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MONETA SANCTÆ HELENÆ.

As a subscriber to your valuable publication, allow me to suggest that
it might, from time to time, be open to contributions explaining obscure
passages or words, which often occur in the works of mediæval writers,
and more especially in early English records. So far as English usages
and customs are concerned, the Glossary of Du Cange is of comparatively
little value to the English student; many terms, indeed, being wrongly
interpreted in all editions of that work. Take, for example, the word
"tricesima," the explanation of which is truly ridiculous; under
"berefellarii," the commentary is positively comic; and many other
instances might be cited. At the same time, it would be presumptuous to
speak otherwise than in terms of the highest respect and admiration of
Du Cange and his labours. The errors to which I allude were the natural
consequences of a foreigner's imperfect knowledge of English law and
English customs; still it is to be lamented that they should have
remained uncorrected in the later editions of the Glossary; and I take
it to be our duty to collect and publish, where feasible, materials for
an English dictionary of mediæval Latin. It is in your power materially
to advance such a work, and under that impression I venture to send the
present "Note."

In the Wardrobe Account of the 55th year of Henry the Third, it is
stated that among the valuables in the charge of the keeper of the royal
wardrobe, there was a silken purse, containing "_monetam Sancte
Helene_." It is well known that, during the middle ages, many and