C 284 ] 
the Aleph , Ghimel , He, Heth , Caph , Koph, Schin, 
and Thau, io confiderably differing from thofe of the 
fame elements in the earlier Phoenician times, feem to 
render this inconteftably clear. I know, indeed, that 
M. l’Abbe Barthelemy would be thought to infinuate, 
if he does not dire&ly affert this, that fuch variations 
are 12 always to be attributed to difference of place, 
11 Journ. des Sfav. Suite de Decembre 1761. p. 83. The cha- 
racter reprefenting Koph in our infcription was not the original, 
nor even the earlier, form of that element. One fomewhat refem- 
bling it was however ufed by the Carthaginians in Sicily, before 
they were difpofleffed of that ifland by the Romans. This plainly 
enough appears from the Punic coin in Tab. XVII. now in my 
fmall cabinet, and never before publifhed. This piece feems to 
exhibit the word tnmp, Carthada, the very Punic name 
of Carthage, according to a Solinus, in Punic characters ; the 
fxrft of which bears fome refemblance to the later figure of Koph , 
as preferved on the monument under confideration. The letters 
on the reverfe are not fo legible. They neverthelefs appear to 
me to form the names of two Carthaginian cities in Sicily. The 
firft of thefe was perhaps KAtD, mot a, or rather motya ; the 
Vau and Jod having been not unfrequeptly omitted in Phoenici- 
an, and therefore probably in Punic, words. The name of the 
other tow r n, as originally impreft on the medal, being in a great 
meafurc defaced ; I fhall not venture at a communication of it 
to the learned world, but leave it to be cleared up by fome other 
coin or infcription that may pofiibly hereafter occur. 
That the names of two Sicilian cities in Punic chara&ers were 
fometimes impreft upon the reverfe of one coin, may be fairly 
inferred from a Carthaginian medal now in my pofieflion ; of 
which I may probably, in a future paper, give a particular ac- 
count. A form of Koph pretty fimilar to that vifible on the mo- 
nument I am confidering likewife appears on a coin of achola, 
acholla, or achvll A, as the medal prefents the word to our 
view, ftruck in the Auguftan age. b rom what has been here 
obferved, as well as from the refemblance both thefe figures of 
Koph bear to the fquare or Chaldee form of the fame element, we 
may collect the remains of antiquity that exhibit them not to 
have been the produce of the earlier Phoenician times, 
* J. Solin. Tolybijt. cap. xxvii. Trajcft, ad Rhen. 1689. 
rather 
