THE GIANT Atfb THE MAYPOLE OF CEkNE. 1 07 



failed, or were not permitted, to demolish it. Probably they 

 pointed to it as a symbol of the Paganism that Christ came to 

 subvert, and were content to put their mark upon it, as they 

 would carve a cross on a cromlech, to arrest its power for evil by 

 means of a holy signature, which Hutchins saw in August, 1772, 

 and carefully copied. (See figure C.) 



The figures can hardly form part of a date. They are not 

 Roman numerals, and Arabic letters were not introduced until 

 the XV. century. The formula, I.H.S., was also of late intro- 

 duction, and would be altogether inappropriate. 



The Giant has usually been repaired every seven years, and 

 was last set in order in 1887 by Jonathan Hardy, now 69 years of 

 age, under the direction of General Pitt- Rivers. It is difficult to 

 believe that the original form of a signature has been exactly 

 preserved by those who were totally unacquainted with its mean- 

 ing. Speculation, therefore, though easy, is unsafe. But of the 

 letters that were drawn by Hutchins, the first is J. ; the second 

 precisely resembles the sign for Saturn in use prior to the XIV. 

 century (24) or it may be H. ; and the third may be D. So that 

 the signature would read : Jehovah [or Jesus], Saturnum [or 

 Hoc] Destruxit, God has overthrown this idol [or Saturn]. 

 Saturn was the god of agriculture and growth, the devourer of 

 his own children (25), the fabled author of circumcision (26), 

 who bore an implement in his right hand, whose festival was 

 celebrated with riotous merriment, and to whom human sacri- 

 fices were offered. Combined with such a conceit may have 

 been a monkish play on the word Satan. 



Passing from conjecture, it is certain that the Cerne Giant 

 presents five characteristics : 



i . It is petrographic. It is cut into the chalk on the side of a 

 steep hill. It is, therefore, a rock carving, 



(24) Adriano Capelli, Dizionario di Abbreviature Latinc, 1899, p. 368. 



(25) One of the local legends is that the Giaiit devoured virgius. 



(26) Eusebius, Prtep., I., 10. 



