According to the fable, Zeus gave his daughter, Thēbê, two black doves endowed with the gift of human speech; one of them flew into Libya, and the other into Dodona. The former gave the responses in the temple of Ammon, and the latter in the oracle of Dodona.
... beach or lime,
Or that Thessalian growth,
In which the swarthy ringdove sat,
And mystic sentence spoke.
Tennyson.
Ringhorse (Sir Robert), a magistrate at Old St. Ronan’s.—Sir W. Scott, St. Ronan’s Well (time, George III.).
Ringwood, a young Templar.—Sir W. Scott, Fortunes of Nigel (time, James I.).
Rintherout (Jenny), a servant at Monkbarns to Mr. Jonathan Oldbuck, the antiquary.—Sir W. Scott, The Antiquary (time, George III.).
Riou (Captain), called by Nelson “The Gallant and the Good;” fell in the battle of the Baltic.
Brave hearts! to Britain’s pride
Once so faithful and so true,
On the deck of fame that died,
With the gallant, good Riou.
Campbell, Battle of the Baltic (1777-1844).
Rip van Winkle slept twenty years in the Catskill Mountains, of North America. (See Winkle.)
Epimenĭdês, the Gnostic, slept for fifty-seven years.
Gyneth slept 500 years, by the enchantment of Merlin.