CHAPTER VI

. TOM, DICK AND HARRY

"Watte vocat, cui Thomme venit, neque Symme retardat, Betteque, Gibbe simul, Hykke venire jubent; Colle furit, quem Geffe juvat nocumenta parantes, Cum quibus ad dampnum Wille coire vovet. Grigge rapit, dum Dawe strepit, comes est quibus Hobbe, Lorkyn et in medio non minor esse putat: Hudde ferit, quem Judde terit, dum Tebbe minatur, Jakke domosque viros vellit et ense necat."

(GOWER, On Wat Tyler's Rebellion.)

Gower's lines on the peasant rebels give us some idea of the names which were most popular in the fourteenth century, and which have consequently impressed themselves most strongly on our modern surnames. It will be noticed that one member of the modern triumvirate, Harry, or Hal, is absent. [Footnote: The three names were not definitely established till the nineteenth century. Before that period they had rivals. French says Pierre et Paul, and German Heinz and Kunz, i.e. Heinrich and Conrad.] The great popularity of this name probably dates from a rather later period and is connected with the exploits of Henry V. Moreover, all the names, with the possible exception of Hud, are of French introduction and occur rarely before the Conquest. The old Anglo-Saxon names did survive, especially in the remoter parts of the country, and have given us many surnames (see ch. vii.), but even in the Middle Ages people had a preference for anything that came over with the Conqueror. French names are nearly all of German origin, the Celtic names and the Latin names which encroached on them having been swept away by the Frankish invasion, a parallel to the wholesale adoption of Norman names in England. Thus our name Harvey, no longer usual as a font-name, is Fr. Herod, which represents the heroic German name Herewig, to the second syllable of which belongs such an apparently insignificant name as Wigg.

MEDIEVAL FONT-NAMES

The disappearance of Latin names is not to be regretted, for the Latin nomenclature was of the most unimaginative description, while the Old German names are more like those of Greece; e.g. Ger. Ludwig, which has passed into most of the European languages (Louis, Lewis, Ludovico, etc), is from Old High Ger. hlut-wig, renowned in fight, equivalent to the Greek Clytomachus, with one-half of which it is etymologically cognate.

Some of the names in Gower's list, e.g. Watte ( Chapter I ), Thomme, Symme, Geffe (