Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 7.djvu/281

11s.vLLAr»sn.:5.1913.] NOTES AND QUERIES. 273 “Snnu>s1m~1 ” (11 S. 206). -The explanation I offer of the name of tlns coin is closely connected with that of the “ pictareen,” or “ bit,” of which it is, or was, a quarter. “ Pictareen ” or “ pistareen ”-»i.e., a small “ piastra ”- was the name of a small silver coin current in the West Indies. A very similar name, “ picayune,” was given in Louisiana, accord- ing to the ‘ N.E.D.,’ to “ the Spanish half- real, value 6* cents or 3 pence, now to the U.S. 5-cent piece or other coin of small value.” If I mistake not, there was a New Orleans newspa r called The Picayune. Now this wordpe is distinctly Provencal, brought from Marseilles, where picaioun was, and is still, the usual name for small silver coin. This may be from L. pecunia, or it may be related to the piccolo coin of N orthem Italy, but certainly throughout Provence it has the Scots sense of “ siller.” Mistral, in one of his poems, advises a young man courting:- Ié vau mai li poutouno Que li picaioun. For him more are worth [do more] the kisses than the picayunes. The copper coins of Provence were the dardéfw, a half-sou or farthing, and the ardit, which was the liard or half-farthing. The latter coin is said to have got its name from having been first coined by Phili pe le Hardi in the thirteenth century; but this seems very doubtful. The dardéno was named after M. de Dardéno, who was en- trusted with its coinage about 1707. He was apparently the “Moussu de Dardéno ” to whom F. T. Gros of Marseilles dedicated one of his poems, ‘ L’Enroouma generau de l’An l730,’ referring to the influenza epidemic of that year. Both coins have disappeared, to the great regret of the people, to whom the centime, practically only an inconvenient money of account, would, as a fifth of a sou, be useless. The people count in sous, and I have seen greengrocery ticketed in liards. Victor Gélu, in one of his poems (1865), says to a gambler whom he knew as a boy :- Que de dardéno as manda :fi pielo o crous? How man farthings have you tossed at heads or tails (Y‘ pile or cross”)? _ An avaricious man is a pito-dardérw. N ow this word, pronounced dardéne, would probably have assed, along with the “ picayime,” to Eouisiana and the French West Indies as a name for small copper coins. And it would readily become corrupted by the common chang of d to i, thentosorsh. Thischanget esplacein many Provencal words ; thus Adelaide has become Azalais; the L. spatha, It. eapada, is espaso ,° demi (to cut a tooth) is jenzz. It is probable that in Creole speech dardéne would become zarzéne, and this would be hardened in English s§eech into “ sharpshin.” nwum NIo11oLsoN. Cros de Cagnes, near Nice. Aumons WANTED (11 S. vii. 208).-I very much doubt whether any author can be found for the roverbial distich that DB. ROBERT F. Inxonn quotes, beginning “ Dat Galenus opes.” In Burton’s ‘ Ana- tomy of Melancholy] 1, 2, 3, 15, it appears in the form Dgt élalenusaopes, Jugginianus honores, e anus cies ur are pedea .° The righ Physilgan, hgligl°’d Lawyers ride, Whil’st the poor Scholar foots it by their side. The marginal reference “ Buchanan, eleg. lib.,” was first attached to these lines ID. ed. 4 (1632), and the error has been mechanic- ally repeated in modern reprints. The note was originally connected with the next quotation, “ Calliope longum,” &c., which is taken from 97, 98 of the first poem in Buchanan’s ‘ Elegiarum Liber.’ In a widely different shfipe the saying may be seen in Franciscus oridus Sabinus’s ‘ Lectiones Subcisivae,’ lib. i. cap. i. :- “ Vix enim prima Latinitatis princi ia dootos aut Iustiniano aut Galeno addicunt: Rlos etiam Leoninos tam barbare constructos quam vilissims sordidtiggimaaque sententire versiculos insulsissimo canen : Dat Galenus opes, dat sanctio Iustiniana, Ex aliis paleas, ex istis collige grana." John Owen has made a fresh application of the familiar words in Medicus et I. C. Dat Galenus open, dat Iustinianus hopores, Dum ne sit atlens iste, neo ille Cliens. ‘Epigrammataf lib. vi. 47. Biichmann, in the 10th ed. of ‘ Gefliigelte Worte,’ quotes from Burkard Waldis’s ‘ Esopus,’ that appeared in 1548 :- Galenus uns reiohlich niihrt, J ustinianus hoch herfahrt. This has been dropped in the latest editions of Biichmann’s vo ume. The form of the Latin proverb may very likely have been suggested by the words of Ovid :- Dat census honores, Census amicitias: pauper ubique iacet. ‘Fasti,’ i. 217. Cf. also ' Amores,’ III. 55. Enwum Bmrsnr. Univ. Coll., Aberystwyth.