lOO NOTES ON LATIN INSCRIPTIONS 



VITIRBVS. The explanation of these forms, which at once presents 

 itself, is that the varieties are due to the misspelling or misreading of 

 Veteri and Veteribus. f^Vitirine and f*F'iterine seem to me, also, to 

 be forms of Veteraneo, from Veteraneus, an adjective of the same 

 meaning with Vetus. Thus we have on altars found in Germany, 

 MATRONIS VETERANEHIS, which may be explained as Veter- 

 aneis, i. e. Veteribus, without reference to Castra Vetera, as Lersch 

 suggests. The form Beo Mogonti Yitires is peculiar. I am inclined 

 to regard it as standing/or Beo Mogonti * Veteri saneto, and infer from 

 it a confirmation that the word, which has been taken for the name of 

 a god, is really the ordinary adjective, signifying " ancient." These 

 altars have characteristics that are worthy of notice. The f majority 

 of them were erected by persons having but one name, not improbably 

 Britons ; on some of them the name of the dedicator is omitted ; 

 there is, I believe, but |one instance in which a military corps is spe- 

 cified ; and there is not one, so far as I know, in which the date is 

 given, nor am I aware of any example of Bees Veteri. They all, 

 however, seem to indicate a preference of the old objects of worship to 

 the new, it may have been, of the native to the imported gods, or of 

 paganism to Christianity. To the argument, derived from the fact 

 that such inscriptions are limited to the north of England, I am not 



f The first of these forms appears on an altar, noticed by Camden ; the second 

 on one figured in The Illustrated Catalogue, &c., n. 96. Dr. Bruce's remarks on 

 it are : 



" The letters are tolerably distinct, but the reading is doubtful, it may [he—Beo Veteri 

 Nepos Calames (?) votum solvit libens : ' Willingly dedicated to the ancient god, in discharge 

 of a vow.' In every age there have been setters forth and denouncers of " Strange Gods " — 

 advocates and opponents of the " new" and the " old learning." Hodgson reads it—" To the 

 veterinary god." 



It must also be borne in mind, in judging of this, that there seems to have been 

 a local god, named Vitris or Veteres " 



There can, I think, be no doubt that the expansion Nepos ia incorrect, and that 

 we should read Deo Veterineo. With regard to the remainder of the inscrip- 

 tion, I venture to suggest that the letters read CALAM may be CHI-HAM, i.e. 

 Cohors prima Hamiorum, and that E'S may stand for ex suscepto, scil. voto. 



* Mr. Ward's explanation Vitoe restitutori, which was approved by Horsley, is 

 certainly erroneous. 



f This affords a strong, but not decisive argument in favour of the deity being 

 native. 



X This favours the belief that the deity was not one specially worshipped by the 

 auxiliary troops. 



