202 



Ancient Ales in the County of Wilts. 



of ballads, dissolute dances, and ludicrous spectacles in churches 

 and churchyards, subjected the frequency of them to pecuniary 

 penalties and ecclesiastical censures, excommunication not ex- 

 cepted. 



Bishop Poore's Constitutions before cited, 1 contain the following 

 passage: — 



" Ad hue prohibemus ne choreoe vel turpes et inhonesti ludi qui ad lasciviam 

 invitant fiaut coemeteriis." 



TRANSLATION : — 



Also we prohibit that no dances, or disgraceful or improper sports, which 

 invite to sin shall take place in churchyards. 



Mr. Warton, in his History of English Poetry, 2 says that 



"Among Bishop Tanner's manuscript additions to CowelPs Law 



Glossary in the Bodleian Library is the following note from his 



own collections : — 



" a.d. 1468. Prior Cant, et commissarii visitationem fecerunt (diocesi Cant, 

 vacante per mortem archiepiscopi) et ibi publicatum erat quod potationes factoe 

 in ecclesiis vulgariter dictoe yevealys [Give ales] vel Bredealys [Bride ales] 

 non essent ulterius in usu sub poena excommunicationis majoris." 



TRANSLATION : — 



a.d. 1468. The Prior of Canterbury and the commissaries made a visitation 

 (the See of Canterbury being vacant by the death of the archbishop) and it was 

 there promulgated that potations made in the churches vulgarly called yeve 

 alys [Give ales], or Bredealys [Bride ales], should not be further in use under 

 the penalty of the greater excommunication. 



8. The Bride Ale. 

 Mr. Brande, in his Popular Antiquities, 3 says that — 



''Bride ale, Bride bush, Bride stake, are nearly synonymous terms, and all 

 derived from the circumstance of the bride's selling ale on the wedding-day, 

 for which she received by way of contribution whatever handsome price the 

 friends assembled on the occasion chose to pay her for it. A bush at the end of a 

 stake or pile was the ancient badge of a country ale-house. Around this stake 

 the guests were wont to dance as about a May-pole. The Bride ale appears to 

 have been called in some places a Bidding, from the circumstance of the bride 

 and bridegroom bidding or inviting the guests. In Cumberland it had the 

 appellation of a Bride's wain." 



1 Id p. 600. 



2 Vol. iii., p. 119, n. (f.) 



3 Vol. ii., p. 70. 



