[43]. They had only the club and buckler.
[44]. Nennius lived in the ninth century, and is said to have left behind him several treatises, of which all that has been published is the history, which was printed for the first time in Dr. Gale’s Collection of British Historians, published at Oxford in 1687 and 1691, in 2 vols. folio. Leland mentions an ancient copy of Nennius’s history, which he says he borrowed from Thomas Solme, Secretary for the French language to king Henry the eighth, in the margin of which were the additions of Sam. Beaulanius, or Britannus. He has transcribed several of these marginal annotations, which as it appears, were afterwards inserted in the body of the history, and were printed in that manner by Dr. Gale. The Doctor in his notes, mentions Beaulanius as the Scholiast on the copy which he used, but Leland has a great many other things, as extracts out of Beaulanius, which Dr. Gale does not mention to be only in the Scholion. There is also in the Bodleian Library a manuscript of Nennius apparently nearly 600 years old, in which the prefaces and all the interpolations, which Leland says are by Beaulanius, are wanting.
Professor Bertram, of Copenhagen, published in the year 1757, “Britannicarum gentium Historiæ Antiquæ Scriptores tres; Ricardus Corinensis, Gildas Badonicus, Nennius Banchorensis: recensuit, notisque et indice auxit Carolus Bertramus, S. A. Lond. Soc. &c. Havniæ, 1757.” 8vo. The Professor followed Dr. Gale’s edition of Gildas and Nennius, but in the latter he has distinguished the interpolations of Beaulanius from the genuine text. Mr. Gough, (Brit. Topogr. vol. 1. p. 15.) mentions Mr. Evan Evans having been long preparing a new edition of Nennius, from the Bodleian and other manuscripts.
[45]. Cambrian Register, 1795, p. 947.
[46]. In 1670, Milton published his History of England, comprising the whole fable of Geoffrey, and continued to the Norman Invasion. Why he should have given the first part, which he seems not to have believed, and which is universally rejected, it is difficult to conjecture. The style is harsh, but it has something of rough vigour, which perhaps may often strike, though it cannot please. On this history, the licenser fixed his claws, and before he would transmit it to the press, tore out several parts. Some censures of the Saxon Monks were taken away, lest they should be applied to the modern Clergy; and a character of the Long Parliament and Assembly of Divines, was excluded; of which the Author gave a copy to the Earl of Anglesea, and which being afterwards published, has been since inserted in its proper place.—Johnson’s Lives of the Poets, Art. Milton.
[47]. Parkhurst’s Heb. Lex. 271.
[48]. The practice of tattooing is of great antiquity, and has been common to numerous nations in Turkey, Asia, the Southern parts of Europe, and perhaps to a great portion of the inhabitants of the earth. It is still retained among some of the Moorish tribes, who are, probably, descendants of those who, formerly, were subjected to the Christians of Africa, and who to avoid paying taxes, like the Moors, thus imprinted crosses upon their skins, that they might pass for Christians. This custom, which originally might serve to distinguish tribes by their religion, or from each other, became afterwards a mode of decoration that was habitually retained, when all remembrance of its origin was effaced.
It may be inferred that the Canaanites and the other nations of the East, were in the habit of tattooing their skins, because Moses, (Levit. xix, 28.) expressly enjoins the Israelites not to imprint any marks upon their bodies, in imitation of the heathens.
The ancient inhabitants of the British Islands, painted their skins in various grotesque figures, with the juice of woad. This custom of tattooing was in use both by the Britons and their first invaders, the Belgæ, and I believe it will be found, that the warriors of all those nations which practised tattooing, invariably threw off their garments in the hour of battle. The name of Picts, is said, though erroneously, to have been given by the Romans to the Caledonians, who possessed the East coast of Scotland, from their painting their bodies. This circumstance has made some imagine that the Picts were of British extraction, and a different race of men from the Scots. That more of the Britons who fled northward, from the oppression and tyranny of the Romans, settled in the low lands of Scotland, than among the Scots of the mountains, may be easily imagined, from the very nature of the country. It was these people who introduced painting among the Picts, From this circumstance, some antiquaries affirm, proceeded the name of the latter, to distinguish them from the Scots, who never had that art among them, and from the Britons, who discontinued the practice of tattooing after the Roman conquest.
The inhabitants of the South Sea Islands, at this day, paint upon their bodies various grotesque figures, for the purpose of striking terror into their enemies, in the day of battle. J. S.