Bourne Archive:
Peacock’s Glossary
http://boar.org.uk/aaiwxw3PeacockGlossary.htm Latest edit 21
Nov 2010
The Bourne Archive
Selections from Peacock’s Glossary of Words from
Manley and Corringham
These quotations come from a copy in the
A transcription of the whole book
is too big a job to be undertaken but the following selection should cover
references made on such web pages as Bourne Places.
The printed book is octavo but it
is bound into a volume interleaved with plain quarto leaves on which the
printed contents have been expanded in manuscript, by the addition of further
words and examples. The date of the printed work is 1876 and the manuscript
additions appear to have been added as they as they came to the compiler’s
attention but probably all are earlier than about 1890. There is a note of
people to whom copies were given and a loose letter of 1889, from the keeper of
the printed books in
In the transcription below,
relevant manuscript references are included in {} brackets. Peacock’s notes are
indicated thus []. Transcriber’s notes are included thus
[…RJP].
Back-lane, a narrow road or street; not a
highway, or if a highway, one that is but little used. ‘They‘re
building, a sight o’ new houses agëan Asby back-lane, for th’ iron-stone men to live
in.’ ‘I took to my heeles as hard as I could runne, and got my selfe into a back-lane.’—Bernard, Terence, 156.
Holm, a hill, or an island. Probably obsolete, except as a
place’s name; as Holme, a hamlet in
the par. of Bottesford, Thorneholme Priory and Haverholme wood
par. Appleby, and the Holmes in par. Winterton. Icelandic hólmr generally means an islet.
Meere, Mere [meer], a mark or boundary of any
kind between one person’s land and another’s, or between one parish or township
and another. ‘Of Richare Welborne
for plowing vp
tho king’s mere
baulk.’—Kirton-in-Lindsey Fine Roll,
1630. ‘Where a person knows his own land by meres or boundaries.’—Survey of Manor of Kirton-in-Lindsey,
1787. A road dividing the parish of Winterton from
that of Winteringham is called the mere. {Meere. ‘A raised way called Icleton-meer,
pointing to Wantage’. Archaeologia VIII 96.
XXXVII. 315. XXXVIII. 408.} {‘Oh countrie
clownes, your closes see you keepe
with hedge and ditche, and mark your meade with meares’ Geo.
Gascoigne, Fruiter and Warre. Edt. Chalmers. 24.} {Meer. Bawtry-Hainton
Turnpike act 1765. p. 2.}
Meerebaulk, lit. a mere-baulk
(see Meere);
a strip of unploughed land between one property and another in an open field.
Meerefurrow, Marfur, a boundary furrow in an open field.
Meerehole, a
place on the bank of the Trent between the townships of East Butterwick and Burringham, where
the river-bank broke and caused a great inundation in the middle of the last [18th. RJP] century.
Meerestone, a
boundary stone.
{Meerstone. Archaeologia XLII. 159. Scroggs,
Practice of Court-Leet and Courts-Baron, 28.} {Meer
Stone. Sanderson Sermons 134.}
Meerestowp, a
boundary post.
Seck, a sack, 1586. ‘For a secke of pease
of Misteir
Seck-arse, the bottom of a sack. ‘Them seck-arses
is rotten out wi’ standin’ i’ th’
Irish hole.’
Seck-poke, a
bag made to contain a sack, i. e. four
bushels, of corn.
Seckin’, sack-cloth; the material of which
sacks are made.
Stang, Stong, (1) a measure of land; a rood. (Obsolescent.) 1652. ’32 acres and three stonge of beans and pease.’—Inventory of Tho. Teanby of
Barton-on-Humber, in
(2)
Riding the stang
is a form of public censure still sometimes practised when a man beats his
wife. [Peacock gives more. RJP]
(3) An
eel spear.
Stang, a sudden spasm of pain.
Stong. See Stang.
Stray Garth, the name of a small pasture in
Kirton-in-Lindsey in 1787. Probably it had its name from being the enclosure
where the strays (q. v.) were kept.
Strays, cattle that have strayed, and for
whom no owner can be discovered. ‘All the Strays
upon the Soke-land in this parish [Winterton] belong to the Prince, the others to the lords of
the Barony Lands.’ —Survey of the Manor
of Kirton-in-Lindsey, 1787. It was an immemorial custom in the parish of
Appleby, that all strays ‘were seized
, and on the succeeding Sunday, a man with a bell proclaimed the same to the
public; this he did on three barrows, …… lying opposite to Thornholme;
if they were not redeemed within twelve months and a day they were disposed of
by public auction. These barrows are now levelled, and the ancient right has
never been in force since the ground enclosure took place.’—W. Andrew, Hist. of Winterton,
1836, 39.
Wath, {Waith}, Wath-stead, a ford. (A.S. wađ, Lat vadum.) ‘They do further
present ….that the
Wong, a measure of land (Obsolete.) At Horncastle there is a piece of
land near the town called The Wong. [The
OED (search wong) gives references chronologically from Beowulf
to the present work. RJP]