476 PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. [aNNO 1700. 



observed to become hereditary, and run in whole families; whence the Greeks 

 had their Macrobii, and the Romans their Celsi ; and in Palestine of old they 

 had their Anakims, or sons of the giants. So that human gigantic bodies are 

 nowise inconsistent with the course of nature. And indeed we have testimonies 

 from authors of unquestionable credit, that there have been men in the world, 

 and it is likely there still are, of such stature, as properly to deserve the nameof 

 giants. 



The first I shall mention was one I saw and measured at Dublin, in the year 

 l682, his name Edmond Malone, who measured 7 feet 7 inches. Walter 

 Parsons, porter to King James the First, born in Staffordshire, was nearly of 

 the same stature ; and I find several other men born in England who have ar- 

 rived to this height. 



Isbrand Dicmerbroeck, in his Anatomy, tells us, that he saw at Utrecht, in 

 1665, a man 84- feet high, all his limbs well shaped, and his strength propor- 

 tionable to his height ; he was born at Schoonhoven in Holland, of parents of 

 an ordinary stature. Mr. Ray in his Travels, mentions having seen this man 

 at Bruges in Flanders. Johannes Goropius Becanus, who lived in Flanders, has 

 recorded several instances still more remarkable ; he says he saw a youth almost 

 9 feet high, a man near 10 feet, and a woman quite 10 feet in height. Pliny 

 the naturalist particularises by name several men in his own age much of the 

 same height as those mentioned by Becanus. 



To these histories we may add the many concurring testimonies given us by 

 various travellers of gigantic men seen in their voyages in the more remote parts 

 of the world. Andreas Thevet, in his Description of America, tells us, that he was 

 shown by a Spanish merchant the skull and bones of an American giant, who 

 was II feet 5 inches in height, and died in the year \55Q: he showed them to 

 M. Thevet, who took the measures of the principal of them ; the bones of the 

 legs measured 3 feet 4 inches in length, and the skull was 3 feet 1 inch about. 

 Which circumference is exactly proportionable to the length of the legs, and if 

 we make an allowance for the hair and skin that covered the skull when he was 

 alive, it falls very little short of the dimensions we have before set down, in 

 computing the size of our giant's head when it was entire. 



From these warrantable histories, and this particular bone before us, we may 

 clearly deduce that there have been human bodies II or 12 feet high ; equal to 

 the stature of the tallest giants mentioned in holy writ. For the height of 

 Goliah of Gath, is expressly said to be but 6 cubits and a span ; and taking a 

 cubit in the most usual acceptance for a foot and a half, his stature will not 

 amount to above g feet 9 inches. Indeed we may reasonably conclude, that Og 

 the King of Basan must have considerably exceeded Goliah in height, if we 



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