48 ANCIEKT INSCRIBED STOTSTES. 



accompanying engraving has been taken ; and in respect to the age of 

 the inscription, as inferred from the palseographic character of the 

 letters, the Professor observes: — "The impression on my mind is, 

 " that it is clearly of a date and character of letter such as ought not 

 " to militate against an early Post- Roman origin being assigned to it. 

 *' The letters seem to me to be more Eoman than is ordinarily the 

 " case on the Cornish stones, which are generally more Anglo-Saxon 

 " in the forms of their letters." Professor Westwood's representa- 

 tion of the inscription, engraved by Mr. Blight, with his accustomed 

 skill and fidelity, and here given, agrees closely with the drawings 

 we had ourselves taken, both from the stone and from our rubbings. 

 The Rev. H. Longueville Jones has favoured me with the following' 

 remarks on the subject of thes^ inscriptions generally, and this one 

 in particular: — "The study of eai-ly British inscriptions has hardly, 

 " even yet, made sufficient progress to enable us to arrive at any 

 "clear notions as to the precise dates of primitive inscriptions like 

 " this. Epigraphical writing was very imperfect, irregular, and 

 *' capricious, even in the best days of Rome ; and if we compare the 

 "rude tracings on the walls of Pompeii with the graven letters on 

 " the great monuments of Rome, we become immediately aware of 

 "the wide limits within which the treatment of such inscriptions 

 "must be allowed to range. — Hence it is dangerous to adventure 

 " upon any specific dates in examining stones of this kind ; and 

 " whatever is said should be accepted with some reserve. The in- 

 " verted A in the first line, if it be a simple ^, and not rather a con- 

 " tracted form of A and I, — occurring on the same stone with an 

 " upright A in the third line, would seem to indicate carelessness or 

 " rudeness on the part of the cutter. The peculiar form of N adopted 

 "in the first line, is by no means common during really Roman 

 "times; and contrasted with the last letter but two in the fourth 

 "line, which I am inclined to consider a true H, constitutes another 

 " anomaly. — The fifth character in the second line appears to me to 

 " be a contraction of L I ; and the same appears in the same place in 

 " the fourth line. The third letter of the third line I read as G. 

 " The two last characters of the third line I take to be the common 

 " contracted forms of Fl and LI, so frequently found on Welsh stones. 

 " The form of R in this inscription is rather more regular than on 

 " some Cornish stones, where the lower part of the curving part of 

 "the letter is often run out as a straight line horizontally, — such as 

 " at St. Cubert's, St. Clement's, &c. j whereas here it curves down- 



