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The Parian Chronicle was engraved on a coarse kind of mar

Selden viewed it,
The top was im-

ble, or stone, five inches thick, which, when at first measured 3 feet 7 inches by 2 feet 7. perfect, the lower corner on the right hand having been broken off, and the right-side measured only 2 feet 11 inches. It contained, at that time, ninety-three lines, reckoning the imperfect ones, and might originally, perhaps, have contained a hundred.

Upon an average, the lines consist of 130 letters, all capitals, in close continuation, unbroken into words, like the oldest Greek manuscripts: the ancient curtailed form of the Pi, I', is observed; the prostrate Eta, , is used for the Zeta; and there are some smaller capitals, particularly the Omicron, Omega, and Theta, intermixed with the larger; and the whole possesses that plainness and simplicity, which are among the surest marks of antiquity, bearing a general resemblance, but not a servile imitation, of the most authentic monuments about the same date; of which, perhaps, it most nearly resembles the Marmor Cyzicenum, at Venice, in the forms of the letters. See a fac-simile of the characters, and of the stone itself, in Hewlett's Vindication, p. 50.

The following is a specimen of the mode of writing:

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The same, in modern Greek letters, divided into words, and the lacunæ supplied:

̓Αφ ̓ οὗ οἱ [Ελλην]ες εις Τροιαν ε[στρ]ατευσ [αντο] ετη DCCCCLIV· βασιλευοντος Αθη[νων Μεν]εσθεως τρεις και δεκατου έτους. Αφ' οὗ Τροια ήλω ετη DCCCCXLV, βασιλεύοντος Αθηνων [Μενεσθε]ως, δευτέρου έτους, μηνος Θ[αργηλιω]νος ἑβδομη φθίνοντος.

The mode of numeration employed in the Chronicle, of expressing the dates of events by the initial letters of the words denoting the numbers, I, denoting as, one, anciently written is; II, TEVTE, five; A, SEкa, ten; H, the aspirate, in Kaтov, one hundred; and by combination IA', or II multiplied by A, fifty; IHI, or II multiplied by H, five hundred; which is not found in the most ancient books and manuscripts, is one of the most certain and unequivocal marks of its antiquity, and also of its country, then subject to the Athenians: for it was an Attic mode of numeration used in Solon's time, and is mentioned only perhaps by Herodian, who represents it as obsolete, in his little treatise Tepi apie " of numeration," of which a fragment is preserved in the fourth volume of Stephens's Greek Thesaurus, p. 205-208.

66

13

See Hewlett, p. 46, and his answers to some Critical Strictures, p. 7, 8.

The author of four dissertations subjoined to the Septuagint version of Daniel, printed at Rome, in 1772, ascribes the Parian Chronicle to Demetrius Phalereus, as its author. The name is unluckily defaced at the beginning of the inscription, and he thus ingeniously supplies the lacunæ :

[Δημητριος ὁ Φανοστρατ] ου [Φαληρεύς, εκ των συμπαν[των ὑπαρχοντ]ων [χρο]νων ανεγραψα, &c.

It is true, indeed, that the classical purity of the style, the great variety of minute and miscellaneous information, in so short a compass, not only respecting the principal facts in some of the most important eras of Greece, but also marking the progress of civilization and science, by fixing the dates of the most eminent legislators, poets, and philosophers, all evince considerable learning and research, and local knowledge, in the compiler of the Chronicle, joined to the labour and expense of the engraving, which evidently prove that he could neither have been a mean nor illiterate individual, but rather some citizen, distinguished for his fortune and talents; yet it is not probable, that Demetrius, however the description may suit him in other respects, was the author, from the mention of Astyanax, the Parian Archon, as observed before, which, though highly proper, if the Chronicle was the production of a native, would surely be irrelevant, were he an Athenian himself, or governor of Athens. And Paros was one of the most flourishing and opulent of the Cyclades, and therefore likely to possess such citizens.

And, indeed, the most rational solution, perhaps, of the silence of subsequent classical writers respecting this curious Chronicle, (which is the principal argument urged to impeach its genuineness) may be derived from its insular and secluded situation. Even the Smyrnæan league itself, though a public record of considerable notoriety and importance in history, is equally unnoticed by subsequent historians, and yet its authenticity is unquestioned.

The inscription in general, so far as is legible, may be considered as accurately engraved, which is no slight recommendation of its merit and utility, considering the difficulty of the task. Still, however, it exhibits occasional errors: such, probably, are those usually reputed archaisms, of εγ, for ev oι εκ; εμ for εν;

αμ for αν ; τομ for τον; τημ for την, &c. because these words are in general written correctly; and in the foregoing specimen, epoch 25, there is a gross omission of EKOσTOV кaι, before SεvTEρOV; because Troy was taken, not in the "second," but in "the twenty-second year of the reign of Menestheus," as is evident from the preceding paragraph, which dates the expedition against Troy "in the thirteenth year of his reign." This latter clause is also erroneously introduced again verbatim in Selden's edition of the inscription, epoch 28. It is true, Chandler proposes a different conjectural reading of the clause; namely, Basiλevovtos Αθηνων Μέδοντος τρεις και δεκατου έτους, substituting the perpetual Archon Medon for Menestheus; but this is inadmissible: for, 1. He could have no access to the marble itself for revision,, which, since Selden's time, has been destroyed and lost, as low down as epoch 31. 2. By the ensuing rectification of the heroic period of the Chronicle, it appears that the 28th epoch corresponded to the eighth year of Acastus.

CONSTRUCTION OF THE CHRONICLE.

From the foregoing specimen, epoch 24 and 25, it is obvious, that the Chronicle was constructed upon two distinct and independent principles of computation. The former Analytic, reckoning upwards from B.C. 264, the fixed date or radix, at the bottom; the latter Synthetic, reckoning downwards from the reign of Cecrops, through the succeeding kings, and perpetual, decennial, and annual Archons. The former was an ingenious and compendious mode of reckoning, by adding to the fixed date, successively, supplemental numbers, expressed shortly by numeral letters. This was, probably, the invention of the compiler of the Chronicle, to save labour and expense in engraving it. The other, however, was the original mode employed by the authors from whose works the Chronicle was taken. And that this was the compiler's design, is evident from the omission of the years of each reign, for the most part, which, in the present epochs, so fortunately preserved, are expressed in words at full length, and took up much room.

It is observable, and has been remarked by Selden, and by all the editors of the Chronicle, that there is a difference of about 25 years between the two methods of computation; and that this difference is not accidental, but designed, running uniformly

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