9*8. XI. MAY 23, 1903.] NOTES AND QUERIES,
415
thrown back and pursued nearly as far as
Riga. The sledge in which Frederick William
drove with his consort and the Hereditary
Prince is preserved in the Berlin Hohen-
zollern Museum. Apart from the painting
by Wilhelm Simmler in the Zeughaus, the
memorable sleigh ride of the Branden-
burgers is recorded on fine gobelins in
Monbijou Castle in Berlin. G. KRUEGER.
Berlin.
MISTAKES IN PRINTED REGISTERS (9 fch S. xi. 326). In 'N. & Q.' for 25 April W. C. B. aptly draws attention to this subject, and supports his complaint by striking illustra- tions, particularly with respect to the mistake of printing "Ingge" for Jugge. I am in a position thoroughly to sympathize with him, on account of having undergone a precisely parallel experience, none the less pertinent because the register I have in mind is episcopal instead of parochial, and of earlier date viz., A.D. 1400. On broad general grounds I think I may claim that a more important issue was involved in my case than in that of W. C. B. Quoting Archbishop Scrope's Register at York, the Charity Commissioners, 1826, followed by some very high authorities, and the sub- sequent Nottingham historians, refer to a messuage granted to Plumptre Hospital, Nottingham, under the unintelligible name of " Inscole." No one gave a variant reading. A few years ago, following up a line of investigations on the ancient churches and religious establishments of this town, by a piece of good fortune I was enabled to prove conclusively that the true reading of this hitherto mysterious name was Juscole, i.e., Jew School. From the circumstance of the
Property being capable of precise location, was thus able to point to the exact spot occupied by the Jews' synagogue of mediaeval Nottingham, which had long been debated inconclusively by our local historians.
A. STAPLETON. 524, Woodborough Road, Nottingham.
HALLOWE'EN PRACTICE (9 th S. xi. 109). The fires lighted formerly in Scotland and Wales on the vigil of All Saints', and in Ireland on the four great festivals of the Druids, of which Hallowe'en was one (Valiancy's ' Col- lectanea de Rebus Hibernicis '), seem to have been generally identified with the ingathering of the harvest, the blazing fir torches carried about on Upper Deeside bearing, no doubt, originally a religious meaning in connexion with the Baal-fires at which they were kindled. One suspects that this choice of fir torches was, in the first place, something
more than accidental, or that it was not
merely on account of their better adapt-
ability for burning, for the fir-tree was
identified with Baal - Berith, the pagan
Messiah. Why the torches were called
" sownicks " does not appear. Jamieson
does not give the word in his ' Dictionary,'
but perhaps they were so called from the
" sowens" (i.e., flummery made of the dust of
oatmeal remaining among the seeds, steeped
and soured) which, with butter instead of
milk, constituted the Hallowe'en supper (see
Eden, 'State of the Poor,' 1797, quoted in
Brand's ' Popular Antiquities,' 1877, p. 210).
The curdled milk appears to have been but
a variation of the so wen -cake which was
solicited by the torch-bearers to celebrate the
occasion, as they proceeded from door to
door. The practice at Balmoral alluded to in
'N. & Q.' (4 th S. xii. 485) is obviously a
survival of the ancient custom of carrying
torches before royal personages as a mark of
honour and as symbols of the royal presence
(see Daubuz's ' Symbolical Diet.,' 1842, s.v.
'Fire'). J. HOLDEN MACMICHAEL.
"PEELER" (9 th S. xi. 265, 358). Was not " peeler " almost entirely confined to Ireland 1 It used certainly to be very common in Irish novels, and I remember meeting with a note in one of these to the effect that it was the Irish name for a policeman. One remembers, too, how at the famous battle of Limerick " the peelers came in view, And jended J;he shaloo upon Shannon shore."
C. C. B.
WRITING AND LANGUAGE OF THE HUNS
(9 th S. xi. 287). L. L. K. will find in the
Babylonian and Oriental Record, vol. vi.
No.' 10, pp. 227-36 (1893), alphabets of the
Huns, according to Telegdi and Harsanyi, as
well as the Cuman alphabet, in a paper by
Paul Kiraly de Dada. Whatever the origin
of these alphabets may be, they are quite
different from those used by the Turks in the
inscriptions of the Orkhon and Upper Yenis-
sei. These were first deciphered by Prof. W.
Thomsen, of Copenhagen, and his first results
are published in the MJmoires de la Societe"
Finno-Ougrienne, v. (1896).
JOHN ABERCROMBY.
LATIN RIDDLE OF LEO XIII. (9 th S. xi. 48, 114). The Latin charade quoted at the first reference appeared in the earliest number (1 November, 1898) of Vox Urbis, p. 8, un- signed, with the heading "^Enigma (vulgo Italice Sciarada}" Arabes, the answer, is, it may be remarked, more satisfying to the eye than to the ear, though we may grant the e in the final syllable the quantity of the Latin
