Are there traces in England of what the people of Germany, on the shores of
the Baltic, call _Hausmaerke_, and what in Denmark and Norway is called
_bolmaerke_, _bomaerke_? These are certain figures, generally composed of
straight lines, and imitating the shape of the cross or the runes,
especially the so-called compound runes. They are meant to mark all sorts
of property and chattels, dead and alive, movable and immovable, and are
drawn out, or burnt into, quite inartistically, without any attempt of
colouring or sculpturing. So, for instance, every freeholder in Praust, a
German village near Dantzic, has his own mark on all his property, by which
he recognises it. They are met with on buildings, generally over the door,
or on the gable-end, more frequently on tombstones, or on epitaphs in
churches, on pews and old screens, and implements, cattle, and on all sorts
of documents, where the common people now use three crosses.
The custom is first mentioned in the old Swedish law of the thirteenth
century (Uplandslagh, _Corp. Jur. Sveo-Goth._, iii. p. 254.), and occurs
almost at the same period in the seals of the citizens of the Hanse-town
Lubeck. It has been in common use {595} in Norway, Iceland, Denmark,
Sleswick, Holstein, Hamburgh, Lubeck, Mecklenburgh, and Pomerania, but is
at present rapidly disappearing. Yet, in Holstein they still mark the
cattle grazing on the common with the signs of their respective
proprietors; they do the same with the haystacks in Mecklenburgh, and the
fishing-tackle on the small islands of the Baltic. In the city of Dantzic
these marks still occur in the prayer-books which are left in the churches.
There are scarcely any traces of this custom in the south of Germany,
except that the various towers of the city-wall of Nurnberg are said to
bear their separate marks; and that an apothecary of Strasburg, Merkwiller,
signs a document, dated 1521, with his name, his coat of arms, and a simple
mark.
Professor Homeyer has lately read, before the Royal Academy of Berlin, a
very learned paper on the subject, and has explained this ancient custom as
significant of popular law, possibly intimating the close connexion between
the property and its owner. I am sorry not to be able to copy out the
Professor's collection of runic marks; but I trust that the preceding lines
will be sufficient in order to elicit the various traces of a similar
custom still prevalent, or remembered, in the British isles; an account of
which will be thankfully received at Berlin, where they have lately been
informed, that even the eyder-geese on the Shetlands are distinguished by
the marks of their owners.
[alpha].
* * * * *
Minor Queries.
_"Seductor Succo."_--Will any of your readers oblige me by giving me either
a literal or poetical translation of the following lines, taken from
Foulis, _Rom. Treasons_, Preface, p. 28., 1681?
"Seductor Succo, Gallo Sicarius; Anglo Proditor; Imperio Explorator;
Davus Ibero; Italo Adulator; dixi teres ore,--Suitam."