12 On an ancient Monument, 



We have here (Edipus expounding the enigma of the 

 Sphinx *, who is seated on a rock ; whence she would seem 

 to have thrown, as if in defiance, under the hero's eye, the 

 bones of some one who had unhappily preceded him. Again, 

 we find at No. 106 of Tassies Geyns, a fine engraving upon 

 carnelian f, which Mr. Raspe has classed amongst the Egyp- 

 tian antiques, having a Sphinx winged and sitting, with a 

 death's head at her feet. No. 8,601 of the same collection, is 

 taken from an ancient engraving upon onyx I, which represents 

 " (Edipus explaining the enigma of the Sphinx, who is sitting 

 upon the top of a rock," Here also may, as I think, be dis- 

 cerned a human scull at the bottom of the rock \. 



But what shall we say upon that very extraordinary reverse 

 of the preceding coin, No. 2 of Cunobelin ; representing, as 

 Mr. Ruding questions doubtfully, " a British warrior, with the 

 head of an enemy in his right hand ?" and upon the obverse 

 is a Sphinx ! 



I have elsewhere observed, that the head of the man upon the 

 Colchester stone has many portrait-like peculiarities ; that the 

 hair is moreover short, appearing as if artificially curled ; that 

 although it would represent a middle-aged man, yet that it is 

 beardless : all which circumstances combined in suggesting my 

 first idea, that it had not been modelled after the head of any 

 individual of an ordinary class. The closely-shaven beard, as 

 well as the carefully-curled hair, were fashions, not only with 

 the Romans of high rank, but, I remark, that upon all the 

 coins of Cunobelin, as well as upon those of an earlier British 

 stamp, in every instance, excepting where a divinity seems to 

 have been personified, the heads are dressed with short hair ; 

 where the state of the art could attain the expression, it appears 



• According to the vulgar tale of the Sphinx's riddle, as proposed to 

 her by CEdipns, whose solution of it, is said to have been the cause of 

 her destruction ; it was : What animal is it, that in the morning walks 

 on four legs, at noon on two, and at night on three ? To which the Hero 

 answered — " Man." 



t Cab. Flor. Gori .Vits. Flor. II. No. 94, 2. 



t StoschMSS. Cat. 41,7. 



^ The sulphur impression that I have of No. S,G01 is not very distinct. 



