Archaic England : $b an essay in deciphering prehistory from megalithic monuments, earthworks, customs, coins, place-names, and faerie superstitionsBayley, Harold
History
Archaic England : $b an essay in deciphering prehistory from megalithic monuments, earthworks, customs, coins, place-names, and faerie superstitions
Bayley, Harold
Archaeology; England -- Antiquities
The dictionaries define "Alfred" as meaning "Elf in council," and
Allflatt or Elfleet as "elf purity". The big Alfe was no doubt
symbolised by the celebrated Alphian Rock in Yorkshire, and the little
Alf was almost certainly worshipped in his coty or stone cradle at
Alvescott near Witney. That this site was another Kit's Coty or "Cradle
of Tudno," as at Llandudno, is implied by the earlier forms Elephescote
(1216) and Alfays (1274). The Fays and the Elves are one and the same
as the Jinns, the Genii, or "the Gentry".
There used to be an "Alphey" within Cripplegate on the site of the
present Church of St. Alphage in London. It was believed that the Elf
King inhabited the linden tree, and the elder was similarly associated
with him. Linden is the same word as London, and the name elder resolves
into the _dre_ or _der_ or abode of El: in Scandinavia the elves were
known as the Elles, whence probably Ellesmere--the Elves pool--and
similar place-names.
We shall subsequently consider a humble Hallicondane or _Ellie King dun_
still standing in Ramsgate. There was also a famous Elve dun or
Elve-haunt at _Elbo_ton, a hill in Yorkshire, where according to local
legend:--
From Burnsall's Tower the midnight hour
Had toll'd and its echo was still,
And the Elphin bard from faerie land
Was upon _Elbo_ton Hill.
In the neighbourhood of this _ton_ or _dun_ of Elbo there are persistent
traditions of a spectral hound or bandog.
In the immediate neighbourhood of the London Aldermanbury--the barrow or
court of Alderman--is a church dedicated to St. Alban, and in this same
district stood the parish church of St. Alphage. There figures in the
Church Calendar a "St. Alphage the Bald," and also a St. Alphage or
Elphege, known alternatively as Anlaf. The word Anlaf resolves into
_Ancient Alif_, and it may be thus surmised that "Alphage the Bald" was
the Alif, Aleph, or Alpha aged.
As has already been seen the Celts represented their Hercules as
bald-headed. St. Alban's, Holborn, is situated in Baldwin's Gardens
where also is a Baldwin's Place. Probably it was the same Bald
One--_alias_ Father Time--that originated the Baldwin Street in the
neighbourhood of St. Alphage and St. Alban, Aldermanbury.
St. Anlaf may be connoted with the St. Olave whose church neighbours
those of St. Alphage, and St. Alban. By the Church of St. Alban used to
run Love Lane, and _Anlaf_ may thus perhaps be rendered Ancient Love, or
Ancient Life, or Ancient Elf.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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