rii, rotharii, rotarii, etc., were so named because they
were revolting peasants, i.e. men connected with the roture, or
breaking of the soil, from which we get roturier, a plebeian. That
would still connect our Rutters with Lat. rumpere, but by a third
road.

Finally, Old French has one more word which seems to me quite as good
a candidate as any of the others, viz. roteur, a player on the rote,
i.e. the fiddle used by the medieval minstrels, Chaucer says of his
Frere--

"Wel koude he synge and playen on a rote."

(A, 236.)

The word is possibly of Celtic origin (Welsh crwth) and a doublet of
the archaic crowd, or crowth, a fiddle. Both rote and crowth are used
by Spenser. Crowd is perhaps not yet obsolete in dialect, and the
fiddler in Hudibras is called Crowdero. Thus Rutter may be a doublet
of Crowther. There may be other possible etymologies for Rutter, but
those discussed will suffice to show that the origin of occupative
names is not always easily guessed.

Since the above was written I have found strong evidence for the
"fiddler" derivation of the name. In 1266 it was decided by a
Lancashire jury that Richard le Harper killed William le Roter, or
Ruter, in self-defence. I think there can be little doubt that some,
if not all, of our Rutters owe their names to the profession
represented by this enraged musician. William le Citolur and William
le Piper also appear from the same record (Patent Rolls) to have
indulged in homicide in the course of the year.

CHAPTER XVII. THE CANTERBURY PILGRIMS

"In Southwerk at the Tabard as I lay,
Redy to wenden on my pilgrymage,
To Caunterbury with ful devout corage,
At nyght were come into that hostelrye
Wel nyne and twenty in a compaignye
Of sondry folk, by aventure y-falle
In felaweshipe, and pilgrimes were they alle,
That toward Caunterbury wolden ryde."

(Prologue, 1. 20.)

This famous band of wayfarers includes representatives of all classes,
save the highest and the lowest, just at the period when our surnames
were becoming fixed. It seems natural to distinguish the following
groups. The leisured class is represented by the Knight (Chapter XV)
and his son the Squire, also found as Swire or Swyer, Old Fr. escuyer
(ecuyer), a shield-bearer (Lat. Scutum), with their attendant Yeoman,
a name that originally meant a small landowner and later a trusted
attendant of the warlike kind--

"And in his hand he baar a myghty bow"

(A, 108.)