473 



the perfect similarity of the interlaced tracery which decorates 

 the base of this cross, — of one side of which I annex a sketch, 

 — to that on the archiepiscopal crozier of Tuam, which, ac- 

 cording to the Annals of Innisfallen, was made in the year 

 1123, but also to the traceries on the base of the cross at 

 Cashel made in 1134, and still more with those on the tomb 

 of Cormac, sculptured, as we may assume, in 1138." 



Of the justness of the above opinions, Dr. Petrie stated 

 that he was now more than ever satisfied, as he had no doubt 

 that the error into which Ware and Harris had fallen, as to 

 the supposed date of the re-erection of the church, was caused 

 by their assuming that the stone on which this inscription is 

 carved belonged to a monument or tomb raised to the memory 

 of O'Hoisin in his own cathedral, and that the inscription on 

 it was an Irish epitaph ; whereas it is now absolutely certain, 

 since the several portions of the cross have been put together, 

 in the Great Industrial Exhibition, that this stone was really 

 but one of those portions : and that the cross, as well as the 

 church of which it was the memorial, was erected by O'Hoisin, 

 previously to his accession to the Archbishopric, is fully estab- 

 lished by the other inscriptions carved upon the base of the 

 cross, as above noticed. 



The second inscription, unlike the first, runs in a series of 

 twenty-four short horizontal lines, each line consisting of from 

 two to four letters. This inscription is not inferior in impor- 

 tance, and is perhaps of even greater interest, than the former ; 

 for it — as well as the other inscriptions on the base of the cross 

 — preserves the name of the king by whose munificence the 

 cross and church were, as we may believe, mainly erected, — 

 and in addition, what is nowhere else preserved, that of the 

 Irish artist, to whose taste and skill those structures were in- 

 debted for their elaborate sculptured decorations. This latter 

 fact has been only ascertained from an examination of the in- 

 scription since the stone was brought to Dublin, and its dis- 

 covery is the result of the carefid cleaning which the tablet 



