36 Mr. Ferguson on the Antiquity of the Kiliee or Boomerang. 



found represented in ancient sculptures, drawings, or impressions on coins, of a 

 curved shape. It appears, however, from an extended examination of glyptical 

 and numismatical antiquities, as well as of the drawings which remain in the 

 chief collections of Etruscan vases, or on sepulchral monuments, that the poetical 

 Hercules is almost invariably represented with the straight, knotted weapon. 

 The only marked exception which has been observed is in the contest of Hercules 

 with Achelous, (PI. I. fig. 9?) in the " Museum Etruscum," where the club 

 in the hand of Hercules is represented of a form somewhat approaching to that 

 of the common "hurl" of this country. It is apparently of an untrimmed stem 

 of palm-tree, which, growing naturally straight, must have been reduced by 

 artificial means to the curved shape ; suiting well with the description given 

 by Statius of the first attempt at forming an artificial weapon among a rude 

 people. 



" Arcades hi : gens una viris, sed dissona cultu 



Scinditur ; hi Paphias rayrtos a stirpe recurvanf 



Et pastorali meditantur praelia trunco." 



Stat, Thehaid. 1. iv. 



Where it is observable that the writer does not seem to consider the mevefustis^ 

 or stake, to be a legitimate weapon till bent into the curved form of the Clava. 

 But although the weapon with which Hercules almost universally appears 

 armed in these poetical representations be undoubtedly a mere Jiistis, or knotted 

 staff, there is one instance of a very differently shaped weapon, which appears 

 certainly intended for the club of Hercules, being represented in ancient sculp- 

 ture. The original is in the French King's collection, and has been described, 

 and a drawing of it given, by Millin, (PI. II. fig. 3.) The subject is a throne, 

 on one side of which two young genii appear playing with a large, flat, curved 

 instrument, which they seem with difficulty to support. Millin, following 

 Viscenti, considers this instrument to be the harpe, or falciform weapon peculiar 

 to Saturn and Perseus. This assumption is, however, quite gratuitous on the 

 part of both. The sculptured instrument is blunt on the inner edge, and square 

 at the broader extremity ; whereas the harpe of Saturn is invariably represented 

 as being sharp on the inner edge, and terminating in a point, (PI. II. fig. 5;) 

 while the harpe of Perseus (PI. II. fig. 4) was a poetical combination of the 

 sword and the Saturnian weapon, having a falciform projection at one side of a 



