holmes: pre-historic remains of rombalds moor. 
301 
that of a true cross, with a streak from the top to the angle of each 
arm, bending to the right of each arm from the centre, making, so 
far, the whole of a square. Except the circle and the angle this is, 
perhaps, the most widely distributed figure in existence, and as 
figured at Ilkley and Tossine, on the Swedish coast, it combines both 
circle and angle, and forms the line of beauty crosswise. Whatever 
may have been its original import, we can trace it perhaps first to 
India, where it remains as a survival figured upon the footprints of 
Buddha. [See Ferguson, Schlieman, and exhaustively in Wareing]. 
The word itself is old Norse, fiol; Ango Saxon, fela; German, veld ; 
English, full, or many; and foot means many footed, or, perhaps, 
firm, stable, or abiding. Repetitions of the form are most numerous 
in Scandinavia. It is found upon very ancient British pottery. 
Schlieman finds it the most numerous figure upon the oldest whirl 
stones and pottery markings. It is common in Tartary, Thibet, 
Etrurea, in Greek, Roman and early Christian art. It is assuredly 
pre-Christian, but brought into Christian monuments from the third 
to the twelfth centuries, and has come down as a brassfounder's bell 
mark into the 17th century. [See Llewellyn Jewitt, Reliquary, 
1881.] The fylfot is a prominent mark upon gold weights, brought 
from Coomassie, 1873, where it is evidently a survival along with 
other archaic figurings still in use. It ceased to be used upon 
Christian crosses with the decline of the Scandinavian runic figurings ; 
but it has latterly been revived, without any other significance than 
an easy and efi'ective form in mosaic, stone, or parquetry wood 
work. The fylfot figure usually stands along with others, as 
either significant of something or as an ornament along with other 
carvings ; but at Ilkley, in two cases, and at Tossine in one, the 
figures exactly similar stand alone, or with the least possible connec- 
tion with others. It does not look like a Christian symbol in any 
of these instances, being much more complex, difiicult to construct, 
and is besides in each case connected with cup markings in the 
figure, so that a Christian cross can scarcely be meant. At Ilkley the 
outcurved line is say three-quarters of an inch in breadth, and three- 
quarters deep, the cups being about an inch and half in diameter and 
