(Vol. iii., pp. 187. 252.)
Your "NOTES AND QUERIES" form the best specimen of a
Conversations-Lexicon that I have yet met with; and I regret that it was
not in existence some years ago, having long felt the want of some such
special and ready medium of communication.
In the old enclosures to the west of the town of Barton we had a spring
of clear water called St. Trunnian's Spring; and in our open field we
had an old thorn tree called St. Trunnian's Tree,--names that imply a
familiar acquaintance with St. Trunnian here; but I have no indication
to show who St. Trunnian was. I am happy, however, to find that your
indefatigable correspondent DR. RIMBAULT, like myself, has had his
attention called to the same unsatisfied Query.
Paulinus, the first Bishop of York, was the first who preached
Christianity in Lindsey; yet St. Chad was the patron saint of Barton and
its immediate neighbourhood, and at times I have fancied that St.
Trunnian might have been one of his coadjutors; at other times I have
thought he may have been some sainted person, posted here with the
allied force under Anlaff, previous to the great battle of Brunannburg,
which was fought in the adjoining parish in the time of Athelstan: but I
never could meet with any conclusive notice, of St. Trunnian, or any
particular account of him. Some years ago I was dining with a clerical
friend in London, and then made known my anxiety, when he at once
referred to the quotation made by DR. RIMBAULT from _Appius and
Virginia_, as in Vol. iii., p. 187.; and my friend has since referred me
to Heywoods's play of _The Four P's_ (Collier's edition of Dodsley's Old
Plays, vol. i. p. 55.), where the Palmer is introduced narrating his
pilgrimage:
"At Saynt Toncumber and Saynt Tronion,
At Saynt Bothulph and Saynt Ann of Buckston;"
inferring a locality for St. Tronion as well as St. Botulph, in
Lincolnshire: and subsequently my friend notes that--
"Mr. Stephens, in a letter to the printer of the _St. James's
Chronicle_, points out the following mention of St. Tronion in
Geoffrey Fenton's _Tragical Discourses_, 4to., 1567, fol. 114.
b.:--'He (referring to some one in his narrative not named)
returned in Haste to his Lodgynge, where he attended the approche
of his Hower of appointment wyth no lesse Devocyon than the
papystes in France perform their ydolatrous Pilgrimage to the ydol
Saynt Tronyon upon the Mount Avyon besides Roan.'"
Should these minutes lead to further information, it will give me great
pleasure, as I am anxious to elucidate, as far as I can, the antiquities
of my native place.
Mr. Jaques lives at a place called St. Trinnians, near to Richmond in
Yorkshire; but I have not the _History of Richmondshire_ to refer to, so
as to see whether any notice of our saint is there taken under this
evident variation of the same appellation.