BOOK V 1 1 . J History of Nature. 257 



CHAPTER LVIII. 

 Of the ancient Letters. 1 



THAT the old Greek Letters were almost the same as the 

 present Latin appeareth by an antique Table of Brass, which 

 came from the Temple at Delphos, and which at this Day is 

 in the Library of the Palatium, dedicated to Minerva by the 

 Emperors, with an Inscription like this on it: Navoixodrr^ 

 Tiffa/Aivov "A^va/o?, jco^a xa/ ' A6qva &veOt))tsv : i.e. Nausicrates (the 

 Son) of Tisamenus an Athenian, caused this Table to be made 

 and set up to Minerva. 



formed villages and flocks ; and their sons, Misor and Sydyc (Wellfreed 

 and Just), discovered the use of salt. 



" Cronus first made a scimitar and spear : Dagon invented the use of 

 bread and the plough. Inachus, whom Archbishop Usher makes contem- 

 porary with the Scriptural Nahor, was the inventor of honorary gold and 

 silver chains. The purple dye from shell-fish was discovered by the Phoe- 

 nician Hercules, the great navigator Melcartus, who first passed through 

 the Straits of Gibraltar, and visited Cornwall. It is true, there seems some 

 doubt whether there be not two individuals referred to under this name, 

 one of whom lived in the days of Canaan ; but if so, at least they were 

 natives of the same country, and were both honoured by their country- 

 men as inventors of the arts by which the nation acquired riches and 

 eminency. Cronus first taught the use of the bow as a weapon; which 

 took place in Crete, an island afterwards famous for this kind of skill. 

 ' Eupolemus says of Enoch, that he was the true Atlas, the inventor of 

 astronomy.' Finally, the infamy of having first practised persecution for 

 religion is ascribed to Cronus, who is supposed to be Ham, the son of 

 Noah, with the concurrence of the Egyptian Thoth ; but the Jews are 

 inclined to derive its origin from the city of Ur, in Chaldam, where Terah 

 was put to death in the fire (Ur) : but in either case the act was devised 

 in support of false religion, or idolatry." Wern. Club. 



1 In the beginning of the 56th chapter, Pliny has expressed his belief 

 that the Assyrian letters are the most ancient in the world : but whether 

 these were the same as in recent times have been discovered among the 

 antique monuments of Nineveh and Babylon ; the Chaldean characters 

 afterwards introduced among the Jews by Ezra ; or the ancient Phoeni- 

 cian, now termed the Samaritan; in either case it is only by passing 

 through great mutations that they can be traced to the Greek and Latin 

 forms of the days of Pliny. Sanchoniatho says that Taautus, called by 

 VOL. II. S 



