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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 24 July 2012
The remark which I had the honour to make to your Lordship, that the late Mr. Hearne, when he liked his author, would follow him implicitly, without giving himself any trouble to examine into the truth of his assertion, I am now going to verify, by producing, what I think, a very palpable instance.
page 68 note [a] Lisle's Pref. to the Treatise of Ælfricus Abbas, § 14.
page 68 note [b] Annot. on Sir John Spelman's Life of Ælfred, p. 213.
page 69 note [c] Ælfred did not in fact translate the whole Bible; for to go no farther, see Archbp. Usher's Historia Dogmatica.
page 69 note [d] See Mr. Hearne, loc. cit. where he seems to concur with Mr. Lisle, even in this.—If these copies had been remaining at the Reformation, most of them would appear now; for Archbishop Parker, and others, made diligent search after them, along with other Saxon MSS. and yet no more than two at most could be found. See Hickes's Thes. iii. p. 71. for one of these is supposed not to be a cathedral copy, but rather to be designed for a Thane. Ibid. p. 217. Bishop Lyttelton.
page 69 note [e] See the Series of Dissertations on some Anglo-Saxon Remains.
page 70 note [f] Mr. Wise ad Asser. Menev. p. 166.
page 70 note [g] It had been printed before by archbishop Parker, as it has since been published by Mr. Wise, in his edition of Asser. Menev. p. 86. who likewise tells us, p. 174, that the MS. copies of it are numerous, and gives some various readings.
page 70 note [h] Appendix to Latin Translation of Sir John Spelman s Life of Ælfred, p. 197.
page 71 note [i] Mr. Wise thinks the Stylus was chiefly for the use of the master or teacher, to whom it might be subservient in a double capacity; that is, both for writing and by way of an indicatorium or festuca. This is certainly very probable; and supposing these books to have been written with a pen, the latter use accounts very well for their being accompanied by a stylus.
page 71 note [k] See Mr. Wise ad Asser. Menev. p. 176. Dr. Lister, in his Journey to Paris, p. 118, tells us, he saw in the abby of St. Germains, and in the King's Library, some codicils, or waxen table books of the Antients, and observes, that “by the letter, (for he could read here and there a word) it was manifest they were in use much later than he could have imagined.”
page 71 note [l] Somner and Benson's Dictionaries, and Mr. Wise. As it signifies manubrium sive ansa according to some, from hence Mr. Wise thinks, comes our north country word the steel or handle of a thing. Mr. Lye, however, deduces this from the Belgick stele and the Saxon 
.
page 72 note [m] Montfaucon, in opposition to Chifflet, cited by Mr. Wise, esteems this jewel of Childeric to be a buckle rather than a stylus.
page 72 note [n] Spelman's Life of Ælfred, p, 109.
page 72 note [o] Skelton calls it a golden pearl, from the shape, p. 19. and Appendix, p. 204. where he objects to the word jewel; but without grounds; for jewel was a very extensive term. The figure in the obverse is composed of gold lines, the interstices whereof are enamel; this is covered with a glass or crystal, and all the rest is gold.
page 72 note [p] Tom. I. p. 142. It is also engraved in the Philosophical Transactions; see Lowthorp's abridgement, v. III. p. 441: by Dr. Musgrave in his works, with a dissertation: by Dr. Wotton, in his Conspectus Hickesii Thesauri, § 18; by Bishop Gibson in Camden, col. 75; by Mr. Skelton, in his translation of Wotton, p. 19: and by Mr. Wise, in Addend. to his neat edition of Asser Menev. p. 171, who informs us, it is now in the Ashmolean Museum, at Oxford, where probably your Lordship has seen it. Robert Harley, afterwards earl of Oxford, caused the obverse to be engraved for Dr. Hickes, from a drawing made by himself, a circumstance which I mention because Skelton omits it in his note, p. 19, which he ought not to have done.
page 73 note [q] Dr. Musgrave once thought it might be an Amulet; but Ælfred never ran, that we know of, into such vanities. Dr. Hickes thought it might be the head of our Saviour (and Dr. Musgrave afterwards came into the same opinion), or of the pope that consecrated this king in his youth. He imagined afterwards, the King might wear it on his breast as a constant memorial of St. Cuthbert, whose head he supposes to be represented upon it, and who, after he had appeared to him, was probably his patron-saint. Lowthorpe's abridgement, and Dr. Hickes' preface, p. 8. Mr. Wise objects to its being either the head of Christ, or St. Cuthbert, on account of the military habit, and the helmet; and proposes it to consideration whether it may not be the head of Ælfred himself; a conjecture, in my opinion, highly plausible.
page 73 note [r] Wotton and Shelton give it HEIT and 
; but is evidently HEHT, from 
or 
, jubere.
page 74 note [s] In this case what the doctors Hickes and Musgrave, supposing it to be suspended and worn upon the breast, call the Apex, will be on the contrary the bottom or lower part.
page 74 note [t] Wise, p. 174, 175.
page 74 note [u] The copy mentioned, Hickes Thes. iii. p. 217, not having been sent, could not be that which was presented to Athelney, but must have been intended for some other place or person. Bishop Lyttelton.