This is more like it

[Kit]

I bought another marriage from SP and I quite like this one:

Mr Thomas Reid, mercht in Stinson, from whence he produced a sufficient Testimonial & Elizabeth Boyd daughter to (looks like umqill) Adam Boyd mercht. in Kilrnk both their first marriages were booked on Thursday October 11- 1739 & after orderly proclamation three several sabbaths were married at Kilmk on Wednesday October 24-1739 by Mr Hill.

[Asa]

That's what you want isn't it :D

[Kit]

Yes it is.

I only have 2 questions 1. why was he a Mr when the rest of the page was just John Brown and 2. why everyone else on the page had a few extra words thrown in:

... marriages were booked on ____ and consigned eight merks? of penalty & after orderly proclamation ...

and what those words mean.

[kiterunner]

He was a Mr because he was of higher social status.

If you can post up the part of the image with the words on it might be easier for us to work out what it means.

[Kit]

I'll try to post it tomorrow Kate, I'm off to bed shortly.

Can I post the whole part of their marriage from the image or is that wrong?

[kiterunner]

I meant one of the bits with "marriages were booked on ____ and consigned eight merks? of penalty & after orderly proclamation". I think it would be better if you can crop the image so it's just that bit, if possible.

[Kit]

Sorry Kate way too tired last night to think sensibly.

I'll see if I can attach things now.

[Kit]

umqill:

http://i183.photobucket.com/albums/x61/KitTheKat1/umqill.jpg

8 somethings of penalty:

http://i183.photobucket.com/albums/x61/KitTheKat1/penalty3somethings.jpg

Sorry the second one is not as good. Apparently when you get to be a Mr the minister also writes a lot bigger than for those who aren't. Enlarging it anymore makes it harder to read.

[Janet]

Kit, it looked like "marks" to me and so I Googled "eight marks of penalty" and found a discussion of another document with the same phrase. (I tried to attach a screen shot. Not sure how successful that was. But on my Google search it was the first item returned, something from RootsWeb. You should find it easily.)

Then, not being entirely sure what to make of "marks" I went looking for that under 18th century English money because it seemed to me I had heard of an old English monetary unit by the same name as today's German currency. This web site explains that the basic monetary unit being the penny, and the penny being quite small, they therefore used the Mark (160 pence) and later the pound (240 pence) for accounting purposes. No Mark coin was issued, they say, which leaves me wondering. But that is what I found (here):
http://www.bignell.uk.com/english_currency.htm
The web site is by an individual, so not necessarily authoritative. It would bear more research, but I thought this sounded interesting.

Hope I'm not off the mark here (ouch, sorry...). Perhaps someone more knowledgeable than I can explain more!

[Kit]

Hi Janet, thanks for looking and making me google. Your answer sounded quite good but now I found someone who said there was a Scottish merk.

A merk was a Scottish unit of currency worth two-thirds of £1 Scots, i.e. 13 shillings and 4 pennies or 69 pence in modern money. However, a merk was used as a measure of the valuation of land - originally in the 15th century.

The person who wrote this didn't seem to know about banns but I'll have to look at it.

[Janet]

Interesting! Learning as I go...

[Kit]

from Wikipedia:

A merk was a Scottish silver coin. Originally the same word as a mark of silver, the merk was in circulation at the end of the 16th century and in the 17th century.

So Janet regardless of whether it was merk or mark, it meant the same thing as you said at that time. Not sure where the other fellow got it meaning a land measure unless I haven't found that yet.

:o:o Edit: If I'd finished reading the wiki entry I would have read:

Markland or Merkland was used to describe an amount of land in Scottish deeds and legal papers. It was based upon a common valuation of the land.

[tenterfieldjulie]

Thanks Janet and Toni, that is very interesting, even if I didn't have a Scottie. If ever I find one of mine has a mark, I'll know what it means lol The only Scots will I have, was proved 30 years after he died. I wouldn't have thought he was mine, as I knew he had gone bankrupt, but it had the name of his farm. What happened was that he had one share in the Kelso bridge and when his son returned from South America, after 30 years, the interest had accummulated and so he had it processed. The best thing about it was that I found where he was buried and I would have never thought so.

[Janet]

Nice little piece of serendipity, Julie.

[kiterunner]

I seem to remember umquile means "deceased".

[Kit]

Ooh thank you Kate. I've been hoping someone knew what that meant.

[ElizabethHerts]

Here's a couple of links for you:

http://www.wordnik.com/words/umquhile

http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/umwhile

[Janet]

Those word web sites are a fantastic resource. Thank you, Elizabeth!

[Kit]

Thanks Elizabeth. They are good links.

Can anyone come up with an idea for Bascler? It is an occupation but I can't find it anywhere. Basculer is french for tilt and Bascler is also a surname but I'm assuming my word has been misspelt.

[tenterfieldjulie]

It doesn't come up in my booklets - "A Scottish Historian's Glossary" or "Scottish Trades, Professions, Vital Records and Directories", so it doesn't sound like it is a common reference. "Bass" comes up as "A door-mat; a workmans toolbasket; a table-mat; a straw horse-collar". Sorry.

[Janet]

Kit, I looked around for your Bascler with the French connection in mind and I've probably gone way too far so just buckle your seatbelt...

http://www.archive.org/stream/annales05loirgoog/annales05loirgoog_djvu.txt

This book describes the use of a device in firearms called a "bascule" which seems to be a sort of rocker arm whereby you can charge one chamber and leave the other chamber ready to fire, and when you reverse the rocker then you can charge the other chamber while the first is now ready to fire. (The word in French is "fusil"; I'm thinking perhaps a double-barreled musket or some such. Not sure what time period you're looking at. This book dates from 1807.) The book names a Monsieur Etienne Fournel, a "basculeur" whose work is executed with perfection.

http://books.google.fr/books?id=lckuEF2szccC&pg=PA263&dq=basculeur&hl=fr&ei=5gWITYTQM8aUtweI0-CDDg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=12&ved=0CGoQ6AEwCzgy#v=onepage&q=basculeur&f=false

This is another book in French, entitled
Exposition Universelle de 1867 à Paris
and subtitled (my translation):
General List of Prizes Awarded by the International Jury
(Interestingly, the book is stamped with "Library of the New York World's Fair 1939".)
On pg 263 it lists prizes for two men in Saint-Etienne who were "basculeurs". So definitely there was an occupation known as "basculeur" in the French armaments industry. I also noticed an ajusteur-basculeur who received a prize. I guess that's a basculeur who does fine-tuning or repairs...? Amazing what you learn when you start digging!

http://books.google.com/books?id=mf49AAAAcAAJ&pg=PA717&lpg=PA717&dq=%22la+bascle%22&source=bl&ots=6HyuFpN4--&sig=gdTeqdulEWszoPKqJbb2Hk0p8Gk&hl=en&ei=RQyITaziN8nFgAe9ponCDQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=9&ved=0CEYQ6AEwCA#v=onepage&q=%22la%20bascle%22&f=false

I also found this entry in the 1778 French dictionary by Diderot where it describes "la bascle" as a kind of fish net.

http://www.archive.org/stream/croniquesdelondo00camduoft/croniquesdelondo00camduoft_djvu.txt

And then there is this "Chronicles of London" which they say is written in the old Norman French and appears to have been compiled about the middle of the fourteenth century. It covers the period from the 44th of Henry III to the 17th of Edward III.
It contains the following passage:

THE FRENCH CHRONICLE OF LONDON. 3
reine la miere sire Edward, et gist a Aumesbury, et le lundi
prochein devant le seint Nichole fut son quer enterre a les frere
menours a Loundres.*
xx. Sire Johan de Bretton, gardein. Rauf le Blount t et Hamond
Box, vicountes.
Mesme Fan a le Pasche moveit le roy vers Escoce. En cele
temps les Normantz vindrent nutauntre come leres ove graunt
navie, et ariverent sus pres 1'ermitage a Dovere, et robberent et
arderent grantz partie de la vile,
xxj. Sire Rauf de Sandwiz, gardein. Henri le BoleJ et Elys
Russel, vicountes.
En cele an fut la descord fait entre le roy d'Engeltere et sire
Johan le Bailliol, et adonk fut il fait roy d'Escoce. Cele an
furent les destres poyngz de .iij. hommes coupes pur la bascle.
En cele an fu sire Rauf de Sandwyz ostez, et fu fait gardein
sire Johan de Brettone. En cele an moveit le descord entre
les portz et les Normantz et les portz conquirent graunt navie.
xij. Sire Johan le Breton, gardein. Robert de Rokesle et Martyn
de Aumesbury, vicountes.
Cele an vint le roy d'Escoce a Loundres al parlement. Mesme
1'an sistrent les justices errauntz a la croisse de piere.
xxiij. Sire Johan le Breton, gardein. Richard de Gloucestre|| et
Henri Box, vicountes.

In my "best" Norman French (lol) I gather that this has to do with the Normans coming over to plunder Dover; there is something about the king rallying his right-hand men, I think, one of whom he made king of Scotland. Is this ringing any bells with anyone? And the king of Scotland then comes to London to the parliament. But what interests me is in the description of the right-hand men: "coupes pur la bascle". Tantalizing. And completely opaque to me.

http://micmap.org/dicfro/chercher/lexique-godefroy/bascle

And then, in something called the Lexique Godefroy, a dictionary of medieval French (found here):
http://www.lexilogos.com/francais_dictionnaire_ancien.htm
there is the definition of "bascle" as a masculine noun meaning "bâtard". But that's hardly what one might call an occupation.

I did warn you to fasten your seatbelt, didn't I? I don't know if I've put you on an interesting track or a wild goose chase, probably the latter, and I won't be insulted if you ignore the whole mess. I hope someone else has a better insight. Anyway, now that I've confused matters hopelessly, I have to go to sleep! Good night.

[Janet]

p.s. I ran "bascler" through a spell-checker and, besides "bascule" which we already looked at, among its frantic guesses were:
backer
buckler
batcher
and (my favorite)...
bicycler!

[kiterunner]

Are you sure it isn't bachelor?

[Kit]

Wow Janet that is a lot. I'll have to re-read it again to digest it all.

Kate I wouldn't think it was bachelor because it was referring to the bride's father. ... Robert Paterson Bascler in Beith ...

[kiterunner]

Can you post up the image of that bit, please, Kit?

[Kit]

Here goes:

http://i183.photobucket.com/albums/x61/KitTheKat1/PatersonBascler.jpg

[lozaras]

Then, not being entirely sure what to make of "marks" I went looking for that under 18th century English money because it seemed to me I had heard of an old English monetary unit by the same name as today's German currency.

Entry from the nitpicker's handbook:
Today's German currency is the Euro ;) :p

Here goes:

http://i183.photobucket.com/albums/x61/KitTheKat1/PatersonBascler.jpg

Could it possibly be another surname? - Baxter ??

[Kit]

It's possible Sarah. The daughter married as Elizabeth Paterson though.

[kiterunner]

It says Baxter.

[Uncle John]

I agree. Robert Paterson Baxter sounds like a good Scottish name. Their soup is rather good.

[kiterunner]

No, Baxter isn't his surname, it's his occupation.

[tenterfieldjulie]

Yeah I have it - he is a baker..

[Kit]

That would make sense, thanks Kate.

The first link Elizabeth gave above says that a baxter was a baker, properly a female baker. So Robert is a bit confused. lol

[Janet]

"Entry from the nitpicker's handbook:
Today's German currency is the Euro"

:eek:
Oh dear, oh dear, pmsl, Lozaras, thank you! Only your best nitpicking friends will tell you when you have egg on your face. OH just turned 65 and, hard on his heels, I wake up to find I've had a "senior moment". Poor old Janet, in her mind's eye she's still back in the last century living dangerously in Geneva wearing a mini-skirt!

[tenterfieldjulie]

Toni in a Scottish Historian's Glossary booklet that I have, it just says that "baxter means baker", nothing about being female.

[Kit]

Thanks Julie.

It seems my days of having a well-off ancestors have gone, if we are back to being a baker. lol

[tenterfieldjulie]

You want and "n" you mean as in "banker" lol

[Kit]

That would be nice Julie. Merchants are good too, apparently. :)