Note 449 — Chapter VI · ‘Nicknames.’
Reading edition
It is curious to compare local registers with local dictionaries. Thus the Promptorium Parvulorum gives as a familiar Norfolk term in the fourteenth century, ‘craske, fryke of fatte,’ or ‘lusty,’ as we should now say. This crask was a vulgar form of the French ‘cras’ (Latin, ‘crassus’). Turning to our registers, we find that while our ‘Crass’s’ are found in our more general rolls as ‘Richard le Cras’ or ‘John le Cras’ or ‘Stephen Crassus,’ our ‘Crasks’ must go to a Norfolk entry for a ‘Walter le Crask.’ (Vide Hist. Norfolk, Index. Blomefield.)