220 PROCEEDINGS OF THE CANADIAN INSTITUTE. 



the Rev. Professor Cam))bell, of Montreal, whose learning and 

 researches in this particuUir field of investigation have been conspicu- 

 ously exliibited in his Etruria Capta. It vf\S\ be possible, I believe, 

 to adduce satisfactory evidence to show that Gaelic is the language 

 of the TJmbrian Tables ; and that, accordingly, they present to us 

 altogether the oldest specimen that has hitherto been discovered, of 

 Irish and Scottish Gaelic. As even the learned and laborious Celtic 

 Grammarian Zeuss was not led to turn his attention to the Gaelic 

 characters of those Tables, no material assistance is furnished by his 

 elaborate Grammar in determining the grammatical forms of what 

 has to be regarded now as the oldest Gaelic composition in the world. 

 Mr. Whitley Stokes who has given extensive and scholarly attention 

 to old and early middle Irish Glosses, enables us to perceive, e.^., in 

 his Goidelica — that the Turin Glosses, etc., and the Irish Hymns in 

 the Liber Hymnorum, forming as those do some of the oldest Irish com- 

 positions of which we have had hitherto any knowledge — present fully 

 as large combinations of words and peculiarities of grammatical 

 construction as are to be found in the Umbriau Tables. The same 

 remark may be made regarding the very old s})ecimen of Scottish 

 Gaelic which is contained in the Book of Deir ; and also regarding 

 the first book which was ])rinted in Scottish Gaelic ; viz., the Gaelic 

 translation of John Knox's Liturgy, by Bishop Carswell of Argyll- 

 It was published in 1567. 



In his History of Rome (Vol. I. p. 100), Mommsen states that 

 " our information regarding the migration of Umbrian stocks comes 

 to us like the sound of bells from a town that has been sunk in the 

 sea. " Niebuhr in his History of Rome (Vol. I. p. 143) thus writes ; 

 " It is certain that the Umbrians were a great nation before the time 

 of the Etrurians in the age of the Sicilians, and that they have the 

 right to the name of a most ancient and genuine people of Italy.' 

 The same learned writer remarks in his Ethnography and Geo- 

 graphy (Vol. II. p. 209) " that people have been extremely anxious 

 to discover the Etrurian language, and who should not be so '? I 

 would readily give a considerable part of my property as a prize to 

 any one who should discovei- it. An entirely new light would 

 thereby be thrown upon the character of the nations of Italy." 



The Tabulae Eiigubmae were discovered in 1444 among tlie ruins 

 of a Theati-e in the neighbourhood of Gubbio in Umbria. Gubbio 



