2'"> S. N" 111., Fkb. 13. '58.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



135 



8vo. George Wharton. 1659 — GG. 



8vo. John White. 1013—41. 



8vo. R. White. 1654. 



8vo. Thomas Wilkinson. 1659, 



8vo. Jeffery Wilson. 1634. 



8vo. William Woodhouse. 1607. 



8vo. John Woodhouse. 1634. 



8vo. W. Lilly and K. Coley. 1682—89." 



Culpeper's, Lilly's, Gibbons', Misson's, Mor- 

 ton's, Street's, Wharton's, Lilly and Coley' a, nrc 

 priced 6d. ; Blagrave's, 5d. ; The Protestant, 7d. ; 

 Rider's, 1*. 5d. ; and all the rest 2d. W. S. 



Hastings. 



There is in my possession a black-letter copy of 

 the Rauens Almanacke for the year 1609, profess- 

 ing to be written by " T. Deckers, which though 

 not exactly answering to the modern idea of an 

 almanack, yet in its opening sentences shows that 

 these useful articles are of a much earlier date than 

 any as yet assigned by your correspondents : — 



" At the beginning of euerie Almanacke, it is the 

 fashion to haue the body of a man drawne as you see*, 

 and not onely baited, but bitten and shot at by wilde 

 beasts and monsters. And this fellow, they that lye all 

 the yeare long (that is to say, those that deale in Ka- 

 lenders,) call the Man of the Moone, or the Moone's 

 Man," &c. 



My copy, otherwise perfect, wants the title- 

 page, so that I cannot say where it was published : 

 the prefatory Epistle ends thus : — 



" And thus because much fowle weather is toward (if 

 my Calender tel no lyes), and that I am loath to haue 

 you stad in a storm, I bid you farwell, dated the I. Ides 

 of the first month of this first great Platonicall and ter- 

 rible yeare 1609.— T. Deckers." 



J, Eastwood. 



I fear that the notices of your correspondents 

 on this subject are calculated to mislead young 

 antiquaries. Almanacks and Calendars are of a 

 much earlier date than is there noticed. It must 

 be obvious that from the earliest times, since the 

 invention of feast, fast, and saints' days, the wor- 

 shippers must have had a guide, especially in those 

 that are moveable. This led the monks in all 

 their service books and mortuaries to prefix an 

 Almanack and Calendar. The first enlarged Al- 

 manack that I have seen is The Shepheard's Kalen- 

 dar, of which several editions were printed in the 

 fifteenth century. The months severally commend 

 themselves : thus — 



" Called I am Janyuere the colde, 

 In Christmas season good fyre I loue, 

 Yonge Jesu, that sometime Judas solde, 

 In me was circumcised for mans behoue. 

 Three kinges sought the sonne of God aboue, 

 They kneeled downe and dyd him homage with lone 

 To God their Lorde that is mans owne brother." 



* Above is the well-known diagram of a naked man 

 surrounded by the signs of the Zodiac. 



Every day is dedicated to some saint, except 

 March 14 and September 7. 



Guides to Lawyers as to term and saints' days, 

 such as Magna Charta and early statutes, were 

 preceded by an Almanack. One is now before 

 me printed by Pinson in 1519. Even the Abridge- 

 ments of our early Chronicles by Grafton and 

 Stowe contained an Almanack; and in many they 

 gave directions to the country fairs. All our 

 early English Bibles, with the exception of Cover- 

 dale's, 1535, 1536, and 1537, are preceded by Al- 

 manack and Calendar, from the first Tyndale, 

 1537, to the present authorised version. The ex- 

 tensive series of Bibles called Genevan, Puritan, or 

 Breeches, from 1568 to 1584, contain Almanack 

 and Calendar. Many of these abound in singular 

 information, in the nature of a tablet of memory 

 (copied from the splendid edition of the Genevan 

 text, royal folio, by the King's Printer, 1583), 

 inter alia : — 

 " Jan, 1. Noah began to see the tops of the mountains. 

 6. Christ was baptized. 

 22. Duke of Somerset Beheaded. 

 27. Paul was converted. 

 Feb. 17. Noah sent the Dove out of the ark. 

 18. Luther died. 

 March 16. Lazarus was raised from Death. 

 22. Mary Magdalen anointed Christ. 

 25. Christ was crucified. 

 April 1. Noah opened the cover of the Ark. 

 14. Man [manna] ceased. 

 18. The Israelites passed the Red Sea. 

 May 1. Moses numbered the People. 

 5. Christ ascended into heaven. 

 17. Noah entred the Ark. 

 June 27. Noah's ark was lifted up. 

 July 6. The Josias of our Age, Edward the Sixt, died. 

 8. John Hus was burnt. 

 17. Moses broke the tables of stone. 

 Aug. 1. Aaron died. 



27. Religion reformed according to God's expresse 

 trueth in the Citie of Geneua, 1535. 

 Sept. 7. Our Soueraigne Ladie Qveene Elizabeth 

 borne. 

 8. Jerusalem utterly rased. 

 Oct. 11. Zwinglius was slaine, 1532. 

 Nov. 10. Martin Luther was borne, 1483. 

 Dec. 16. Ezra commanded the Israelites to leaue their 

 strange wiue« 

 25. Steuen was stoned to death. 



27. Saint John died, aged Ixxxixyeeres. 



28. Herod slewe the Innocentes." 



In this the saints' days were greatly abridged. 



In Bagford's Collections (British Museum) 

 there are many rare Almanacks : — 



" No. 5937. ^ Almynack and Pronostication of the 

 j'-ere of oure Lord m.ccccc. and xxx, a large sheet very full 

 of Saints' days, by Caspar Laet the yonger, Doctor yn 

 Physic (the Moore of his day). Emprented at Antwerpe 

 by me Cristofel of Karemunde, This has the Arms of 

 England, the same as in Tj-ndale's Testaments, 4°, 1536, 

 and ' the declaratio of this alrayune about the tynie for 

 bloud lettinge.' " 



Part of an Almanack, date lost, with the fol- 

 lowing prophecy : — 

 " The most mighty and redoubted King of Englade, 



