Christ's or Cris Cross Row (Vol. viii., p. 18.).—The Alphabet. See The Romish Beehive, 319.:

"In Bacon's Reliques of Rome, p. 257., describing the hallowing of churches, among other ceremonies is the following: 'There must be made in the pavement of the church a crosse of ashes and sand wherein the whole Alphabet, or Christ's Crosse, shall be written in Greek and Latin letters.'

"Sir Thos. More, in his Works, p. 606. H, says, 'Crosse Rowe was printed on cards for learners.' I first went to school at a dame's, and had a Horn-Book (as it was called), in which was the Alphabet in a form something like that here given, and the dame called me and other beginners to learn our 'Cris Cross Row;' at that time the term was used, that is, about seventy years since."

Goddard Johnson.

Titles to the Psalms in the Syriac Version.—Mr. T. J. Buckton (Vol. ix., p. 242.) observes, in reference to the superscription

למנצח בנגינת

‎, "For the chief performer on the neginoth," that "the Syriac and Arabic versions omit this superscription altogether, from ignorance of the musical sense of the words." And lower down he speaks as if

נחילות

‎ were expressed in the Syriac by the word "church." I do not question the accuracy of Mr. B.'s renderings of the Hebrew words, for they have been admitted for centuries; but I wish to observe that the translator of the Syriac should not be lightly charged with ignorance of Hebrew, as I can testify from an extensive acquaintance with that venerable version. I therefore cannot allow that the words were omitted by the translator for that reason. Besides, whenever he found a word untranslateable, he transferred it as it was. Nor do I admit that nehiloth, in Psalm v., is translated by the term "church." And this leads me to remark, what seems to have been overlooked by most writers, viz. that the Syriac version omits uniformly the titles of the Psalms as they are found in Hebrew[[9]]. The inscriptions contained in the common editions of these Psalms form no part of the translation. One of them refers to the destruction of Jerusalem by Titus! They are not always the same. I am acquainted with at least three different sets of these headings contained in the Syriac MSS. in the British Museum. Erpenius omitted them altogether in his edition of the Psalter, and Dathe's follows his; for which very substantial reasons are given by him in the "Præf. ad Lect." of his Psalterium Syriacum, pp. 36, 37., Halæ, 1768.

B. H. C.

Footnote 9:[(return)]