,12s. VH. NOV. 20, 19200 NOTES AND QUERIES.
401
LONDON, NOVEMBER 30, 1920.
CONTENTS. No. 136.
X NOTES : The Province of Sonning, 401 Extracts from the Aldeburgh Records, 402 An Essay in Communism, 403 Swifc and Prince Butler, 404 Among the Shakespeare ArchivesDate of the Death of Pope John XXIII. The Arms of Biddle A Wake Game, 405 Konald and Dixon Families Throwing Snowballs Bowler Hat Dr. Alexander Keith, 408.
QUERIES : Astronomical Table Elder Brewster of the Mayflower Poet Laureate's ' Essay on Keats ' Poems by J. G. Grant, 407 'The Mistletoe Bough' Ancient Painting at Nicsea Engraving by Blake Hundredth Psalm" Association Books "Bridget Baker" Cano D. Gregor" Fostersmith Family The Apocrypha and Coronations, 408 Dorothy White Askell Family
- Canaletto -The Belfry at Calais Place-name : Hyde-
News of Napoleon's Death Jocelyn Flood Mackreth Dorothy Vernon Plague Relic from St. Botolph's, Aldgate " Set the Assize Weekly," 409 Staffordshire Porcelain " Par bien attendre" B.C. for "Before Christ" "Saturday to Monday" Thomas Farmer Bailey Dixon and Dycson " Lavinia "Authors Wanted, 410.
iREPLIESi-Benzon: Celebrated Gambler, 411 Poisoned Kingof Krance, 412 Sir Robert Belief Beaupr^-Chartu- leries, 414 Robert Roe of Cambridge Dame Margaret Grevill, 415 The Original War Office : Secretaries of State for War and for the Colonies French Songs Wanted : 'O Richard! O mon roi ! ' "That" and "Which" Epitaph : Author Wanted Belvoir Castle Tapestries, 416 Karliesb English Poetess The Royal Sovereign 'Parliamentary Petitions, 417 Selborne Church Bells- Decimate Lease for 99 Years Dickens Reference Wanted Heacock or Hilcock Name Quarr Abbey, 418 S. Raven, Miniature Painter Authors Wanted, 418. .WOTES ON BOOKS: 'The Early Life and Education of John Evelyn' 'London County Council: Proposed Demolitionof Nineteen City Churches ' Dream Children and the Child Angel.'
Notices to Correspondents.
ISotea.
THE PROVINCE OF SONNING.
'Tnis "province," mentioned in the founda- tion charter of Chertsey in 666, may be ddentified with the " Seven Hundreds of Windsor Forest," and had the noteworthy "geld assessment of 300 hides (297|- exactly, according to Mr. Baring's ' Tables '). From the topographical point of view it has two 'distinguishing points.
1. The former episcopal manor (or hun-
- dred) of Sonning cut the greater part of the
"province " off from, the rest of Berkshire, for it extended right across the county from Sonning on the Thames, through Woking- "ham, to Sandhurst on the borders of Hampshire and Surrey. The use of eccle- siastical lordships as boundaries or marks, specially useful on account of their sacred character, may be noticed elsewhere : e.g., the Bishop of Lincoln's hundreds of Dorchester sand Thame effectually separated the Chil.
tern Hundreds from the rest of Oxfordshire,
and these hundreds remained West Saxon
till Bensington was taken by Off a in 777,
quite a century after the northern area had
become Mercian. It is therefore reasonable
to explain Sonning in a similar way, as a
device to protect the Windsor Forest
district from aggression, in this case West
Saxon aggression ; though it is true that a
small part, the later Charlton Hundred, lay
to the west of the bulwark.
2. The "province " contained three de- tached portions of Wiltshire. The largest, extending from Wokingham to Twyford, was physically within Sonning manor and so part of the mark ; the others, to the southwest, would naturally belong to Charl- ton Hundred. All three fragments were members of the manor and hundred of Amesbury, 40 jto 45 miles away. Amesbury is notable. It was a royal manor with traditions of ancient dignity, for it contains Stonehenge, and was the reputed burial- place of the British hero Ambrosius. It had artificially attached to it not only these fragments of Berkshire, but two considerable manors in the Jutish part of Hampshire Lyndhurst in the New Forest and Bowcombe in the Isle of Wight though they were not incorporated in Wiltshire as the Sonning fragments were.
The attachment of these distant manors can be explained most readily by regarding them as relics of ancient conquests of the West Saxon kings. Ceadwalla may have done it, when in restoring the broken unity of Wessex he ravaged "Kent "and "Wight" and annexed the latter to his own kingdom.
It is natural to look for a district of 300 hides in the Tribal Hidage. There are but two areas of that assessment which remain unappropriated those of Sweordora or Sweodora) and Fserpinga (or Fserwinga). The latter seems more likely, but has the ancient marginal note, "Fserpinga is in Middle England," which the Windsor Forest district was not, except by contrast with Wight. If this note be disregarded, Fser- pinga will fit into the scheme easily enough. It has been suggested elsewhere that the two districts of Arosseta 600 and Fserpinga 300 have been displaced in the extant texts of the 'Tribal Hidage,' and should follow Wihtgara with its 600 hides ; thus at once making up the exact tale of the Mercian 30,000 and (adding Aro to Wiht) showing the traditional 1,200 hides for the Jutes of south Hampshire. It is obvious that the attachment to Amesbury of manors both in
