INNE CAC LEF ISEF ETITVA in Irish AITITE FEISI. FEIL CAC EINNI i. e. The joyful feaft for any bounty. No. 2. Represents an altar without fire; the artist has placed a fmall blaze on the ground, to fhew the disappointment. A woman ftands by the altar with a lamb in her arms, to point out the intention of the facrifice. The fame old man and his attendant are retiring from the altar in hafte and confufion. A Druidefs leans over the altar lamenting and explaining the cause of the ill omen. Infcription in Etrufcan, is, The FRITITE. FEIS. AE. CVC. S. ITHIA. i. e. Returning unfuccefsful from the festival facrifice of the Lamb (vowed) to Holy Ithia. N. B. The Etrufcan Infcripion is to be read from right to left. VOL. IV. No. XIII. G THE PLAT E III. THIS little image of brafs, is of the fize of the drawing; it was found under the root of a tree, that was grubbed up in the County of Rofcommon; it has been gilt, but the gilding is worn off in moft places. It is in the collection of the Mufeum of Trinity College. This image has the appearance of an idol; the hands hold the corners of the beard, like the Etrufcan Silenus in Gori's collection; but, the pofition of the arms and feet have every appearance of its having been the ornament of a crucifix. The Irish Druids, like their Scythian ancestors, permitted no image worfhip. The unchifelled ftone was the emblem ufed by all antient nations. The Chinese and Indians ftill retain this ftone, though their pagodas are crowded with images, and Paufanias declares that all the antient Greeks had no other emblem of their deities. Maximus Maximus Tyrius fays, that before the time of Mahummed, the Arabians had no other; and the Mater Deorum of the Romans, was a black rough ftone. The Etrufcans claim the art of making images; they certainly learnt it of the Egyptians; but the Etrufcans were the first that formed them after nature; the Egyptians deferve no eulogium on this account, their figures are clumfy and unnatural; thofe of the antient Etrufcans are as bad; but the figures of the more modern artists of that wonderful people, are equal to the works of the most celebrated Grecian artifts. In the Gentleman's Magazine for December 1742, is an account of two filver images found under the ruins of an old tower, which had raised various conjectures and fpeculations amongst the antiquaries. They were about three inches in height, representing men in armour, with very high helmets on their heads, and ruffs round their necks, and standing on a pedestal of filver, holding a fmall golden fpear in their hands. The account is taken from the Dublin papers; the writer refers to Merrick's tranflation of Tryphiodorus, an Ægyptian (that compofed a Greek poem on the deftruction of Troy, as a fequel to Homer's Iliad) to fhew that it was cuftomary with the antients, at the foundation of a fort or city, to confecrate fuch images to fome tutelar guardians, and depofit them in a fecret part of the building; where he alfo inferts a judicious expofition of a difficult text of Scripture on that fubject. The defcription of these images correfponds exactly with the Etrufcan statues, fee Gori's Museum Etruf |