486 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[No. 112. 



hands, during the third and fourth centuries, ex- 

 hibited a much higher refinement than amongst 

 the degenerate Romans, — the divinity and life of 

 Jesus being represented in their paintings by a 

 youth of godlilce mien and heavenly grace, wilh 

 his font upon the mane of a Hon, wiiilst his death 

 it still typified by a lamb expiring at the foot of a 

 cross, which it sprinkles with its blood, and his 

 resurrection by a jihoenix, which rests upon the 

 sunmiit of a palm-tree, the emblem of his victory. 



I have stated that even the ci'oss, as an emblem, 

 was admitted "reluctantly" into the churches of 

 the early Christians. The fact, and the causes of 

 this reluctance, are stated fairly by Gibbon (cli.xx.), 

 principally on the authorities consulted by Bas- 

 nage in his Histoire des EgUses Refonnees, to have 

 had their origin in the idea of infamy and ignominy 

 which they attached to the mode of execution by 

 crucifixion, — feelings analogous to those inspired 

 by a gallows or a gibbet; and it required a long 

 lapse of time, even afier Constantine had abolished 

 throughout the Roman dominions the punishment 

 which had prevailed for slaves and malefactors, 

 but which the Saviour of mankind had submitted 

 to suffer, before the people could be led to regard 

 as a symbol for veneration that which had so 

 long been an oliject of horror and disgust. A 

 most interesting account of the subsidence of this 

 feeling, and of its effects upon Sacred Art whilst 

 it prevailed, will be found in Emeric David's 

 Discourfs sur la Peintare Moderne, p. 115. It 

 rendered allegory so indispensable, that in the 

 exhaustion of fancy it declined into conceits and 

 puerility, which finally brought the subject into 

 contempt, and compelled the hierarchy to exert the 

 influence of the Church for its correction. This 

 led to a measure the record of which is strongly 

 corroborative of the statement of Mr. Curzon ; 

 namely, that a.d. 692, at the Quine Sextine, or 

 Council in TruUo, it was ordered that thenceforth 

 fiction and allegory should cease, and the real 

 figure of the Saviour he depicted on the tree. {Can. 

 82. Act. Concil. Paris, 1714, v. iii. col. 1691, 1692.) 



Tbe Greeks complied, but with reluctance, to 

 delineate the actual crucifi.xion ; and as, in the 

 controversy which arose in the second centui-y, 

 and never entirely subsided, regarding the beauty 

 or deformity of the Saviour's features, the Greek 

 Church had espoused the side of St. Basil, Tertul- 

 lian, and Origen, who maintained that " he was 

 without form or comeliness," their artists exhibited 

 such a spectacle of deformity on the cross, that to 

 the present hour a proverb compares a lean and 

 ugly person to " un crucifix des Grecs." The 

 Latins and Italians, on the other hand, whilst they 

 were equally hostile to the literal exhibition of the 

 Redeemer's death, und forbore for n'-arli/ a century 

 to comply with the orders of the Council in TruUo, 

 adopted, as to his beauty, the party of Celsus and 

 Chrysostom, — quoted the expression of David, 



" thou art fairer than the children of men," — and 

 painted the Saviour, albeit suspended on the fatal 

 tree, as a youth of heavenly mien ; and instead of 

 the crown of thorns, the lance, and the sponge, 

 they represented him with a diadem, and insensible 

 to suffering or pain. 



These remarks, though they will no doubt be 

 insufficient as an answer to your con-espondent, 

 may perhaps <lirect him to authorities, the con- 

 sultation of which will satisfy his inquiry. 



London. J. Emerson Tennent. 



THE WORD " Pi5(\(pos." 



(Vol. iv., pp. 339. 458.) 



In commenting on the criticisms of J. B., may 

 I be allowed to follow the order of his own rea- 

 soning as much as possible? 



1st. I am glad to find that Scapula is right, but 

 I must object to the iise of the ]iarticiple acqui- 

 escing, as a|)plied to me. My word is " c/eduction," 

 and is applied to a rule grounded upon Scapula's 

 correctness, and may, I think, settle the sense of 

 those disputed verses in ISIatt. xiii. 55, 56., to 

 say nothing of two indisputable proofs which might 

 be adduced. 



2nd. I am wrong — for what ? for appearing, in 

 the eyes of J. B., to have done that which I have 

 not done,— for bringing in links of" the Indo-Ger- 

 manic languages," which I have neither done, nor 

 can do. 



3rd. " The word is solely and peculiarly 

 Greek." Let me give only one etymon by way of 

 preparation for my answer. Let us take the word 

 mouse. Well, it comes from the Latin vius, which 

 comes, you will say, from the Greek ^us, and there 

 are many clever etymologists, excepting a few, with 

 J. B. and myself, would say, " it is solely and pe- 

 culiarly Greek ;" but we go up to the Sanscrit 

 (the mother of European languages), and bring 

 forward mush, a mouse, and here is the terminus — 

 and why ? because mush signifies to steal, and 

 therefore sufficiently describes the nature of the 

 little animal. Now, because we cannot find an 

 existing link between the Greek and Sanscrit, is 

 that a reason for asserting aoeK(pos to be of ])ure 

 Greek origin ? No ; and if J. B. will only recollect 

 that all words in Sanscrit, excepting bare primary 

 roots, are compounded after the same manner as 

 a^fAcpos, or rather oe\-(p, he will, I hope, find that I 

 have 7iot been wrong in my etymon. Aloreover, let 

 J. B. prove, if he can, what is the meaning of Se\(p 

 in the Greek, unaided by any other language. 



4th. Why is the Sanscrit bhratre brought into 

 the contest ? perhaps to prove what has not been 

 proved, viz. that it also signifies /rater uterinus. 



5th. "How happened it that the word (ppar-qp 

 was lost in Greek ? " Whj^, because the Greeks 

 thought it too barbarous a word to own, as coming 

 through the Latins from the barbarous Goths, 



