308 UNIVERSAL ERUDITION. 



ed with their booty : that travellers in their lita>- 

 nies begged of God to preferve them from meet- 

 ing with any of thefe nobility, and there are 

 Hill ancient litanies remaining in which their 

 particular names are mentioned ; and this prac- 

 tice continued till the fifteenth century -, that the 

 magiftrates of the cities were then confidered as 

 the firft rank of the people j and laftly, that no 

 private gentleman mud expect to find his name,, 

 his origin and family in modern genealogies, 

 and ftill lefs in the hiilory of pail ages, when 

 writing was fo rare, and before printing had fa- 

 cilitated the prefervation of fuch inconfiderable 

 objects. 



VII. The laws, the conftitutions, and received 

 euftoms require however, that to be admitted 

 into certain illuftrious chapters, or military and 

 other orders, the candidate mould be able to 

 prove his quarters ; by quarter in heraldry is 

 meant a fheild or fcutcheon , fixteen of thefe 

 are neceflfary to prove nobility by four defcents, 

 in thofe focieties where iuch fort of nobles only 

 are admitted y this term is derived from an an- 

 cient ctaftom of placing on the four corners of 

 a tomb, the fcutcheon of the father, mother, 

 grandfather and grandmother of the deceafed. 

 There are in Flanders and Germany, tombs that 

 have eight, fixteen, and thirty two quarters. 

 The authenticity of the thirty two quarters is, 

 however, always very difficult to be proved, and 

 frequently liable to much fufpicion -, the proof 



of 



