'2"«i S. VIII. Dec. 31. '69.J 



NOTES AND QUEKIES. 



529 



Abbo Ameilhon, who was librarian of the Ville 

 de Paris and of the Arsenal for more than half a 

 century, and who died in 1811, we read that he 

 acted a conspicuous part in the destruction of the 

 titles of the nobility during the reign of terror. 

 In his capacity as Commissioner for the examina- 

 tion of such titles he wrote, on the 24th of Janu- 

 ary, 1793, as follows to the Attorney-general and 

 Syndic of the department of Paris : — 



" I am instructed to inform 3-ou that the commis- 

 sioners appointed for the examination of the titles of the 

 Cabinet Orders of the ci-devant King, deposited at the 

 national library, are ready to transmit to the Commis- 

 sioners of the department about 270 vols, and boxes, which 

 still remain to be destroyed. It is for the Directory to ap- 

 point the daj' most convenient for the burning, of which 

 the public should be informed by means of placards," &c. 



On Feb. 14, Ameilhon wrote to the same 

 official : — 



" I now send j'ou a statement of the various articles 

 which are still in the depot of the quondam Orders of the 

 ci-devant King, and which should form the materials for 

 a final burning. I am, with sentiments of republican 

 fraternity, &c. Ameilhon." 



Here follows a list of the various articles which 

 remain to be burned : — 



" 128 vols, bound, and 34 boxes containing documents 

 and titles for the ci-devant Order of the Holy Ghost, and 

 others of the late King ; 2 vols, of coats of arms for the 

 said Orders ; 34 vols, of papers and original titles which 

 served to draw up the Armorial General de France ; 166 

 vols, of the collection styled Collection de Le Laboureur ; 

 2 vols, of letters of nobilitA' and of pardon ; 15 vols, con- 

 taining Vouchers for the Order of St. Lazarus, and for 

 entering the Military Schools, together with a box fitted 

 with similar documents for admission into the ci-devant 

 noble Chapters. It results from these original documents, 

 that Ameilhon concurred in and presided over the burn- 

 ing of 652 vols., boxes, and cases, which ought to have 

 been preserved in the national library, where they had 

 been deposited. This act of Vandalism, directed by an 

 historian (for Ameilhon's works prove him to have been 

 a man of considerable learning and research), is an irre- 

 parable loss for historj', while it could not avail to retard 

 the creation of a new order of nobility and the return of 

 the old at the restoration." 



This is but a small portion of the details relat- 

 ing to the destruction perpetrated by one man in 

 one city — the capital of France. What, then, 

 must have been the havoc committed throughout 

 the whole kingdom ? In the lack of evidence as 

 to pedigrees, it can hardly be a matter of surprise 

 that false claimants should arise, and pretend to 

 be the inheritors of rank and title, the true owners 

 of which have been engulphed in the whirlpool of 

 revolution. J. Maceay. 



NAMES OF KUMBEKS, AND THE HAND. 



Bosworth, or rather authorities cited by him, 

 derive ten from the Mces.-Got. tai Tiund, the 

 hands. If this be correct, this English word ten 

 must have existed, in some primeval tongue, be- 



fore the Greek or Latin language was spoken. 

 This appears from the number of words in those 

 languages which have ten for their root : such as 

 teneo, tendo, Kreiuu, &c., all referring to hand. It is 

 probable also, for the same reasons, that hand be- 

 longed to some primeval tongue. Prehendo con- 

 tains it. And Whiter has noticed Its existence in 

 the ixeKaySfTov ^i<pos of Homer, the black-handled 

 sword. From some early tongue also the Celtic 

 has its deic ten: hence the Greek Se^o, and the 

 Latin decern. But that deic is the first syllable of 

 SaicrvXws and digitus will scarcely be doubted 

 when we observe it in such words as S(iKvutJ.i, in 

 the old deicere for dicere, to point out, and most 

 probably in dexle?' and index. But not only 

 words denoting ten, those also signifying ^ve, 

 twenty, and a hundred, appear to me to have one 

 common root in hand. The affinity between vfixve, 

 guinque, the Mces.- Got. _/?«/, the Germ an ywjj/", &c., 

 has been often noticed. Now I suspect that we 

 have allied to these the English words finger, 

 fang, and fin, the A.-S. f anger, to hold, the 

 Latin Jingo ; and, moreover, the English wing, 

 if it be allowed that wiii and gain are the same 

 word. I am strengthened in this opinion from 

 another consideration : the Welsh pump, five, and 

 the Persian pung^ admitted to belong to the above 

 family of words, show an interchange of/) with/. 

 Now the Persian penje, the fist, is doubtless allied 

 to pung ; and cognate with these are the Latin 

 pugnus, the Greek ttuJ, the French poivg, the Por- 

 tuguese punho, &c., all referring to hand. 



'i'he word hundred, Bosworth derives from the 

 Mces.-Got. hund, the hands ; and in analogy with 

 this is the derivation of the Latin centum, which 

 appears to have originated in some of the above 

 words. The interchange of p with c is not with- 

 out authority. The Oscan pitpit was the Latin 

 quidquid, where q has the sound of c hard. But 

 more to my purpose, the Etruscan ewer was the 

 Latin pue7'. And Mr. Guest has shown, in the 

 Phil. Soc. Proceedings (vol. iii.), that in some 

 branches of the Celtic this interchange prevails 

 to a remarkable extent. It is, therefore, possible 

 that the c in cent may be the p in pung. I^believe 

 it is capable of proof that in other tongues,* as wel 

 as our own, the habit prevailed o iadding d or t 

 derived words ending in ru The t, therefore, in 

 cent may be non-radical: moreover, the cent of 

 the Latin is the cant of the Celtic ; and that this 

 word is connected with hand I infer from the 

 Port, canhato, left-handed. I am confirmed in 

 this opinion when I see that the French gant, the 

 Italian guanto, the English gauntlet — all referrin 

 to hand — differ from cant only in the substitution 

 of g for c, a change which appears in vigesimus 

 for vicesimus. Is it not then very probable that 

 cant, centum, the Old Eng. hent, as well as the 

 &ho\c pung, fang, funger, gant, &c., are all vary- 

 ing forms of one primitive word signifying the 



