138 GOLD GORGETS OR LUNETTES. 



tliem, we are left only to conjecture; and as conjectures are 

 various, we find various names assigned to them. They have 

 been called gorgets, diadems, collars, tores, according as they have 

 been thought designed for wear round the throat, on the head, or 

 round the neck. The mode of attachment, or connexion, of the 

 two ends (for they generally have bulbous extremities or hooks) 

 is also open to question. Like the pen-annular armlets and brace- 

 lets of our Keltic predecessors, they must have been kept in their 

 place either by mere pressure, or by hooks, or by external means 

 of connexion which have been made of perishable or fragile 

 materials. In the absence of correct information, the name lunette 

 has been adopted, as pledging us to no theory on this point. 



So also we are left to conjecture whether these frail lunettes 

 of Cornwall and Ireland were designed for male or female use. 

 We know, however, that among nations as well Asiatic as Euro- 

 pean, such articles were and are in use in common by both sexes, 

 whether designed for mere decoration, or as insignia of state, or of 

 official distinction, or of eminent merit. Joseph was invested with 

 his gold chain by Pharaoh, and Daniel by Belshazzar, the Chaldsean 

 King, in token of vice-regal authority (Dan. ch. 5, v. 29) ; and it 

 is remarkable that the word called " chain " in our version is, in 

 the latter instance, called by the Chaldsean name "manek," or 

 " meneka," in the Hebrew Bible, — the very name assigned to the 

 Gallic torques by one of the best of Eoman historians, Polybius.* 

 The Panchsean Arabians, both male and female, priests and war- 

 riors, wore torques, armlets, and ear-rings, according to Diodorus 

 of Sicily (Lib. V, cc. 45, 46) ; and (if the indifferent authority 

 of Dion Cassius, or rather of his abridger, Xiphilinus, the monk, 

 is to be trusted) Boadicea wore a golden chain or tore (o-t^etttov) 

 when she addressed her very apocryphal allocution to her army ; 



* The word iu the Greek is fxaviccKYig, (Polyb., Lib. II, ce. 29 and 30), to 

 which Bochart and G-esenius confidently refer as the synonym and derivative 

 of the Chaldfean word. I cannot, however, agree in opinion with Mr. Bath- 

 urst Deane, who fancies that this /xot-viaKYig exactly characterizes the Breton 

 lunettes or circles, as distinguished from torques. Polybius plainly refers 

 to the Gallic torque or military collar, which has little in common with the 

 Irish lunettes or gorgets, though possibly the use and object may have been 

 the same. 



Those who desire to know all that is to be found in written records 

 about torques, must resort to Scheffer's treatise in the Thesaurus of Groevius, 

 Vol. 12, and to Mr. Birch's paper, already quoted. 



