260 



Mr. PETRIE'S Inquiry into the Origin and 



" The three daughters of Lodbrog worked a reaf'an on the standard of Hingar and Hubba, with 

 many magical incantations, which was to be invincible. This ensign, common among the Northerns, 

 was supposed to give omens of victory or defeat : if it gayly fluttered in the wind, it presaged suc- 

 cess, but if it hung down motionless, it portended misfortunes. It is plain from many Abraxas in 

 Chifflet, and many passages adduced in Cuper's Harpocrates, that the raven was an Egyptian hiero- 

 glyphic, and had a predictive virtue." Antiquities of Ireland, pp. 208, 209- 



Whether the birds in this sculpture represent ravens or not, I shall not 

 take upon me to decide. They are certainly not so like those birds as Doctor 

 Ledwich has represented them ; but, even supposing them to be ravens, it by 

 no means follows that the sculpture is Danish, or illustrative of Danish mytho- 

 logy. It is extremely probable that the raven was as much a bird of omen with 

 the pagan Irish as with the pagan Danes and other nations ; it is still considered 

 so in the popular superstitions of the Irish, and PICXC, the Irish name of the 

 bird, was a usual name for men in Ireland both in Pagan and Christian times. 

 But it would nevertheless be an absurdity to suppose that the ravens, repre- 

 sented in this sculpture, have any connexion with pagan superstitions. 



In the next illustration, which is that described by Archdall as " a dragon 



twisting its head round, and the tail turned up between its legs into the mouth," 

 Dr. Ledwich recognizes another Danish symbol, which he thus describes : 



" A wolf in a rage, with his tail in his mouth. The ferocity of this animal, and his delight in 

 human blood, are the chief themes of Scaldic poetry. Odin, the ruler of the gods, as he is stiled in 

 the Edda, is constantly attended by two, named Geri and Freki, whom he feeds with meat from his 

 own table." Ib. p. 208. 



In the next illustration, which represents another 

 of these stones as now broken at one side, Dr. Ledwich 

 could find nothing emblematic of the mythology of the 

 Edda, and therefore has omitted it altogether. Not so, 

 however, in the case of the two following, which he 

 describes as Runic knots, but which appear to me as nothing more than or- 



