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THEIR INSCRIPTIONS.

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which must have been the Samaritan, as those characters were used by the Hebrews prior to their Babylonish captivity. In consequence of the stone being much fractured and defaced, the following could only be decyphered, but which gives us still a somewhat correct idea of its date. It runs thus:

זהוא קבר אדונירם עבד המלך שלמה שבא לגבת את המס ונפטר יום

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of which the following is the Spanish manuscript version:-"De Adoniram la fossa es esta, que vigne Salomo del Re servent dia, y mori tribut lo pera rebre. The following is a literal English translation :"This is the grave of Adoniram, the servant of King Solomon, who came to collect the tribute, and died on the day.

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The Bishop of Mantua published a history of the Franciscan order, in which he mentioned, on the authority of the manuscript alluded to, the existence of the above-men

*See Appendix C.

*

24 VILLALPANDO INSTITUTES AN INQUIRY.

tioned monument. Villalpando, a learned Jesuit and a shrewd critic, read the book, but not being willing to put implicit confidence in the bishop's startling assertion, desired his brethren, the Jesuits, who lived in Murviedro, a beautiful little place built from the ruins of Saguntum, to make great search for that particular stone on the site described; his request was complied with; an investigation was instituted. The Murviedro natives immediately pointed out a large stone near the gate of the citadel, which was commonly called by the natives, "The Stone of Solomon's Collector." There was an almost obliterated Hebrew inscription on the self-same stone, but not corresponding to the one looked for which we shall presently notice. There was, however, a manuscript chronicle preserved in the town, in which they found the following entry: "At Saguntum, in the citadel, in the year of our Lord 1480, a little more or less, was discovered a sepulchre of surprising antiquity. It contained an embalmed corpse, not of the

ADONIRAM'S TOMB-STONE.

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usual stature, but taller than is common. It had, and still retains on the front, two lines in the Hebrew language and characters, the sense of which is 'The sepulchre of Adoniram, the servant of King Solomon, who came hither to collect tribute.' Of this Adoniram, the servant of Solomon, mention is made in the 5th chapter [14th verse] of the first book of Kings, and more expressly in the 4th chapter [6th verse] of that book. The Hebrew letters rendered into Roman are these: 'Ze hu keber Adoniram ebed ha Melec Selomo, seba ligbot et hammas, voniptar yom.'

In page 112 of the same chronicle they found the following: "The marble mausoleum of surprising antiquity, which was discovered at Saguntum in the year of our Lord, 1482, and was inscribed with the Hebrew letters which are these in Roman, "Ze hu keber," &c. [as above], still exists in the citadel before the outer gate." Villalpando did not stop there; he succeeded in possessing himself afterwards of a careful copy (through others of his order) of some other

C

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DECYPHERED NOT BY JEWISH,

manuscript, which makes honourable mention of the same monument.

Were the rabbies the originators of this circumstance, I would certainly have hesitated before I brought it before you; not because I think that every thing rabbinical is of necessity absurd, ridiculous, and false; but in order to conciliate the strong prejudices of some who do think so, and treat every thing coming from that quarter with contempt; and generally, because they do not understand them. Not a word of the whole transaction is mentioned by any of the rabbies. The investigation was set on foot by Christian authors of great learning and extensive reading. Nor can it be said that it was a story conjured up by the Jesuits. There was no object in their doing so. They were never friendly to any thing Jewish; and in Villalpando's time the most venomous animosity prevailed in their breast against every thing Jewish. Again, if their object was to deceive, why did they not make out the inscription on the monument which the natives have pointed

BUT BY CHRISTIAN DIVINES.

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out to them, to correspond with the one recorded in the Duke of Savoy's ancient manuscript. There is not the remotest affinity between the two epitaphs. All the incidental circumstances connected with those monuments seem to me to conspire to attest that it was not their object to deceive in this matter.

Now, I wish to call your attention for a few minutes to the inscription which Villalpando's friends discovered on the stone pointed out to them by the natives. It is the following, according to their decyphering

שארן נבח פקוד מרה לשרו קחו יה

והרה עד מלך אמציה

The inscription, as thus given, though it makes rhyme, certainly makes no sense whatever. To say the least, it is very bad Hebrew, if Hebrew at all; and is enough to puzzle the worst Hebrew scholar to make any sense of it.*

*The author has met with many indifferent linguists who were quicker in making sense of a bad composition than many learned philologists.

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