384 Sir Edward Maunde Thompson [March 19, 



They were found in 1875 in the house of a pawnbroker or banker 

 named Lucius Csecilius Jucundus. Enclosed in a box placed in a 

 recess above the portico, they fortunately escaped absolute destruction, 

 although much blackened and damaged by the heat. They comprise 

 two classes of documents, viz. deeds connected with auctions, and 

 receipts for payments of taxes. They range in date mostly from 

 A.D. 53 to A.D. 62, and they are generally trij^tychs, that is, tablets 

 formed of three boards or leaves of wood. Of the same period are 

 a few fragments of Latin-written papyri found among the Greek 

 collection recovered at Herculaneum. They are, however, very scanty. 



The next important material consists of twenty-four waxen 

 tablets, which were recovered in the ancient mining works of 

 Verespatak, in Dacia, the ancient Alburnus Major, and concern 

 the private affairs of the miners. Twelve of them bear dates between 

 the years 131 and 167 of our era. These tablets were probably left 

 in the mines when the Eoman colony was suddenly attacked by the 

 barbarians; and it has been suggested that the destruction of the 

 place was effected in the war with the Marcomanni, a.d. 166-180. 

 They are published in the ' Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum.' 



Contemporary with these collections we may also count a few 

 documents and stray tiles and such fragments found at various 

 sites, which are scratched with alphabets or verses or haphazard 

 memoranda. 



The greater part of the materials which have just been enumerated 

 consist of documents or fragments written in cursive handwriting, 

 and afford us means of tiacing pretty clearly the C(jurse which that 

 form of Eoman writing took in the early centuries, leading on to the 

 current handwriting which we find in the papyri of Italy of the early 

 middle ages, and forming eventually the type upon which the national 

 handwritings of Italy, France, and Spain were developed. 



Two tables of alphabets in the ' Corpus Inscriptionum ' show 

 the forms of letters used in the wall inscriptions and those used in 

 the waxen tablets of Dacia. In the first division of the first plate, we 

 have the oldest forms of letters painted with a brush : in the first 

 row, square capitals, formed precisely ; in the second and third rows, 

 the more careless and quickly written alphabet, which, from its 

 negligent style, has been called Mustic. In the third and fourth 

 divisions are the cursive alj^habets of the graffiti. Eunning the eye 

 vertically down the several columns of the letters, we can follow 

 their changes and see the history of the development of certain forms 

 very plainly. In writing quickly, all parts of the letters which may 

 be dispensed with without obscuring their forms naturally fall away ; 

 the cross stroke of A is soon found to be a trouble, it drops into a 

 tag, and in many cases altogether disappears. The letter B, even in 

 the early stage in the second division, begins to lose the upper 

 bow. In the third division, the main stroke, instead of being drawn 

 in its proper vertical line, runs off to the line of the bow, and 

 then a bow is added on the left, giving the letter the appearance of a 



