M. L. EOUSE^ B.L.^ ON THE PEDIGREE OP THE NATIONS. 99 



It will occur to some that this community of nomenclature 

 is so widespread that the Thirasians, Thracians, or Tyrsenoi 

 must have once quite pervaded each of the three great 

 peninsulas of Europe ; and therefore that they must be 

 identical with the Pelasgoi, who in a remote period peopled 

 Greece and Southern Italy, and who, Herodotus says, still spoke 

 a tongue quite differing from Greek where they were isolated 

 from the Greeks ; and, while Smith's Dictionarij of Classical 

 Geograiihy builds up a careful argument to show that the 

 Thracians and the Pelasgoi were one people, Professor Oscar 

 Meuthelius contends that the names Pelasgoi and Tyrsenoi are 

 freely interchanged by the early Greek writers. I am struck 

 by the fact, however, that in the passage cited Herodotus, in one 

 of his examples, uses the words : " Those Pelasgoi, for instance, 

 who live at Creston above the Tyrsenoi," showing that he did 

 not deem the Pelasgoi to be identical with the Tyrsenoi. 



I must now revert to the passage quoted in my former paper 

 from Tacitus's Agricola respecting the natives of South Wales 

 and Cornwall in his days. " The dark faces of the Silures and 

 their usually curly locks, coupled with the fact that Spain lies 

 over against them, creates a belief that ancient Iberians crossed 

 over and took possession of this region as a settlement."* It is 

 the belief of Professor Ehys, the philologist, that such an 

 admixture is what has caused the divergence of Welsh from 

 other Keltic languages in the United Kingdom, and Mons. 

 George Lecoat (or Arcoat), a Breton pastor and antiquary, 

 assures me that the shorter built and broad-faced men with 

 black eyes, who are descended from the Britons who escaped to 

 Armorica after the Anglo-Saxon invasion, occupy a distinct 

 habitat from the slender, long-faced men with brown eyes who 

 are descended from the old Veneti and Arinoricans,t and that 

 the former are still called by the rest Breiz, or tattooed ones,{ 

 though they have made tattooing very popular in Brittany§ ever 

 since their arrival ages ago. 



Yet it was not necessary for the Silures to sail all the way 

 from Spain ; since from Aquitania (which our comparison of 

 geographical names has shown to have been far larger than 

 in Caesar's day, extending on one side probably up to the 



Agricola, XI. 



t The two types were set forth by a number of photographs taken for 

 the purpose by the late Gen. Pitt Pivers. 



X The generally-received derivation of Picti (Picts). 

 ^ Cf. what is said about the Thracians on pp. 89, 90. 



