Notes and Queries, Number 17, February 23, 1850   By: Various

A MEDIUM OF INTER COMMUNICATION FOR LITERARY MEN, ARTISTS, ANTIQUARIES, GENEALOGISTS, ETC.

"When found, make a note of." CAPTAIN CUTTLE.

No. 17.] Saturday, February 23. 1850. [Price Threepence. Stamped Edition 4d.

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CONTENTS.

NOTES: Page Alfred's Orosius, by R.T. Hampson 257 Folk Lore Omens from Cattle Horse's Head Rush bearings 258 On Authors and Books, No. 5., by Bolton Corney 259 Plagiarisms, or Parallel Passages, No. 2. 260 St. Antholin's 260

QUERIES: College Salting, by Rev. Dr. Maitland 261 A few Dodo Queries, by H.E. Strictland 261 Coleridge's Christabel, Byron's Lara: Tablet to Napoleon 262 Minor Queries: Howkey or Horkey Lord Bacon's Psalms Treatise of Equivocation 263

REPLIES: Etymology of Armagh, by Rev. Dr. Todd 264 William Hasse and his Poems, by E.F. Rimbault, LL.D. 265 Beaver Hats Pisan, by T. Hudson Turner 266 Replies to Minor Queries: Norman Pedigrees Translation of Ælian Ave Trici Daysman Saveguard Calamity Zero Complutensian Polyglot Sir W. Rider Pokership Havior, Heavier or Hever Sir W. Hamilton Dr. Johnson's Library 266

MISCELLANIES: Etymology of News The Golden Age 270

MISCELLANEOUS: Notes on Books, Sales, Catalogues, &c. 270 Books and Odd Volumes wanted 271 Notices to Correspondents 271 Advertisements 271

KING ALFRED'S GEOGRAPHY OF EUROPE.

The sketch of Europe, which our illustrious Alfred has inserted in his translation of Orosius , is justly considered, both here and on the Continent, as a valuable fragment of antiquity[1]; and I am sorry that I can commend little more than the pains taken by his translators, the celebrated Daines Barrington and Dr. Ingram, to make it available to ordinary readers. The learned judge had very good intentions, but his knowledge of Anglo Saxon was not equal to the task. Dr. Ingram professedly applied himself to correct both Alfred's text and Barrington's version, so far as relates to the description of Europe; but in two instances, occurring in one passage, he has adopted the judge's mistake of proper names for common nouns. I do not call attention to the circumstance merely as a literary curiosity, but to preserve the royal geographer from liability to imputations of extraordinary ignorance of his subject, and also to show the accuracy of his delineation of Europe at that interesting epoch, whence the principal states of Europe must date their establishment.

King Alfred, mentioning the seat of the Obotriti, or Obotritæ, as they are sometimes named, a Venedic nation, who, in the 9th century, occupied what is now the duchy of Mecklenburg, calls them Apdrede , and says "Be nor than him is apdrede, and cast north wylte the man æfeldan hæt."[2]

Barrington translates the words thus: "To the north is Aprede, and to the north east the wolds which are called Æfeldan."[3]

Dr. Ingram has the following variation: "And to the east north are the wolds which are called Heath Wolds."[4] To the word wolds he appends a note: " Wylte . See on this word a note hereafter." Very well; the promised note is to justify the metamorphosis of the warlike tribe, known in the annals and chronicles of the 9th century as the Wilti, Wilzi, Weleti, and Welatibi, into heaths and wolds. Thirty pages further on there is a note by J. Reinhold Forster, the naturalist and navigator, who wrote it for Barrington in full confidence that the translation was correct: "The Æfeldan," he says, "are, as king Alfred calls them, wolds ; there are at present in the middle part of Jutland, large tracts of high moors, covered with heath only."