276
NOTES AND QUERIES, no s. vm. OCT. 5, 1907.
men engaged on the restoration of this
church, during the middle of the last
century, as to the hardness of the timber
with which they had to deal, the subj oined
letter is of value. The church of SS. Peter
and Paul, Newchurch, was built about 600
years ago.
Henry Taylor, Esq. Rusthall, Kent.
DEAR SIR. The under-mentioned facts I can vouch for.
Old British oak is the hardest wood that a car- penter has to work. It is nothing unusual to find old oak beams, which on the outside are quite rotten, inside nearly as hard as iron.
Forty years ago I worked in an old church at Romney Marsh, in a village called Newchurch. The timbers of the church are old oak, and it was impossible to keep an edge upon my tools ; I was continually sharpening them.
I have in my youth also worked on old oak barn floors, upon which the corn used to be thrashed with a flail. My oilstone was in constant requisi- tion, and to drive nails was nearly impossible.
My experience of the heart of oaK is that the older it gets the harder it becomes.
Your obedient servant,
A. T. STOAKES. HENRY TAYLOR.
MR. HENRY TAYLOR is quite correct in his assumption that when (in 1849) he made his note, the old timber in Greensted Church was generally believed to be chestnut.
Samuel Lewis, in his ' Topographical Dictionary of England ' (1842), records under ' Greenstead, Ongar ' :
" The nave of this church [St. Martin's] is com- posed of the half-trunks of chestnut trees, about a foot and a half in diameter, split through the centre, and roughly hewn at each end, to let them into a cill at the bottom, and into a plank at the top, where they are fastened by wooden pegs. The fabric is 29 ft. 9 in. long by 14 ft. wide and 5ft. 6 in. high at the sides, which supported the primitive roof. It is supposed to have been erected about 1013."
I have not visited Greensted since I had the neighbouring church at Chipping Onga: in hand (1884) ; but at that time I carefully examined its ancient timbers, and, without a doubt, considered they were English oak.
MR. TAYLOR cannot think the wood of every old church has been examined. When some years ago, a long discussion took place in technical papers upon the subject, al ancient fabrics which were stated to possess mediaeval chestnut, received attention but the earliest example found was a Rodmersham (Kent). Westminster Hal was amongst the number, but we all now know that its grand old roof is constructec entirely of oak.
In 1871 I was in Belgium in company
with the Society of Architects, to which body
'. belong. At Ypres we visited the grand
"'loth Hall, with its famous open-timbered
roof (460 feet long by 38 feet wide),
["here we were assured by a local antiquary
Jhat the wood was all sweet chestnut, which
lad been floated in the log into Belgium in
or about 1485. Always anxious to learn, I
succeeded, at the risk of breaking my neck,
n climbing into several different parts of
- he roof in question, and there cut away
"arge splinters from various beams. These I .abelled on the spot, and on my return lome planed them. Upon examination they all turned out to be oak, and not chestnut at all !
In Evelyn's time chestnut appears to- tiave been much in vogue, for in ' Sylva,' under the title of ' The Chess-nut,' he- writes :
" Its use is now (next to the Oak) one of the mos sought after by the Carpenter and Joyner. It hath Formerly built a good part of our ancient houses in the City of London. I once had a very large Barn near the City, fram'd entirely of this timber/'
HARRY HEMS.
Fair Park, Exeter.
SlLK FIRST MENTIONED IN THE BlBLE
(10 S. viii. 231). The translators of the A. V. give their readers a chance of sub- stituting " silk " from the margin, for the " fine linen " of the text, in Genesis xli. 42 : " Pharaoh took off the ring from his hand' and put it upon Joseph's hand, and arrayed him in vesture of fine linen." The R. V. hesitates between fine linen and " cotton.' Bishop Christopher Wordsworth, comment- ing on the verse, says, or the printer makes him say, that the material was of "fine muslin like cotton," though it is probable that he wrote " muslin-like cotton." This, he goes on to explain, is shesh, byssus, which was worn by Egyptian priests and other dignitaries. Smith's ' Dictionary of the Bible ' avers that " the only undoubted notice of silk in the Bible occurs in Rev. xviii. 12, where it is mentioned among the treasures of the typical Babylon."
ST. SWITHIN.
E. A. LTJTYENS, PAINTER (10 S. viii. 230). Mr. Edwin Landseer Lutyens, architect,, of 29, Bloomsbury Square, is described in ' Who 's Who ' as the son of Charles Lut- yens. The latter may possibly be the artist about whom MR. DUKE inquires ; and if this is so, Mr. Edwin Lutyens would pro- bably furnish the required information.
JOHN HEBB.
Primrose Club, S.W.
