New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1917-03-01
The Spelling of Proper Names

In the course of an erUdite discourse on
the spelling Of Shakespeare's name MIR.
NJ. II. Spielmann makes the surprising
suggestion that the apparent indifference
Of our ancestors to photography must
really have been governed by "a clear mo
tive and deliberate intention" He IS APP
narentlv satisfied in his own mind of some
definite, if mysterious, purpose lmpelllng
"tbe author who would spell land his
printers would Loyalty set up in type) by
cold generalization in different ways on
the self-same page, even in the self-same
line, the most ordinary words" But IN
happilv he dismisses the question as one
(Which cannot now be discussed"
As far as Shakespeare, Shakespear'
Shakespeare, Shakspere and the rest 60, he
is by no means inclined to accept HALL
weIl-Phillips's assumption that ut may
fairly be stated that all the scholars OF
note who have taken pains to investigate
the subject adopt the longer form" And,
indeed, the lists he gives of sundry edl-
tions from 1923 to 1910 show clearly
enough that among Shakespeares editors
there is nothing approaching agreement.
Shakespeare himself had several ways OF
spelling his name, TO say nothing OF his
contemporaries who made shots at which
to-day are hardly recognizable.
But if Mr.. Spielnrann is disinclined to
attribute this want of consistency to care
lessness it must not be supposed that he
suspects the use of cipher or any occult
clew IN the real authorship of the plays.
He leaves such speculations to the Baco-
Man cranks, for he knows very well that
most people Of that age spelled as they
pleased, and were not tied as we are TO-
day to dull uniformity.
1t is pity, however, that he does not de-
veloD his theory little more fully, for the
impression received by most readers OF old
hooks is that spelling was for long a mat
ter Of comparative Indifference, provided
only that it conveyed a reasonably accu-
rate notion of the sound.
We take a more pedantic interest IN our
names now and are great sticklers for
orthodox spelling. Some families even
insist on fantastic forms, on the suppose
ton that they are ancient and authentic.
Thus we find certain branches of the fami-
lies Of French, Ford, and others beginning
/ with f. who sign themselves with double
/ lower-case initial, thus: french, ford,
/ frauncis, etc. Presumably they have
/ found their names so in some old manu-
script and concluded that they ought to
be printed in the same manner. This, OF
/ course, is sheer ignorance and illiteracy on
/ their part, since the capital f in court
! hand was always indicated in this way
The double survived for many years in
script. Thus Henry Fielding, the novelist,
usually employed it in writing his name,
but he would have been shocked indeed
if his printer had followed the copy lit
orally on his title pages.
Speaking Of Fielding, IT may be recalled
that one Of his noble kinsmen took him to
task for his spelling and asked why he
departed from the established family form
Fielding. His answer was that he sup
poscd he was the first Of the Ficldings who
knew how 10 spell. Even in his century
there was a certain laxity in spelling, but
printers we're already tending toward
rlxd uniformity. In the seventeenth cen