—While in Greece last year, I was talking one day with a highly intelligent person on the English translation of the New Testament. In the course of our conversation he said, that in the third chapter of St. Matthew's Gospel we had got an entirely wrong meaning for the verse in which we are told the food of St. John the Baptist, viz. "locusts and wild honey." I have not at this moment a Testament in ancient Greek by me but in the Romaic the paragraph alluded to runs thus:
Verse 4. ... "Καὶ ἡ τροφὴ του ἦτον ἀκρίδες, καὶ μέλι ἄγριον."
He said that the word ἀκρίδες, which we have translated "locusts," means rather the "young and tender parts of plants." Since that time I have looked into various Lexicons and Dictionaries both of the ancient and modern Greek, but have been unable to find anything to assist me in fixing this meaning. In that of Hedericus, it is thus given: "Ἀκρὶς, ίδος, ἡ, Locusta." There is also, however, "Ἄκρις, ιος, ἡ, Summitas, cacumen montis. Ab ἄκρος, summus." Whether there may be any confusion between these two words I know not; and here, possibly, I may be assisted by some obliging reader. I have consulted, along with a clergyman who is well skilled in Greek literature, and who is perfectly acquainted with Romaic, many commentaries; but in every one we found this passage either entirely passed over, or very unsatisfactorily noticed.
Βορέας.
Queries.
COINAGE OF VABALATHUS, PRINCE OF PALMYRA.
A great boon would be conferred on numismatists if some of your correspondents would endeavour to elucidate the puzzling legend sometimes found on coins of this prince.
Vabalathus, or Vhabalathus, Athenodorus (which Mionnet and Akerman make to be the Greek translation of Vabalathus), was the son of the celebrated Zenobia, by an Arab prince, and was raised to the imperial dignity by his mother. His sway extended over some parts of Syria and Egypt, A.D. 266-273.
Aurelian gave to Vabalathus a petty province of Armenia, of which he made him king, though perhaps this arose from the mistake of Occo and Salmasius (in Vopisc. p. 380.) in reading ΑΡΜΕΝΙΑϹ for ΑΥΓ . ΕΡΜΙΑϹ on his Egyptian coins (Vide infra).
His portrait appears on the reverse of coins of Aurelian, with the legend VABALATHVS . VCRIMDR. Frölich and Corsini have unsuccessfully attempted the interpretation of this word. Père Hardouin, considering, VCRIMOR as the correct reading, divides it V. C. R. IM. OR., i.e. Vice Cæsaris Rector Imperii Orientis; but, as Banduri rightly observes, the existence of this legend is extremely doubtful, VCRIMDR being the authorised one, and is undoubtedly so in a specimen in my cabinet; and though the worthy Jesuit remarks, "Barbaram vocem aliquam arbitrari sub hisce Notis Latinis latere, frigidum genus exceptionis est, ac desperantium," I am inclined to think that the true interpretation is to be sought in the Syriac, or some of the Oriental languages.