NPPF: C.17: aka Jack Degree

[Jasper Fidget]

"Jack Degree or Jacques de Grey": degree (Anglo Saxon "građa"): 

Jack-in-the-Green: the Green Man, a woodland spirit often rendered in a
frame of leaves who is ceremonially put to death during the Pagan Beltane
festival (May 1) to celebrate the coming of Spring.  His execution is said
to release the spirit of summer.  Now also: "A chimney sweep enclosed in a
framework of boughs, carried in Mayday processions" (Webster's).  

http://website.lineone.net/~dominicow/green_man_folklore.htm

An intersection between Pagan and Christian (a border zone, as with the
color grey): of the Green Men decorating Gloucester Cathedral: "Perhaps he
reminds us of our interconnectedness with nature and the greening power of
trees and plants. [...] The Green Man probably arrived in the Christian
Church as a part of a general sense of Spirit in Nature, an inheritance from
the Pagan past, an inheritance which was doubtless more subconscious than
deliberate."

http://www.gloucestercathedral.uk.com/2001/greenman.asp

See also "Sir Gawain and the Green Knight":
http://www.hti.umich.edu/cgi/c/cme/cme-idx?type=header&idno=Gawain (Middle
English edited by J.R.R. Tolkein)

http://alliteration.net/Pearl.htm (modern translation by Paul Deane)

Implies the (abundant) Celtic and Anglo Jack legends and tales ("Jack the
Giant Killer", "Jack and the Beanstalk"), concerned mainly with a trickster
protagonist who beats someone stronger through cunning (but who may not
always live happily ever after).  There's even one branch ("Jack and Molly",
_Jack Tales_) localized to Appalachia.

http://www.worldwideschool.org/library/books/youth/fantasy/TheBlueFairyBook/
chap39.html

http://www.pitt.edu/~dash/type0328jack.html

http://www.mwg.org/production/websites/jacktales/who/

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0395669510/qid=1061236132

Jack is also a name associated with various villains, including
Jack-the-Lad, "the nickname of Jack Sheppard, an 18th-century thief [...]
(a) a young troublemaker; (b) a working-class hero; (c) a wanted criminal."
(OED); and Jack-the-Ripper.  Also a general villain of nature: Jack Frost.
(We'll see Gradus assume the role of several historical and fictional
villains before finally becoming Jack Grey.)

Jack: "A thing which saves human labour; a device, a tool." (OED)

Jack-of-the-Clock: A figure of a man which strikes the bell on the outside
of a clock. (OED)

Jack-at-a-pinch. (a) One called upon to take the place of another in an
emergency. (b) An itinerant parson who conducts an occasional service for a
fee. (Webster's Revised)

Everyman-Jack: colloq. each and every person. (OED)

Jack-of-all-trades: one who can turn his hand to any kind of work.
(Webster's Revised)

Jack-in-a-box: A child's toy, consisting of a box, out of which, when the
lid is raised, a figure springs. (Webster's)

Jack-in-office: an insolent fellow in authority. --Wolcott. (Webster's)

Jack-o'-Lantern comes from an old Irish legend about a man who won a pact
with the devil which kept him from going to hell, but who was too wicked to
get into heaven, so was doomed to wander the marshes for eternity, swinging
a ghostly lantern.

http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_o_lantern


-=Jasper Fidget=-