Curiosities of Puritan Nomenclature

“In the holy tongue of CanaanI placed my chiefest pleasure,Till I pricked my footWith an Hebrew root,That I bled beyond all measure.”

In the “City Match,” written by Mayne in 1639, Bannsright says —

“Mistress Dorcas,If you’ll be usher to that holy, learned woman,That can heal broken shins, scald heads, and th’ itch,Your schoolmistress: that can expound, and teachesTo knit in Chaldee, and work Hebrew samplers,I’ll help you back again.”

The Puritan was ever nicknamed after some Old Testament worthy. I could quote many instances, but let two from the author of the “London Diurnall” suffice. Addressing Prince Rupert, he says —

“Let the zeal-twanging nose, that wants a ridge,Snuffling devoutly, drop his silver bridge:Yes, and the gossip’s spoon augment the summe,Altho’ poor Caleb lose his christendome.”

More racy is his attack on Pembroke, as a member of the Mixed Assembly:

“Forbeare, good Pembroke, be not over-daring:Such company may chance to spoil thy swearing;And these drum-major oaths of bulk unrulyMay dwindle to a feeble ‘by my truly.’He that the noble Percy’s blood inherits,Will he strike up a Hotspur of the spirits?He’ll fright the Obediahs out of tune,With his uncircumcis-ed Algernoon:A name so stubborne, ’tis not to be scannedBy him in Gath with the six fingered hand.”

If a Bible quotation was put into the zealot’s mouth, his cynical foe took care that it should come from the older Scriptures. In George Chapman’s “An Humorous Day’s Work,” after Lemot has suggested a “full test of experiment” to prove her virtue, Florilla the Puritan cries —

“O husband, this is perfect trial indeed.”

To which the gruff Labervele replies —

“And you will try all this now, will you not?

Florilla. Yes, my good head: for it is written, we must pass to perfection through all temptation: Abacuk the fourth.

Labervele. Abacuk! cuck me no cucks: in a-doors, I say: thieves, Puritans, murderers! in a-doors, I say!”

In the same facetious strain, Taylor, the Water-poet, addresses a child thus:

“To learne thy duty reade no more than this:Paul’s nineteenth chapter unto Genesis.”

This certainly tallies with the charge in “Hudibras,” that they

“Corrupted the Old TestamentTo serve the New as precedent.”

This affection for the older Scriptures had its effect upon our nomenclature. No book, no story, especially if gloomy in its outline and melancholy in its issues, escaped the more morbid Puritan’s notice. Every minister of the Lord’s vengeance, every stern witness against natural abomination, the prophet that prophesied ill – these were the names that were in favour. And he that was least bitter in his maledictions was most at a discount. Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego were in every-day request, Shadrach and Abednego being the favourites. Mordecai, too, was daily commemorated; while Jeremiah attained a popularity, as Jeremy, he can never altogether lose. “Lamentations” was so melancholy, that it must needs be personified, don a Puritanical habit, and stand at the font as godfather – I mean witness – to some wretched infant who had done nothing to merit such a fate. “Lamentations Chapman” appeared as defendant in a suit in Chancery about 1590. The exact date is not to be found, but the case was tried towards the close of Elizabeth’s reign (“Chancery Suits, Elizabeth”).

It is really hard to say why names of melancholy import became so common. Perhaps it was a spirit morbidly brooding on the religious oppressions of the times; perhaps it was bile. Any way, Camden says “Dust” and “Ashes” were names in use in the days of Elizabeth and James. These, no doubt, were translations of the Hebrew “Aphrah” into the “vulgar tongue,” the name having become exceedingly common. Micah, in one of the most mournful prophecies of the Old Testament, says —

“Declare ye it not at Gath, weep ye not at all: in the house of Aphrah roll thyself in the dust.”

Literally: “in the house of dust roll thyself in the dust.” The name was quickly seized upon:

“Sept., 1599. Baptized Affray, d. of Richard Manne of Lymehus.” – Stepney.

“May 15, 1576. Wedding of William Brickhead and Affera Lawrence.” – St. Peter’s, Cornhill.

This last entry proves how early the name had arisen. In Kent it had become very common. The registers of Canterbury Cathedral teem with it:

“1601, June 5. Christened Afra, the daughter of William Warriner.

“1614, Oct. 30. Christened Aphora, the daughter of Mr. Merrewether.

“1635, July 20. Robert Fuller maryed Apherie Pitt.”

In these instances we see at a glance the origin of the licentious Aphra Behn’s name, which looks so like a nom-de-plume, and has puzzled many. She was born at Canterbury, with the surname of Johnson, baptized Aphra, and married a Dutch merchant named Behn. When acting as a Government spy at Antwerp in 1666, she signs a letter “Aphara Behn” (C. S. P.), which is nearer the Biblical form than many others. It is just possible her father might have rolled himself several times in the dust had he lived to read some of his daughter’s writings. Their tone is not Puritanic. The name has become obsolete; indeed, it scarcely survived the seventeenth century, dying out within a hundred years of its rise. But it was very popular in its day.

Rachel, in her dying pains, had styled, under deep depression, her babe Benoni (“son of my sorrow”); but his father turned it into the more cheerful Benjamin (“son of the right hand”). Of course, Puritanism sided with the mother, and the Benonis flourished at a ratio of six to one over the Benjamins:

“1607. Christened Benony, sonne of Beniamyn Ruthin, mariner.” – Stepney.

“1661, Dec. 20. Christened Margrett, d. of Bennoni Wallington, goldsmith.” – St. Dionis Backchurch.

“1637, May 6. Order to transmit Benoni Bucke to England from Virginia.” – “C. S. P. Colonial.”

“1656, March 25. Petition of Benoni Honeywood.” – “C. S. P. Colonial.”

I don’t think, however, all these mothers died in childbed. It would speak badly for the chirurgic skill of the seventeenth century if they did. It was the Church of Christ that was in travail.

Ichabod was equally common. There was something hard and unrelenting in Jael (already mentioned) that naturally suited the temper of every fanatic:

“1613, July 28. Christened Jaell, d. of Roger Manwaryng, preacher.” – St. Helen, Bishopsgate.

Mehetabell had something in it, probably its length, that made it popular among the Puritan faction. It lasted well, too:

“1680, March 24. Married Philip Penn and Mehittabela Hilder.” – Cant. Cath.

“1693, May 21. Baptized Mehetabell, d. of Jeremiah Hart, apothecary.” – St. Dionis Backchurch.

But while Deborah, an especial pet of the fanatics, Sara, Rebecca, Rachel, Zipporah, and Leah were in high favour as Old Testament heroines, none had such a run as Abigail:

“1573, Oct. Abigoll Cumberford, christened.” – Stepney.

“1617, Oct. 15. Christened Abbigale, d. of John Webb, shoemaker.” – St. Peter, Cornhill.

“1635, Jan. 19. Married Jarrett Birkhead and Abigaile Whitehead.” – Ditto.

“May 30, 1721. Married Robert Elles and Abigail Six.” – Cant. Cath.

Few Scripture names made themselves so popular as this. At the conclusion of the sixteenth century it was beginning its career, and by Queen Anne’s day had reached its zenith. When the Cavalier was drinking at the alehouse, he would waggishly chant through his nose, with eye upturned —

“Come, sisters, and singAn hymne to our king,Who sitteth on high degree.The men at Whitehall,And the wicked, shall fall,And hey, then, up go we!‘A match,’ quoth my sister Joice,‘Contented,’ quoth Rachel, too;Quoth Abigaile, ‘Yea,’ and Faith, ‘Verily,’And Charity, ‘Let it be so.’”

A curious error has been propagated by writers who ought to have known better. It is customarily asserted that abigail, as a cant term for a waiting-maid, only arose after Abigail Hill, the Duchess of Marlborough’s cousin, became waiting-woman to the queen, and supplanted her kinswoman. Certainly we find both Swift and Fielding using the term after this event. But there is good reason for believing that the sobriquet is as old as Charles I.’s reign. Indeed, there can be no reasonable doubt but that we owe the term to the enormous popularity of Beaumont’s comedy, “The Scornful Ladie,” written about 1613, and played in 1616. The chief part falls to the lot of “Abigal, a waiting-gentlewoman,” as the dramatis personæ styles her, the playwright associating the name and employment after the scriptural narrative. But Beaumont knew his Bible well.

That Abigail at once became a cant term is proved by “The Parson’s Wedding,” written by Killigrew some time between 1645 and 1650. Wanton addresses the Parson:

“Was she deaf to your report?Parson. Yes, yes.Wanton. And Ugly, her abigail, she had her say, too?Parson. Yes, yes.”

That this sentence would never have been written but for Beaumont’s play, there can be no reasonable doubt. It was performed so late as 1783. In 1673, after yearly performances, it was published as a droll, and entitled “The False Heir.” In 1742 it appears again under the title of “The Feigned Shipwreck.” Samuel Pepys, in his Diary, records his visits to the playhouse to see “The Scornful Lady” at least four times, viz. 1661, 1662, 1665, and 1667. Writing December 27, 1665, he says —

“By coach to the King’s Playhouse, and there saw ‘The Scornful Lady’ well acted: Doll Common doing Abigail most excellently.”

Abigail passed out of favour about the middle of the last century, but Mrs. Masham’s artifices had little to do with it. The comedy had done its work, and Abigail coming into use, like Malkin two centuries before, as the cant term for a kitchen drab, or common serving wench, as is sufficiently proved by the literature of the day, the name lost caste with all classes, and was compelled to bid adieu to public favour.

This affection for the Old Testament has never died out among the Nonconformists. The large batch of names I have already quoted from modern directories is almost wholly from the earlier Testament. Wherever Dissent is strong, there will be found a large proportion of these names. Amongst the passengers who went out to New England in James and Charles’s reigns will be found such names as Ebed-meleck Gastrell, Oziell Lane, Ephraim Howe, Ezechell Clement, Jeremy Clement, Zachary Cripps, Noah Fletcher, Enoch Gould, Zebulon Cunninghame, Seth Smith, Peleg Bucke, Gercyon Bucke (Gershom), Rachell Saunders, Lea Saunders, Calebb Carr, Jonathan Franklin, Boaz Sharpe, Esau del a Ware, Pharaoh Flinton, Othniell Haggat, Mordecay Knight, Obediah Hawes, Gamaliell Ellis, Esaias Raughton, Azarias Pinney, Elisha Mallowes, Malachi Mallock, Jonadab Illett, Joshua Long, Enecha Fitch (seemingly a feminine of Enoch), and Job Perridge. Occasionally an Epenetus Olney, or Nathaniell Patient, or Epaphroditus Haughton, or Cornelius Conway, or Feleaman Dickerson (Philemon), or Theophilus Lucas, or Annanias Mann is met with; but these are few, and were evidently selected for their size, the temptation to poach on apostolic preserves being too great when such big game was to be obtained. Besides, they were not in the calendar! These names went to Virginia, and they are not forgotten.

III. Objectionable Scripture Names

Camden says —

“In times of Christianity, the names of most holy and vertuous persons, and of their most worthy progenitors, were given to stirre up men to the imitation of them, whose names they bare. But succeeding ages, little regarding St. Chrysostome’s admonition to the contrary, have recalled prophane names, so as now Diana, Cassandra, Hyppolitus, Venus, Lais, names of unhappy disastre, are as rife somewhere, as ever they were in Paganisme.” – “Remaines,” p. 43.

The most cursory survey of our registers proves this. Captain Hercules Huncks and Ensign Neptune Howard fought under the Earl of Northumberland in 1640 (Peacock’s “Army List of Roundheads and Cavaliers”). Both were Royalists.

“1643, Feb. 6. Buried Paris, son of William and Margaret Lee.” – St. Michael, Spurriergate, York.

“1670, March 13. Baptized Cassandra, d. of James Smyth.” – Banbury.

“1679, July 2. Buried Cassandra, ye wife of Edward Williams.” – St. Michael, Barbados, (Hotten).

“1631, May 26. Married John Cotton and Venus18 Levat.” – St. Peter, Cornhill.

Cartwright, the great Puritan, attacked these names in 1575, as “savouring of paganism” (Neal, v. p. xv. Appendix). It was a pity he did not include some names in the list of his co-religionists, for surely Tamar and Dinah were just as objectionable as Venus or Lais. The doctrine of a fallen nature could be upheld, and the blessed state of self-abasement maintained, without a daily reminder in the shape of a Bible name of evil repute. Bishop Corbett brought it as a distinct charge against the Puritans, that they loved to select the most unsavoury stories of Old Testament history for their converse. In the “Maypole” he makes a zealot minister say —

“To challenge liberty and recreation,Let it be done in holy contemplation.Brothers and sisters in the fields may walk,Beginning of the Holy Word to talk:Of David and Uria’s lovely wife,Of Tamar and her lustful brother’s strife.”

One thing is certain, these names became popular:

“1610, March. Baptized Bathsheba, d. of John Hamond, of Ratcliffe.” – Stepney.

“1672, Feb. 23. Buried Bathsheba, wife of Richard Brinley, hosier.” – St. Denis Backchurch.

The alternate form of Bath-shua (1 Chron. iii. 5) was used, although the clerks did not always know how to spell it:

“1609, July 1. Baptized Bathshira and Tabitha, daughters of Sir Antonie Dering, Knight.

“1609, July 5. Buried Bathshira and Tabitha, ds. of Sir Antonie Dering, Knight, being twines.” – Pluckley, Kent.

“1601, Jan. Baptized Thamar, d. of Henry Reynold.” – Stepney.

“1691, Nov. 20. Baptized Tamar, d. of Francis and Tamar Lee.” – St. Dionis Backchurch.

“1698, April 10. Buried Tamar, wife of Richard Robinson, of Fell-foot.” – Cartmel.

As for Dinah, she became a great favourite from her first introduction; every register contains her name before Elizabeth’s death:

“1585, Aug. 15. Christening of Dina, d. of John Lister, barbor.

“1591, Aug. 21. Buried Mrs. Dina Walthall, a vertuous yong woman, 30 years.” – St. Peter, Cornhill.

Crossing the Atlantic with the Pilgrim Fathers, she settled down at length as the typical negress; yet Puritan writers admitted that when she “went out to see the daughters of the land,” she meant to be seen of the sons also!

Taylor, the Water-poet, seems to imply that Goliath was registered at baptism by the Puritan:

“Quoth he, ‘what might the child baptized be?Was it a male She, or a female He?’ —‘I know not what, but ’tis a Son,’ she said. —‘Nay then,’ quoth he, ‘a wager may be laidIt had some Scripture name.’ – ‘Yes, so it had,’Said she: ‘but my weak memory’s so bad,I have forgot it: ’twas a godly name,Tho’ out of my remembrance be the same:’Twas one of the small prophets verily:’Twas not Esaias, nor yet Jeremy,Ezekiel, Daniel, nor good Obadiah,Ah, now I do remember, ’twas Goliah!’”

Pharaoh occurs, and went out to Virginia, where it has ever since remained. It is, as already shown, familiar enough in Yorkshire.

Of New Testament names, whose associations are of evil repute, we may mention Ananias, Sapphira, and Antipas. Ananias had become so closely connected with Puritanism, that not only did Dryden poke fun at the relationship in the “Alchemist,” but Ananias Dulman became the cant term for a long-winded zealot preacher. So says Neal.

“1603, Sep. 12. Buried Ananias, sonne of George Warren, 17 years.” – St. Peter, Cornhill.

“1621, Sep. Baptized Ananias, son of Ananias Jarratt, glassmaker.” – Stepney.

Sapphira occurs in Bunhill Fields:

“Here lyeth the body of Mrs. Sapphira Lightmaker, wife of Mr. Edward Lightmaker, of Broadhurst, in Sussex, gent. She died in the Lorde, Dec. 20, 1704, aged 81 years.”

She was therefore born in 1633. Her brother (they were brought up Presbyterians) was Robert Leighton, who died Archbishop of Glasgow.

Drusilla, again, was objectionable, but perchance her character was less historically known then:

“1622. Baptized Drusilla, d. of Thomas Davis.” – Ludlow.

Antipas, curiously enough, was almost popular, although a murderer and an adulterer:

“1633, Feb. 28. Baptized Antipas, sonne of Robert Barnes, of Shadwell.” – Stepney.

“1662. Petition of Antipas Charrington.” – “Cal. St. P. Dom.”

“1650. Antipas Swinnerton, Tedbury, wollman.” – “Tokens of Seventeenth Century.”

Dr. Increase Mather, the eminent Puritan, in his work entitled “Remarkable Providences,” published at Boston, U.S.A., in 1684, has a story of an interposition in behalf of his friend Antipas Newman.

Of other instances, somewhat later, Sehon Stace, who lived in Warding in 1707 (“Suss. Arch. Coll.,” xii. 254), commemorates the King of the Amorites, Milcom Groat (“Cal. St. P.,” 1660) representing on English soil “the abomination of the children of Ammon.” Dr. Pusey and Mr. Spurgeon might be excused a little astonishment at such a conversion by baptism.

Barrabas cannot be considered a happy choice:

“Buried, 1713, Oct. 18, Barabas, sonne of Barabas Bowen.” – All-Hallows, Barking.

Mr. Maskell draws attention to the name in his history of that church. There is something so emphatic about “now Barrabas was a robber,” that thoughts of theft seem proper to the very name. We should have locked up the spoons, we feel sure, had father or son called upon us. The father who called his son “Judas-not-Iscariot” scarcely cleared the name of its evil associations, nor would it quite meet the difficulty suggested by the remark in “Tristram Shandy:”

“Your Billy, sir – would you for the world have called him Judas?.. Would you, sir, if a Jew of a godfather had proposed the name of your child, and offered you his purse along with it – would you have consented to such a desecration of him?”

We have all heard the story of Beelzebub. If the child had been inadvertently so baptized, a remedy might have been found in former days by changing the name at confirmation. Until 1552, the bishop confirmed by name. Archbishop Peccham laid down a rule:

“The minister shall take care not to permit wanton names, which being pronounced do sound to lasciviousness, to be given to children baptized, especially of the female sex: and if otherwise it be done, the same shall be changed by the bishop at confirmation.”

That this law had been carelessly followed after the Reformation is clear, else Venus Levat, already quoted, would not have been married in 1631 under that name. Certainly Dinah and Tamar come under the ban of this injunction.

Curiously enough, the change of name was sanctioned in the case of orthodox names, for Lord Coke says —

“If a man be baptized by the name of Thomas, and after, at his confirmation by the Bishop, he is named John, his name of confirmation shall stand.”

He then quotes the case of Sir Francis Gawdie, Chief Justice of the Court of Common Pleas, whose name by baptism was Thomas, Thomas being changed to Francis at confirmation. He holds that Francis shall stand (“Institutes,” 1. iii.). This practice manifestly arose out of Peccham’s rule, but it is strange that wanton instances should be left unchanged, and the orthodox allowed to be altered.

Arising out of the Puritan error of permitting names like Tamar and Dinah to stand, modern eccentricity has gone very far, and it would be satisfactory to see many names in use at present forbidden. I need not quote the Venuses of our directories. Emanuel is of an opposite character, and should be considered blasphemy. We have not adopted Christ yet, as Dr. Doran reminded us they have done in Germany, but my copy of the London Directory shows at least one German, bearing the baptismal name of Christ, at present dwelling in the metropolis. Puritan eccentricity is a trifle to this.

IV. Losses(a.) The Destruction of Pet Forms

But let us now notice some of the more disastrous effects of the great Hebrew invasion. The most important were the partial destruction of the nick forms, and the suppression of diminutives. The English pet names disappeared, never more to return. Desinences in “cock,” “kin,” “elot,” “ot,” “et,” “in,” and “on,” are no more found in current literature, nor in the clerk’s register. Why should this be so? An important reason strikes us at once. The ecclesiastic names on which the enclytics had grown had become unpopular well-nigh throughout England. It was an English, not a Puritan prejudice. With the suppression of the names proper went the desinences attached to them. The tree being felled, the parasite decayed. Another reason was this: the names introduced from the Scriptures did not seem to compound comfortably with these terminatives. The Hebrew name would first have to be turned into a nick form before the diminutive was appended. The English peasantry had added “in,” “ot,” “kin,” and “cock” only to the nickname, never to the baptismal form. It was Wat-kin, not Walterkin; Bat-kin, not Bartholomewkin; Wilcock, not Williamcock; Colin, not Nicholas-in; Philpot, not Philipot. But the popular feeling for a century was against turning the new Scripture names into curt nick forms. As it would have been an absurdity to have appended diminutives to sesquipedalian names, national wit, rather than deliberate plan, prevented it. If it was irreverent, too, to curtail Scripture names, it was equally irreverent to give them the diminutive dress. To prove the absolute truth of my statement, I have only to remind the reader that, saving “Nat-kin,” not one single Bible name introduced by the Reformation and the English Bible has become conjoined with a diminutive.19

The immediate consequence was this; the diminutive forms became obsolete. Emmott lingered on till the end of the seventeenth century; nay, got into the eighteenth:

“Emmit, d. of Edward and Ann Buck, died 24 April, 1726, aged 6 years.” – Hawling, Gloucester.

But it was only where it was not known as a form of Emma, and possibly both might exist in the same household. I have already furnished instances of Hamlet. Here is another:

“The Rev. Hamlet Marshall, D.D., died in the Close, Lincoln, in 1652. With him dwelt his nephew, Hamlet Joyce. He bequeaths legacies in his will to Hamlet Pickerin and Hamlet Duncalf, and his executor was his son, Hamlet Marshall.” —Notes and Queries, February 14, 1880.

It lasted till the eighteenth century. But nobody knew by that time that it was a pet name of Hamon, or Hamond; nay, few knew that the surname of Hammond had ever been a baptismal name at all:

“1620, Jan. 3. Buried Hamlet Rigby, Mr. Askew’s man.” – St. Peter, Cornhill.

“1620. Petition of Hamond Franklin.” – “Cal. S. P. Dom.,” 1619-1623.

It is curious to notice that Mr. Hovenden, in his “Canterbury Register,” published 1878, for the Harleian Society, has the following entries: —

“1627, Aprill 3. Christened Ham’on, the sonn of Richard Struggle.”

“1634. Jan. 18. Christened Damaris, daughter of Mr. Ham’on Leucknor.”

Turning to the index, the editor has styled them Hamilton Struggle and Hamilton Leucknor. Ham’on, of course, is Hammon, or Hammond. I may add that some ecclesiastic, a critic of my book on “English Surnames,” in the Guardian, rebuked me for supposing that Emmot could be from Emma, and calmly put it down as a form of Aymot! What can prove the effect of the Reformation on old English names as do such incidents as these?

An English monarch styled his favourite Peter Gaveston as “Piers,” a form that was sufficiently familiar to readers of history; but when an antiquary, some few years ago, found this same Gaveston described as “Perot,” it became a difficulty to not a few. The Perrots or Parratts of our London Directory might have told them of the old-fashioned diminutive that had been knocked on the head with a Hebrew Bible.

Collet, from Nicholas, used as a feminine name, died out also. The last instance I know of is —

“1629, Jan. 15. Married Thomas Woollard and Collatt Hargrave.” – St. Peter, Cornhill.

Colin, the other pet form, having got into our pastoral poetry, lingered longer, and may be said to be still alive:

“1728. Married Colin Foster and Beulah Digby.” – Somerset House Chapel.

The last Wilmot I have discovered is a certain Wilmote Adams, a defendant in a Chancery suit at the end of Elizabeth’s reign (“Chancery Suits: Elizabeth”), and the last Philpot is dated 1575: