396
NOTES AND QUERIES.
ix. MAY 17, 1902.
I am unaware of the nature of the explanation
offered in the Academy. I have since thought
over the matter, and come to the conclusion
that it might also mean " thief " being a
clipping of gonnof. In other words, a noff
would be a creature who joins thieving to
vileness of living. If I am wrong, probably
MR. PLATT will kindly correct me. I notice
he mentions schickster. This is unknown to
me otherwise than as sc/iikser = a servant
girl. No self-respecting Jew ever uses the
word nowadays. It is a vile word. I may
add another to the growing list of * Yiddish-
isms ' viz., 0yv0r=pride or side, from the
Hebrew gangavah. : M. L. R. BRESLAR.
SIR ALAN DE HEYTON (9 th S. ix. 248). Sir Alan de Heton was lord of Ellingham, co. Northumberland, 1 Richard II., in which year he served under Henry, Earl of North- umberland, at the siege of Berwick, and, taking a leading part in the assault, he acquired considerable notice by his courage.
In 1376, on the day of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Sir Alan, with thirteen other knights viz., Henry, Lord Percy, Richard Tempest, IngilramdeUmfran- ville, John Conyers, John Heron, Thomas de Uderton, Wai terBlount,&c. were entertained at a banquet given by Walter de Hepscotts, Abbot of Alnwick.
He left at his death three daughters and coheirs : (1) Elizabeth, married Sir John de Fen wick, of Wallington ; (2) Margaret, married first Sir William de Swinburne, Kt., and secondly Thomas Middleton, of Silks- worth, co. Durham; (3) Joan, married Sir Robert Ogle, Kt., of Bothal Castle, who had livery of their property 12 Richard II.
A Sir Henry Heton, Kt. (query, if son of Sir Alan . ?;, married Isabel, daughter and eventual coheir of Bertram Montboucher, lord of Beamish, co. Durham, but died without issue, his widow remarrying Sir Robert Harbottle, Kt., of Preston, of which marriage there were at least two sons : Robert Harbottle, who continued the line, and Thomas, trustee to the entail made by his brother of the estates, 17 Henry VI. This Thomas Har- bottle is presumably the mysterious - Harbottle, whose Christian name does not appear in any of the visitations, who left three daughters and coheirs, of whom one married Thomas Rid dell, ancestor of the eminent Nova-Castrian family of that name ; a second, Isabel, was the wife, first of Robert Musgrave, of Ryall (by whom she had two daughters and coheirs : Joan, wife of John Fenwick, of Wallington, and the other, wife of Robert Milford, of Seghill, which families
quartered), and secondly of Nicholas Rad-
ciiffe; and the third, Agnes, married Sir
Roger Fenwick, Kt., of Stanton.
The Hey ton or Heaton arms were Vert, three lions rampant argent. It may here be remarked that in the Carr MS. Roll of the Arms of the Mayors and Sheriffs of Newcastle- upon-Tyne, printed as an appendix to Tonge's k Visitation of the North ' by the Surtees Society, the sheriff for 1508, who there occurs as Thomas Heighten, should read Thomas Leigh ton. Of the arms assigned to him, Argent, a chevron between three popinjays gules, beaked or, I can make nothing. The coat is evidently only a variation of that of the Northumbrian family of Wallington. The sheriff, whose name stands corrected in Mr. Richard Welford's ' History of Newcastle and Gateshead,' probably belonged to the Leigh- tons or Lightons, of Lernrnington, Roth bury Forest, tfec., who traditionally derive from the same stock as the Barons of Ullyseshaven (?), in Forfar, in which case his arms would be Argent, a lion rampant gules, armed or.
H. REGINALD LEIGHTON.
East Boidon, R.S.O., co. Durham.
ST. PATRICK (9 th S. ix. 309). " Women,
smiths, and Druids" were the chief agents
of magic in the Celtic world. The smiths
held this position because they dealt with
iron, which (even more than other metals)
was hostile to the unseen powers of evil. For
the ethnological reason of this circumstance
see Rhys's 'Folk-lore, Welsh and Manx.' In the
Middle Ages, and later, the village smith still
kept something of his original character of a
witch-doctor. JOHN HOBSON MATTHEWS.
Town Hall, Cardiff.
PINS IN DRINKING VESSELS (9 th S. iv. 287, 358, 484 ; ix. 10, 136, 255, 293). I thank FR. N. for his correction (ante, p. 293). I was, how- ever, quite aware that Dr. Milner was a Roman Catholic, and that he was not the Church of England Bishop of Winchester. To have been exactly correct I should have said that he was consecrated at Winchester on 22 May, 1803, as Bishop of Castabala, and that as the Catholic Vicar Apostolic of the Midland District of England he had episcopal jurisdiction including Winchester, his head- quarters. Strictly speaking, therefore, your last correspondent is correct, but seemingly he overlooked the fact of Dr. Milner's ap- pointment as Vicar Apostolic. ' The Life of the Right Rev. John Milner, D.D., Bishop of Castabala, Vicar Apostolic of the Midland District of England,' was published by James Duffy, of Dublin and of 22, Paternoster Row, in 1862, I believe. I understand from Lord
