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and the ftatute of limitations." (317.)
The family of Townley appear to
have been feated at the place whence
they took their name for 29 genera-
tions. Their manfion was, till about
a century ago, a complete quadrangle,
with four turrets at the angles. The
South fide remains; the oppofite fide
was rebuilt by Richard Townley, efq.
1628, the new building applied to it
on the North by the laft poffeffor.
The North Eaft fide is laid open. All
the materials of the chapel were pre-
ferved entire; the vefiments, fome of
which are of a very antique and un-
ufual form, are recorded by tradition
to have been brought from Whalley
abbey. Here is an unbroken feries of
family portraits, from John Townley,
eq. temp. Eliz. to the father of the
prefent owner. One apartment is
completely filled (befides a full length
of Richard Townley, efq. who died
1635) with heads inferted on the pan-
nels of the wainfcot. In the dining-
room hangs a noble picture of the firit
Lord Widdrington, killed in Wigan-
lane; a page prefenting him with ar-
mour. But the great ornaments of
this place are the noble woods, princi-
pally of antient oak, finely difpofed,
and feattered over the park and de-
mefnes to a great extent." (p. 321-2.)
Mr. W. clears up a popular tradition
of the ghost of fome unknown pofleflor
of this eftate exclaiming againit an en-
croachment, feized by the officers of
the duchy of Lancafter, and granted to
Charles lord Mountjoy, Earl of Devon,
temp. Jac. I.; "but the offence has
been remembered long after it has been
redreffed, and even when the name of
the offending party was forgotten. I
am not difpleated to have been able to
trace this popular fuperftition to its real
fource." (p. 228.)

in the prefent day, yet firmly perfua-
ded, that as no other attempts to re-
drefs the evil are lawful in the efta-
blifhed clergy, fo none are at the long
run likely to be attended with any good
effects but a rigid adherence to the doc-
trines and difcipline of the church"
(p. 341.) The old chapel was rebuilt,
1788, on higher ground at an expence
of 8701.; more than a moiety of
which was defrayed by the author,
who was licenfed to it 1796, on his
own petition, by bishop Cleaver, who
confecrated it 1794; having continued
without a minifter from the Diffolution
200 years, when Anthony Wether.
head was licented by Bishop Peploe, on
the nomination of Thomas White, of
Helme, gent. 1742. He died 1760,
aged 80, and was fucceeded by Wil-
liam Halwell, who died 1796. The
first flep towards a re-endowment of
this poor neglected foundation was a
rent charge of 11. per annum left upon
the effate of Hane by Mr. Henry
Wood, a native of that place, who had
been clerk of the works under Sir
Chriftopher Wren during the rebuild-
ing of St. Paul's cathedral, and whofe
curious accounts of that great work are
now in the author's pofletion.

After a probable comparison of the cutting off the head of every beaft that dies of the hydrocephalus, and burying it in a defert place, as a preventative of the diforder, with the fcape-goat fent into the wilderness as a transfer of fin, Mr. W. thus accounts for the decreafe of witches and fuperftition in thefe parts in modern times: "The fact (fays he), I am perfuaded, is not to be accounted for from any increafe of general intelligence and rational incredulity, nor, excepting in a few perfous, from mere knowledge of religion and worthy conception of the divine Cliviger is a name we little fufpect- agency; but, if any probable caufe can ed of being a corruption of Clyffig be affigned, it is furely a melancholy one, that the people are grown more cyne, or the rocky diftrict, afterwards to Clincher; though even a Ro- felfith and lefs converfible; that their man origin might correfpond with the old periodical feafons of narrative fefti vity are inermitted; that their fimplifituation of the diftrict in the very gorge of the English Apennines, among city is diminished, though their underalnio inacceffible rocks. Our fenfiftandings are not enlarged; and, above ble author has here brought us to his all, that the introduction of manufac own home, his paternal manfion, and chapel, where he has literally the fatiffion formed by the clergy of Manchester faction of being at home, attentive to the fouls of his 300 hearers and 40 communicants, for whofe benefit he has inftituted a monthly facrament, deeply deploring the ftate of religion

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*Mr. W. is far from adopting a conclu

in a late account of the fate of religion there, that two thirds of the people never attended religion at all; different members of the fame family undoubtedly attend in the morning and afternoon. (p. 241.)

tures,

braries in Europe contain fuch Cufic fragments as the Bodleian. The alphabet of the Homerites was probably derived from Affyria, their moft antient characters being called Suri or Syriac in an Arabic treatife on them in the Imperial library at Vienna. Paleftine and Phoenicia are proved by antient authors to have antiently belonged to Affyria; and their language clearly proves its Babylonic origin, being merely a dialect of the more antient Affyrian. The Samaritan is the fame as the Phoenician.

Such was the extenfive and moft antient original learning of the Chaldeans and Babylonians, ot borrowed from the Perfians or Egyptians, that in dictionaries Chaldean was fynonymous with a learned man. From the fquare temple of Bel at Babylon was borrowed the form of the Sicilian temples, that of the Sun at Palmyra, that of Solomon, and that which fucceeded it. The Tower of Babel, which does not appear to have been deftroyed or rebuilt, was in the centre of Babylon, fquare, with feven or eight towers rifing above each other, narrowing in proportion to the height; had a pyramidal appearance, and is called by Strabo, xvi. Ilugaμs; Telpaywvos. Every Indian pagoda on both fides of the Ganges is of a pyramidal form. Thofe of Deogur, which exhibit the earliest flage of Hindoo architecture, are fimple pyramids without any light whatever within. The Shoomadoo, or great temple of Pegu, is pyramidal, compofed of brick, and without excavation or aperture of any fort. The fame form is obfervable in the Egyptian pyramids, which were fepulchres, as that of Bel. Confidering the Chaldeans were inventors of aftrology, which is the principal fiudy both of Indians and Chinefe, and other adfcititious circumtances, we are led to refer this form and name to Chaldea, in whofe language, as well as in Hebrew, amud fignifies a column; and, as it imitated fire, the Greeks made it pyr-amis, after the Greek pyramid, as Bel was the Sun. Babylon in Egypt was a colony of that in Chaidea, and the pyramids and obelifks stood quite near to it.

Chap. IV. on " Writing" brings the matter to iflue, when to our great mortification we find, that Democritus compofed a book, Пp Twy ev Baby orgar ypaμmalar, On the fucred letters

fed at Babylon, which book is LOST in the wreck of time," and no antient author has left us any information refpecting the nature, form, and fhape of thefe letters:" the more fcope, therefore, for the fagacity and penetration of an indefatigable linguift. "But a writing has at length been found different from the fquare Chaldaic, ftill ufed among the Jews, and found at Palmyra from the Cuthean or Samaritan, the Etranghelo or antient Syriac, alfo called Chaldaic, and the Sabean, otherwife called Mendæan or Nabathæo-Chaldaic; in fhape refembling none of the characters hitherto difcovered, excepting thofe feen in the celebrated ruins of Chehilminar. And though the Babylonian feem to have at top a fhape fomewhat different from the Perfepolitan, this is to be afcribed only to the different workmanship, or different fiyle of writing, as is the cafe in different countries and at different periods. Thus we may fee the fame Perfian character as reprefentel 100 years ago by Herbert, who had no knowledge of our Babylonic ones, exactly nail-headed like them; and antient gems and cylinders found in Perfia exhibit nail-headed characters exacily of the fame kind. The reafon why the Affyrians ufed characters shaped like nails may have been arbitrary. The Romans and Etrurians ufed to drive a nail annually into their temples. Moft of the Roman characters feem to be a mere compound of nails; and, though fome of them appear to have a rounder fhape, we find, that the Greek and Etrufcan alphabets whence they were derived, and which exhibit a more jutt and original form, were all pointed, and acquired roundness only in the courfe of time." (37-40.) 66 That the moft antient characters of Perfia refembled nails has been already feen; and that they were derived from Babylon is proved, not only by the greater antiquity and culture of the Chaldeans, but alfo by the teftimony of Themistocles, noticed by profeffors Tychten and Munter in their recent diflertation on the Perfepolitan inferiptions, and before them by Niebuhr in his defcription of the ruins of Chehilminar, where this traveller very judiciously remarks, that the nail-headed characters to be met with in Perfia are perhaps the more antient Affyrian letiers of which Themificcies fpeaks. Or if the authen

infcribed the most antient learning on columns. Demofthenes mentions a law of Thefeus on a pillar of ftone; and if the Babylonians had no tone pillars, they must have pillars of brick, for Democritus is faid to have tranfcribed his moral difcourfes from a Babylonifh pillar; and Jofephust fpeaks of the defcendants of Seth, before the Flood, erecting pillars of fione and brick. From thefe and other inftances we may infer, that the writing was perpendi cular rather than horizontal among

the

ticity of these letters should be rejected, we have the teftimony of Herodotus about Darius Hyftafpes making ufe of Affyrian characters; and that of St. Epiphanius, that most of the Perfians, even in his time, befides their own letters, employed characters borrowed from the neighbouring country of Syria (Xewilas yap of who I powy la Περσικά τοιχεία και τω Συ ω γραμμαι, Hæres, 76). Even the Indian devanaguri or oldeft Sanferit characters are manifeftly compounded of nail-headed perpendicular ftrokes. Such are thofe Egyptians, Chinese, and Ethiopians. in the infcriptions in the ruins of Ma- That the Babylonian bricks are to be habalipuram, at Ellora, Ekeoira, and read fo appears from gems, and that Salfette, and that near Buddal. What the heads of the nails ought to be upI here affert is confirmed by the antient permoft. Euftathius ad II. v. fays, the Tibetan, ftyled Uchen, in which the antient Greeks wrote perpendicularly, facred writings of Tibet are preferved; fo do the Syrians ftill; alfo the Monthe ground of all which, except one or gols and Tartars. The Perfians, in two, is an upright line with a nail- changing the perpendicular polition of headed top. Thefe tops the modern the Babylonian nail character into a Indians, it feems, have lengthened or horizontal one, feem to have adopted increafed fo far, that they touch each the moft natural way in doing fo, for other. The Samaritan letters on fome the heads of the horizontal nails are coins have a kind of nail-headed tops. all to the left. Thefe Babylonian chaThe Eftranghelo or Syriac fquare characters are not alphabetic letters, for racter may perhaps alfo have been compofed of nails placed in different directions. Among thefe that is remarkable, for it is to be found exactly of the fame form in the Babylonic infcriptions, and perfectly agrees with the daleth of the Samaritan and Pho nician alphabets. The Abyflinians, the Kuzuri or antient characters of Georgia, and the Runic, all appear

nail-headed. (36—45.)

The materials of which the tower of Babel, the temple of Belus, and all the public buildings in Babylon, were conructed, were bricks, like thofe under confideration; and Pliny fays, "bricks were ufed at Babylon for preferving af tronomical obfervations t." Niebuhr fays, he found inferiptions legible after 6 or 700 years; and that the Babylonian aftronomers, in all probability, infcribed on bricks fuch obfervations only as they withed to be preferved from alteration by copyifts, or from the injuries of time. Joshua wrote the law of Mofes on flones. The Egyptians

* As has been completely done in the laft edition of Dr. Bentley on Phalaris, 1777, P. 391. EDIT.

+ Epigenes apud Babylonios DCCXX. annorum obfervationes fiderum coctilibus Jaterculis infcriptas docet, gravis auctor inprimis. N. A. vii. 57

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then the fame forins muft foon recur; but groups compofed of abundance of nails, like the various ftrokes in the Chinese characters, all different from each other, and different from the Perfepolitan inferiptions, which being more fimplified, the fame characters frequently recur. The Doctor is of opinion, that before the writing of ded into fyllables, words were exwords was fo fimplified as to be diviprefled, not by hieroglyphicks only, which may exprefs whole fentences though often obfcure, but by fome arbitrary fign, figure, or character, deftined to exprefs complete words, and which he therefore calls monograms.

"The characters on the Babylonian bricks being then according to my opinion fach mon grains, formed and combined by an arbitrary inflitution, and defigned to exprefs not letters or fyllables, but either whole fentences or whole words, it is evident, that no other refource remains for us at pre

* Clemens Alex. Strom. I. Diogenes Laertius fays, he went to the Egyptian priests to learn geometry, and to Perfia, Chaldæa, and the Red Sea; and that he wrote of the facred letters, probably what we now call hieroglyphicks, at Meroe, as well as thofe in Babylon; a Hillory of Chaldæa, Xardwunos dyes. † Antiq. I. 3.

fent,

fent, except by means of a greater quantity of fuch characters to employ the art of combination, ard thus to decypher their meaning, (which we fhall be better able to do when more copious materials fhall be procured, from the Eaft by the liberality of the honourable East India Company;) or, til thefe are obtained, to judge by well-founded reafoning what they may probably contain.” (p. 56.) By following the latter method I fhill endeavour to prove, that thefe infcriptions are ordinary inferiptions on bricks, as was ufual among other nations. We not only find the fame inferiptions on almoft all, but we fee the greater part of the furface is left vacant, which would hardly be the cafe if they contained aftronomical obfervations, or other remarkable cvents. One indeed differs from the reft, but it contains only a narrow impreffion, as is ufual in works of pottery. Now Beauchamp has obferved, that the bricks of each quarter among the extenfive ruins of Babylon had a peculiar impreflion, though all thofe of the fame quarter iefembled each other. Another of thefe bricks differed only in a very trifle from the rell. The inferiptions are also as common on the bricks buried in the walls, as on thofe on the outfide. M. de Sacy wrote to me from Paris, that thofe fent thither are quite different from thofe I fent impreflions pf. If I receive any others, I fhall prefent them as a fupplement to this work." (p. 56-60.)

4, are very

The refult of this difcuffion is: 1, that the nail-headed characters found in Perfia are real characters; 2, ufed not only there, but in Babylonia and Chaldæa; 3, not derived from Perfia but Babylon, and therefore ought in future to be called rather Babylonian; likely the fhered fetters of Babylon, on which Democritus wrote; 5, that they were the Chaldaic cha racters mentioned by the Antients, rather than the fquare Chaldaic now ufed by the Jews; their being found on common bricks is of little moment, for the Egyptian hieroglyphicks occur on monuments of every kind; 6, that feVeral other alphabets of other nations feem to have been originally derived from Babylon, where, 7, there exifted 2000 years ago a perpendicular monogrammatic writing; 8, that the Perfcpolitan infeription ought not to be read perpendicularly; but, when fa fituated

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round the windows or door of the lace of Iftakar, they are like the legend of a medal; 9, that the nail-headed characters, of which they are compofed, are of another combination, different from the Babylonian, to be read horizontally only, and from left 19 right." (p. 61–62.)

It is impoflible not to be pleafed with the fund of learning difplayed in this concife fyftem of Babylonian antiquities, or to refrain from admiration; that, while the veftiges of the language derived from that antient capital, and applied probably to fome hiftoric or other beiter purpofe in the capital of a later nation (Perfia), fhould exift at prefent, it may be only in the ordinary purpose of brickmakers marks, expreffing perhaps the number of the clamp, the name of the maker, or the fale of materials delivered. Sic tranfit gloria mundi! "Is this proud Babylon which they have built ?"

2.

An Hiftory of the Parish of Whalley and Honor of Clitheroe, in the Counties of Lancatter and York. By Thomas Durham Whitaker, LL. D. Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries. Blackburn, 1801.

WE view with approbation another candidate for topographical fanic exemplifying by his own exertions, that

Topography has charms for a writer, and thofe too refulting even from her want of dignity and of diftance: to exalt fcenes of daily obfervation into fubjets of literary enquiry, to account for firiking but obfcure appearances in his own vicinity; to reconcile apparent contradictions in antient dates or facts of which the objects are familiar; to trace fome neighbouring work of antient art, which is now magnificent in decay, to its perfection or commencement; to compare fome great revolu tion of a kingdom with its effects upon private property, provincial dialect, or dometic manners to develope the progrefs of parochial endowments in which himself has an intereft; to trace the origin and alliances, the advancement or decline of families with which he is connected; and to combine them all with objects endeared by early has hits and long aflociation; cannot but afford a mingled exercife to the powers of reafon and fancy, of observation and memory, gratifying in an high de

* Who claims relationship to a fifter of Dean Nowell, p. 227.

gree

gree to the topographical writer." Convinced that the lighteft effufions of a ferious mind ought to be directed to the ufe of edifying, and while hiftories and novels, the most popular in their nature, and the moft extenfive in their circulation, were daily illuing from a licentious prefs, as the vehicle of impiety and fedition, he does not wish to diflemble that he entered upon the prefent work with a deliberate purpote, which the enfuing pages, it is hoped, will prove that he has not forgotten, of giving a contrary and perhaps a new direction to Topography, that is, of vindicating the prelent conftitution of England, and of ferving the interefts of religion, by the occafional introduction of fuch remarks as appeared to arife out of the fubject."

of

The Hiftory of Whalley-is traced from the British and Romau periods; in which, however, the author has been foreftalled by a writer, who, to all the ftores of erudition, adds an ardour of fpirit which no difficulties can difcourage, a penetration which no obfcurity can baffle, and a fplendour, vet perhaps a wildnefs, of imagination, which, if it throws over the page hiftorical antiquity fomewhat of the air of romance, feldom fails to delight where it is impoflible that it thould CORvince. And if the calmn invefiigation of facts and appearances, however, fometimes led the Tittorian of Whalley to differ very widely in his conclufions from the Hiftorian of Manchefter; if, in particular, after much reflection, he has been compelled to reject the authority of an Itinerary, which, as it feconded the great Antiquary's impetuous fpirit of topographical difcovery, was adopted by him with too little inveftigation of the evidence on which it refted; he has endeavoured at leaft to bear in mind, that the eccentricities of genius, like the extravagances of virfire, are to be touched with a tender and refpectful hand."

Foremost in his lift of obligations ftand the 16 folio volumes of Collections, containing not fewer than 20,000 original charters, made by Chriftopher, fon of Richard Townley, efq. and now in the library of Charles T. efq. of T. in pursuance of a great plan, carried on in concert with his illuftrious friends Dugdale and Dodfworth, in the troublefome times of the Jaft century, the tranfeript of the now left chartulary of Whalley abbey in

Lord Curzon's poffeffion, and various other Collections, enumerated in his Preface, p. vi. In afliftance fo flattering in materials,. fo copious and original, a compiler may be allowed to take pleafure; yet this fenfation is far from being unmixed; for, with advantages fuch as have fallen perhaps to the lot of few topographers, he is appalled by the reflection, that his own refponfibility is increafed in proportion; and having feen few objects through the obfcure and diftorting medium of printed books; having written in ge neral with original charters before him." and, where they failed, having always been able to avail himself of correct and authentic tranferipts; he feels how feldom the charge of incorrectnels can be transferred to careless epitomizers or unfaithful reporters of antient evidence who have gone before him. Even in thefe lighter exercifes of the underfianding fo much is due to the fanctity of truth, that, where no other poffible evil can follow from misleading, a dealer in probabilities ought to make it a matter of confcience never to mif

lead." (p. v.)

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With thefe ingenuous profeflions in our view, we follow the author in the detail of his labour.

Book I. chap. I. treats briefly of the Roman history, and afcertains the tract occupied by the Sciantü, and that the Belifama of Ptolomy was the Rible. and not, as Mr. Whitaker determined, the Merfey; and the credit of Richard of Cirencester is reduced to that of a modern Antiquary, and the Monk of Ravenna a better guide. Ribchefter is the Roman ftation Coccium, or Rigo dunum, and has many confiderable marks of antiquity in inferiptions, &c. When Leland vifited it, "there was a place where the people fabled the Jues had a temple." There is the fame tradition at Leicester, and probably from the fame caufe. Two inferiptions in Horsley and the last edition of Camden feem wanting here. The Watling-fireet proceeds from Ribchelter to Coin and Caftercliff (Colunium), and in another direction to Cafleshaw (Cambodunum). Coln feems to have been populous in the Roman times; and many of their coins have been found thereabouts. A road from Mancimum to Ilkley (Olicang) paffed thro Whalley parith; and pointing to Cambodunum there joined a road from thence to Ilkeley. At the foot of

Blackstone

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