Note 378 — Chapter IV · SUNDAY AT REYKJAVIK—DRINKING IN ICELAND.

Síra is more commonly, but not so correctly, written Séra, and by foreigners Sjera; and I have heard it pronounced Shera. It is a Romance word, originally Senior, hence Seigneur, Signore, Senhor, Señor, Sir, Sir-r (Richardson), Sirrah, and “Sir-ree.” Icelanders still keep up our fashion of Shakespeare’s day, and apply it to clerks with the Christian name only, as Sir Hugh. Magister was the university title of the M.A. in our fifteenth century: Dominus (the Dan of Chaucer and his contemporaries, and the Don of modern Italian priests) was, and still is, the B.A., entered as Sir This or Sir That (the surname) in some of the college registers down to the time of Queen Anne, and, I believe, even in our day. Hence, possibly, the origin of the French Sir Brown and Sir Jones.