72 



IV. On the true Date of the Rosetta Stone, and on the Inferences deducihle 

 from it. By the Rev. Edward Hincks, D. D. 



Read May 9, 1842. 



IN investigating the affairs of ancient nations by the help of the contemporary 

 monuments that are yet in existence, there is no knowing beforehand how prolific 

 a single truth may be ; what a train of interesting and even important facts may 

 be brought to our knowledge by combining that one truth with those that are 

 already known. This should lead us to prize every new fact that can be ascer- 

 tained, however unimportant it may appear in itself. And, on the other hand, a 

 similar consideration should lead us to endeavour to correct every falsely assumed 

 fact, no matter how trivial the error may appear ; for falsehood is unfortunately 

 as prolific as truth ; and one falsehood, assumed as a fact, may give birth to errors 

 without number. 



A striking illustration of these general principles has lately occurred in M. 

 Letronne's Edition of the Greek Inscription on the Rosetta Stone ; in which, 

 with the most perverse ingenuity, he draws inference after inference from the 

 false date, which Dr. Young assigned to that monument ; which inferences are 

 all erroneous, and are in most cases the very reverse of those which should have 

 been drawn. 



The date, which Dr. Young erroneously assigned to that monument, was the 

 27th March, 196 B. C, according to the proleptic Julian reckoning ; the true 

 date was, according to the same reckoning, the 27th March, 197 B. C. I will 

 first contrast the inferences which M. Letronne has drawn from Dr. Young's 

 date, with the inferences that he would have drawn had he adopted the earlier 

 date ; placing, for greater clearness, the corresponding inferences, which are ge- 

 nerally contradictory, in parallel columns. Having done this, I will bring for- 

 ward reasons, on which I confidently pronounce it to be impossible that Dr. 

 Young's date was the real date of the monument. 



