124 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[No. 224. 



which was taken away by Edward I., and is now 

 in Westminster Abbey. 



These are the outlines of this tradition. My 

 object now is to ask whether any of your corre- 

 spondents can inform me, first, Whether the Jews 

 had, or have, any like superstition concerning 

 Jacob's pillar ; and whether the royal family of 

 Judah possessed such a stone among their trea- 

 sures ? Secondly, Whether any Jews are sup- 

 posed to have settled in Ireland at so early a 

 period ; and whether (that being the case) there 

 are now, or were once, proofs of their having done 

 so, either in the Irish language or in any of the 

 ancient laws, customs, buildings, &c. of the coun- 

 try ? Thirdly, Whether the Scoteh believe that 

 stone to liave come from Ireland ; and whether 

 that belief in the owner of it being king existed 

 in Scotland ? and, lastly, Can any of your corre- 

 spondents, learned in geology, inform me whether 

 the like kind of stone is to be met with in any 

 part of the British Isles ? or whether, as the le- 

 gend runs, a similar kind of stone is found in the 

 Arabian plains ? The story has interested me 

 greatly ; and if I could gain any enlightenment 

 on the subject, I should be much obliged for it. 



An Indian Subscriber. 



^Several of our historians, as Matthew of West- 

 minster, Hector Boethius, Robert of Gloucester, the 

 poet Harding, &c, have noticed this singular legend ; 

 but we believe the Rabbinical writers (as suggested by 

 our Indian correspondent) have never been consulted 

 respecting it. Sandford, in his valuable History of the 

 Coronation of James II. (fol., 1687, p. 39.), has given 

 some dates and names which will probably assist our 

 correspondents in elucidating the origin of this far- 

 famed relic. He says, "Jacob's stone, or The Fatal 

 Marble Stone, is an oblong square, about twenty-two 

 inches long, thirteen inches broad, and eleven inches 

 deep, of a bluish steel-like colour, mixed with some 

 veins of red ; whereof history relates that it is the 

 stone whereon the patriarch Jacob is said to have lain 

 his head in the plain of Luza. That it was brought 

 to Brigantia in the kingdom of Gallacia in Spain, in 

 which place Gathal, King of Scots, sat on it as his 

 throne. Thence it was brought into Ireland by Simon 

 Brech, first King of Scots, about 700 years before 

 Christ's time, and from thence into Scotland, by King 

 Fergus, about 330 years before Christ. In the year 

 850 it was placed in the abbey of Scone in the sberif- 

 dom of Perth by King Kenneth, who caused it to be 

 inclosed in a wooden chair (now called St. Edward's 

 Chair), and this prophetical distich engraven on it : 



* Ni fallat Fatum, Scoti hunc quocunque locatum 

 Inveniunt lapidem, regnare tenentur ibidem.' 

 ' If Fates go right, where'er this stone is found, 

 The Scots shall monarchs of that realm be crown'd.' 



Which is the more remarkable by being fulfilled in the 

 person of James I. of England." Calmet, however, 

 states that the Mahometans profess to have this relic 

 in their custody. He says, " The Mahometans think 

 that Jacob's stone was conveyed to the Temple of Jeru- 



salem, and is still preserved in the mosque there, where 

 the Temple formerly stood. They call it Al-sahra, or 

 the stone of unction. The Cadi Gemaleddin, son of 

 Vallel, writes, that passing through Jerusalem, in his 

 way to Egypt, he saw Christian priests carrying glass 

 phials full of wine over the Sakra, near which the 

 Mussulmen had built their temple, which, for this 

 reason, they call the Temple of the Stone. The wine 

 which the Christian priests set upon the stone was no 

 doubt designed for the celebration of mass there."] 



OLD MEREWORTH CASTLE, KENT. 



Among your subscribers there are doubtless 

 many collectors of topographical drawings and en- 

 gravings. I shall feel specially obliged if any of 

 them could find in their collections a view of old 

 Mereworth Castle (as it stood prior to the com- 

 paratively modern erection of Lord Westmore- 

 land), and furnish me with a long desiderated 

 description of it. Local tradition represents it as 

 having been a baronial castle rising from the 

 middle of a small lake, like that of Leeds, though 

 of smaller dimensions, with the parish church at- 

 tached. I should rather conjecture it to have 

 been an ancient moated manor-house, magnified, 

 in the course of tradition, into a baronial castle 

 and lake. 



"Whatever the old building was, it was pulled 

 down by John, seventh Earl of Westmoreland, 

 during the first half of the last century. Had it 

 been of the character of Leeds Castle, as the re- 

 presentative of a long line of baronial ancestry, he 

 would hardly have levelled such a structure, with 

 all its inspiring associations, merely for the purpose 

 of gratifying his passion for Palladian architecture 

 by the erection of the present mansion. 



The ancient building seems to have been the 

 residence of the knightly family of De Mereworth 

 during the twelfth, thirteenth, and part of the 

 fourteenth centuries, and from that time, till near 

 the end of Elizabeth's reign, it ceased to be a 

 family residence ; for, after passing through va- 

 rious hands (none of whom were likely to have 

 resided there), it descended in 1415 to Joan, wife 

 of the Lord Burgavenny, sister and coheir to the 

 Earl of Arundel. The Burgavennys of that day 

 resided always at. their castle of Billing, which 

 circumstance would intimate that it was a grander 

 and more baronial residence than Mereworth 

 Castle (for they had come into possession of both 

 estates very nearly at the same period) ; and 

 afterwards Mereworth by settlement passed to 

 Sir Thomas Fane of Badsell, in marriage with 

 Mary, daughter and sole heiress of Henry Lord 

 Burgavenny, and "jure suo" Baroness Despencer, 

 in 1574. From that time till its dismantling in 

 the last century, Mereworth Castle was again a 

 family residence, the seat of the Earls of West- 

 moreland ; Francis, eldest son of said Sir Thomas 



