628 On the Buddhist Emblem of Architecture. [No. 165. 



two of the glyphs being complete, (a a) the third being split down the 

 centre, and one- half being on each edge of the block of stone, {b b). The 

 Triglyph, or combination of three scores, has been throughout all ages 

 the symbol of the Deity, the Tri-une God ; we find them variously 

 combined ; sometimes in the form of a star | 3 sometimes in that of 

 a c * which is the early type of the sacred Tau,* so expressive a cha- 

 racter among the antient Egyptians ; and generally held to be symbolic 



of " eternal life." They may be found again thus |X| And in many 

 other forms, such as -Jf which is the simplified form of the Cabalistic 

 Abraxas, (fig. 4,) typifying the sun, or thus ^ emblematising the most 

 simple as it is the most powerful resolution of forces, and the one to 

 which all others may be reduced. On the three Yods impressed on the 

 Hebrew Abraxas, (fig. 5,) and the three wings of a hawk, symbolic of 

 the idea " God," found on that of the Egyptian, (fig. 6.) I have already 

 had occasion to remark, (Note on a Boodhist symbolic Coin, published 

 in the Transactions of the Society,) that these three scores compose the 

 word *XJJ Allah, the term for " God," among the Mohammedans, and 

 which becomes the more marked in the Cufic characters,! composing 

 that word. It is a very common, and abundant figure in Boodhist 

 symbolism, and the interpretation given to it in the paper on the coin 

 just referred to, was immediately acquiesced in by several learned 

 natives and Boodhist priests, to whom it was shewn on my return to 

 Arracan. 



* Vide some remarks on this character by the Author, " Introduction to Grammar of 

 the Language of Burmah," p. xxxix. 



f In those characters (^J|jlO the final a is shewn to be a member of the word, 

 and to be radical, the same as in its Hebrew analogue DTl/M alahim, in which last 

 the plurality of the root is evident. Thus in the plural number it is the word used for 

 " God," in many parts of the Bible; and throughout the first chapterof Genesis, espe- 

 cially verse 26. TWV^ OV6tt "VJW1 "Then said the Alahim (God,) we will make, 

 &c. &c." The discussion of the characters that compose the Arabic word jJJ} is foreign 



to my present purpose, but I will merely say that I consider the initial \ alif, in no 

 wise belonging to the word itself, but being a sort of formative prefix, article, or epi- 

 thetic; that the second character now pronounced, and considered a A lam, was 

 originally, perhaps long before the existence of alphabetical characters, pronounced as 

 an " alif;" and that the expressive part of the word consisted, like the Hebrew term, 

 of the sounds of simply Alif, Lam, and He. Some of the modern compounds of the 

 word place the view I have given, if not beyond a doubt, at least far within the realms 

 of probability. 



