Note on Folk-Names of Yellowhammer and OystercatcherAuthor(s): Bertram LloydSource: Folklore, Vol. 56, No. 2 (Jun., 1945), p. 273Published by: Taylor & Francis, Ltd. on behalf of Folklore Enterprises, Ltd.Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1257015 .

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Collectanea 273 And the small child that only a day or two ago I saw so intently whip-

ping a travesty of a top, stained an abominable green, was hc too, un- knowingly, still striving to expel evil from our midst? He certainly might seem to have been quite as successful.

I. GATTY

NOTE ON FOLK-NAMES OF YELLOWHAMMER AND OYSTERCATCHER

THE Welsh name for the Yellowhammer-Gwas y Neidr-means " Ser- vant of the Snake ". A native of Newcastle Emlyn (Carmarthenshire) a cultured and travelled man, informed me that the origin of this folk- name for the Yellowhammer (which he too had used in his boyhood) was that the bird was popularly supposed to warn snakes of approaching enemies. This explanation of the name was new to me. Another- heard long ago in Caernarvonshire-was that the snakes were hatched in Yellowhammers' nests, as indeed was proclaimed by the curious snake- like markings which decorate the eggs of these birds!

The aversion to the Yellowhammer in some parts of Scotland is well known, but it is not there associated with snakes, I believe.

Is the explanation of Gwas y Neidr given by my Newcastle Emlyn informant unique, or is such a superstition traceable elsewhere? In South Wales I have heard Gwas y Neidr used as a folk-name for a Dragon- fly, but I have not succeeded in discovering the connecting link between insect and snake, and should be glad if any folklorist could throw light on it.

(The name for Dragon-fly in many parts of Wales is Gwaell Neidr (the snake's 'skewer' or knitting-needle'). Gwas may be a corruption of this-I. C. P.)

Oystercatcher. At Llangranog (Cardigan) these birds were called " Saer Coch " by the fishermen, but I could get no satisfactory explanation of the name. I believe that on the coast further north (at Lleyn) the bird is called " Saer " (? Carpenter).

BERTRAM LLOYD

A PEOPLE'S COURT

I AM informed by Miss E. H. Goodwin, Pentre-poeth Girls' School, Carmarthen, of a custom which persisted at Cynwyl Elfed, Carmarthen- shire, until I865. Miss Goodwin is a native of the village and the details of the custom were given her by her father.

At the " square at the bottom " of the village stands a white stone (Y Garreg Wen) and above it there grew formerly a huge oak tree. This was for generations the meeting-place of the villagers, and under the tree the cases of all offenders against the moral laws of the village were tried. When a person committed an offence against these laws, the villagers

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