GIANT. 



Clafz. a commifTary on board LeMaire's fleet, declares that 

 he found, in tlie fepukhres on the coaft of Patagonia, tlie 

 bones of men who were between ten and eleven feet lilgh. 

 Nodal and fir Richard Hawkins merely relate, th.U tliefe fa- 

 vages were a liead taller than the inhabitants of Europe, and 

 of f'.ich a ftature, tliat the people on board their vefiels called 

 them giants. 



Thofe who bear tefthnony to the contrary, are Winter, 

 the Dutch admiral Hcrmite, Froger in De Geinics's Nar- 

 rative, and Cr John Nf.rborough. Sir Francis Drake 

 alfo is illent with refpett to the llature of the inhabitants 

 of Patagonia ; but Winter pcfitively affirms, that tlie 

 accounts of their being giants are falfehoods invented by the 

 Spaniards. Narborough meafurjd the Ikulls and the print 

 of the feet of the favagcs on the coait of the llrait 6f 

 Magellan, which, he fays, were of the common fize : and he 

 had often feen companies of them at Poi't St. Julian, who 

 were neither taller nor bigger than other men. However, 

 it may beobferved in general, that the greater part of thofe 

 v.hu hold the affirmative in this quellion, fpcak of people 

 that inhabited the defert coafts of Patagonia to the eaft and 

 we'*: ; and that, on the contrary, thofe who hold the nega- 

 tive, fpeak of thofe wlio inhabit the ftrait upon the fides 

 of the utmoil point of America to the north and fouth. 

 Frezier relates, not from his o-.vn knowledge, but from the 

 tjilimoiiyof eyc-witnefTes, that there was, at a confiderable 

 diilance within the country from tliecoafl of Chili, an In- 

 dian nation, called by their neighbours Caucohues, who 

 fome imes came down to the Spaniili fettlemep.t.<!, that were 

 more tlian nine feet hig'i, and v.ere the fame race with the 

 P.itagonians v.'ho live on the eaftern coaft. It appears from 

 various relations, that the inliabitants of th.e two borders of 

 the llrait are of the common ftature, and that the race, 

 dillinguiflied by the name of Patagonians, make their con- 

 ftant refidence upon the defert coafts, fcarcely acceffible to 

 any but themfelves ; and when European ftiips frequented 

 the ftrait, they removed and fettled in the interior part of 

 the country : howev.er, the current teftimony of late navi- 

 gators, particularly commodore Byron, captain Wallis, and 

 captain Carteret, will put an end to the doubts that have 

 been hitherto entertained ot the exiftence of fuch perfons. 

 Commodore Byron, who vifited the coaft of Patagonia, in 

 1764, fpeaks of the inhabitants as of a gigantic ftature ; but 

 he did not meafure any of them, and only concluded, by 

 the proportion of their ftature to his own and that of his 

 companions, that they could not be lels than fix and a halt, 

 or feven feet in height, and proportionably ftrong and bulky. 

 Captain Vfalhs had an interview v,-ith tliefe people in 1766, 

 and found, by meafuring them, that the ftature of the 

 greater part of them was from five feet ten inches to fix feet, 

 thongh there were fome v.ho v.ere fix feet five and fix feet 

 fix inches, and one who was fix f^-et feven inches. Captain 

 Carteret, who attended captain Wallis on this occafion, con. 

 firms the above account in his letter to Dr. Maty. See Phil. 

 Tranf. vol. Ix. art. 2. p. 20, &c. See Hawkciv.'ortli's 

 Voyage, vol. li. Introd. and p. 28. 154. 



Gl.\NTs, Rtlel, in jincieiit Ulythology, were the fons of 

 Terra, or the Earth, by Ctclus, wlio made war againft Ju- 

 piter and the cekftial deities, to avenge the defeat cf the 

 Titans. Thefe giants are reprefonted as of an enormous 

 height and fize, having a wild and dreadful afpecl, and 

 poftefied of ftrength proportioned to theif bulk : each of 

 them had a hundred hands, and ferpenls iQl'lead of legs. 

 Being determined to dethrone Jupiter, tliey reared Mount 

 OiTa upon Pelion, :«id Olympus upon Offa, and from thc-cte 

 attacked the gods with huge rocks, fon\e of v\ hieli fell into 

 the fea and became jllands, and otiicrs fell cu ti.e earth and 



VuL. XVI. 



formed mountains. Jupiter fumtr.oned a council of the god», 

 and being infonned that it was ncceflary to obtain the aflift- 

 ance of lome mortal, with the advice of Palla.s he called up 

 Hercules, and with the aid of this hero, extergjinated the 

 giants Enccladus, Polybotes, Alcyon, Porphyrion, the two 

 Ions of Ala;u3, Epliialtns, Othus| Eurytus, Clytius, Ty- 

 thyus, Pallas, Hippolitus, Agriiis, Thoon, and Typhon, 

 the Lift of whom it was more diflicult to vanquifli than all 

 the others. Jupiter having thus gained a complete viclory, 

 caft the rebels down to Tartarus, where they were to receive 

 the full puiiifi-.ment of their enormous crimes : according to 

 the account of fome of the poets, he buried them alive under 

 Mount Etna and different i.Oands. 



For the explication of this fable, fome have fuppofed that 

 Jupiter (for whofe hiftory, fee Jumtek) dellroycd the 

 robbers that infefted Thefialy, and that thefe are the pre- 

 tended giants ; for v.e have already obfervcd (in the prc- 

 cedin;^: article) that the appellation « Nephilim," occurring 

 in fcripture, and tranflated giants, fignifies people addided 

 to all kinds of licentioufnefs and violence, or robbers and 

 rufnans. Jupiter, when he left Crete to vifit the other 

 parts of Grf.-ce, ufually refided on mount Olympus, where 

 he had probably built a ftrong citadel. Tills mount Olvm.- 

 pus, highly elevated, was afterwards taken for heaven iticlf, 

 and the nioft ancient poets, efpecially Homer, fo dcfcribc 

 it. The banditti now mentioned, determined in their attack 

 on that prince, befiege him in his citadel, which afterwards 

 gave rife to the fiftion of their having attempted to fcale 

 heaven, and of tlieir having made an a'.Tault upon it. It ii 

 added, that with this view they piled Ofta upon Pelion, 

 inijiorting, as it is conjedured, that they had forti.tied thefe 

 two mountaii;s, which are alfo in Theflaly, and at no great 

 diftance from Olympus, whither they retired after their cx- 

 cuifions, and kept Jupiter's ganifon in awe. For other 

 particulars, fee Banier's Mythology, vol. iii. See alfo 



TiT.V.NS. 



Giants' Bones, a name too haftily given bv the vulgar t» 

 certain bones and parts of ftceletons, of an enormous fize, 

 found in England and other places. Of aU the numbers of 

 thefe, which have been publicly ftiewn about as wonders in 

 nature, not one but has proved, on examination, a bone of 

 an elephant, or elfe of a whale, or of fome other tcrreftrial 

 or aquatic animal now perhaps extinft ; the firft, however, 

 is ulually the cafe, as the bones of elephants are much more 

 frequently found buried: in the earth than thofe of the 

 whale. 



Sir Hans Sloane mentions a vertebra of the loin of a whale 

 fent him from Oxfordft-.ire, where it was dug up under 

 giound, and afterwards ufed as a ftool to fit upon, and vul- 

 garly fuppofed part of a human back-bone. Now, if the 

 whole fize of the body had been calculated from this piece, 

 the account would have prcft nted fuch a fize as would hav* 

 far exceeded all llie fabulous ftories of giants' ikeletons ex- 

 tant in the world. 



Many (keletons of this kind have been found wliich haT« 

 bct-a called the (keletons of giants : fuch are thofe of Phi- 

 loftratus, which are find to be the bones of meu of twelve, 

 twenty, and even thirty cubits high ; that found iu a moun- 

 tain of Crete,, and mentioned by Pia'o and Pliny, forly-fiu 

 cubits high; another cf fixty cubits, found near Tangier 

 in Mauritania, mcntioHed by Plutarch and Strabo, and iup. 

 pofed to be the ikelrtou of Anteus ; the (lieleton of Pallas, 

 the ion of Evander, found in Rome, and laid to be taller 

 than tlie walls of that city ; another, found in England i.i 

 nyi, fifty feet long. St. Aullin alleges, in proof of tlie 

 exiilencc of giants before the flood, a grinder tooth, w liich 

 lie fa.v on the ftiores of I'tica, which was in reality that of 

 G jj iia 



