9 
that many of the ancient names of countries, seas, and places 
are also significant; and that the same thing is true of the 
names of the Etruscans and Pelasgi, as well as of the words of 
both these people which have come down to us in the Greek 
and Roman writers. From this he infers that the Pelasgi, the 
Etruscans, and the Celts were all colonies of the Phoenician 
people, and all spoke the language now called Gaelic or 
Hiberno-Celtic, He instanced the remarkable fact men- 
tioned by Suetonius in his Life of Augustus Cesar, (c. 97,) 
where, giving an account of the death of Augustus, and the 
omens which preceded it, he says: 
‘Sub idem tempus ictu fulminis ex inscriptione statue 
ejus prima nominis litera effluxit. Responsum est centum solos 
dies posthac victurum, quem numerum C litera notaret; fu- 
turumque ut inter deos referretur, quod ASSAR, id est 
reliqua pars e Cesaris nomine, Etrusca lingua Deus yoca- 
retur.” 
oyay is one of the Irish names for God, and not only is 
the word itself to be found in the Irish dictionaries and 
MSS. but it is compounded of two Irish words meaning the 
eternal ruler, or ruler of ages: aor, ages—ay, ruler. 
The author gave many examples of the significance of the 
names of the Greek and Roman divinities, and also of the 
ancient names of countries, in the Hiberno-Celtic language ; 
among them the following: 
Aurora—the golden hour, or sunrise. 
Bacchus—the lame drunkard. 
Diana—the goddess. 
Gorgones—the frightful women. 
Haruspex—judging from a pang or throe. 
Tris—the sun and the shower. 
Nepiune—the king of the waves. 
The names of the Nereides denote the flitting aerial 
nymphs; the nymph of the sea weed; the silent nymph ; 
the spark of the wave; the nymph of the deep water, the 
