1862.] 11^ [Moilot. 



same type, consequently of the same date, as the two beads men- 

 tioned in the same museum. These balls, according to Minutoli's 

 excellent paper on the stained glass of the Ancients (Berlin, 1836), 

 are not of Roman origin, and are found in old Etruscan graves ; also 

 in Egypt, where they may have been manufactured at Alexandria, 

 before the Christian era, perhaps as far back as the golden times of 

 the Phoenicians, who were celebrated for their glassware, as well as 

 for their commerce, and for their extensive navigation. That they 

 sailed on the Atlantic is known, and it is probable that this was the 

 route by which their glass reached the Baltic countries, since it ap- 

 pears to be missing in a general manner in Southern Germany and 

 in Switzerland. We know besides, that the Phoenicians carried on 

 a regular trade with Gades (Cadiz), where they met with the traders 

 from the North. 



It follows, that those glass beads and baldrics from the ossuaries 

 at Beverly are anterior to the Christian era, and that America ap- 

 pears to have been visited already at that remote period by Europeans, 

 most likely by those skilful navigators, the Phoenicians. 



The discovery of America by the Phoenicians has been strongly 

 suspected by many, and it would account in a very natural manner 

 for the tradition of the Atlantis. The fact in itself is far from ap- 

 pearing improbable, when we reflect that long before the Christian 

 era, the Alexandrian astronomers knew the earth to be round, and 

 that one of them, Eratosthenes (third century before Christ), calculated 

 the circumference of the earth with a surprising degree of accuracy. 

 The celebrated French antiquarian, Letronne, examining this question 

 with his usual penetration, even comes to the conclusion, that Era- 

 tosthenes only applied to his own imperfect data the measurement of 

 a degree of the meridian, carried out long before his time.* There 

 are also other circumstances, indicating a remarkable degree of civi- 

 lization and of scientific pursuit in those remote times of the Phoeni- 

 cian prosperity. 



The find at Beverly goes to show, that a given moment of the 

 American copper age coincided with a given moment of that Euro- 

 pean civilization, to which the enamelled beads mentioned belong, 

 and which can hardly reach lower down than the Christian era, while 

 it appears to go as far back as five, or even ten centuries earlier. Of 

 course it is not to be understood, that the American copper age was 



* Pytheas und die Geographie seiner Zeit, von T. Lelewel. Hoffman, Leipzig, 

 1838. A capital little book, containing also Letronne's paper. 



