INSCRIPTIONES BRITANNIA LATINS. 149 



in acknoAvledgment of the aid of that deity, who had manifested on 

 this occasion iiis characteristic of giving most timely and effectua] 

 assistance." 



" If my interpretation be correct, this stone possesses unique 

 interest, as the inscription is, so far as I am aware, the only one 

 extant which records an engagement between the Romans and the 

 Britons." See also " Britanno-Roman InscrijDtions," p. 14:2. 



In n. 498 two inscriptions are given : — 



(a) DIFFVSIS 



PROVING 

 BRITANNIA AD 

 VTRVMQVE- O 

 EXEROITVS M 

 ib) OMNIVM- FIL 



HADR 



A- NECESSITAT 



VATIS NORP 



F ING 



Hiibner regards the two fragments — which were found in the same 

 place, Jarrow Church — as parts of the same stone, and remarks : — 

 " Frobabile est commemoratos esse exercitus magnos, diffuses per castrd 

 in provincia Britannia collocata inter utrumque oceani litus, /ortasse 

 propter res gestas, quse omnium Jidem et virtutem probavenuit, ah 

 imperatore Hadriano coUaudatos dira tantum necessitate coactos 

 abstinuisse ah ultimo orbis noti limite suhjiciendo, conservatis tunc 

 reipublicas finibiis vel quae sunt similia." In his preface on the 

 Vallum Hadriani, he says of the same stone : — " Certum est eum 

 operis alicujus ah Hadriano inter utrurnque oceanwm perfecti memoriarn 

 continere, quod opus paene necessario statuendum est fuisse ipsurii 

 vallum." 



In the Canadian Journal, vol. xii., p. 112, 1868, a similar view is 

 taken : not, indeed, as to the two fragments being parts of the same 

 stone — for the lettering as represented in Dr. Bruce's woodcuts, p. 

 309, 3rd Ed., is so different as to preclude that opinion — but as to the 

 great importance of the first as " marking the completion of some 

 important enterprise," and that enterprise is subsequently stated as 

 " the completion of the occupation of the isthmus between Sol way 

 Firth and the mouth of the Tyne by a chain of military posts." In 

 the note the conjecture is offered that "there may have been [on the 

 upper portion of the stone], for anything that Ave know to the 



