fore OCHIRIS or OSIRIS, is le fils de foleil par excellence, the fon of the Sun. And here occurs another old Irish word Chris and Chreafan, i. e. holy, facred. Crifean, i. e. Sagart, (Vet. Gloss.) i. e. Crifean is the fame as Sagart, a Prieft. I take this name to have been given to the Druid in his holy office of facrificing to the fun; it has also a great affinity to Kreefbno, the name of a Hindoo deity. (See Halhead's grammar of the Bengal Language, page 20.) And according to Gori, Cerus in the Etrufcan Language, fignifies facred: Did we ever hear of a Mac-Morgan or an OGriffith? Was O, or Mac, a common name with the Gauls or Welsh Britons? How came the Erfe and Irish by these oriental appellations? or by the Egyptian Ifis the moon, in Irish Eas, and Easconn the full moon.

The next colony recorded in the Irish history, are faid to be the Cruiti, or Cruitni or Peacti. "As a bhfhlathamhnas Eiremoin tangadur Cruitnith no Peacti, fluagh do thriall on Tracia go Eirinn," i. e. in the reign of Eremon, the Cruiti or Cruitni or Peacti, migrated from Thrace to Ireland,-to which Keating adds," according to the Pfalter of Cafhel, written by Cormac, the reafon of this migration, was, that Polycornus the tyrant and king of Thrace, refolved to feize upon the only daughter of Gud, a chief of the Peacti. Herodotus places the Pactyæ and Crithoti in Thracia Cherfoneffus. Thrace, Samos and Crete, had been peopled by Phoenicians, Pelafgians and Etrufcans; Polycrates the tyrant, (preVOL. IV. No. XIII.

C

bably

bably mistaken by Cormac for Polycornus) drove the Samarians to Crete, and purfued them from thence to different places, and at length fays Eufebius, they retired to Italy.

The Greeks were chiefly indebted to the Thracians for the polite arts that flourished among them. Orpheus, Linus, Mufæus, Thamyris and Eumolpus, all Thracians, were the firft, as Euftathius informs us, who charmed the inhabitants of Greece with their eloquence and melody, and perfuaded them to exchange their fiercenefs for a fociable life and peaceful manners; nay, great part of Greece was antiently peopled by Thracians. Tercus, a Thracian, governed at Daulis in Phocis; from thence a body of Thracians paffed over to Eubæa, and poffeffed themselves of that Ifland. Of the fame nation were the Aones, Tembices, and Hyanthians, who made themselves mafters of Baotia; in fine, great part of Attica itself, was inhabited by Thracians. But tho' the Greeks knew they were fo chiefly indebted to them both for the peopling and polishing of their country, they have with the utmost ingratitude and injuftice, ftyled them Barbarians. word that originally only implied foreigners, from the Phænician bar, and Irifh bara, wandering, of another nation, dehors. *

βαρβαρος α

Thefe

There are many places in Ireland apparently named by this Thracian Colony, after others in antient Thrace, fuch are,

Thefe Peacti or Pactyæ, are not the Picti or woad painted Britons, (the Welsh) defcribed by Cæfar. They are diftinguifhed by the Scots by the name of Peacti, a word that founds exactly the fame as Pactyæ. The Thracians were remarkable for branding their foreheads and arms, but never painted their bodies. Tracam, in Irish, is to brand with a hot iron, and probably was the origin of the name, and not from Thiras, as Bochart after Jofephus imagines; and perhaps Thirax, mentioned Gen. x. 2. to be the youngest fon of Japhet, was fo called from inftituting the custom of branding.—

-Membraque qui ferro gaudet pinxiffe, Gelonus. Says Claudian.

ent.

And,

Inde Caledonio velata Britannia monftro

Ferro picta genas ;

The custom of fealing or branding was very antiGod from the beginning, gave his people

And a hundred others, may be drawn from the fame fountain head, and in other parts, the names of many places of antient Etruria are to be found.

typical things and actions, which he called figns; and fome facraments which appear to have been termed feals and fignets. St. Paul calls the circumcifion of Abraham, a feal of righteousness, (Rom. iv. 11.) In the fame epiftle he exhorts,-" Grieve not the holy spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption." Ifai. xlix. 16. "Behold I have graven thee upon the palms of my hands." Exod. xiii. 9. " And it fhall be for a fign unto thee upon thine hand, and for a memorial between thine eyes." But, befides these public or ecclefiaftical feals, each man (or nation) had his private feal for a counterpart, or correfpondent Hieroglyphic to the faid public ones; to testify for him, in all his public arts, whofe fervant and fpiritual child he was. This, among other facred ufages and rites, the first apoftates to heathenifm carried off with them, perverting and abufing the fame, to the last degree of infatuation. For, they had not only their figns which were yάuala » dn 9, images and emblems of their Gods, in their feals, drinking cups, military ftandards, and many other things; but, they themselves were ordinarily confecrated to their Gods, by burning or branding fome name, mark, emblem (apnuo fignature) or number of their faid Gods, in their own flesh, on their hands, necks, foreheads, and other parts. Thus Ptolemy Philopater, was furnamed Γάλλος διὰ τὸ φύλλα κισσί xaтssia, because he was ftigmatized in his body with ivy leaves, the emblematical mark of Bacchus : The votaries of the Sun were marked with the numeral

meral letters XII. for the number 608, which was the Sun's number. *

Whence also, the beast in the Revelation, is faid to cause all, both fmall and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their hand, and in their forehead. So idolaters in general, marked themselves in their skin and flefh for the devils votaries. To oppofe this abomination, God forbad his people to print any marks in their flesh, (Lev. ix. 27). So in Revelations xiv. 10. If any man worship the beaft and his image, and receive his mark in his forehead or in his hand, the fame fhall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, and shall be tormented with fire and brimstone."

יטרר

Herodotus and Strabo, having noticed that the Thracians followed this cuftom to excefs, I have ventured my opinion, that they might have been fo called from tracam, to brand, a word in the antient language, fiill preferved in the Irish; at the fame time I acknowledge, that the Hebrew words trak impellere violenter, taruk,exul, tarcon expellere,dakis expulfio, pina & phinah, expellere, ghalal expellere, tuathath, expulfus; Athak; & nathak (in the Chaldee,) extirpare, expellere, feem more rationally to be the origins of the names given by the Hebrews to the Tracians, Turks, Dacii, Pæni or Phoni, Phœnicians, Galli & Gallati; and probably to our Tuath-Dodonians, and our Attach-tuath and Attaccotti; for it is evident from holy writ, that all these nations or people, foon after the flood, had drawn the wrath of God upon them, and were told, that

Halloway's Originals, Phyfical and Theological.

the