_The Tanthony._--Will your correspondent ARUN permit one to refer him to
an authority for the use of the word "Tanton" for St. Anthony? An
hospital in York, dedicated to St. Anthony, after the dissolution came
into the possession of a gild or fraternity of a master and eight
keepers, who were commonly called "Tanton Pigs." Vide Drake's
_Eboracum_, p. 315.
[Greek: D].
_Tanthony Bell at Kimbolton._--"Tanthony" is from St. Anthony. In
Hampshire the small pig of the litter (in Essex called "the cad") is, or
once was, called "the Tanthony pig." Pigs were especially under this
saint's care. The ensign of the order of St. Anthony of Hainault was a
collar of gold made like a hermit's girdle; at the centre thereof hung
a crutch and a small bell of gold. St. Anthony is styled, among his
numerous titles, "Membrorum restitutor," and "Dæmonis fugator:" hence
the bell.
"The Egyptians have none but wooden bells, except one brought by the
Franks into the monastery of St. Anthony."--Rees' _Cyclopædia_, art.
Bell.
I hope ARUN will be satisfied with this connexion of St. Anthony with
the pig, the crutch, and the bell.
"The staff" in the figure of the saint at Merthyr is, I should think, a
crutch.
"The custom of making particular saints tutelars and protectors of one
or another species of cattle is still kept up in Spain and other
places. They pray to the tutelar when the beast is sick. Thus St.
Anthony is for hogs, and we call a poor starved creature a _Tantony_
pig."--Salmon's _History of Hertfordshire_, 1728.