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What has been here obferved of the Maltefe in- 
fcription is, with regard to it’s antiquity, at lead", 
equally applicable to that of Carpentras (4), the 
duds of whofe letters are Hill more remote from 
thole of the Samaritan ; and confequently this, ac- 
cording to M. I’ Abbe’s decifion, mud be dill of a 
later date. And, indeed, the rude and almod bar- 
barous forms of it’s Phoenician elements«render this 
incontedably clear. Some of them are extremely 
fimilar to, if not apparently the lame with, thole of 
the correfpondent letters on certain Spanifh or Afri- 
can Phoenician coins, druck, as there is reafon to be- 
lieve, after the commencement of the Roman em- 
pire. And if this be the cafe, how can we fuppofe 
them to have been fome of the fird alphabetic cha- 
racters that ever appeared, or thole immediately de- 
duced (5) from hieroglyphics themfelves? Theyfeem 
to have been only corruptions of the earlier Phoenician 
letters, from whofe forms feveral of them have very 
coniiderably varied. So high an antiquity as that 
above fuppofed is not announced by the face of the 
infcription, and therefore the learned will not perhaps 
readily affent to fuch a fuppofition. 
II. 
The eleventh letter of the fird line, which is taken 
for Thau, feems to have been a little mutilated by 
the injuries of Time ; as part of the drait line cutting 
(4) Ibid. p. 53. 
(5) Recucil cl’ Antiquit. Egypt- Etrufq. Grcc. & Romain. par 
M. le Comte dc Caylus, Tom. I. p. 65. Plan. xxvi. A Paris, 
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