6() The Rev. J. Hamilton on the Punic Passage in Plautus, 



In the ninth we have the Libyan spiti as duplicate of the Punic sibit : and 

 as synonymous expressions with each other respectively, 57?^^ -^id, witness testi- 

 fied, corresponding with dubert, report is ; uiH, rendered accessible, with psa 

 opened, gubylim, regiones, with micom, locum. 



The agreement in the tenth has also been fully demonstrated in its place. 



Thus on the one hand, the Latin, augmented and elucidated by such subsidia 

 as we can bring to bear upon it, suggests to the linguist a copious Hebrew voca- 

 bulary and synonymy applicable to the purport of the sentence, supplying an 

 apparatus of verbal and phraseological tests for his Hermeneutical analysis, 

 which, on the principle of affinities, serve to detect and disengage from their 

 state of combination the elementary ingredients of our Punic compound. 

 On the other hand, to the Punic thus detected and elicited, some Libyan word 

 or phrase betrays a family likeness not to be mistaken : or some outstanding 

 synonyme which the Punic rejected, as inapplicable, is recognized as a fellow 

 synonyme in the Libyan. The Libyan thus exhibiting, to a gi'eat degree, the 

 same words with the Punic, differently pronounced, or the same ideas differently 

 expressed, duplicates in sense, or duplicates both in sense and sound. In short, 

 the criterion of our reading the Punic rightly will be, that the Punic so read will 

 furnish the key that unlocks the Libyan. — A result not only curious, but convinc- 

 ing, and affiarding a kind of assurance in our philology somewhat analogous to 

 that afforded by the experimentuni cruets in philosophy. 



Such unexceptionable exactness as implies exemption from what may be called 

 fractional verbal errors, and complete exclusion of uncertainty or doubt, our 

 Hermeneutic Theory does not pretend to ;* but to the satisfactory explanation of 

 the philological phenomena, not only of the unadulterated Punic text and the 

 Latin interpretation, but of what has been " unattempted yet," the Libyan ver- 

 sion, it does. 



* For example, the Libyan phrase comucro lu ani, (whicli appears the synonyme of the Punic 

 beth nothothi,) may be read ether " a guest and dear friend," ST "ipl En, or 3?'-)D1 Cn3, " as a 

 guest and as a friend," in accordance with that verse of the 35th Psahn, "as a friend and a bro- 

 ther." In the same manner, in the eighth verse, the Libyan li may correspond with the Punic 

 by mecum. But more probably is the Libyan corruption of luhh tabula, the synonime of the Punic 

 chi/rs, the same. So again in the ninth verse, erm macom of the Libyan may either be read Qin, 

 i^ the antiquated place " as distinguished from the wcll-linown word, macom-ades, "ncieplace;" 



