Chapter 12

Fig.120.—Gaulish. From Akerman.

Fig.121.

The story of St. George treading on the Padstow Rock, and the subsequent gush of water, is immediately suggestive of the Pegasus legend. Pegasus, the winged steed of the Muses, which, with a stroke of its hoof, caused a fountain to gush forth, is supposed to have been thus named because he made his first appearance near thesources—Greekpegai—of Oceanus. It is obvious, however, from the coins of Britain, Spain, and Gaul, that Pegasus—occasionally astral-winged and hawk-headed—was very much at home in these regions, and it is not improbable thatpegasuswas originally the CelticPeg Esus. The god Esus of Western Europe—one of whose portraits is here given—was not only King Death, but he is identified by De Jubainville with Cuchulainn, the Achilles or Young Sun God ofIreland.[293]Esus, the counterpart of Isis, was probably the divinity worshipped at Uzes in Gaul, a coin of which town, representing a seven-rayed sprig springing from a brute, is here reproduced, and that King Esus or King Osis was the Lord of profound speculation, is somewhat implied bygnosis, the Greek word for knowledge. Tacitus mentions that the neighing of the sacred white horse of the Druids was regarded as oracular; the voice of a horse is termed its neigh, from which it would seem horses were regarded as super-intelligent animals whichknew.[294]The inscriptionCUNorCUNOwhich occurs so frequently on the horse coins of Western Europe is seemingly akin token, the root ofknow,knew,canny, andcunning. In India the elephantGanesa—seemingly a feminine form ofGenesisandGnosis—was deemed to be the Lord of all knowledge.

In connection with Pegasus may be noted Bukephalus, the famed steed of Alexander. The InscriptionsEPPILLUSandEPPI[295]occur on the Kentish coins, Figs. 122 and 123;hiphaorhippawas the Phœnician for a mare; in Scotland the nightmare is known asephialtus; ahippodrome is a horse course, whence, perhaps, Bukephalus may be translated Big Eppilus. The little elf or elve under a bent sprig is presumably Bog or Puck, and in connection with theEagle-headed Pegasus of Fig. 164 may be noted the Puckstone by the megalithicAggleStone at Purbeck, where is a St. Alban’s Head.[296]

Figs.122 and 123.—British. From Akerman.

Whether or not Pegasus was Big Esus or Peg or Puck Esus is immaterial, but it is quite beyond controversy that the animals now under consideration are Elphin Steeds and that they are not the “deplorable abortions” which numismatists imagine. The recognised authorities are utterly contemptuous towards our coinage, to which they apply terms such as “very rude,” “an attempt to represent a horse,” “barbarous imitation,” and so forth; but Iam persuaded that the craftsmen who fabricated these archaic coins were quite competent to draw straightforward objects had such been their intent. Akerman is seriously indignant at the indefiniteness of the object which resembles a fishbone and “has been called a fern leaf,” and he sums up his feelings by opining that this uncouth representation may be as much the result of incompetent workmanship as of successive fruitless attempts at imitation.[297]

Figs.124 to 127.—Iberian. From Barthelemy.

Figs.128 and 129.—Iberian. From Akerman.

Fig.130.—Gaulish. From Akerman.

Incompetent comprehension would condemn Figs. 124 to 129, particularly the draughtsmanship of the head: it is hardly credible, yet, says Akerman, the small winged elfin these coins “apparently escaped the observation of M. de Saulcy”. They emanated from the Tarragonian town of Ana or Ona, and are somewhat suggestive of the mythic tale that Minerva sprang from the head of Jove: the horses on the Gaulish coin illustrated in Fig. 130, which is attributed either to Verdun or Vermandois, are inscribedVero Ioveand that Jou was the White Horse is, to some extent, implied by our elementary wordsGeeandGeho. According to Hazlitt “the exclamation Geho! Geho! which carmen use to their horses is not peculiar to this country, as I have heard it used in France”:[298]it is probable that the Jehu who drove furiously was a memory of the solar charioteer; it is further probable that the story of Io, the divinely fair daughter of Inachus, who was said to have been pursued over the world by a malignant gadfly, originated in the lumpish imagination of some one who had in front of him just such elfin emblems as the pixy horse now under consideration. That in reality the gadfly was a goodmoucheis implied by the term gad: the inscriptionKioon Fig. 74 (p. 253) reads Great Io or Great Eye, and in connection with the remarkable optic of the White Horse at Uffington may be connoted the place-name Horse Eye nearBexhill. The curious place-name Beckjay in Shropshire is suggestive of Big Jew or Joy: the blue-crestedmonarch of the woods we call a jay (Spanish,gayo, “of doubtful origin”) was probably the bird of Jay or Joy—just aspicusor the crested woodpecker was admittedly Jupiter’s bird—and the Jaye’s Park in Surrey, which is in the immediate neighbourhood of Godstone, Gadbrooke, and Kitlands, was seemingly associated at some period with Good Jay or Joy.

We speak ironically to-day of our “Jehus,” and the wordhackstill survives: in Chaucer’s time English carters encouraged their horses with the exclamation Heck![299]the Irish forhorsewasech, and the inscription beneath the effigy on Fig. 131, a Tarragonian coin, reads, according to Akerman,Ekk. That thehackwas connected in idea with the oak is somewhat implied by a horse ornament in my possession, the eye or centre of which is represented by an oak corn oracorn. In the North of England the elves seem to have been known ashags, for fairy rings are there known ashagtracks. The wordhackneyis identical with Boudicca’s tribe the Ikeni, and it is believed that Cæsar’s reference to the Cenimagni or Cenomagni refers to the Ikeni: whence it is probable that the Ikeni, like the Cantii, were worshippers of Invicta, the Great Hackney, theCeni Magnaor Hackney Magna.

The water horse which figures overleaf may be connoted with the Scotch kelpie, which is radicallyek ElpiorElfi: the kelpie or water horse of Scotch fairy lore is a ghastly spook, just as Alpa in Scandinavia is a ghoul andEphialtesin Albany or Scotland is a nightmare: but there must almost certainly have been a White Kelpie, for the Greeks held a national horse race which they termed the Calpe, and Calpe is the name of the mountain which forms theEuropean side of the Pillars of Hercules. From the surnames Killbye and Gilbey one may perhaps deduce a tribe who were followers of’K AlpetheGreat All Feeder: that the kelpie was regarded as the fourfold feeder is obvious from the four most unnatural teats depicted on the Pixtil coin of Fig. 133.

Fig.131.—Iberian. From Akerman.

Fig.132.—British. From Akerman.Fig.133.—Channel Islands. From Barthelemy.

Fig.132.—British. From Akerman.

Fig.133.—Channel Islands. From Barthelemy.

The Welsh form of Alphin is Elphin, and the Cornish height known as Godolphin—whence the family name Godolphin—implies, like Robin Goodfellow,Good Elphin. With Elphin, Alban, and Hobany may be connected the Celtic Goddess Epona, “the tutelar deity of horses and probably originally a horse totem”. To Epona may safely be assigned the wordpony; Irishponi; Scotchpowney, all of which the authorities connect withpullus, the Latin forfoal: it is quite true there is apin both. We have already traced a connection between neighing, knowing, kenning, and cunning, and there is seemingly a further connection between Epona, the Goddess of Horses, andopine, for according to Plato the horse signified “reason andopinioncoursing about through natural things”.[300]

British horses used to be known familiarly as Joan, and the termjennetpresumably meantLittle Joan: the Italian for ahackneyischinea. At Hackney, which now forms part of London, there is an Abney Park which was once, it may be, associated with Hobany or Epona: the main street of Hackney or Haconey (which originally contained the Manor of Hoxton) is Mare Street; and thismarewas seemingly the Kenmurewhose traces are perpetuated in Kenmure Road, Hackney. At the corner of Seven Sisters Road is the church of St. Olave, and the neighbouring Alvington Street suggests that this Kingsland Road district was once a town or down of Alvin the Elphin King. Godolphin Hill in Cornwall was alternatively known as Godolcan, and there is every reason to suppose that Elphin was the good old king, the good all-king, and the good holy king.

Hackney was seemingly once one of the many congregating “Londons,” and we may recognise Elen or Ollan in London Fields, London Lane, Lyne Grove, Olinda (or Good Olin) Road, Londesborough Road, Ellingfort (or Strong Ellin) Road, Lenthall (or Tall Elen) Road. In Linscott Street there stood probably at one time a Cot, Cromlech, or “Kit’s Coty,” and at the neighbouring Dalston[301]was very possibly a Tallstone, equivalent to the Cornishtal carnorhigh rock.

The adjectivelongorlankyis probably of Hellenic origin, and the giants or long men sometimes carved inhill-sides (as at Cerne Abbas) were like all Longstones once perhaps representations of Helen.

Fig.134.—“Metal ornaments found on horse trappings (North Lincolnshire, 1907). Nos. 1-8 represent forms of the crescent amulet; Nos. 8-11, the horseshoe. No. 12 is a well-known mystic symbol. No. 15 shows the cross potencée, and No. 16 the cross patée: these seem to denote Christian influence. Nos. 13 and 14 indicate the decay of folk memory concerning amulets, thoughthe heart pattern was originally talismanic. Nos. 7 and 8 form bridle ‘plumes,’ No. 6 is a hook for a bearing-rein; the remainder are either forehead medallions or breeching decorations. The patterns 1-4, 9, 11, 13, 14, and 16, are fairly common in London.”FromFolk Memory(Johnson, W.).

FromFolk Memory(Johnson, W.).

Fig.135.—Iberian. From Akerman.Fig.136.—British. From Evans.

Fig.135.—Iberian. From Akerman.

Fig.136.—British. From Evans.

The Town Hall at Hackney stands on a plot of ground known as Hackney Grove, and the neighbouring MildmayPark and Mildmay Grove suggest a grove or sanctuary of the Mild May or Mary. That Pegasus was known familiarly in this district is implied by the White Horse Inn on Hackney Marshes and by its neighbour “The Flying Horse”: Hackney neighbours Homerton, and that the national Hackney ormarewas Homer or Amour is obvious from Fig. 135, where a heart, the universal emblem ofamour, is represented at its Hub, navel, or bogel. According to Sir John Evans the “principal characteristic” of Fig. 136 is “the heart-shaped figure between the forelegs of the horse, the meaning of which I am at a loss to discover”:[302]but any yokel could have told Sir John the meaning of the heart or hearts which are still carved into tree trunks, and were rarely anything else than the emblems of Amor. The observant Londoner will not fail to notice particularly on May Day—the Mary or Mother Day—when our Cockney horses parade in much of their immemorial finery and pomp—that golden hearts, stringed in long sequences over the harness, are conspicuous among the half-moons, stars, and other prehistoric emblems of the Bona dea or pre-Christian Mary.

Hackney includes the churches of St. Mary, St. Michael, and St. Jude: Jude is the same word asgood, and the St.Jude of Scripture who was surnamed Thadee, and was said to be the son of Alpheus, is apparently Good Tadi or Daddy,aliasSt. Alban the All Good, the Kaadman. St. Jude is also St. Chad, and there was a celebrated Chadwell[303]at the end of the Marylebone Road now known as St. Pancras or King’s Cross: at King’s Cross there is a locality still known as Alpha Place.

At Hackney is a Gayhurst Road, which may imply an erstwhile hurst or wood of Gay or Jay, and “at the south end of Springfield Road there is a curious and interesting little hamlet lying on the water’s edge. The streets are very steep, and some of them extremely narrow—mere passages like the wynds in Edinburgh.”[304]This little hamlet is “encircled” by Mount Pleasant Lane, whence one may assume that the eminence itself was known at some time or other as Mount Pleasant.

The “Mount Pleasant” at Hackney may be connoted with the more famous “Mount Pleasant” at Dun Ainy, Knock Ainy, or the Hill of Aine in Limerick. The “pleasanthills” of Ireland were defined as “ceremonialhills,” and it was particularly on the night of All Hallows that the immemorial ceremonies were there observed. To this day Aine or Ana, a beautiful and gracious water-spirit, “the best-natured of women,” is reverenced at Knockainy, and the legend persists that “Aine promised to save bloodshed if the hill were given to her till the end of the world”.[305]That Mount Pleasant at Hackney or Hackoney was similarly dedicated to High Aine or Ana is an inference to which the facts seem clearly to point.

It would also be permissible to interpret Hackney as Oaken Island, in which light it may be connoted with Glastonbury, the wordglastonbeing generally supposed to beglasten, the British for oak. Glastonbury, the celebrated Avalon, Apple Island, Apollo Island, or Isle of Rest, was a world-famous “Mount Pleasant,” and on its most elevated height there stands St. Michael’s Tower. Glastonbury itself,[306]“its two streets forming a perfect cross,” is almost engirdled by a little river named theBrue. The French townBrayis in the so-called Santerre or Holy-land district: the remains of a megalithicsanterre,saintuarieor sanctuary are still standing at Abury or Aubury in Wiltshire, and we may equate this place-name withabri, a generic term in French, “origin unknown,” forsanctuaryor refuge.

Near Bray, Santerre, is Auber’s Ridge, which may be connoted with Aubrey Walk, the highest spot in Kensington, and it would seem thatAbury’s,abris, or “Mount Pleasants” were once plentiful in the bundle of communities, townships, parishes, and lordships which have now merged into the Greater London: Ebury Square in the South-West may mark one, and Highbury in the North, with its neighbouring “Mount Pleasant,” another.

The immortal Mount Pleasant of the Muses was named Helicon, and from here sprang the celebrated fountains Aganippe and Hippocrene. At Holywell in Wales there is a village called Halkin lying at the foot of a hill named Helygen: there is a Heligan Hill in Cornwall, and a river Olcan in Hereford: there is an Alconbury in Hunts, and an Elkington (Domesday Alchinton) at Louth. An Elk is a gigantic buck whose radiating antlers are so fern-likethat a genus has appropriately been designated the Elk fern. Ilkley in Yorkshire is thought to be the Olicana of Ptolemy, and there is standing to-day at Ramsgate a Holy Cone or Helicon modernised into “Hallicondane”. Thedanehere probably implies adunor hill-fort, and theHalliconitself consists of a peak crossed by four roads.[307]This Ramsgate Hallicondane, which stands by Allington Park, may have been adunof the Elle or Elf King: in France Hellequin is associated with Columbine, and the little figure labelledCuin(infra, p. 397 Fig. 336), may be identified with this virgin. The Alcantara district to which this Cuin coin has been attributed was, it may safely be assumed, atara,tre, ortroyof Alcan.

On the top of Tory Hill in Kilkenny,i.e.,Kenny’s Church, stood a pagan altar: the more famous Tara or Temair is associated primarily with a “son of Ollcain”; it is said next to have passed into the possession of a certain Cain, and to have been known asDruim Cainor “Cain’s Ridge”.[308]

Halcyon days mean blissful, pleasant, radiant, ideal, days, and of the Holy King or All King the blue jewelled King-fisher or Halcyon seems to have been a symbol. Whether there be any connection between Elgin and the Irish Hooligans, or whether these trace their origin to the “son of Ollcain,” I do not know. From the colossal Kinia and Acongagua down to the humblestpeg, everypeakseems to have been similarly named. The pimple is a diminutive hill orpock, and thepykesof Cumberland arethepeaksof Derbyshire. At the summit of the Peak District stands Buxton, claiming to be the highest market-town in England: around Buxton, formerly written “Bawkestanes,” still stand cromlechs and other Poukelays or Buk stones: Backhouse is a surname in the Buxton district, and the original Backhouses may well have worshipped either Bacchus,i.e., St. Baccho, or the gentle Baucis who merged into a Linden tree.

Fig.137.—Ancient Pagan Altar on Tory Hill. FromSketches of Irish History(Anon., 1844).

Near Buxton are the sources of the river Wye, and by Wye in Kent, near Kennington, we find Olantigh Park, St. Alban’s Court, Mount Pleasant, Little London, and Trey Town: by the church at Wye are two inns, named respectively “The Old Flying Horse,” and “The New Flying Horse”; Wye races are still held upon an egg-shaped course, and close to Kennington Oval—which I am unable to trace beyond its earlier condition of a market-garden—stands a celebrated “White Horse Inn”. At Kennington by Wye a roadside inn sign is “The Golden Ball,” which once presumably implied the Sun or Sol, for in the immediate neighbourhood is Soles Court.

Fig.138.—Iberian. From Akerman.

The horse was a constantly recurring emblem in the coins of Hispania, and the object on the Iberian coin here illustrated is defined by Akerman as “an apex”: the appearance of this symbol, seemingly a spike or peg posed upon a teathill, on an Iberian or Aubreyan coin is evidence of its sanctity in West Europe. Theologians of the Dark Ages have been ridiculed for debating the number of angels that could stand upon a pin-point, but it is more than probable that the question was a subject of discussion long before their time: the Chinese believe that “at the beginning of Creation the chaos floated as a fish skims along the surface of a river; from whence arose something like athornorpickle, which, being capable of motion and variation, became a soul or spirit”.[309]The fairysanctity of the thorn bush would therefore seem to have arisen from itsspikes, and the abundance of these emblems would naturally elevate it into the house or abode ofspooks: the burning bush, in which form the Almighty is said to have appeared before Moses, was, according to Rabbinical tradition, a thorn bush: the Elluf and the Alvah trees—thealephor thealphatrees?—are described as large thorned species of Acacia; and the spiky acacia, GreekAkakia, is related toakis, a point or thorn.

One of the attributes of the Man-in-the-Moon is a Thorn Bush, whence Shakespeare puts into the mouth of Moonshine, “This thorn bush is my thorn bush; and this dog my dog”. The Man-in-the-Moon being identified withCain, it becomes interesting to note that the surname Kennett is accepted as a Norman diminutive ofchien, a dog.[310]On p. 149—a mediæval papermark—the Wanderer is surmounted by a bush; a bush is a little tree, and the wordbush(of unknown origin) is a variant of Bogie—also ofbougie, the French for candle: bushes and briars were the acknowledged haunts of Bogie,aliasHobany or Hob-with-a-canstick or bougie.

Boucheused to be an English word meaning meat and drink, whence Stow, referring to the English archers, says they hadbouchof court (to wit, meat and drink) and great wages of sixpence by the day.[311]In Rome and elsewhere a suspended bush was the sign of an inn, whence the expression “Good wine needs no bush”: theboucheor mouth is where meat and drink goes in, similarlymouthmay be connoted with the Britishmeath, meaning nourishment.Peckis also an old word for provender, and we still speak of feeling peckish.[312]

The wordbucket—allied to Anglo-Saxonbuc, meaning a pitcher—implies that this variety of large can or mug was used for peck purposes: the illustration herewith, representing the decoration on a bronze bucket found at Lake Maggiore, consists of speck-centred circles, and dotted, spectral, or maculate geese, bucks, and horses.

Fig.139.—Bronze from bucket, Sesto Calendo, Lake Maggiore. From the British Museum’sGuide to the Antiquities of the Early Iron Age.

It is unnecessary to dilate on the great importance played in civic life by inns: numberless place-names are directly traceable to inn-signs; and the brewing of church ales, considered in conjunction with facts which will be noted in a subsequent chapter, make it almost certain that churches once dispensed food and drink and thatinnwas originally an earlier name for church. Among the inscriptions of the catacombs is one which the authorities believe marks the sepulchre of a brewer: but these pictographs are without exception emblems, and it is more likely that the design in question (Fig. 140) stands for “that Brewer,”[313]the Lord of the Vineyard, or the Vinedresser. The Green Man with his Still implies a brewer; the distilling of Benedictine is still an ecclesiastical occupation, and the wordbrewsuggests that brewing was once the peculiar privilege of thepèresor priests who brewed the sacred ales. The wordkegis the same as the familiar BlackJack, and underjugSkeat writes: “Drinking vessels of all kinds were formerly calledjocks,jills, andjugs, all of which represent Christian names. Jug and Judge were usual as pet female names, and equivalent to Jenny or Joan.”

Fig.140.—FromChristian Iconography(Didron).

The Hackney inn known as “The Flying Horse” may possibly owe its foundation and sign to the Templars, who possessed property in Hackney: the Templars’ badge of Pegasus still persists in the Temple at Whitefriars, and the circular churches of the Templars had certainly somesymbolic connection with Sun or Golden Ball. At Jerusalem, the ideal city which was always deemed to be the hub, bogel, or navel of the world, there are some extraordinary rock-hewn water tanks, known as the stables of King Solomon: Jerusalem was known as Hierosolyma or Holy Solyma, and that Solyma, Salem, or Peace was associated in Europe with the horse is clear from the coin of the Gaulish tribe known as the Solmariaca (Fig. 141). The animal here represented is treading under foot a dragon or scorpion, and the Solmariaca, whose city is now Soulosse, were seemingly followers of Solmariak, the Sol Mary, or Fairy. The aim of theFreemasons is the rebuilding of the Temple of Solomon or Wisdom, and it is quite evident that the front view of a temple on Fig. 142 is not the representation of a material building such as the Houses of Parliament now depicted on our modern paper-money. The centre of Fig. 142 is a four-specked cross, the centre-piece of Fig. 143 is the six-breasted Virgin, and Fig. 144 is a very elaborated pantheon, hierarchy, or habitation of All Hallows: the inscription readsBasilica ulpia,i.e.,The ChurchUlpia.

Fig.141.—Gaulish. From Akerman.Fig.142.—Iberian. From Akerman.

Fig.141.—Gaulish. From Akerman.

Fig.142.—Iberian. From Akerman.

Fig.143.—From Barthelemy.Fig.144.—From Barthelemy.

Fig.143.—From Barthelemy.

Fig.144.—From Barthelemy.

Fig.145.—Iberian. From Akerman.

Abdera, now Adra, is a Spanish town on the shores of the Mediterranean, founded, according to Strabo, by the Tyrians, and the name thus seems to connote atreofAbor Hob. I have elsewhere endeavoured to prove that King Solomon, the Mighty Controller of the Jinns, was the Eye of Heaven or the Sun, and this emblem appears in the triangle or delta of Fig. 145: the corresponding inscription on Fig. 145 are Phœnician characters, readingThe sun,[314]and the curious fish-pillars are almost certainly a variant of thededdu. In Ireland a Salmon of Wisdom enters largely into Folklore: the wordsalmonis Solomon or Wisdom, as also issolemn: in Latinsolemnissolennis, upon which Skeat comments: “Annual, occurring yearly, like a religious rite, religious, solemn, Latinsollus, entire, complete:annus, a year. Hencesolemn—returning at the end of a complete year. The old Latinsollusiscognate with Welshholl, whole, entire.” The cognomen Solomon occurs several times in the lists of British Kings, and one may see it figuring to-day on Cornish shop-fronts in the form of variants such as Sleeman, Slyman, etc. Solomon may be resolved into the Sol man, the Seul man, the Silly[315](innocent) man, or the Sly man, the Cunning man, or Magus. The “Sea horse” to the right, illustrated by Akerman on Plate XX, No. 8, is a coin of the Gaulish Magusa, and bears the inscription Magus which, as will be remembered, was a title of the Wandering Jew.

Maundrell, the English traveller, describing his journey in the seventeenth century to Jerusalem, has recorded that, “Our quarters, this first night, we took up at the Honeykhan, a place of but indifferent accommodation, about one hour and a half west of Aleppo”. He goes on to say: “It must here be noted that, in travelling this country, a man does not meet with a market-town and inns every night, as in England. The best reception you can find here is either under your own tent, if the season permit, or else in certain public lodgments, founded in charity for the use of travellers. These are called by the Turkskhani; and are seated sometimes in the towns and villages, sometimes at convenient distances upon the open road. They are built in fashion of a cloister, encompassing a court of 30 or 40 yards square, more or less, according to the measure of the founder’s ability or charity. At these places all comers are free to take shelter, paying only a small fee to the khan-keeper (khanji), and very often without that acknowledgment; but one must expect nothing here but bare walls. As for other accommodations of meat,drink, bed, fire, provender, with these it must be every one’s care to furnish himself.”[316]

The main roads of Britain were once seemingly furnished with similar shelters which were known as Coldharbours, and the Coldharbour Lanes of Peckham and elsewhere mark the sites of such refuges.

The Eastern khans, “built in fashion of a cloister,” find their parallel in the enclosed form of all primitive shelters, and the wordscloseandcloisterare radicallyeccles,eglos, oreglise. Whence the authorities suppose Beccles in Silly Suffolk to be a corruption ofbeau egliseor Beautiful Church: but to whom was this “beautiful church” first reared and dedicated, and by what name did the inhabitants of Beccles know their village? The surname Clowes, which may be connoted with Santa Claus, is still prevalent at Beccles, a town which belonged anciently toBuryAbbey.

The patron saint of English inns, travellers, and cross-roads, was the Canaanitish Christopher, and the earliest block prints representing Kit were “evidently made for pasting against the walls in inns, and other places frequented by travellers and pilgrims.”[317]Kit’s intercession was thought efficacious against all dangers, either by fire, flood, or earthquake, hence his picture was sometimes painted in colossal size and occupied the whole height of the building whether church or inn. The red cross of St. John of Jerusalem was theChristopher; travellers carried images of Cuddy as charms, and the equation of St. John with Canaanitish Christopher will account for Christopher’s Houses being entitled Inns,[318]or Johns, or Khans. Underthe travellers’ images of Christopher used to be printed the inscription, “Whosoever sees the image of St. Christopher shall that day not feel any sickness,” or alternatively, “The day that you see St. Christopher’s face, that day shall you not die an evil death”. The emblem onpage 262, was, I think, wrongly guessed by Didron as “the spirit of youth”: it is more probably a variant of Christopher, or the Spirit of Love, helping the palmer or pilgrim of life.

Figs.146 and 147.—Gaulish. From Akerman.

Fig. 146, a coin of the Turones, whose ancient capital is now Tours, consists of a specky or spectral horse accompanied by an urn: this urn was the symbol of the Virgin, and the reader will be familiar with a well-known modern picture in which La Source is ambiguously represented as a maiden standing with a pitcher at a spring.Yveris Norse for awarm bubbling spring, and on the coins of Vergingetorix we find the pitcher and the horse: the wordvirginis equivalent toSpring Queen, and ascetofigures largely in British mythology as the ark, box, or womb of Ked, it is probable that Virgingetorix may be interpreted King Virgin Keto. In Gaulrexmeant King or Queen, but this word is less radical than the Spanishrey, Frenchroi, Britishrhi: according to Sir John Rhys, “the old Irishri, genitiverig, king, andriganqueen would be somewhat analogous, although the Welshrhian,the equivalent of the Irishrigan, differs in being mostly a poetic term for a lady who need not be royal”.[319]The name Maria, which in Spain is bestowed indiscriminately upon men and women, would therefore seem to beMother Queen, andRhea, the Great Mother of Candia, might be interpreted asthe Princessorthe Queen.

Fig.148.—Egyptian.Fig.149.—Etrurian. FromCities and Cemeteries of Etruria(Dennis, G.).Fig.150.—British. FromA New Description of England and Wales(Anon, 1724).

Fig.148.—Egyptian.

Fig.149.—Etrurian. FromCities and Cemeteries of Etruria(Dennis, G.).

Fig.150.—British. FromA New Description of England and Wales(Anon, 1724).

Among inscriptions to the Gaulish Apollo the most common are those in which he is entitled Albiorix and Toutiorix: these are understood by the authorities as having meant respectively “King of the World,” and “King of the People”.

With the Cornish Well known as Joan’s Pitcher may beconnoted the variety of large bottle called ademijohn: according to Skeat this curious term is from the Frenchdamejeanne, Spanishdamajuana—“Much disputed butnotof Eastern origin. The French form is right as it stands though often much perverted. From Frenchdame(Spanishdama), lady; and Jeanne (Spanish Juana), Joan, Jane.” In our wordpitcherthethas been wrongly inserted, the Frenchpicheris the Germanbecher, Greekbikos, and all these terms includingbeakerare radically Peggy, Puck or Big. Pitchers are one of the commonest sepulchral offerings, and we are told that the Iberian bronze-working brachycephalic invaders of Britain introduced the type of sepulchral ceramic known as the beaker or drinking cup: “This vessel,” says Dr. Munro, “was almost invariably deposited beside the body, and supposed to have contained food for the soul of the departed on its way to the other world.”[320]

The German form of Peggy or Margaret is Gretchen, which resolves into GreatChunor GreatMighty Chief: Margot and Marghet may be renderedBig GodorFairy GodorMother Good.

That the pitcher, demijohn, or jug was regarded in some connection with the Big Mother or Great Queen is obvious from the examples illustrated, and the apparition of this emblem on the coins of Tours may be connoted with the female-breasted jugs which were described by Schliemann as “very frequent” in the ruins of Troy. Similar objects were found at Mykenæ in connection with which Schliemann observes: “With regard to this vase with the female breasts similar vases were found on the islands of Thera (Santorin) and Therassia in the ruins of the prehistoriccities which, as before stated, were covered by an eruption of that great central volcano which is believed by competent geologists to have sunk and disappeared about 1700 to 1800B.C.”.[321]It is peculiarly noticeable that the dame Jeanne or jug is thus associated in particular with Troy, Etruria, Therassia, Thera (Santorin), the Turones, and Tours.

The centre stone of megalithic circles constituted the speck or dot within the circle of the feeder or pap, and not infrequently one finds a Longstone termed either The Fiddler or The Piper. The incident of the Pied Piper is said to have occurred at Hamelyn on June 26th, 1284, during the feast of St. John and St. Paul. The street known as Bungen Strasse through which the Piper went followed by the enraptured children is still sacred to the extent that bridal and other processions are compelled to cease their music as they traverse it: Bungen of Bungen Street may thus seemingly be equated withbon Johnor St. John on whose feast day the miracle is said to have happened. The Hamelyn Piper who—

... blew three notes, such sweetSoft notes as never yet musician’s cunningGave to the enraptured air,

... blew three notes, such sweet

Soft notes as never yet musician’s cunning

Gave to the enraptured air,

may be connoted with Pan orFather An, and the mountain now called Koppenberg, into which the Hamelyn children were allured, was obviously Arcadia or the happy land of Pan: thebergof Koppenberg is no doubt relatively modern, and the original name, Koppen, resolves intocop,kopje, orhill-top of Pan. The Land of the Pied Piper was manifestlyHimmel, which is the German forheaven, and it may also be the source of the place-name Hamelyn.

He led us, he said, to a joyous landJoining the town and just at hand,Where waters gushed and fruit trees grew,And flowers put forth a fairer hue,And everything was strange and new.

He led us, he said, to a joyous land

Joining the town and just at hand,

Where waters gushed and fruit trees grew,

And flowers put forth a fairer hue,

And everything was strange and new.

The story of the Piper and the children is found also in Abyssinia, and likewise among the Minussinchen Tartars: the word Minnusinchen looks very like smallSinchenor beloved Sinchen, and with thisSinchenorbungenmay be connoted the Tartarpanshenor pope, and also Gian Ben Gian, the Arabian name for the All Ruler of the Golden Age. That Cupid was known among the Tartars is somewhat implied by the divinity illustrated on p.699.

The Tartar story makes the mysterious Piper a foal which courses round the world, and with ourponymay be connotedtarpon, the Tartar word for the wild horse of the Asiatic steppes.Canois the Latin forI sing, and on Figs. 152 and 153 the Great Enchantress or Incantatrice is represented with the Pipes of Pan: among the wonders in the land of Hamelyn’s Piper were horses with eagles’ wings and these, together with the celestial foal and other elphin marvels, are to be found depicted on the tokens of prehistoric Albion. The tale of the Pied Piper may be connoted with the emblem of Ogmius leading his tongue-tied willing captives, and in Fig. 158 the mighty Muse is playing in human form upon his lute. In Fig. 160 the story of St. Michael or St. George is being played by a Pegasus, and in Fig. 158CUNOis represented as a radiant elf. The arrow on Fig. 163 connects the exquisitely executed little figure with Cupid, Eros, or Amor—the oldest of the Gods—and probably this particular cherub was known as Puck, for his coin was issued in the Channel Islands bya people who inscribed their tokensPooctika,Bucato,Pixtil, andPichtil,i.e.,Pich tallorchief(?).

Figs.151 to 158.—British. No. 151 from Whitaker’sManchester. No. 152 from Evans. Nos. 153 to 157 from Akerman. No. 158 fromA New Description of England and Wales.

Figs.159 to 163.—Channel Islands. From Akerman.

Figs.164 to 167.—British. From Akerman.

It is not improbable that this young sprig was known as the Little Leaf Man, for in Thuringia as soon as the trees began to bud out, the children used to assemble on aSunday and dress one of their playmates with shoots and sprigs: he was covered so thoroughly as to be rendered blind, whereupon two of his companions, taking him by the hand lest he should stumble, led him dancing and singing from home to home. Amor, like Homer, was reputed blind,and the what-nots on Fig. 167 may possibly beleaves, the symbols of theliving, loving Elf, orLife—“this senior-junior, giant-dwarf Dan Cupid”.

It was practically a universal pagan custom to celebrate the return of Spring by carrying away and destroying a rude idol of the old Dad or Death:—

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