ciumque requirunt. Pro hac una ora subole, quam superstitem reliquisti. Eterna in requie felicitatis causa manebis, xiv. Kalendis Octobris, Cucurbitinus et Abundantius hic simul quiescunt. DDNN. Gratiano V, et Theodosio Augustis (consulibus)" (p. 133).

"Here rests a handmaid of God, who out of all her riches now possesses but this one house, whom her friends bewail and seek in vain for consolation. Oh pray for this one remaining daughter whom thou hast left behind! Thou wilt remain in the eternal repose of happiness. On the fourteenth of the Calends of October Cucurbitinus and Abundantius rest here together. In the consulship of our Lords Gratian (V.) aud Theodosius Emperors."

We cannot help thinking, however, that Marini's explanation of "hunc unum subolem," "this one daughter," is a mistake. It seems hardly possible to doubt that a son is meant, possibly either Cucurbitinus or Abundantius, whom we find named in the latter part of the epitaph. M. De Rossi conjectures, too, with considerable probability, that "Ancilla Dei" is a proper name of that fanciful class described in a former page, like "Servus Dei," or 66 Quod vult Deus.'

Another rude inscription of about the same period, A.D. 380, is worth transcribing for the tenderness of the sentiment contained under its uncouth form:

INFANTIAETAS VIRGINITATIS INTEGRITAS MORVM GRABTAS

FIDEI ET REVERENTIAE DISCIPLIA IC SITA RVTINA IACET QUE VIXIT ANIS XXI DEPOSITA III NONIS AVG EVAGRIO ET EVCERIO CCSS.

"Infantiæ ætas, virginitatis integritas, morum gravitas, fidei et reverentiæ disciplina, hic sita Rufina jacet. Quæ vixit annis XXI. Deposita III Nonis Augusti Evagrio et Eucherio consulibus" (p. 137).

The beauty of sentiment which pervades many of these rude compositions comes out very strikingly, in contrasting them with the pagan. inscriptions of the same class. This is very remarkable in the different views of death which the sepulchral inscriptions of pagans and Christians exhibit the former, as is meet in them "that have not hope," all gloom and despair: INFELICISSIMI AMISSIONE EJUS; PERPETUIS TENEBRIS ET QUOTIDIANAE MISERABILI ULULATIONI DAMNATI; the latter professing as their law, VIVENTEM DEO CREDITE, FLERE NEFAS, and regarding death as but the entrance to true life :

"Mens nescia mortis

Vivit, et aspectu fruitur bene conscia Christi."

Here is a Christian mother's view of the early death of her child :—

"MAGUS PUER INNOCENS; ESSE JAM INTER INNOCENTIS COEPISTI QUAM STAVILES TIBI HAEC VITA EST; QUAM TE LETUM EXCIPET MATER ECCLESIAE DE OC MUNDO REVERTENTEM COMPREMATUR PECTORUM GEMITUS STRUATUR FLETUS OCULORUM."

The same habit of mind, referring all things to what, in the Christian view, is of course the great end of man, is often observable in little turns of expression, which please no less by their simplicity than by the felicitousness of the ideas which they embody. There is a world of deep Christian thought in the simple words: HOSPITA CARO. And in the

d Le Blant, p. 333.

same view of our life on earth, as being but a brief journey towards our true home in heaven, the form employed to express the good work of the almsgiver is, AD COELOS PRAEMISIT OPES. "He sent his wealth before him to heaven" (p. 316). The happiness of the just after death is described as "repose in the bosom of Abraham” (p. 95). And the sentiment is occasionally conveyed in a playful allusion to the profession, or to the name of the deceased:-as in a semi-barbarous epitaph in the same collection, on a charitable merchant (neguciator) named Agapus, who is described, by a metaphor borrowed from his trade, as having been throughout life a STACIO MISERIS ET PORTUS EGINIS; an anchorage for "the afflicted" and a "harbour for the needy" (p. 41).

This contrast between the spirit and sentiment of the Christian inscriptions, and that exhibited in the similar monuments of pagan Rome, suggests a comparison still more interesting to the historical student, for which a recent discovery at Rome has furnished the opportunity long desired; namely, of the form of epitaph in use among the early Roman Christians, with that of the contemporary sepulchral inscriptions of the Jewish population of the same city. Among the many discoveries of Bosio during the long series of his explorations, as the readers of our notice of the Roman catacombs may recollect, was that of a Jewish catacomb outside of the ancient Porta Portuensis, which he regarded as the burying place of the Transtiberine Jews. But, in the superior attraction of the Christian remains, then in all the first freshness of their interest, the Jewish monuments were comparatively overlooked. Aringhi, in his edition of the Roma Subterranea, printed one or two of the epitaphs; but the exploration does not appear to have been vigorously pursued; after a time the cemetery was forgotten; and, strange as it may seem, all trace, even of its site, has been lost. Recent explorations, however, both at Rome and elsewhere in Italy, have led to better results. At Venosa, the ancient Venusium, a very interesting Jewish cemetery, with many Hebrew inscriptions, and with the well known seven-branched candlestick as well as other symbols, was discovered in 1853. In 1854, another cemetery of the same general character was discovered at Oria. The most important, however, for the purpose of comparison, is that which was discovered at Rome, in the beginning of 1862, in a vineyard known as the Vigna Randanini, situated on the ancient Via Appia, some distance outside of the Porta Capena. Of the catacomb itself it will be enough to say, that in all its general characteristics it resembles the Christian catacombs; consisting of long streets, or galleries, excavated in the sandstone, with the tombs cut into their perpendicular sides. Instead of the Christian symbols of the cross, or the monogram, the anchor, the fish, or the ship, the Jewish graves display the seven-branched candlestick, the volume of the law, and other Jewish emblems; but in most other respects it would be difficult to distinguish between the cemeteries of the two races. The point of comparison with which we are concerned at present is the character of the funereal inscriptions which the two communities respectively employed.

• Ed. Rev., vol. cix., p. 101.

Of the names which appear in the inscriptions only seven are Hebrew; twelve are Greek, and twenty-four Latin; and yet the prevailing language of the epitaphs is Greek. There is not a single one in Hebrew, and only twelve out of the entire collection are Latin. It is plain, indeed, from many circumstances, that whatever may be said of the Roman Jews as a body, the Jews who used this particular catacomb must rather have been of the Dispersion than of Judea Proper. Some of the inscriptions, indeed, expressly attest the fact. Thus :

MANNACIVS

SORORI CRYSIDI
DULCISSIME

PROSELYTI

"Mannacius to his sweetest sister Chrysis, a proselyte" (Nuove Epigrafi, p. 15). Accordingly, the language and structure of the epitaphs are all but identical with those of the Christian epitaphs of Rome. We find in these the same confusion of Greek and Latin in the same epitaph; the same peculiarities in the orthography of both languages; the same use of Greek inflections for Latin words; the same solecisms of government and structure; the same representing of Latin words in Greek letters, and the same rendering of the sounds of the vowels and diphthongs of either language in accordance with the peculiar orthography of the other. Several of these characteristics are curiously combined in the following short epitaph:

The central column being occupied by the symbol of the sevenbranched candlestick, the epitaph read as follows:-Bevepwoa ȧvpŵv xvii, ἔκου μαρίτους μήσις xv. "Venerosa, aged 17 years, had a husband (was married) fifteen months." It is unnecessary to point out the many solecisms crowded into these few words: avpwv for annorum, combines the introduction of Latin words into a Greek sentence with the equally strange anomaly of declining the Latin word with a Greek inflection. The singularly anomalous form ekov (for exe) can only be explained as a blunder of the author of the epitaph; and papirovs, which is but the rendering in Greek letters of maritus, is quite as clearly the blunder of a foreigner for the accusative maritum.

Much more important is the comparison of the sentiment and doctrine of these Jewish epitaphs with those of the Christian catacombs. And first, it is surprising to find that, while several of the symbols which appear upon the tombs are plainly Jewish, yet there are others which had hitherto been popularly regarded as almost as certainly Christian. The palm-branch, long considered as the Christian symbol of martyrdom, is a

ƒ In a few the word "peace," is found in Hebrew characters; and in one the Hebrew is employed, in a Latinized Hebrew name, to supply the want of any equivalent Roman character to express the Hebrew sound of v.

Garrucci, Cimitero, p. 32.

favourite emblem in the Jewish cemetery. A forceps-shaped instrument, which, upon the slabs in the catacombs, many archæologists held to represent, and which very probably when standing by itself does represent, one of the torturing-hooks used among the cruel appliances by which the fidelity of the martyrs was tried in the persecution, is here commonly found on the Jewish tombs, not singly, it is true, as in the Christian, but in connection with the candlestick and the lamp and vessel of oil, being intended, as it would seem, to represent the forceps or scissors with which the lamp was trimmed.

Still more startling, however, is the fact, which these inscriptions reveal, that those well-known adjurations for the "rest," or "life" of the dead, on which Roman Catholic controversionalists rely as evidence of the early Christian use of prayer for the dead, are quite as frequent an accompaniment of the Jewish epitaph as of the Christian; nay, that, if the inscriptions in M. De Rossi's great Christian collection, so far as it has yet proceeded, be compared with Father Garrucci's purely Jewish series, the proportion of such prayers in the latter will be found to exceed very considerably that which appears in the Christian collection. The fact is so novel, that we shall transcribe a few of the most characteristic specimens. The form occurs in the Latin as well as in the Greek epitaphs. Thus :

"MARCIA BONA JUDEA. DORMI(TIO) TUA I(N) BONIS." "Marcia a good Jewess. Thy sleep be amongst the good !"-p. 34.

And

"ALEXANDER
BUBULARIUS DE MA

CELLO QVIXIT ANNIS
XXX. ANIMA BONA OM

NIORIUM AMICUS
DORMITIO TUA INTER

DICAEIS (dikalois).”

"Alexander, a flesher from the shambles, who lived thirty years. O good Soul, friend of all men, may thy sleep be amongst the just !"-p. 44.

In the following, besides the actual prayer, there is an address to the reader to beg his prayers also::

ΕΝΘΑΔΕ ΚΕΙΤΑΙ

ΙΩΣΗΣ ΤΟ ΝΗΠΙΟΝ
ΗΔΥΝ ΕΤ ΒΗΗ ΠΡΟ
ΚΟΠΙΣ Ο ΠΑΤΗΡ ΚΡΙΣ
ΠΙΝΑ ΔΕ ΜΗΤ ΠΡΟΣ
ΕΥΧΟΙΟ ΕΝ ΕΙΡΗΝΗ

ΤΗΝ ΚΥΜΗΣΙΝ ΑΥΤΟΥ.

"Here lies Joses, a sweet infant aged two years and eight months. His father was Procopius, and his mother Crespina. Pray for his sleep in peace!"

The discovery of these forms on the Jewish epitaphs has been hailed in the schools of popular polemics with no little triumph, as a new evidence of the extra-evangelical origin of the analogous prayers for the

Nuove Epigrafi, p. 8.

dead which are in use in the modern Roman Church. It is right to know, nevertheless, that the fact of these prayers having been in use among the Jews has long been well known to students of archæology. Bosio published in his Roma Subterranea a few specimens of the epitaphs of the Jewish catacombs discovered by him, in which the very same form occurs. And indeed, so far are the Roman archæologists from concealing the analogy between some of the usages and forms of their church and those of ancient Judaism and even Paganism, that, soon after the publication of Conyers Middleton's celebrated Essay on the Heathen Origin of the Rites and Ceremonies of the Roman Church, an elaborate work was published in Rome, and under the patronage of the cardinal vicar, by the celebrated Giovanni Marangoni, with the express purpose of avowing the analogy, and even tracing it into details far more minute and curious than those suggested by the English controversialist. Nay, it would seem from the only English Roman Catholic notice of the recent discovery which has come under our observation, that, far from shrinking from the publication of the facts, they on the contrary regard it as a confirmation of that argument in favour of their doctrine which they draw from the epitaphs of the Christian catacombs, and which we discussed on a former notice of that interesting subject.-Edinburgh Review, July, 1864.

Early Christian Art.-That the early Christians should retain the same gesture of prayer towards the only God which they had used towards idols is no slight refutation of their jealousy of all profane associations. The ancient attitude of prayer-the uplifted arms and open, upturned hands-was one instinctively adopted by a race whose gestures were full of meaning, symbolical and natural. This attitude pleaded for help by the very helplessness of the petitioner. In such a position the suppliant could not defend himself; therefore it was the posture most proper to prayer. It was thus Eneas, when in danger of perishing by the tempest, prayed to the gods-"Duplices tendens ad sidera palmas." It is in this attitude that Daniel stands between the lions, and that the Three Children stand in the furnace. This attitude is alluded to frequently in Scripture, "When ye stand praying" (Mark xi. 25); “I will therefore that men pray everywhere, lifting up holy hands" (1 Tim. ii. 8). To those conversant with the art of the catacombs, a woman veiled and standing in this gesture of prayer is a familiar image. This image occurs frequently on walls and ceilings, and is also observable in the centre compartment of sculptured sarcophagi. The interpretation of the Roman Church to this day, as seen in Padre Marchi's work, identifies this frequently-repeated figure with the Virgin Mary. Protestant commentators, knowing the untenable nature of that solution, have offered another scarcely less absurd. The figure, according to them, is that of the Church. It does not seem to have occurred to either class of inter

Cose Gentilesche e profane trasportate ad Uso ed Adornamento delle Chiese. Per Giovanni Marangoni. 4to. Roma: 1744.

i Dublin Review, new series, vol. i., p. 377. The same view is taken in the Théologie des Catacombes, of the Abbé Bouix, published at Arras this year.