Note 89 — NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS REFERRED TO IN THE FOREGOING LIFE.

“Mr. Steevens suggests, with great probability, that this word may have the same meaning as howve or houve, used by Chaucer for a head-dress; Maid Marian’s head-dress was always very fine: indeed some persons have derived her name from the Italian word morione, a head-dress.” Mr. Steevens was never less happy than he is in this very probable conjecture. The word howve or houve, in Chaucer, is a mere variation of hood: and Maid Marian’s head-dress must, to be sure, have been “very fine” when made of four yards of broad cloth! A huke is a woman’s gown or habit. (Huke, palla, toga, palium Belgicis feminis usitatum.—Skin.) Skelton mentions it in his Elinour Rumming: