Notes and Queries, Number 17, February 23, 1850

"Ipsa egreditur nostri fundi calamitas."

Ter. Eun. i. 1.

Upon which the commentator in the Delph. ed. has this note:—

"Calamitas est grando et tempestas, quæ calamos segetum prosternit et conterit. Unde Cicero Verrem vocat 'calamitosam tempestatem.'"

Ainsworth, quoting the above passage from Terence, adds:—

"Ubi Donatus. Proprie calamitatem rustici vocant quod comminuat calamum; h.e. culmen et segetem."

The etymology of its synonym, "disaster," is more direct—δυσ αστηρ, a star of evil influence, or, as we say, "born under an ill planet."

    Φιλολογοσ.

Forcellini, s.v. Calamitas, says:—

"Proprie significat imminutionem clademque calamorum segetis, quæ grandine vel impetuoso aliquo turbine aut alia quapiam de causa fit."

He then quotes Servius, Ad Georg, i. 151:—

"Robigo genus est vitii, quo culmi pereunt, quod a rusticanis calamitas dicitur."

Then follows the note of Donatus on Ter. Eun. i. 1. 34.

It appears to me, if "calamitas" were derived from calamus, it would mean something very different from what it does.

Another suggestion is, that the first syllable is the same as the root of cad-o, to fall; l and d, everybody knows, are easily interchangeable: as Odysseus, Ulixes: δακρυον, lacrima, tear, &c. &c. If so, calamitas is a corrupted form of cadamitas. Mar. Victorinus, De Orthogr. p. 2456., says:—

"Gueius Pompeius Magnus et scribebat et dicebat Kadamitatem pro Kalamitatem."—(Quoted from Bothe's Poetæ," Scenici Latinorum, vol. v. p. 21.)

But how is the -amitas to be explained? I may as well add, that Döderlein, with his usual felicity, derives it from κολουω.

    EDWARD S. JACKSON.

I beg to refer MR. F.S. MARTIN (No. 14. p. 215.), for the derivation of "Calamity," to the Etymologicon Linguæ Latinæ of Gerard Vossius, or to the Totius Latinitatis Lexicon of Facciolatus and Forcellinus. He will there find that the word calamitas was first used with reference to the storms which destroyed the stalks (calami) of corn, and afterwards came to signify metaphorically, any severe misfortune. The terrific hail-storm of the summer of 1843, which destroyed the crops of corn through several of the eastern and midland counties of this kingdom, was a calamity in the original sense of the word.

"W.P.P." has also kindly replied to this query by furnishing a part of the Article on Calamitas in Vossius; and "J.F.M." adds, Calamitas means—

"The spindling of the corn, which with us is rare, but in hotter countries common: insomuch as the word calamitas was first derived from calamus, when the corn could not get out of the stalk."—Bacon, Nat. Hist. sect. 669.

Derivation of "Zero" (No. 14. p. 215.).—Zero Ital.; Fr. un chiffre, un rien, a cipher in arithmetic, a nought; whence the proverb avere nel zero, mépriser souverainement, to value at nothing, to have a sovereign contempt for. I do not know what the etymology of the word may be; but the application is obvious to that point in the scale of the thermometer below the numbered degrees to which, in ordinary temperatures, the mercury does not sink.

    Φιλολογοσ.

Deanery of Gloucester, Feb. 7. 1850.

"Zero" (No. 14. p. 215.)—Zero, as is well known, is an Italian word signifying the arithmetical figure of nought (0). It has been conjectured that it is derived from the transposition from the Hebrew word ezor, a girdle, the zero assuming that form. (See Furetière, vol. iii.) Prof. le Moine, of Leyden (quoted by Ménage), claims for it also an Eastern origin, and thinks we have received it from the Arabians, together with their method of reckoning ciphers. He suggests that it may be a corruption from the Hebrew [Hebrew: rphs], safara, to number.

Complutensian Polyglot.—I cannot pretend to reply to "MR. JEBB'S" inquiry under this head in No. 12. p. 213.; but perhaps it may assist him in his researches, should he not have seen the pamphlet, to refer to Bishop Smallridge's "Enquiry into the Authority of the Primitive Complutensian Edition of the New Testament, as principally founded on the most ancient Vatican MS., together with some research after that MS. In order to decide the dispute about 1 John v. 7. In a letter to Dr. Bentley. 8vo. London, 1722."

    J.M.

Oxford, Feb. 5.

Sir William Rider.—In reply to the queries of "H.F.," No. 12. p. 186., respecting Sir William Rider, I beg to say that among the many MS. notes which I have collected relating to the Rider family, &c., I find the following from the Visitation of Surry, 1623, and from a MS. book of Pedigrees of Peers in the Herald's College, with additions.

"Thomas Rider married a daughter of – Poole of Stafforde, by whom he had Sir William Rider, born at Muchalstone, co. Stafforde, Sheriff of London, 1591, Citizen and Haberdasher, Lord Mayor, 1600. Will dated 1 Nov., and proved 9 Nov. 1610, 8 Jas. I. (94 Wood); buried at Low Layton, Essex, &c. Sir William married Elizabeth, da. of R. Stone, of Helme, co. Norfolk; by whom he had, besides other children and descendants, Mary daughter and coheiress, who married Sir Thomas Lake, of Canons, Middlesex, from whose issue descended Viscount Lake."

    S.S.

Pokership (No. 12. p. 185., and No. 14. p. 218.).—It is to be regretted that no information has been supplied respecting the meaning of this remarkable word, either from local sources or from the surveys of crown lands in the Exchequer or Land Revenue offices. In one or the other of these quarters we should surely find something which would dispense with further conjecture. In the meantime the following facts, obtained from records easily accessible, will probably be sufficient to dispose of the explanations hitherto suggested, and to show that the poker of Bringwood forest was neither a parker nor a purser.

The offices conveyed to Sir R. Harley by James I. had been, before his reign, the subject of crown grants, after the honor of Wigmore had become vested in the crown by the merger of the earldom of March in the crown. Hence, I find that in the act 13 Edward IV. (A.D. 1473), for the resumption of royal grants, there is a saving of a prior grant of the "office of keeper of oure forest or chace of Boryngwode," and of the fees for the "kepyng of the Dikes within oure counte of Hereford, parcelles of oure seid forest." (6 Rot. Parl. p. 94.)

In a similar act of resumption, 1 Henry VII., there is a like saving in favour of Thomas Grove, to whom had been granted the keepership of Boryngwood chase in "Wigmoresland," and "the pokershipp and keping of the diche of the same." The parkership of Wigmore Park is saved in the same act. (6 Rot. Parl. p. 353 and 383.)

In the first year of Henry VIII. there is a Receiver's Account of Wigmore, in which I observe the following deductions claimed in respect of the fees and salaries of officers:-

"In feodo Thomæ Grove, forestarii de Bringewod,
6l. 1s. 6d.
– ejusdem Thomæ, fossat'de Prestwode dych,
18d.
– Edm. Sharp, parcarii parci de Wiggemour,
6l. 1s. 6d.
– Thomæ Grove, pocar' omnium boscorum
in Wiggemourslonde – 30s. 4d."

There is another like account rendered in 23 & 24 Hen. VII. These, and no doubt many other accounts and documents respecting the honor of Wigmore and its appartenances, are among the Exchequer records, and we are entitled to infer from them, firstly, that a parcarius and a pocarius are two different offices; secondly, that, whether the duty of the latter was performed on the dikes or in the woods of Boringwood chase, the theory of Mr. Bolton Corney (pace cl. viri dixerim) is very deficient in probability. If the above authorities had not fallen under my notice, I should have confidently adopted the conjecture of the noble Querist, who first drew attention to the word, and, so far from considering the substitution of "poker" for "parker" an improbable blunder of the copyist, I should have pronounced it fortunate for the house of Harley that their founder had not been converted into a porcarius or pig-driver.

    E. SMIRKE.

Pokership.—I had flattered myself that Parkership was the real interpretation of the above word, but I have once more doubts on the subject. I this morning accidentally stumbled upon the word "Porcellagium," which is interpreted in Ducange's Glossary, "Tributum ex porcis seu porcellis."

Porcarius also occurs as Porcorum custos, and mention is made of "Porcorum servitium quo quis porcos domini sui pascentes servare tenetur."

Now, considering how much value was formerly attached to the right of turning out swine in wooded wastes, during the acorn season, it seems probable that Sir R. Harley might be the king's "Porcarius," or receiver of the money paid for an annual license to depasture hogs in the royal forests; and, after all, Porkership is as like to Pokership as Parkership, and one mistake would be as easily made as the other.

    BRAYBROOKE.

Audley End, Feb. 16.

[We are enabled to confirm the accuracy of Lord Braybrooke's conjecture as to Pokership being the office conferred upon Sir Robert Harley, inasmuch as we are in expectation of receiving an account of the various forms of its name from a gentleman who has not only the ability, but also peculiar facilities for illustrating this and similar obscure terms.]

Havior—Heavier or Hever.-Supposed etymology of Havior, Heavier, and Hever, as applied by park-keepers to an emasculated male deer.—"NOTES AND QUERIES," (No. 15. p. 230.)

Pennant, in his British Zoology, 8vo. edition, 1776, vol. i. p. 38., and 8vo. edition, 1812, vol. i. p. 45., under the article, "Goat" says:—

"The meat of a castrated goat of six or seven years old, (which is called Hyfr,) is reckoned the best; being generally very sweet and fat. This makes an excellent pasty, goes under the name of rock venison, and is little inferior to that of the deer."