98 CHRONOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS 



Iii "A. D. 197" (Clinton), an Ecclesiastical Council was held by 

 Victor at Rome ; and the celebration of Easter was, to some extent, 

 disconnected from the Jewish Passover : the innovation was not 

 adopted by the Asiatic churches. 



In " A. D. 211," the accession of Caracalla, the twenty-first Roman 

 Emperor, took place. His name, and that of his brother Geta, have 

 been found in hieroglyphic characters at Esneh. The name of Cara- 

 calla occurs also in a Greek inscription in the quarries at Philae. 



In "A. D. 217," the accession of Macrinus, the twenty-second Ro- 

 man Emperor, took place. His name has been found on coins issued 

 in Egypt. 



In " A. D. 218," the accession of Elagabalus, the twenty-third Ro- 

 man Emperor, took place. His name has been found on coins issued 

 in Egypt. 



Philostratus iii. 5, states, that Apollonius Tyanaeus " saw in India 

 some of those nuts which in Greece are kept in the temples as curio- 

 sities." The cocoa-nut (Cocos nucifera) appears to be also mentioned 

 by Cosmas Indicopleustes ; and is clearly the " karyon megiston ton 

 indikon" of the Pseudo-Callisthenes iii. 8, and Julius Valerius. — 

 Cocoa-nuts are said to be noticed in the Itinerary of Abuzeid and 

 Wahab, and by Rhazes, Haly Abbas, Mesue, and Avicenna ; I saw in 

 Egypt a quantity that had been imported by the route of Mecca and 

 the Thebaid. 



According to Beckmann, Philostratus alludes to the dourra (Sorghum 

 vulgare) as seen in India by Apollonius Tyanaeus : and Heliodorus 

 is considered (by Delile) to refer to its growing at Meroe. I have 

 not found the dourra figured on the Egyptian monuments ; but stems 

 intermingled with those of the papyrus, were shown me in a parcel 

 exhumed at Saccara, possibly as ancient as the Coptic Period. — The 

 dourra is mentioned by Ibn Masah, Abu Hanifa, Rhazes, and Ibn 

 Baitar, under its Indian name "jawars :" its cultivation in Egypt is 

 noticed by Alpinus, and by all subsequent travellers. 



In u A. D. 222," the accession of Alexander Severus, the twenty- 

 fourth Roman Emperor, took place. His name has been found in a 

 Greek inscription at Antinoe. 



In " A. D. 235," the accession of Maximinus, the twenty-fifth Roman 

 Emperor, took place. His name has been found on coins issued in 

 Egypt. 



In " A. D. 238," the accession of Pupienus Maximus, the twenty- 



