[ 2 8o ] 
It ought to be here remarked, that the word tum 
terminates the fecond line, and begins the third; as 
alfo that the proper name hannibal, by a 
fimilar kind of bifTeCtion, belongs both to the third 
and fourth lines. But this is by no means to be won- 
dered at. The Greeks obferved the fame method 
of writing in their infcriptions *°, both of an earlier 
and a later date. 
III. 
That the words above explained form a fepulchral 
infcription, will admit of nodifpute. The three firft 
of them in particular, which feem to be a fort of 
preface or introduction to the proper infcription, render 
this inconteftable ; and the others, either in conjunc- 
tion with or exclulive of them, amount to an afler- 
tion of this in direCt terms, and confequently prove 
it to demonftration. ^ That the term the fecond 
word of the infcription, is equivalent to the Hebrew 
/Y3, notwithflanding the omiffion of Jod, is evident 
beyond contradiction, not only from the reafon above 
aligned, but likewife becaufe the expreflion oSy 
denotes the house of long duration, a man’s 
long HOME, or the grave, the very fenfe it is 
ufed in here, Eccles. xii. 5. Nor can the Jod well be 
looked upon as an effential part of the noun, fince 
the plural of fiO in the Hebrew is QTD, and the 
Ethiopic term for a houfe is agreeing in all re- 
fpeCts with the fecond word here. M. l’Abbe Bar- 
,0 Chifh. Antiquitat. Ajiatic. pafl*. Vid. ctiam Tho, Reinef. Syn - 
tagm. Infcript. Antiqu. palf. Lipfix*, 1682. 
thelemy 
