Chapter VII: Oberon (2)

Aubrey or Auberon may be said almost to pervade the West and South of England: at Barnstaple or Barn Market we meet with High Bray, river Bray, Bratton, Burnham, Braunton, _Berryn_arbor, the Brendon Hills, Paracombe and _Baggy_ Point; in the Totnes neighbourhood are _Big_bury, Burr Island, Beer Head, Berry Head, Branscombe, Branshill, and Prawle Point, which last may be connoted with the rivers Barle, Bark, and Brue. It is perhaps noteworthy that the three spots associated until the historic period with flint-knapping[367] are _Beer_ Head in Devon, _Pur_fleet near Barking, and _Bran_don in Suffolk.

Totnes being the traditional landing-place of Bru it is interesting to find in that immediate district two Prestons, a Pruston, Barton, Bourton or Borton, Brookhill, Bructon, Brixham, Prescott, Parmount, Berry Pomeroy, Prestonberry and Preston Castle or Shandy's Hill.[368] Ebrington suggests an _ington_ or town of the children of Ebr; Alvington may be similarly connected with Alph, and Ilbert and Brent seemingly imply the _Holy Ber_ or _Bren_. The True Street by Totnes may be connoted with the adjacent Dreyton, and Bosomzeal Cross in all probability once bore in the centre, or bogel, the boss which customarily forms the eye of Celtic crosses. Hu being the first of the three deddu, tatu, or pillars, the term Totnes probably as in Shoeburyness meant Tot_nose_, and the adjacent Dodbrooke, Doddiscombleigh, and Daddy's Hole may all be connoted with the Celtic _tad_, _dad_, or _daddy_. With the Doddi of Doddiscombleigh or _Doddy's Valley Meadow_, may be connoted the gigantic and commanding Cornish headland known as Dodman. The Hollicombe by Preston was presumably the holy Coombe, and Halwell, at one time a Holy Well: in this neighbourhood of Kent's Cavern and Kent's Copse are Kingston and Okenbury; at Kingston-on-Thames is Canbury Park, and it is extremely likely that the true etymology of Kingston is not _King's Town_ but _King Stone_, _i.e._, a synonymous term for Preston and the same word as Johnstone.

If as now suggested Bru was _père Hu_ we may recognise Hu at Hoodown which, at Totnes, where it occurs, evidently does _not_ mean a low-lying spit of land but, as at Plymouth Hoe or Haw, implied a hill. In view of the preceding group of local names it is difficult to assume that some imaginative Mayor of Totnes started the custom of issuing his proclamations from the so-called Brutus Stone in Fore Street merely to flatter an obscure Welsh poet who had vain-gloriously uttered the tradition that the British were the remnants of Droia: it is far more probable that the Mayor and corporation of Totnes had never heard of Taliesin, and that they stolidly followed an immemorial wont.

With the church of St. Just or Roodha, and with the Rodau of Rodau's Town neighbouring the Danejohn at Canterbury or Durovernum, we shall subsequently connote Rutland or Rutaland and the neighbouring Leicester, anciently known as Ratæ. The highest peak in Leicestershire is Bardon Hill, followed, in order of altitude, by "Old John" in Bradgate Park, Bredon, and Barrow Hill.

Adjacent to Ticehurst in Sussex--a hurst which is locally attributed to a fairy named Tice--may be found the curious place-names Threeleo Cross and Bewl Bri. These names are the more remarkable being found in the proximity of Priestland, Parson's Green, Barham, and Heart's Delight. Under the circumstances I think Threeleo Cross must have been a tri holy or three-legged cross, and that Huggins Hall, which marks the highest ground of the district, was Huge or High King's Hall: in close proximity are Queen's Street, Maydeacon House, Grovehurst, and Great Old Hay.

With _Bredon_ in Leicestershire, a district where the tradition of a three-jumping giant, as has been seen, prevailed, may be connoted the prehistoric camp, or _abri_, of Bradenstoke, and that Abury itself was regarded as a vast _trinacria_ is probable from the fact that in the words of a quite impartial archæologist: "The _triangle_ of downs surrounding Avebury may be considered the hub of England and from it radiates the great lines of hills like the spokes of a wheel, the Coltswolds to the north, the Mendips to the west, the Dorsetshire Hills to the south west, Salisbury Plain to the south, the continuation of the North and South Downs to the east, and the high chalk ridge of the Berkshire Downs north-east to the Chilterns."[369]

In this quotation I have ventured to italicise the word _triangle_ which idea again is recurrent in the passage: "The Downs round Avebury are the meeting-place of three main watersheds of the country and are the centre from which the great lines of hills radiate north-east, and west through the Kingdom. Here at the junction of the hills we find the largest prehistoric temple in the world with Silbury, the largest artificial earth mound in Europe, close by."[370]

The assertion by Stukeley that Avebury described the form of a circle traversed by serpentine stone avenues has been ridiculed by less well-informed archæologists, largely on the ground that no similar erection existed elsewhere in the world. But on the British coin here illustrated a cognate form is issuing from the eagle's beak, and in Fig. 190 (a Danish emblem of the Bronze Age), the Great Worm or Dragon, which typified the Infinite, is supporting a wheel to which the designer has successfully imparted the idea of movement.

Five miles N.-E. of Abury there stands on the summit of a commanding hill the natural great fortress known as Barbury Castle, surrounded by the remains of numerous banks and ditches. The name Barbara--a duplication of Bar--is in its Cretan form Varvary, and it was seemingly the Iberian or Ivernian equivalent of "Very God of Very God," otherwise Father of Fathers, or Abracadabra. In Britain, and particularly in Ireland, children still play a game entitled, The Town of Barbarie, which is thus described: "Some boys line up in a row, one of whom is called the prince. Two others get out on the road and join hands and represent the town of Barbarie. One of the boys from the row then comes up to the pair, walks around them and asks--

Will you surrender, will you surrender
The town of Barbarie?

They answer--

We won't surrender, we won't surrender,
The town of Barbarie.

Being unsuccessful, he goes back to the prince and tells him that they won't surrender. The prince then says--

Take one of my good soldiers.

This is done, and the whole row of boys are brought up one after the other till the town is taken by their parting the joined hands of the pair who represent the town of Barbarie."[371]

It will be remarked that Barbarie is represented by a _pair_, which is suggestive of the Dioscuri or Heavenly Twins, and on referring to the life of St. Barbara we find her recorded as the daughter of Dioscorus, and as having been born at Heliopolis, or the city of the sun. The Dioscuri--those far-famed heroes Castor and Pollux--were said to have been born out of an egg laid by Leda the Swan: elsewhere the Dioscuri were known as the Cabiri, a term which is radically _abiri_. It is probable that St. Barbara was once represented with the emblems of the two Dioscuri or Cabiri, for one of her "tortures" is said to have been that she should be hanged between two forked trees. These two trees were doubtless two sprigs such as shown in Fig. 191 or two flowering pillars between which the Virgin was extended Andrew-wise in benediction. The next torture recorded of St. Barbara was the scorching of her sides with burning lamps, from which we may deduce that the Virgin was once depicted with two great lights on either side. Next, St. Barbara's oppressors made her strongly to be beaten, "and hurted her head with a mallet": the Slav deity Peroon was always depicted with a mallet, and the hammer or axe was practically a universal symbol of _Power_. As already noted, Peroon, the God with a mallet, has been equated by some scholars with Varuna of India; in Etruria the God of Death was generally represented with a great hammer, and the mallet with which St. Barbara was "hurted" may be further equated with the celebrated Hammer of Thor.

The gigantic hammer cut into the hillside at Tours, and associated in popular estimation with Charles Martel, in view of the name Tours is far more likely to have been the hammer of Thor, who, as we have seen, was assigned to Troy.

We are told that St. Barbara's father imprisoned his daughter within a high and strong _tour_, _tor_, or _tower_, that no man should see her because of her great beauty: this incident is common alike to fairy-tale--notably at Tory Island--and hagiology, and one meets persistently with the peerless princess imprisoned in a peel, broch, or tower. In Fig. 192 is represented a so-called Trinity of Evil, but in all probability this is a faithful reproduction of the Iberian Aber or Aubrey, _i.e._, the trindod seated upon his symbolic _tor_, _tower_, or _broch_. The strokes at the toes, like the more accentuated lines from the fingers of Fig. 193, denoted the streaming light, and when we read that one of the exquisite tortures inflicted upon St. George was the thrusting of poisoned thorns into his finger-nails it is a reasonable conclusion that St. George was likewise represented with rayed fingers. The feast of St. Ibar in Hibernia is held upon 23rd April or _Aperil_, which is also St. George's Day.

FIG. 193.--God the Father Wearing a Lozenge-Shaped
Nimbus. Miniature of the XIV. Cent. Italian Manuscript
in the Bibliotheque Royale.

From _Christian Iconography_ (Didron).]

St. Barbara, we are told, was marvellously carried on a stone into a high mountain, on which _two_ shepherds kept their sheep, "the which saw her fly"; and it is apparent in all directions that Barbara was peculiarly identified with the Two-One Twain or Pair. Barbara is popularly contracted into Babs or Bab, and the little Barbara or Babette may probably be identified with the Babchild of Kent. The coin here illustrated was unearthed at the village of Babchild, known also as Bacchild, and its centre evidently represents the world _pap_, Pope, _paab_, or _baba_: in Christian Art the All Father is represented as a Pope, and as twin Popes, and likewise as a two-faced Person.

There is little doubt that the pre-Christian Pope was sometimes represented as a mother and child, and it was probably the discovery of one of these images or pictures that started the horrible scandal of Pope Joan or Papesse Jeanne. It is said that this accomplished but unhappy lady occupied the papal-chair for a period of two years five months under the title of John the _Eighth_, but having publicly become the mother of a little son her life ended in infamy and ill odour. To commemorate this shocking and incredible event a monument representing the Papess with her baby was, we are told, erected on the actual spot which was accordingly declared accursed to all ages: but as the incident thus memorised occurred as long ago as the ninth century, it is more probable that the statue was the source of the story and not _vice versa_. According to some accounts Joan was baptised Hagnes which is the feminine form of Hagon or Acon: others said her name was Margaret, and that she was the daughter of an English missionary who had left England to preach to the Saxons. At the time of the Reformation Germany seized with avidity upon the scandal as being useful for propaganda purposes, and with that delicacy of touch for which the Lutherans were distinguished, embroidered the tale with characteristic embellishments. According to Baring-Gould the stout Germans, not relishing the notion of Joan being a daughter of the Fatherland, palmed her off on England, but "I have little doubt myself," he adds, "that Pope Joan is an impersonification of the great whore of Babylon seated on the Seven Hills":[372] on the contrary, I think she was more probably a personification of the Consort of St. Peter the Rock, and the Keeper of the Keys of Heaven's Gate. Among Joan's sobriquets was Jutt, which is believed to have been "a nickname surely!": more seemingly Jutt was a Latinised form of Kud, Ked, Kate, or Chad, and Engelheim, or _Angel Home_, the alleged birth-place of Jutt, was either entirely mystical, or perhaps Anglesea, if not Engel Land.

The father of Jutt's child was said to have been Satan himself, who, on the occasion of the birth, was seen and heard fluttering overhead, crowing and chanting in an unmusical voice:--

Papa pater patrum, Papissae pandito partum
Et tibi tunc eadem de corpore quando recedam.

This description would seem to have been derived from some ancient picture in which the Papa was represented either as a fluttering or chanting cock, or as cockheaded. Such representations were common among the Gnostics, and the legend, _papa-pater-patrum_, Father, Father of Fathers, is curiously suggestive of Barbara or Varvary: in the Gnostic emblem here reproduced is the counterpart to the cock-headed deity, and the reverse is obviously Vera, Una, or the naked Truth.

Gretchen, the German for Margaret, being _Great Jane_, will account for Pope Joan, and Gerberta, another of her names is radically Berta: Bertha, or Peratha, among the Germans is equated with Perchta, and translated "Bright One," or the "Shining One": the same roots are found in St. Cuth_bert_, or _Cudbright_ as he becomes in Kirkcudbrightshire.

The child of Papesse Jeanne, Gerberta, Hagnes or Jutt was deemed to be Antichrist: according to other accounts the mother of the feared and anticipated Antichrist was a very aged woman, of race unknown, called Fort Juda. Fort Juda was probably _Strong Judy_, Judy, the wife of Punch, being evidently a form of the very aged wife of Pan, the goat-headed symbol of Gott.[373] As Peter was the Janitor of the Gate, so Kate or Ked was similarly connected with the _Gate_ which is the same word as Gott or Goat: the Gnostic _God_ here represented is a seven-goat solar wheel.

The horns and head of the goat still figure in representations of Old Nick, and there is no doubt that the horns of the crescent moon, under the form of Io, the heifer, were particularly worshipped at Byzantium: this City of the Golden Horn, now known as Constantinople, to which it will be remembered the British Chronicles assign our origin, was founded by a colony of Greeks from Megara, and in Scandinavia it is still known as Megalopolis, or the City of Michael; its ancient name Byzantium will probably prove to have been connected with _byzan_ or _bosen_, the bosses or paps, and Pera, the Christian district which borders the Bosphorus, may be connoted with Epeur.

Fig. 200, reproduced from a Byzantine bronze pound weight, is supposed to represent "two military saints," but it more probably portrays the celestial pair, Micah and Maggie. Their bucklers are designed in the form of marguerites or marigolds; the A under the right hand figure is Alpha, whence we may perhaps equate this saint with Alpha, the consort of Noah. The spear-head under the other Invictus is the "Broad" arrow of Britain, and the meaning of this spear-head or arrow of Broad will be subsequently considered. It will be noticed that the stars which form the background are the triple dots, and the five-fruited tree is in all probability the Tree of Alpha, Aleph, or _Life_. Why _five_ was identified with _vif_ or _vive_, _i.e._, life, I am unable to surmise, but that it was thus connected will become apparent as we proceed.

The Arabic form of Constantinople is Kustantiniya, which compares curiously with Kystennyns, one of the old variants of the Cornish village named Constantine. There is a markedly Byzantine style about the group of British coins here reproduced, and Nos. 45 and 46 manifestly illustrate the Dioscuri, Twins, or Cabiri. The Greek word for _brothers_ or twins is _adelphi_, and as according to Bryant the Semitic _ad_ or _ada_ meant first we may translate _adelphi_ into First Elphi or First Fay-ther. The head of No. 49, which is obviously an heraldic or symbolic figure, consists of the three circles, intricate symbolism underlies the Byzantine reliquary cross here illustrated, and the same fantastic system is behind the Gnostic paper-mark represented on Fig. 203. In this it will be noted the eyes are represented by what are seemingly two feathers: the feather was a symbol of the Father, and will be noted in the Alephant emblem illustrated on page 160.

In Fig. 204 the Celestial Invictus is depicted as a Trinity; three feathers are the emblem of the British Prince of Wales, and there is evidently some recondite meaning in the legend that St. Barbara insisted upon her father making three windows in a certain building on the grounds that "_three_ windows lighten all the world and all creatures". Upon Dioscorus inquiring of his daughter why she had upset his arrangements for two windows, Barbara's reply is reported to have been: "These three fenestras or windows betoken clearly the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, the which be three persons and One Very God". The word _person_ is radically the same as _appear_ and _appearance_, and the portrayal of the Supreme Power as One, Two, or Three seems evidently to have been merely a matter of inclination: Queen Vera or Virtue may be regarded as One or as the Three Graces or Virtues. The mythic mother of St. David is said to have been Gwen of the Three Paps, and this St. Gwen Tierbron, or Queen of the Three Breasts, may be equated with the Lady Triamour, and with the patron of Llandrindod or St. _triune dad_ Wells. On the horse ornament illustrated _ante_ (No. 14, Fig. 134, p. 286), three hearts are represented: on Fig. 205 three circles, together with a palm branch,[374] associated with the national horse.

The emblems on page 499 depict two flying wheels, and likewise
Three-in-One: near St. Just in Cornwall used to be
three interlaced stone circles, and the phenomenon of
three circles is noticeable elsewhere; there is little
doubt, says Westropp, that in the three rings of
Dunainy on the Knockainy Hill the triad of gods,
Eogabal, Feri, and Aine, were supposed to dwell.[375]

Avebury consists of two circles within one, and that "Avereberie" was regarded as the great periphery may be concluded from the name _Avereberie_ which is equivalent to periphery, Varvary, or Barbara. The bird emblem existing at _Farr_ is suggestive that the county of Forfar was once inhabited by worshippers of Varvara, Barbara, the Fair of Fairs, or Fire of Fires.

Having set his labourers to work, the legend continues that Barbara's father departed thence and went into a far country, where he long sojourned: the Greeks used the word _barbaroi_ to mean not ruffians but those who lived or came from _abroad_; the same sense is born by the Hebrew word _obr_, and it is to this root that anthropologists assign the name _Hebrew_ which they interpret as meaning men who came from _abroad_.

It is noteworthy that, according to Herodotus, the messengers of the Hyperboreans who came from abroad, _i.e._, _barbaroi_, were entitled by the Delians, "_Perpherees_" and held in great honour:[376] the inverted commas are original, whence it would seem that _perpheree_ was a local pronunciation of _hyperboreæ_.

The general impression is that the Hebrew, or _Ebrea_ as the Italians spell it, derived his title from _Abra_ham whose name means Father of a Multitude. At _Hebron_ Abraham, the son of Terah, entertained three Elves or Angels: "He saw three and worshipped one":[377] at Hebron Abram bought a piece of land from a merchant named Ephron,[378] and I cannot believe that Ephron really meant, as we are told, _of a calf_; it is more probable that he derived his title from Hebron where Ephron was evidently a landowner. Tacitus records a tradition that the Hebrews were originally "natives of the Isle of Crete,"[379] and my suggestion that the Jews were the Jous gains somewhat from the fact that York--a notorious seat of ancient Jewry--was originally known as Eboracum or Eboracon. Our chroniclers state that York was founded by a King Ebrauc, the Archbishop of York signs himself to-day "Ebor," and the river Eure used at one time to be known as the Ebor: the Spanish river Ebro was sometimes referred to as the Iber.[380]

An interesting example of the Cabiri or Adelphi once existed at the Kentish village of Biddenden where the embossed seven-spiked ladies here illustrated, known as the Biddenden Maids, used to be impressed on cakes which were distributed in the village church on Easter Sunday. This custom was connected with a charity consisting of "twenty acres of land called the Bread and Cheese Land lying in _five_ pieces given by persons unknown, the rent to be distributed among the poor of this parish". The name of the two maidens is stated to have been Preston, and that this was alternatively a name for Biddenden is somewhat confirmed by an adjacent Broadstone, Fairbourne, and Bardinlea. Whether it is permissible here to read Bardinlea as Bard's meadow I do not know, but considered in connection with the local charity from five pieces of land it is curious to find that according to the laws of Dyvnwal Moelmud, the different functionaries of the Bardic Gorsedd had a right each to _five_ acres of land in virtue of their office, were entitled to maintenance wherever they went, had freedom from taxes, no person was to wear a naked weapon in their presence, and their word was always paramount.[381] In view of this ordinance it almost looks as though the charitable five acres at Biddenden were the survival of some such privileged survival.

As Biddy is a familiar form of Bridget or Bride, Biddenden may be understood as the dun or den of the Biddys, and the modern sense of our adjective _bad_ is, it is to be feared, an implication either that the followers of the Biddy's fell from grace, or that at any rate newer comers deemed them to have done so. The German for _both_ is _beide_, but that _both_ the _Bid_denden maidens were bad is unlikely: the brace of chickabiddies[382] illustrated overleaf may perhaps have fallen a little short of the designer's ideals, yet they were undoubtedly deemed fit and good, otherwise they would not have survived. That their admirers, while seeing Both or Twain, worshipped Ane is obviously possible from the popular "Heathen chant" here quoted from Miss Eckenstein's _Comparative Study of Nursery Rhymes_:--

1. We will a' gae sing, boys,
Where will we begin, boys?
We'll begin the way we should,
And we'll begin at ane, boys.

O, what will be our ane, boys?
O, what will be our ane, boys?
--My only ane she walks alane,
And evermair has dune, boys.

2. Now we will a' gae sing, boys;
Where will we begin, boys?
We'll begin where we left aff,
And we'll begin at twa, boys.

What will be our twa, boys?
--Twa's the lily and the rose
That shine baith red and green, boys,
My only ane she walks alane,
And evermair has dune, boys.

In the near neighbourhood of Biddenden are Peckham, Buckman's Green, Buckhill, and Buggles, or Boglesden: the two bogles now under consideration were possibly responsible for the neighbouring Duesden, _i.e._ the Dieu's den or the Two's den. According to Skeat the word _bad_, mediæval _badde_, is formed from the Anglo-Saxon _baeddel_, meaning an hermaphrodite; all ancient deities seem to have been regarded as hermaphrodites, and it is impossible to tell from the Britannia, Bride, or Biddy figures on p. 120 whether Bru or Brut was a man or a maid. Apollo was occasionally represented in a skirt; Venus was sometimes represented with a beard; the beard on the obverse of No. 46, on p. 364, is highly accentuated, and that this feature was a peculiarity of Cumbrian belief is to be inferred from the life of Saint Uncumber. St. Uncumber, or _Old Queen Ber_, was one of the seven daughters born at a birth to the King of Portugal, and the story runs that her father wanting her to marry the prince of Sicily, she grew whiskers, "which so enraged him that he had her crucified".[383]

One may infer that the fabricator of this pious story concocted it from some picture of a bearded virgin extended like Andrew on the Solar wheel: close to Biddenden is Old Surrender, perhaps originally a den or shrine of Old _Sire_ Ander.[384]

At Broadstone, by Biddenden, we find Judge House, and doubtless the village _juge_ once administered justice at that broad stone. In Kent the paps are known colloquially as _bubs_ or _bubbies_: by Biddenden is a Pope's Hall, and a Bubhurst or Bubwood, which further permit the equation of the Preston Maids with Babs, Babby, or Barbara. St. Barbara was not only born at Heliopolis, but her tomb is described by Maundeville as being at Babylon, by which he means not Babylon in Chaldea, but Heliopolis in Egypt. In _The Welsh People_ Sir J. Morris Jones establishes many remarkable relationships between the language of Wales and the Hamitic language of early Egypt; in 1881 Gerald Massey published a list of upwards of 3000 similarities between British and Egyptian words[385]; and _In Malta and the Mediterranean Race_, Mr. R. N. Bradley prints the following extraordinary statement from Col. W. G. MacPherson of the Army Medical Service: "When I was in Morocco City, in 1896, I met a Gaelic-speaking missionary doctor who had come out there and went into the Sus country (Trans-atlas), where 'Shluh' is the language spoken, just as it is the language of the Berber tribes in the Cis-atlas country. He told me that the words seemed familiar to him, and, after listening to the natives speaking among themselves, found they were speaking a Gaelic dialect, much of which he could follow. This confirmed my own observation regarding the names of the Berber tribes I myself had come across, namely, the Bini M'Tir, the Bini M'Touga, and the Bini M'Ghil. The 'Bini' is simply the Arabic for 'Children of,' and is tacked on by the Arabs to the 'M' of the Berbers, which means 'sons of' and is exactly the same as the Irish 'M,' or Gaelic 'Mac'. Hence the M'Tir, M'Touga, and M'Ghil, become in our country MacTiers, the MacDougalls, and the MacGills. I prepared a paper on this subject which was read by my friend Dr. George Mackay of Edinburgh, at the Pan-Celtic Congress there in 1907, I think, or it may have been 1908. It caused a leading article to be written in the _Scotsman_, I believe, but otherwise it does not appear to have received much attention."

As it is an axiom of modern etymology to ignore any statements which cannot be squared with historical documents it is hardly a matter of surprise that Col. MacPherson's statements have hitherto received no consideration. But apart from the fact that certain Berber tribes still speak Gaelic, the Berbers are a highly interesting people: they extend all over the North of Africa, and the country between Upper Egypt and Abyssinia is known as Barbara or Barba. The word _Africa_ was also written _Aparica_, and the Berbers, apart from founding the Old Kingdom of _Bornou_ and the city of Timbuctoo, had an important seat at _Berryan_. They had in the past magnificent and stately temples, used the Arabic alphabet, and the Touriacks--the purest, proudest, most numerous, and most lordly family of the Berbers--have an alphabet of their own for which they claim great antiquity: they have also a considerable native literature.[386] The Touriack alphabet is almost identical with that used by the Tyrians in later times, and the name Touriack is thus probably connected with Tyre and Troy. In 1821, a traveller described the Touriacks as "the finest race of men I ever saw--tall, straight, and handsome, with a certain air of independence and pride that is very imposing. They are generally white, that is to say, comparatively so, the dark brown of their complexion being occasioned only by the heat of the climate. Their arms and bodies, where constantly covered, are as white as those of many Europeans."[387]

To Britons the Berbers should be peculiarly interesting, as anthropologists have already declared that the primitive Scotch race were formed from "the great Iberian family, the same stock as the Berbers of North Africa": Laing and Huxley further affirm that among these Scotch aborigines they recognise the existence of men "of a very superior character".[388] It will probably prove that the "St. Barbe" of Gaul--a name connected with the megalithic monuments at Carnac--originated from Barba, or Berber influences: with this Gaulish St. Barbe may be connoted the fact that the pastors of the heretical Albigenses, whose headquarters were at the town of Albi, were for some unknown reason entitled _barbes_.

A traveller in 1845 describes the Berbers or Touriacks as very white, always clothed, and wearing pantaloons like Europeans. The word _pantaloon_ comes from Venice where the patron saint is St. Pantaleone, but the British for pantaloons is _breeks_ or _breeches_. It was a distinction of the British to wear breeks: Sir John Rhys attributes the word Briton to "cloth and its congeners," and when, _circa_ 500 B.C., the celebrated Abaris visited Athens his hosts were evidently impressed by his attire: "He came, not clad in skins like a Scythian, but with a bow in his hand, a quiver hanging on his shoulders, a plaid wrapped about his body, a gilded belt encircling his loins, and trousers reaching from the waist down to the soles of his feet. He was easy in his address; affable and pleasant in his conversation; active in his despatch, and secret in his management of great affairs; quick in judging of present accuracies; and ready to take his part in any sudden emergency; provident withal in guarding against futurity; diligent in the quest of wisdom; fond of friendship; trusting very little to fortune, yet having the entire confidence of others, and trusted with everything for his prudence. He spoke Greek with fluency, and whenever he moved his tongue you would imagine him to be some one out of the midst of the academy or very Lyceum."[389]

I have suggested that Abaris or Abharas was a generic term for Druid or Chief Druid, and it is likely that the celebrated Arabian philosopher Averrhoes, who was born in Spain A.D. 1126, was entitled Averroes (his real name seems to have been Ibn Roshd) in respect of his famous philosophy: it is noteworthy that the Berbers were known alternatively as Barabbras.[390]

In No. 41, on p. 364, two small brethren are like Romulus and Remus sucking nourishment from a wolf. This animal is the supposed ancestor of all the dog-tribe: the word _wolf_ is _eu olf_, and the term _bitch_, applied to all females of the wolf tribe, is radically _pige_, _peggy_, or _Puck_. The Bitch-nourished Brethren are radically _bre_, for the _-ther_ of _brother_ is the same adjective as occurs in fa_ther_, mo_ther_, and sis_ter_.

Taliesin, the mystic title of the Welsh Chief Druid of the West, is translated as having meant _radiant brow_: the brow is the covering of the brain, and in No. 2, on p. 120, Britannia is pointing to her brow. In No. 3 of the same plate she is represented in the remarkable and unusual attitude of gazing up to Heaven: it will be remembered that, according to Cæsar, Britain was the cradle of the Druidic Philosophy, and that those wishing to perfect themselves in the system visited this country; that the Britons prided themselves on their brains is possibly the true inference to be drawn from the two curious coins now under consideration.

The President of Celtic poetry and bardic music is said to have been a being of gigantic height named Bran: it is to Bran the Blessed that tradition assigns the introduction of the Cross into Britain, and when Bran died his head is stated to have been deposited under the White Tower of London, where it acted as a talisman against foreign aggression. One of the disastrous blunders alleged against King Arthur was the declaration that he disdained to hold the realm of England, except in virtue of his own prowess,[391] and Romance affirms that he disinterred the magic head of the Blessed Bran, thereby bringing untold woes upon the land. As a parallel to this story may be connoted the historic fact that when the Romans in 390 B.C. inquired the name of the barbaric general who had led the Celts victoriously against them, the Celtic officer replied by giving the name of the God to whom he attributed the success of his arms, and whom he figured to himself as seated invisible in a chariot, a javelin in his hand, while he guided the victorious host over the bodies of its enemies.[392] Now the name of this invisible chief under whom the Gaulish conquerors of Rome and Delphi claimed to fight, was Brennos, whom De Jubainville equates with Brian, the First of the Three divine Sons of Dana, or Brigit, the _Bona Dea_ of Britain. The highest town in France, and the principal arsenal and depot of the French Alps is entitled Briancon, and as this place was known to the Romans as Brigantium, we may connote Briancon with King Brian. Brigan may probably be equated with the fabulous Bregon of Hibernia, with Bergion of Iberia, and with St. Brychan of Wales, who is said to have been the parent of fifty sons and daughters, "all saints". The Hibernian super-King, entitled Brian Boru, had his seat at Tara, and from him may be said to have descended all the O'Briens, the Brownes, and the Byrons. The name Burgoyne is assigned to Burgundy, and it is probable that inquiry would prove a close connection between the Burgundii and giant Burgion of Iberia. In the Triads the Welsh prince Brychan is designated as sprung from one of the three holy families of Prydain: through Breconshire, or Brecknock, runs the river Bran; and that Awbrey was a family name in Brecon is implied by the existence in the priory church of St. John, or Holyrood, of tombs to the Awbreys.

When the head of the beneficent and blessed Bran was deposited at London it is said to have rested there for a long time with the eyes looking towards France. One of the most remarkable and mysterious of the Pictish symbols, found alike in Picardy and Pictland generally, is the so-called butterfly design of which three typical examples are here illustrated. What it seems to represent is _Browen_ or the _Brows_, but it is also an excellent bird, butterfly, or _papillon_: or as we speak familiarly of using our brains, and as the grey matter of the brain actually consists of two divisions, which scientists entitle the _cerebrum_ and the _cerebellum_, the two-browed butterfly might not illogically be designated the brains. Both Canon Greenwell and Sir Arthur Evans have drawn attention to similar representations of the human face on early objects from Troy and the Ægean; the same symbol is found on sculptured menhirs of the Marne and Gard valleys in France, while clay vessels with this ornament, belonging to the early age of metal, have been found in Spain. The "butterfly" is seen on gold roundels from the earliest (shaft) graves at Mycenæ, and as Sir Hercules Read has rightly said, "everything points to the transmission of that influence to the British Isles by way of Spain".[393]

The Scandinavians assigned three eyes to Thor, and Thor, as has been seen, was attributed by them to Troy. On the stone illustrated on p. 381, now built into the church at Dingwall--a name which means _court hill_--three circles are on one side and two upon the other: some of the Trojan idols are three-eyed and some are "butterflies". Is it possible that this Elphin little face, or _papillon_, was the precursor of the modern cherub or Amoretto, and that it was the Puck of the Iberian Picts, who conceived their Babchild or Bacchild as peeping, _pry_ing, touting, and _peer_ing perpetually upon mankind? The ancients imagined that every worthy soul became a star, whence it is possible that the small blue flower we call a periwinkle was, like the daisy, a symbol of the fairy, phairy, or peri _peri_scope. In Devonshire the speedwell (_Veronica +chamædrys_) is known as Angels' Eyes; in Wales it is entitled the Eye of Christ:[394] the word _periwinkle_ may be connoted with the phairies Periwinkle, and Perriwiggen, who figure in the court of Oberon.

In the magnificent emblem here illustrated the Pillar of the Universe, "to Whom all thoughts and desires are known, from Whom no secrets are hid," is supporting a great universe zoned round and round by Eyes, Cherubs, or Amoretti, and the earth within is represented by a cone or berg. In Fig. 221 the Creator is depicted as animating nine choirs of Amoretti by means of three rays or _breaths_, and as will be shown subsequently the creation of the world by means of three rays or beams of light from heaven was an elemental feature of British philosophy.

The periwinkle, known in some districts as the cockle, may, I think, be regarded as a prehistoric symbol of the world-without-end query:--

Twinkle, twinkle, little star,
How I wonder what you are.

The term cockle was applied not only to the periwinkle and the poppy, but likewise to the burdock, whose prickly _burrs_ are obviously a very perfect emblem of the Central Pyre, Fire, Burn, or Brand. In Italy the barberry, or berberis, is known as the Holy Thorn, as it is supposed that from this bush of _pricks_ and prickles was woven Christ's crown of thorns. As a home of the spooks the _brakes_ or _bracken_ rivalled the hawthorn,[395] and it was generally believed that by eating fern or bracken seed one became invisible. Witches were supposed to detest bracken, because it bears on its root the character C, the initial of the holy name Christ, "which may be plainly seen on cutting the root horizontally". Commenting on this belief the author of _Flowers and Folklore_ remarks: "A friend suggests, however, that the letter intended is not the English C, but the Greek X (Chi), the initial letter of the word _Christos_ which really resembles the marks on the root of the bracken."[396]

In Cornish _broch_ denoted the yew tree, the sanctity of which is implied by the frequency with which a brace or pair of yews are found in churchyards. The yew is probably the longest living of all trees, accredited instances occurring of its antiquity to the extent of 1400 years, and at Fortingal in _Perth_shire there is a famous yew tree which has been estimated to be 3000 years of age. This is deemed to be the most venerable specimen of living European vegetation, but at _Bra_bourne, in Kent, used to be a superannuated yew which claimed precedence in point of age even over that of Perthshire. A third claimant (2000 years) is that at Hensor (the _ancient sire_?) in Buckinghamshire, and a fourth exists at Buckland near Dover.[397]

The _yew_ (Irish _eo_), named in all probability after Io, or Hu the Jupiter,[398] or Ancient Sire of Britain, is found growing profusely in company with the box on the white chalky brow of Boxhill overlooking Juniper Hall. The foot of this slope around which creeps the placid little river Mole is now entitled _Bur_ford Bridge, but before the first bridge was here built, the site was seemingly known as Bur ford. The neighbouring Dorking, through which runs the Pipbrook, is equivalent to Tor King, Tarchon, or Troy King, and there is a likelihood that the Perseus who redeemed Andromeda, the _Ancient Troy Maid_, was a member of the same family. In the Iberian coin herewith inscribed Ho, which is ascribed to Ilipa or Ilipala, one may perhaps trace Hu, _i.e._, _Hugh_ the _mind_ or _brain_ in transit to these islands.

To the yews on Boxhill one may legitimately apply the lines which Sir William Watson penned at the neighbouring Newlands or the lands of the self-renewing Ancient Yew:--

Old Emperor Yew, fantastic sire,
Girt with thy guard of dotard Kings,
What ages hast thou seen retire
Into the dusk of alien things?

From Newlands Corner where the yews--the self-seeded descendants of immemorial ancestors--are thickly dotted, is a prospect unsurpassed in England.

The beech trees which are also a feature in the neighbourhood of Boxhill irresistibly turn one's mind to the immortal beeches at _Burn_ham in Bucks. Bucks supposedly derives its name from the patronymic Bucca or Bucco, and this district was thus presumably a seat of the Bucca, Pukka, or Puck King, _alias_ Auberon, to whom at Burnham the _beech_ or _boc_ would appear to have been peculiarly dedicated. There is a Burnham near Brightlingsea; a Burnby near Pocklington, a Burnham on the river Brue, a Burn in Brayton parish, Yorks; a river Burn or Brun in Lancashire, a river Burry in Glamorganshire, and in Norfolk a Burnham-Ulph. In Brancaster Bay are what are termed "Burnham Grounds"; hereabouts are Burnham Westgate, Burnham Deepdale, Burnham Overy, etc., and the local fishermen maintain "there are three other Burnhams under Brancaster Bay".[399] Doubtless the sea has claimed large tracts of Oberon's empire, but from Brean Down, Brown Willy, and Perran Round in the West to the famous Birrenswerk in Annandale, and the equally famous Bran Ditch in Cambridgeshire, the name of the Tall Man is ubiquitous. Among the innumerable Brandons or Branhills, Brandon Hill in Suffolk, where the flint knappers have continued their chipping uninterruptedly since old Neolithic times, may claim an honourable pre-eminence.

FOOTNOTES:

[323] _Cf._ Thomas, J. J., _Brit. Antiquissima_, p. 29.

[324] Hone, W., _Everyday Book_, i., 502.

[325] Squire, C., _Mythology of Ancient Britain and Ireland_, p.
52.

[326] Hazlitt, W. Carew, _Faiths and Folklore_, ii., 338.

[327] _Cf._ Johnson, W., _Folk Memory_, p. 143.

[328] Among the many Prestons I have enquired into is one with
which I am conversant near Faversham. Here the Manor House is
known as Perry Court; similarly there is a Perry Court at a
second Preston situated a few miles distant. In the
neighbourhood are Perry woods. There is a modern "Purston" at
Pontefract, which figured in Domesday under the form
"Prestun".

[329] Taylor, Rev. T., _Celtic Christianity of Cornwall_, p. 33.

[330] Courtney, Miss M. L., _Cornish Feasts and Folklore_, p. 123.

[331] Haslam, Wm., _Perranzabuloe_.

[332] _Ibid._, p. 60.

[333] "Mr. W. Mackenzie, Procurator Fiscal of Cromarty, writes me
from Dingwall (10th September, 1917), as follows: 'We are not
without some traces and traditions of phallic worship here.
There is a stone in the _Brahan_ Wood which is said to be a
"knocking stone". Barren women sat in close contact upon it
for the purpose of becoming fertile. It serves the purpose of
the mandrake in the East. I have seen the stone. It lies in
the Brahan Wood about three miles from Dingwall.'"--Frazer,
Sir J. G., quoted from _Folklore_, 1918, p. 219.

[334] Guerber, H. A., _Myths and Legends of the Middle Ages_, p.
219.

[335] Guerber, H. A., _Myths and Legends of the Middle Ages_, p.
221.

[336] "The Brehon laws are the most archaic system of law and
jurisprudence of Western Europe. This was the code of the
ancient Gaels, or Keltic-speaking Irish, which existed in an
unwritten form long before it was brought into harmony with
Christian sentiments.... It is impossible to study these laws
and the manners and customs of the early Irish, together with
their land tenure, and to compare them with the laws of Manu,
and with the light thrown on the Aryans of India by the
Sanskrit writings without coming to the conclusion that they
had a common origin."--Macnamara, N. C., _Origin and
Character of the British People_, p. 94.

[337] _Place-names of England and Wales_, p. 406.

[338] Of the Teutonic _Tiw_, Dr. Taylor observes: "This word was
used as the name of the Deity by all the Aryan nations. The
Sanskrit _deva_, the Greek _theos_, the Latin _deus_, the
Lithuanian _dewas_, the Erse _dia_, and the Welsh _dew_ are
all identical in meaning. The etymology of the word seems to
point to the corruption of a pure monotheistic faith." In
Chaldaic and in Hebrew _di_ meant the Omnipotent, in Irish
_de_ meant _goddess_, and in Cornish _da_ or _ta_ meant
_good_. From the elementary form _de_, _di_, or _da_, one
traces ramifications such as the Celtic _dia_ or _duw_
meaning a _god_. In Sanskrit Dya was the bright heavenly
deity who may be equated with the Teutonic _Tiu_, whence our
Tuesday, and with the Sanskrit Dyaus, which is equivalent to
the Greek Zeus. The same radical _d_' is the base of _dies_,
and of _dieu_; of _div_ the Armenian for _day_; of _div_ the
Sanskrit for _shine_; of _Diva_ the Sanskrit for _day_. Our
ancestors used to believe that the river Deva or Dee sprang
from two sources, and that after a very short course its
waters passed entire and unmixed through a large lake
carrying out the same quantity of water that it brought in.

The word "Dee" seems widely and almost universally to have
meant _good_ or _divine_, and it may no doubt be equated with
the "Saint Day" who figures so prominently in place-names,
and the Christian Calendar.

[339] Hone, W., _Everyday Book_, i., 1118.

[340] _Ancient Coins_, p. 3.

[341] Lardner, D., _History of Spain and Portugal_, vol. i, p. 18.

[342] _Ibid._, p. 13.

[343] _Ibid._, p. 6.

[344] Macalister, R. A. S., _Proc. Roy. Ir. Acad._, xxxiv., C.,
10-11.

[345] Mann, L. M., _Archaic Sculpturings_, p. 34.

[346] _Wild Wales_ (Everyman's Library), p. 258.

[347] Keightley, _Fairy Mythology_, p. 523.

[348] Bell's _Travels_, i., 248.

[349] _Cf._ Guest, Dr., _Origines Celticæ_, i., 61.

[350] Bellot, H. H. L., _The Temple_, p. 12.

[351] That there is nothing far-fetched in this possibility is
proved by a Vedic Hymn _circa_ 2500 B.C.: "Enter, O lifeless
one, the mother earth, the widespread earth, soft as a maiden
in her arms rest free from sin. Let now the earth gently
close around you even as a mother gently wraps her infant
child in soft robes. Let now the fathers keep safe thy
resting-place, and let Yama, the first mortal who passed the
portals of Death, prepare thee for a new abiding place."

[352] Near Land's End is _Bar_tinny or _Per_tinny, which is
understood to have meant _Hill of the Fire_.

[353] At Bradfield is a British camp on _Bar_ley Hill. Notable
earthwork _abris_ exist at _Bray_ford, _Bor_ingdon Camp, "Old
_Barrow_," _Parra_combe, and _Pre_stonbury in Devonshire: at
_Buri_ton, and _Bury_ Hill in Hampshire: at _Bree_don Hill,
_Burrough_-on-the-hill, and _Bury_ Camp in Leicestershire: at
_Borough_ Hill in Northamptonshire: at _Burrow_ Wood, _Bury_
Ditches, _Bury_ Walls, and Caer_bre_ in Shropshire: at Carn
Brea in Cornwall: at _Bourton_, and _Bury_ Castle, in
Somerset: at _Bar_moor in Warwickshire: at _Bar_bury, _Bury_
Camp, and _Bury_ Hill in Wiltshire: at _Berrow_ in
Worcestershire. Earthworks are also to be found on _Brow_
downs, _Bray_ downs, _Bray_ woods, and _Bury_ woods in
various directions.

[354] F. M., p. 464.

[355] "Camps of indubitably British date, Saxon, and Norman
entrenchments, to say nothing of minor matters such as dykes
and mounds and so-called amphitheatres, all are accredited to
a people who very probably had nothing at all to do with many
of them."--Allcroft, A. Hadrian, _Earthwork of England_, p.
289.

[356] The Bull's head will have been noted on the buckler of
Britannia, _ante_, p. 120.

[357] Bohn's Library, p. 114.

[358] Stone, J. Harris, _England's Riviera_.

[359] Abelson, J., _Jewish Mysticism_, p. 31.

[360] The authorities equate the names Alberic and Avery.

[361] F. M., p. 206.

[362] Book xl., chap. i.

[363] Friend, Rev. H., _Flowers and Folklore_, ii., 474.

[364] _Myths of Ancient Britain_, p. 18.

[365] Taylor, Rev. R., _Diegesis_, p. 271.

[366] Wood, E. J., _Giants and Dwarfs_, p. 44.

[367] Johnson, W., _Folk Memory_, p. 185.

[368] _Cf._ Shandwick or Shandfort _ante_, p. 327, also Shanid, p.
55.

[369] Cox, R. Hippesley, _A Guide to Avebury_, p. 55.

[370] _Ibid._

[371] _Folklore_, XXIX., i., p. 182.

[372] _Curious Myths of the Middle Ages._

[373] Jupiter is said to have been suckled by a goat.

[374] The Sanscrit for _palm_ is _toddy_--whence the drink of that
name.

[375] _Proc. of Royal Irish Acad._, xxxiv., C., 3, 4.

[376] Book IV., 33.

[377] Maundeville, in his Travels, mentions that near Hebron, "a
sacerdotal city, that is a sanctuary on the Mount of Mamre,
is an oak tree which the Saracens call _dirpe_, which is of
Abraham's time, and people called it the dry tree. They say
that it has been there since the beginning of the world, and
that it was once green and bore leaves, till the time that
our Lord died on the cross, and then it died, and so did all
the trees that were then in the world."--_Travels in the
East_, p. 162.

[378] _Gen._ xxiii.

[379] _History_, v., 2.

[380] Guest, Dr., _Origines Celticæ_, i., 54.

[381] _Barddas_, p. xxx.

[382] _Vide_ inscription _Chuck_hurst?

[383] Dawson, L. H., _A Book of the Saints_, p. 221.

[384] Skeat considers that _Sirrah_ is "a contemptuous extension of
_sire_, perhaps by addition of _ah!_ or _ha!_ (so Minsheu);
Old French _sire_, Provencial _sira_".

[385] _A Book of the Beginnings._

[386] "The Berbers, their language, and their books ought to be
fully explored and studied. Archæology and linguistic science
have lavished enthusiastic and toilsome study on subjects
much less worthy of attention, for these Berbers present the
remains of a great civilisation, much older than Rome or
Hellas, and of one of the most important peoples of
antiquity. Here are 'ruins' more promising, and, in certain
respects, more important, than the buried ruins of Nineveh;
but they have failed to get proper attention, partly because
a false chronology has made it impossible to see their
meaning and comprehend their importance. The Berbers
represent ancient communities whose importance was beginning
to decline before Rome appeared, and which were probably
contemporary with ancient Chaldea and the old monarchy of
Egypt."--Baldwin, J. D., _Prehistoric Nations_, p. 340.

[387] _Ibid._, p. 342.

[388] Laing, S., and Huxley, T. H., _The Prehistoric Remains of
Caithness_, pp. 70, 71.

[389] Quoted from Higgens, G., _Celtic Druids_.

[390] Latham, R. G., _The Varieties of Man_, p. 500.

[391] "Thy prowess I allow, yet this remember is the gift of
Heaven."--Homer.

[392] De Jubainville, _Irish Myth. Cycle_, p. 84.

[393] _A Guide to the Antiquities of the Bronze Age_ (B. M.).

[394] Wright, E. M., _Rustic Speech and Folklore_, p. 334.

[395] Rev. Hilderic Friend. This gentleman adds: "Interesting as
the study proves, we shall none of us regret that the English
nation is daily becoming more and more intelligent and
enlightened, and is leaving such follies to the heathen and
the past" (vol. ii., 568).

[396] As bracken is the plural of brake, fern was once presumably
the plural of _pher_.

[397] See Johnson, W., _Byways in British Archæology_, 375-7.

[398] Since writing I find that Didron, in vol. ii. of _Christian
Iconography_, p. 180, illustrates a drawing of Jupiter upon
which he comments, "a crown of yew leaves surrounds his
head".

[399] Guest, Dr., _Origines Celticæ_, i., 12.