494 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[2" d S. IX. Junk 23. '60. 



should now call) " garrison town," as this is its 

 original signification. But if this were its mean- 

 ing in the present instance, the title would assert 

 that a garrison town had ivritten a letter " to his 

 onely Sonne." I understand " garrison " to de- 

 note what we should now express by some such 

 phrase as " a member of a garrison." And I 

 think that most of your readers who will take 

 the trouble to refer to my transcript of the title 

 (p. 388.) will agree with me. So on this point 

 my Query is still unanswered. G. M. G. 



Laystall (2 nd S. ix. 428.) — Many years ago I 

 used to hear this word applied, by a very old 

 gentleman from Cheshire, to a heap which he used 

 to contrive for keeping worms. He was a great 

 angler ; and in my boyhood I have helped him to 

 make a Lay-stall, by placing layers of straw and 

 cowdung alternately upon each other, and well 

 watering the heap when completed. In such a 

 heap, which he always called a Lay-stall, he used 

 to keep his worms for angling, but especially 

 brandlings, which he most prized. F. C. H. 



Britain 1116 b.c. — (2 nd S. ix. 402.) — The 

 Chronicle of England by Capgrave gives, what is 

 common in most ancient histories, a fabulous 

 origin, which may nevertheless contain some ele- 

 ment of truth. Geoffrey of Monmouth, at the 

 instigation of Walter Mapes, Archdeacon of Ox- 

 ford, translated the Acts of the British Kings out 

 of the ancient British tongue, which makes Brutus, 

 son of Ascanius, and grandson of iEneas, the first 

 sovereign of Britain and founder of London, and 

 enumerates sixty-seven kings to Cassibellaun, the 

 opponent of Caesar. Amongst these sovereigns 

 we may recognise the names : 6 Ebrauc (York), 

 9 Hudibras, 10 Bladud (Bath), 11 Leir (Shak- 

 speare's Lear), 12 Gonorilla, 23 Guithelin (Wat- 

 ling Street ?), 34 Margan (the sea), 40 Coillus 

 (King Cole), 66 Lud, and 67 Cassibellauu, who 

 lived b.c. 50. But as the exploits of Arthur, 

 A. d. 450, are still extant mainly in fable, we must 

 not expect historical certainty at a period five 

 centuries earlier, unless confirmed by Greek or 

 Latin contemporary authorities ; still less, if we 

 travel farther backwards to eleven centuries be- 

 fore Christ, and long prior to written history, if 

 we except the early part of the Old Testament, 

 and perhaps a few authorities to whom Josephus 

 refers at the beginning of his Antiquities. Al- 

 though Geoffrey's list of kings may be fabulous, 

 still it is circumstantial, and the number of tl.e 

 kings corresponds pretty well with Newton's 

 average estimate of the duration of a reign. It 

 is, prima facie, preferable to the statement of 

 Capgrave, who simply divides this island into 

 three parts, Loegria, Albania, and Cambria, and 

 finds etymological sovereigns for them in Leo- 

 grius, Albanactus, and Camber, as he finds Brute 

 for Britain. Nennius, who mentions Brito, the 



son of Silvius, and great-grandson of iEneas, as 

 ruling in Britain in the time of Eli the priest and 

 judge of Israel, makes no mention of any of the 

 sixty-seven of his successors, which Dr. Giles 

 considers, excepting Cassibellaun, as existing only 

 in the imagination of him who first catalogued 

 them. {Hist, of Anc. Brit. i. 49.) 



T. J. Buckton. 

 Lichfield. 



Coldhaebour : Coal (2 nd S. ix. 440.) — The 

 first of these words appears to be a vegeto-mineral 

 term. Coal, co-al, co-aled, in its participial form, 

 would seem to be an Anglicised corruption of a 

 Latin compound signifying concretion. The Lat. 

 co-aZ-esco-, co-al-es-, deprived of its inceptive 

 suffix, might suggest the possibility of such a de- 

 rivation, denoting material formation, the massing 

 and gradual uniting or growing together of coal 

 constituents. The above etymology may not be 

 acceptable to C. T. and the other numerous cor- 

 respondents who have with varied success dis- 

 cussed the origin of these words in your pages ; 

 but if the one now advanced be admissible, then 

 in the Anglo-Roman name, Coldharbour, Coaled- 

 arbor, we have a word expressive of that tran- 

 sitionary process of vegetable deposits trans- 

 formed ; in other words, of the Coal-escent stage, 

 or rather concretion of carbonised matter. I fear 

 this is a somewhat strained etymology, but, 

 quantum valeat, I offer it for C. T.'s consideration. 



F. Phillott. 



P.S.— Since writing the above, it has occurred 

 to me that li Coldharbour " might be, after all, 

 only a familiar cori'uption of the French, Le Col 

 dCArbre, query, a wooded ravine ; or, a pass 

 where trees grew. The article dropped would 

 give the anglicised designation, Cold' arbor. 



" Coal," in fhe cognate languages of N. W.Eu- 

 rope, appears as kohle, hole, kaal, kul, col, and hoi ; 

 terms which sometimes stand for coal the mineral, 

 sometimes for anything that has been carbonised 

 by fire, as when we say " burnt to a coal." 



In Hebrew we have kola, to roast, and gehhalim, 

 hot coals. These words in the subsequent pro- 

 nunciation of Hebrew, which prevailed at an early 

 period, became holo and gekholim (the a long, as 

 in father, acquiring the sound of o). From one 

 of these, probably the latter, we appear to have 

 derived our English coals. Gekholim, kohlen 

 (Ger.), coals. Vedette. 



Irish Celebrities : Garibaldi, etc. (2 nd S. 

 ix. 424.) — The name Garibaldi or Gerbaldi is 

 derived from the O. H. G. name Gerbold or Ga- 

 ribald (of which the inverse is Bolger), which 

 would either translate " very bold " or " bold in 

 war ; " from the O. G. ger, war (A.-S. gar), ger, 

 valde, desirous, active; geren, cupire, studere, ger, 

 a dart. The same root is found in composition of 

 several hundred personal names : as Garman, Ger- 



