“And accordingly a gammon of bacon was delivered unto the said William Parsley, and Jane his wife, with the usual solemnity.
“Examined per Thomas Wheeler, steward. The same day a gammon was delivered to Mr. Reynolds, steward to Sir Charles Barington, of Hatfield, Broad Oak.”
The Origin of Rings in general.—The origin of rings, their matter and uses, together with the supposed virtue of the precious stones set in them, afford a subject well deserving the notice of the curious. According to the accounts of the heathen mythology, Prometheus, who in the first times had discovered a great number of secrets, having been delivered from the chains by which he was fastened to Mount Caucasus for stealing fire from heaven; in memory or acknowledgment of the favour he received from Jupiter, made himself, of one of those chains, a ring, in whose collet he represented the figure of part of the rock where he had been detained, or rather, as Pliny says, set in it a bit of the same rock, and put it on his finger. This was the first ring, and the first stone. But we otherwise learn that the use of rings is very ancient, and that the Egyptians were the first inventors of them; which seems confirmed by the history of Joseph, who, as we read in Genesis, chap. xli. for having interpreted Pharaoh’s dream, received not only his liberty, but was rewarded with this prince’s ring, and the superintendency of Egypt. Josephus, in the third book of the Jewish Antiquities, says, the Israelites had the use of them after passing the Red Sea, because Moses, on his return from Mount Sinai, found that they had forged the golden calf from their wives’ rings. The same Moses (which was upwards of four hundred years before the wars of Troy) permitted the priests to have established the use of gold rings, enriched with precious stones. The high-priest wore upon his ephod, which was a kind of camaieu, rings, that served him as clasps; a large emerald was set, and engraved with mysterious names. The ring he wore on his finger was of estimable value and celestial virtue. Had not Aaron, the high priest of the Hebrews, a ring on his finger, whereof the diamond, by its virtue, operated prodigious things? for it changed its vivid lustre into a dark colour, when the Hebrews were to be punished by death for their sins: when they were to fall by the sword, it appeared of a blood colour; if they were innocent, it sparkled as usual. It is observable, that the ancient Hebrews used rings in the time even of the war of Troy. Queen Jezebel, to destroy Nabath, as it is related in the first book of Kings, made use of the ring of Ahab, king of the Israelites, her husband, to seal the counterfeit letters that ordered the death of that unfortunate man. Did not Judah, as mentioned in the thirty-eighth chapter of Genesis, deceive his daughter-in-law Tamar, (who had disguised herself,) by giving her his ring and bracelets as a pledge of the faith he had promised her? Though Homer is silent in regard to rings both in his Iliad and Odyssey, they were, notwithstanding, used in the time of the Greeks and Trojans; and it is from them that several other nations received them. The Lacedemonians, as related by Alexander ab Alexandro, pursuant to the orders of their king Lycurgus, had only iron rings, despising those of gold; probably because their king was willing thereby to retrench luxury, and discourage the use of effeminate ornaments among his subjects, as inconsistent with the manly plainness of Spartan virtue.
The ring was reputed, by some nations, a symbol of liberality, esteem, and friendship, particularly among the Persians, none being permitted to wear any, except given to him from the king himself. This is what may also be remarked in the person of Apollonius Thyaneus, who, as a token of singular esteem and great liberality, received one from the great Jarchas, prince of the gymnosophists, who were the ancient priests of the Indies, and dwelt in forests, as our bards and Druids, where they applied themselves to the study of wisdom, and to the speculation of the heavens and stars. This philosopher, by the means of that ring, learned every day the greatest secrets in nature.
Though the ring found by Gyges, shepherd to the king of Lydia, has more of fable than truth in it, it will not, however, be amiss to relate what is said concerning Herodotus, Cælius after Plato, and Cicero, in the third book of his Offices. This Gyges, after a great flood, passed into a very deep cavity in the earth, where having found, in the belly of a brasen horse, with a large aperture in it, a human body of enormous size, he pulled from off one of the fingers, a ring of surprising virtue; for the stone on the collet rendered him who wore it invisible, when the collet was turned towards the palm of the hand; so that the party could see, without being seen, all manner of persons and things. Gyges, having made trial of its efficacy, bethought himself that it would be a means for ascending the throne of Lydia, and for gaining the queen by it. He succeeded in his designs, having killed Candaules, her husband. The dead body this ring belonged to was that of an ancient Brahmin, who in his time was chief of all. The rings of the ancients often served for seals. Alexander the Great, after the defeat and death of Darius, used his ring for sealing the letters he sent into Asia, and his own for those he sent to Europe. It was customary in Rome for the bridegroom to send the bride, before marriage, a ring of iron, without either stone or collet, to denote how lasting their union ought to be, and the frugality they were to observe together; but luxury herein soon gained ground, and there was a necessity of moderating it. Caius Marius did not wear one of gold till his third consulship: and Tiberius, as Suetonius says, made some regulation in the authority of wearing rings; for besides the liberty of birth, he required a considerable revenue, both on the father and grandfather’s side.
In the preceding dissertation we have anticipated the Matrimonial Ring, therefore our further observations need be but few.
Swinburne says, the iron ring was adorned with an adamant; the metal hard and durable, signifying the duration and prosperity of the contract. “Howbeit,” he says, “it skilleth not at this day what metal the ring be of. The form of it being found, and without end, doth import that their love should circulate and flow continually. The finger on which this ring is to be worn, is the fourth finger on the left hand, next unto the little finger, because there was supposed a vein of blood to pass from thence into the heart.”
We shall conclude this chapter with an account of an ancient custom, called Hand-Fasting.
This custom formerly took place at an annual fair, in the parish of Eskdale-muir, in Dumfriesshire, thus described by the Rev. W. Brown, in his Statistical Account of that parish: “At that fair it was the custom for the unmarried persons of both sexes, to choose companions with whom they were to live till that time next year. If they were pleased with each other at that time, then they continued together for life; if not, they separated, and were free to make another choice, as at first. The fruit of their connection, if there were any, was always attached to the disaffected person. A priest, whom they named Book-i’-bosom, (because he carried in his bosom a Bible, or a register of the marriages,) came from time to time to confirm the marriages.” Mr. Brown traces this custom from the Romans.—See Sir J. Sinclair’s Statistical Account, vol. xii. p. 615.