468 
NOTES AND QUERIES. 
[ No.'29. 
I find that it is a common notion amongst ladies, 
that May marriages are unlucky. ’ 
Can any one inform me whence this prejudice 
arose ? Aurrep GatTy. 
Ecclesfield, April 29, 1850. 
[This superstition is as old as Ovid’s time, who tells 
us in his Fasti, 
“ Nec viduz tedis eadem, nee virginis apta 
Tempora. Quz nupsit non diuturna fuit. 
Hac quoque de causa (si te proverbia tangunt), 
Mense malas Maio nubere vulgus ait.” 
The last line, as our readers may remember, (see 
ante, No. 7. p. 97.), was fixed on the gates of Holy- 
rood on the morning (16th of May) after the marriage 
of Mary Queen of Scots and Bothwell. ] 
Throwing Old Shoes at a Wedding.— At a wed- 
ding lately, the bridesmaids, after accompanying 
the bride to the hall-door, threw into the carriage, 
on the departure of the newly-married couple, a 
number of old shoes which they had concealed 
somewhere. On inquiry, I find this custom is not 
uncommon ; I should be glad to be favoured with 
any particulars respecting its origin and meaning, 
and the antiquity of it. ARUN. 
[We have some Norrs on the subject of throwing 
Old Shoes after a person as a means of securing them 
good fortune, which we hope to insert in an early 
Number. | 
Sir Thomas Boleyn’s Spectre. —Sir Thomas 
Boleyn, the father of the unfortunate Queen of 
Henry VIIL., resided at Blickling, distant about 
fourteen miles from Norwich, and now the resi- 
dence of the dowager Lady Suffield. The spectre 
of this gentleman is believed by the vulgar to be 
doomed, annually, on a certain night in the year, 
to drive, for a period of 1000 years, a coach drawn 
by four headless horses, over a circuit of twelve 
bridges in that vicinity. These are Aylsham, 
Burgh, Oxnead, Buxton, Coltishall, the two Mey- 
ton bridges, Wroxham, and four others whose 
names I do not recollect. Sir Thomas carries his 
head under his arm, and flames issue from his 
mouth. Few rusties are hardy enough to be found 
loitering on or near those bridges on that night ; 
and my informant averred, that he was himself on 
one occasion hailed by this fiendish apparition, and 
asked to open a gate, but “he warn’t sich a fool 
as to turn his head; and well a’ didn’t, for Sir 
Thomas passed him full gallop like :” and he heard 
a voice which told him that he (Sir Thomas) had 
no power to hurt such as turned a deaf ear to his 
requests, but that had he stopped he would have 
carried him off. 
This tradition I have repeatedly heard in this 
neighbourhood from aged persons when I was a 
child, but Inever found but one person who had ever 
actually seen the phantom 
correspondents can give some clue to this extra- 
ordinary sentence. ‘The coach and four horses is 
Perhaps some of your | 
attached to another tradition I have heard in the 
west of Norfolk ; where the ancestor of a family 
is reported to drive his spectral team through the 
old walled-up gateway of his now demolished 
mansion, on the anniversary of his death: and it 
is said that the bricks next morning have ever 
been found leosened and fallen, though as con- 
stantly repaired. The particulars of this I could 
easily procure by reference to a friend. 
E. S. T. 
P.S. Another vision of Headless Horse is prevalent 
at Caistor Castle, the seat of the Fastolfs. 
Shuck the Dog-fiend.—This phantom I have 
heard many persons in East Norfolk, and even 
Cambridgeshire, describe as having seen as a black 
shaggy dog, with fiery eyes, and of immense size, 
and who visits churchyards at midnight. One 
witness nearly fainted away at seeing it, and on 
bringing his neighbours to see the place where he 
saw it, he found a large spot as if gunpowder had 
been exploded there. A lane in the parish of 
Cverstrand is called, after him, Shuck’s Lane. 
The name appears to be a corruption of ‘“ shag,” 
as shucky is the Norfolk dialect for “shaggy.” 
Is not this a vestige of the German “ Dog-fiend?” 
B.S: 
QUERIES. 
NUMISMATIC QUERIES. 
Can any numismatical contributor give me any 
information as to the recurrence elsewhere, &c., 
of the following types of coins in my possession : — 
1. A coin of the size of Roman 1 B., of the 
province of Macedonia Prima. — Obv. A female 
head, with symbols behind, and a rich floriated 
edge: Rev. A club within an oaken garland: 
Legend in the field, MAKEAONOQN TIPATHS. 
The type is illustrated by Dr. Horne, in his 
Introduction to the Study of the Bible, in explana- 
tion of Acts, xvi. 11,12. The specimen in my 
possession is in lead, finely struck, and therefore 
not a cast, and in all respects equal in point of 
sharpness and execution to the silver of the same 
size and type in the British Museum; and was 
dug up by a labourer at Chesterton, near Cam- 
bridge. How is the metal of which my specimen 
is composed to be accounted for ? 
2. A 3B. coin apparently by the portrait of 
Tiberius. — Legend defaced: Rev. The type 
known by collectors as the altar of Lyons: Ex. 
(ROM)AE ET AV(G.) 
3. A 3B. of Herennia Estruscilla.— Rev. The 
usual seated figure of Pudicitia; and the Legend, 
PVDICITIA AVG. 
According to Col. Smyth, Akermann, and other 
authorities, no third brass of this empress exists ; 
but the specimen before me has been decided as 
undoubtedly genuine by many competent judges. 
4. A 3B. coin of the Emperor Macrinus, struck 
