'mes ne ert d'or adubbee, ne d'autre metal,
de peres preciuses, de ivoire ne _roal_';
i. e. but it was not adorned with gold nor other metal, nor with precious
stones, nor ivory, nor _rewel_. Du Cange gives a Low Lat. form _rohanlum_,
and an O. Fr. _rochal_, but tells us that the MS. readings are _rohallum_
and _rohal_. The passage occurs in the Laws of Normandy about wreckage, and
should run--'dux sibi retinet ... ebur, _rohallum_, lapides pretiosas'; or,
in the French version, 'l'ivoire, et le _rohal_, et les pierres
precieuses.' Ducange explains the word by 'rock-crystal,' but this is a
pure guess, suggested by F. _roche_, a rock. It is clear that, when the
word is spelt _rochal_, the _ch_ denotes the same sound as the Ger. _ch_, a
guttural resembling _h_, and not the F. _ch_ at all. Collecting all the
spellings, we find them to be, in French, _rohal_, _rochal_, _roal_; and,
in English, _ruwal_, _rewel_, _ruel_, (_reuylle_, _ruelle_). The _h_ and
_w_ might arise from a Teutonic _hw_, so that the latter part of the word
was originally -_hwal_, i. e. whale; hence, perhaps, Godefroy explains F.
_rochal_ as 'ivoire de morse,' ivory of the walrus (A. S. _hors-hwæl_). The
[198] true origin seems rather to be some Norse form akin to Norweg.
_röyrkval_ (E. _rorqual_). Some whales, as the _cachalot_, have teeth that
afford a kind of ivory; and this is what seems to be alluded to. The
expression 'white as _whale-bone_,' i. e. white as whale-ivory, was once
common; see Weber's Met. Romances, iii. 350; and _whales-bone_ in Nares.
Most of this ivory was derived, however, from the tusk of the walrus or the
narwhal. Sir Thopas's saddle was ornamented with ivory.