Chapter XXII). Bacon looks like a nickname, but is invariably found without the article. As it is common in French, it would appear to be an Old French accusative to Back, going back to Germanic Bacco (Chapter XIII). Hinks is Mid. Eng. hengst, a stallion, and is thus identical with Hengist (Chapter XX). Stott means both a bullock and a nag (Chapter XIX).

Everyone remembers Wamba's sage disquisition on the names of animals in the first chapter of Ivanhoe. Like much of Scott's archaeology it is somewhat anachronistic, for the live animals were also called veals and muttons for centuries after Wamba's death

"Mouton, a mutton, a weather"; "veau, a calfe, or veale." (Cotgrave.)

Calf has become very rare as a surname, though Kalb is still common in Germany. Bardsley regards Duncalf and Metcalf as perverted from dun-croft and meadow-croft. It seems possible that they may be for down-calf and mead-calf, from the locality of the pasture, but this is a pure guess on my part. It is curious that beef does not appear to have survived, though Leboeuf is common in French, and bullocks are still called "beeves" in Scotland. Tegg is still used by butchers for a two-year-old sheep. Palsgrave gives it another meaning--

"Tegg, or p.r.i.c.ket (Chapter XXII), saillant."

Roe is also found in the older forms Rae and Ray, of course confused with Wray (Chapter XIII), as Roe itself is with Rowe (Chapter I). Doe often becomes Dowe. Hind is usually occupative (Chapter III), but Fr.

Lab.i.+.c.he suggests that it must sometimes be a nickname--

"b.i.+.c.he, a hind; the female of a stagge." (Cotgrave.)