490 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[2°* S. IX. June 23. '60. 



indicated a ridge of land left unploughed be- 

 tween the furrows, or a strip of grass at the end 

 of a field. The Saxon term was bale, and the 

 Welsh use the same word now, I believe. Skinner 

 derives balk from Valicare, Ital., to pass over ; 

 but I confess to being presumptuous enough to 

 think this rather far-fetched. The most common 

 use of the word balk now is to indicate the 

 imaginary boundary at one end of a billiard 

 table. 



The word pightel, or as it is also spelt, pickle, 

 pyele, and pingle, is used principally in those 

 counties where the East Anglian dialect prevails, 

 as Norfolk, Suffolk, and Cambridgeshire. It de- 

 signates a small enclosed field attached to a dwell- 

 ing-house or cottage, but I never heard it applied 

 to " an enclosure surrounding a dwelling-house," 

 nor do I think the word at all " synonymous with 

 lawn." If, therefore, our American cousins use 

 the word in such a sense, they have given it a 

 meaning of their own. In Suffolk the word 

 pightel is principally applied to the closes or 

 small fields in which flax is grown. 



The etymology of this word is involved in 

 much obscurity. Cowel gives the Italian word 

 piccolo as the derivation, and most dictionaries, 

 which have the word at all, give the same deriva- 

 tion. Although it is a formidable thing to differ 

 from authorities like Cowel and Todd, I am for 

 many reasons unwilling to adopt the derivation 

 they give for the East Anglian word pightel. A 

 friend of mine, and contributor to " N. & Q.," 

 whose knowledge of the East Anglian dialect and 

 the Saxon language is far more extensive than 

 my own, has suggested that the word in question 

 is derived from a Saxon root which is now lost. 

 Again I would suggest the word pight, an old 

 form of the past participle of the verb to pitch, 

 as a not impossible derivation for pightel. The 

 word pight is used several times by Spenser in 

 his Fairy Queen and Shepherd's Calendar in the 

 sense of fixed or placed ; Shakspeare also uses 

 the word in a similar sense, and Fabyan says : — 



" The kynge then pyght his pauylyons and strengthed 

 bis felde for sodayne brekynge out of the Turkes." — Vol. 

 ii. 1272. 



There is also the obsolete verb to pight (not to 

 be found in Johnson), which is akin to the A.-S. 

 verb pycati, to prick, and may be derived perhaps 

 from pigg, Su. Goth., meaning to pierce. It is 

 so used by Wicliffe in his Translation of the 

 Bible : — 



" And eftsoone anothir scripture seith, thei schulen se 

 into whom thei pighten thorough." — S. John, xix. 37. 



Pightel would thus mean, as II. N. suggests, a 

 piece of ground staked out. 



In the neighbourhood of Cromer, Norfolk, 

 pightels, especially when laid down in grass, are 

 often called lokes, probably from the Saxon verb 

 locan, to look, because they adjoin the homestead 



and are overlooked by it. Near Lowestoft, Suf- 

 folk, I heard the word loke applied to a green 

 lane, on what principle I do not know. 



The words pightel and'eroft, the meanings of 

 which are almost identical, are still to be met 

 with in deeds. The latter word is used in almost 

 every county of England to denote a field of some 

 sort, generally pasture or meadow land. The 

 words garth and toft, too, are not unfrequently 

 met with ; the former especially, which means 

 more properly a piece of garden ground ; the 

 latter is applied to a piece of land on which a 

 building has at one time or other stood. Garth 

 and croft are both Saxon, and toft finds its 

 equivalent in the Su. Gothic word topt. 



I do not quite know to what " new and ex- 

 pressive use of the word ventilate " H. N. refers : 

 he surely cannot mean the expression " to ven- 

 tilate a subject," as this is by no means a new 

 use of the word. The word ventilate, in the 

 sense of to examine or discuss, is used by Fell 

 and by Aycliffe ; and Abp. Sancroft, writing 

 nearly two centuries ago, has the following sen- 

 tence in one of his works : — 



" Nor doth the victor commonly permit any ventila- 

 tion of his dictates: for when the body is a slave, why 

 should the reason be free ? " — Modern Politics, s. 5. 



If this be not the use to which N. H. alludes, he 

 will perhaps favoui\us with an example of the word 

 applied in the new sense he spoke of. 



As I have been speaking so much of Norfolk, 

 I think this not an inappropriate place to add my 

 testimony to that of Ache as to the universal use 

 of the word dickey for donkey on and near the 

 east coast of Norfolk. J. A . Pn. 



The word " ventilate " is of no modern origin ; 

 it was used in England before the existence of 

 America was known to civilised man. 



It was the ordinary term used in courts of law 

 from the earliest day to signify the raising of 

 a discussion on any point. (See Du Cange, 

 " Ventilare causam — earn agitare, de ea disse- 

 rere.") 



An instance of its use in France is cited, a. d. 

 1367: — 



" Et toutes leurs causes mues et a mouvoir, soient ven- 

 tillees et determine'es .... en nostre chambre de Parle- 

 ment." 



Another instance is cited more than two cen- 

 turies earlier : — 



" Cumque diu haec causa fuit ventilata." 



In pleadings in our own courts, especially the 

 ecclesiastical, the word is of ordinary occurrence, 

 and has been used for at least seven centuries. 



X. X. 



Your American correspondent H. N. will find 

 that the word "ventilate" was used in England in 



