618 Discovery of Eorse-heads. By Dr. E. C. Kobertson. 



am .... Mitlira gives those who do not belie him 

 swift horses." 



The famous Carthaginian coin, representing the horse's head, 

 must not be forgotten, nor the lines of Virgil, preserving the tra- 

 dition of its finding, and of what it was a type. 



" Effodere loco signum, quod regia Juno 

 Monstrarat, caput acris equi ; sic nam fore bello 

 Egregium, et facilem victu per esecula gentem. 



^n. i., 443. 



On the chalk hills of Berkshire maybe seen the " Great White 

 Horse," striding along at full gallop, as he has appeared for 

 many centuries. The figure of a horse has been cut out of the 

 turf, four feet in depth, exposing the white chalk beneath.^' It 

 covers some acres, I believe, in extent, and being on the side of a 

 high hill, is a prominent object in the landscape. Periodically 

 the " scouring " of the sculpture in the turf takes place, where- 

 by the form of the horse has been preserved fresh and intact to 

 this day. The " scouring," with its attendant festivities and ath- 

 letic games, has been graphically described by Hughes. The 

 white horse was there in the 12th century and long before. In 

 a cartulary of Abingdon of that period, land is described as 

 " prope montem, ubi ad album equum scanditur." The figure 

 has a bird-like head, with open jaws, much resembling the bird- 

 head of the horse, on the coin figured 1. Nothing is known of 

 its origin, but it may be supposed to owe its existence, in some 

 manner or degree to the ancient " cultus " of the horse, by our 

 forefathers.! 



The horse represented on the coin No. 1, has the ears of a 

 horse, but the head and bill of a bird, like a stork or crane. It 

 holds within its extended jaws a ball. Cox in his " Aryan My- 

 thology " mentions that in mythological tales we constantly meet 

 with a ball, often a golden ball (as the golden apples in the gar- 

 dens of the Hesperides), which is lost or killed when the sun 



* It is very singular to find in the valley of the Mississipi, a similar re- 

 presentation of animals, esteemed sacred by the early inhabitants, but 

 made in relief, instead of as the Britons did, in intaglio. Amongst the 

 animals so represented is the elephant — did the mound-builders bring 

 their knowledge of the animal from India ? 



t The snow-white steed still appears on the ensign of Kent as it an* 

 ciently did on the shield of the old Saxons in Germany. Hence the white 

 horse is still borne on the royal shield of Brunswick-Hanover (Palgrave). 



