Dr. Hickes (according to Mr. Clarke) no where expressly fays, what was the weight of the Saxon pound; but from his manner of computation, he seems to think it would have weighed feven thousand two hundred Troy grains.. After various reafonings and conjectures from the bishops Fleetwood, Nicholfon, Hooper, and others, the Greeks (fays our author) and Egyptians ufed a pound of 12 ounces in their mints; and fo did the Romans. They were fo remarkable in this refpect, that the divifion of their long and fquare measures, and the diftribution + of their real and perfonal eftates, were all formed upon the fame plan, upon the As, with all those terms and proportions, that belonged to it as a pound. The mints, which they established in the feveral parts of Europe, fpread this divifion of the pound into all the provinces of the empire. It was univerfally received among the Gauls; they very courteously copied almost all the Roman cnftoms, either from a national and natural complaifance, or a political view of making their court to rapacious governors; and went fo far as to carry it to a ridiculous affectation §. They, * Frontinus inter Rei agrariae fcriptores, p. 29, 30. Varro, De re ruftica, 1. i. c. 10. et Columella. 1. v. c. 1. t "Hereditas plerumque dividitur in duodecim uncias." Digeft. 1. xxviii. t. 5. § 50. "Juxta Gallos duodecim unciae libram, viginti folidos continentem, efficiunt." Rei agrar. fcript. p. 322. Libra dicitur, quicquid per duodenarii numeri perfec tionem adimpletur." Ibid. p. 323. This was the language of the lower ages. Fred. Gronovius blames Scaliger for the impropriety of ufing Libra in this fenfe, and obferves that, to fpeak correctly, he should have faid the As; which in this cafe was not confidered as a weight, but as the divifor omnium Jeilium. De fefter. p. 350. I fee nothing wrong in Scaliger's expreffion," hereditatem integram pondo uniş Libræ fuiffe comprehenfam." The metaphorical ufe of the As, when applied to eftates, &c. began when the As was the common word for a pound; and all the feveral parts and divifions, as Sextans, Triens, Bes, Dodrans, &c. were fo applied as well as the integer itself. The lawyers kept to the old form; though Libra was afterwards ufed in the fame manner, for the integer. This appears from Volufius Mæcianus, “ prima divifio folidi, id eft, libræ, quod As vocatur." De pec. vet. 395 and from the verfes afcribed to Fannius; Nunc as the Romans had done before them, weighed their very time in fcales; and, because the year* had twelve months, and the day twelve hours, they fpoke of them, as fo many pounds of time. A furprizing metaphor to be adopted by fuch a mercurial people. But perhaps, as it was taken up at firft, fo it was dropped again, without any reafon. It would not have been much amifs in the prefent age, when our time seems to lye heavy upon.our hands, and so many pounds of it are spent with fuch an endless diffipation, as if it was a real weight. If the treatifes, afcribed to Bede, De computo, De ratione calculi, unciarum, etc. are really his, it is then certain, that the Saxons divided their money pound in the fame manner, into 12 ounces +. But to know the divifion of their pound would be a matter of very little confequence, unless the weight of it was known. We should otherwife have no certain standard by which we could examine their coins, or judge of the proportion they bore to thofe of other nations. We are much indebted to the late Mr Folkes for this discovery; he has given us two estimates of the Saxon pound, both of which I fhall produce in his own words 1. "It is reasonable to think, that William the Conqueror introduced no new weight into his mints; but that the fame weight used there for fome ages, and called the pound of the Tower, was the old pound of the Saxon moneyers before the Conqueft. This pound was lighter than the Troy pound by three quarters of an ounce Troy.' "Nunc dicam folidae quae fit divifio Libræ, Uncia nam Libræ fi deeft, dixere Deuncem." Ver. 41. Here the words As and Libra feem to be fynonymous. An expreffion not elegant, may be correct enough, i. e. justified by analogy and use. Libra was thus used in the lower ages. When 72 Solidi were struck out of the Roman pound, it was confidered as a new integer; thus airga Tv in the Anthology for 72 years: Libra teftium in the act of Marcellinus for 72 witneffes. * « Libra-annus, qui conftat ex xii. menfibus: Libradies, qui conftat xii. horis." Rei agrariæ fcript. ut fupra. Vid. Plin. H. N. 1. ii. c. 14. } + "Libra, five As, eft duodecim unciarum." Bedo opp. Table of English filver coins, p. 1, 2, 13 Mr. Folkes gives this estimate of the Saxon pound from very good authority, from a verdict relating to the coinage, dated the 30th of October, 18th Hen. VIII. 1527, now remaining in the Exchequer, in which are the following words: "And whereas heretofore the merchaunte paid for coynage of every pounde Towre of fyne gold, weighing xi oz. quarter Troye, iis. vid. Nowe it is determined by the kings highness, and his faid councelle, that the aforefaid pounde Towre, shall be no more used, and occupied; but al maner of golde and fylver fhall be wayed by the pounde Troye, which maketh xii oz. Troye, which excedith the pounde Towre in weight i quarters of the oz." He refers us likewife to another authority much older, taken from the Register of the Chamber of accounts at Paris. The difference of the feveral pounds then made ufe of in that kingdom is there computed, and the proportion between the Troy and English pounds is thus estimated. "Ou royaume fouloit avoir iv marcas: c'est afsavoir le març de Troyes, qui poife xiv fols, ii den. Efterlins de poix le marc de la Rochelle, dit d'Angleterre, qui poise xiii s. iv den, Efterlins de poix." • This account was probably taken about the beginning of Edward the Third's reign, not long after A. D. 1329; and as the proportion is here given by Mr. Folkes, the weight of the Rocheile or English pound will be found 451,76 Troy grains, fomething heavier than the former. The difference between these two estimates is fo inconfiderable, that either of them will answer our purpose, and fhew, if not exactly, yet very nearly, the weight of the old Saxon pound. But of the two I fhould prefer the last, because it was fo much nearer the Saxon times; and eftimating the weight of the several pounds, was not an incidental point, as in the former cafe, but the very business of the writer; and becaufe, (which Mr. Folkes did not feein to fufpect) the Troy pound had been established in our mints; and the old Tower pound quite difufed, fome years before that estimate of Henry the Eighth was taken. But both thefe computations are fo near each other, that they were certainly taken from the fame pound, and have in proportion a much greater agreement, than the coins which were ftruck out of it.' In the second chapter of this work, Mr. Clarke treats of the Saxon pound, which Gronovius and bishop Hooper imagine to be Roman, as well as their weights and measures, and the fame which the Romans left in Britain. Our author, however, is of opinion, that they brought their own weights and meafures along with them from Germany, and that their pound differs very little from the Colonia weight which is still used by by the Germans in all the money affairs of that country; and he proves his position with great accuracy. He thinks, confequently, that the German and English money was very nearly of the fame value, though it appears from a quotation of Matthew Paris, that the English pound was somewhat heavier than the German; and he concludes, that the old Saxon pound, the fame which was univerfally used by the antient Germans, was of Greek original. It does not fall within the province of our Review to give the reader a detail of all the authorities, estimates, and calculations, adduced by the reverend author to prove this point. It is fufficient to say, that his reasoning, great part of which is from analogy, is fair, candid, and (fo far as the nature of the fubject can admit of precifion) conclufive. It may be proper, however, by way of fpecimen, to lay one evidence of the relation between the Greek and Saxon weights, and the writer's manner of computation, before our readers. The Romans, (fays he) in their money affairs, made no use of the talent, except in their treaties and tranfactions with the Greeks and fome Eastern nations. A Roman talent is a thing unheard of among their writers. The Greeks use it perpetually, and their nummulary talent was 60 pounds. The word Talent does not, I believe, occur in the prefent remains of the Saxon language; but the weight, the estimate does exactly. Their laws have rated their greater fines in this proportion. For the murder of a King the law fays, that the Weregylde is 120 pounds, and his Cynegylde 120 l. more;, i, e. a fine of twice 60 pounds, or two talents, was due to the public, and as much more to his family, in all, four talents, or 240 pounds. The taking up such an uncommon way of computation, as was used by no other European nation, but the Greeks, can hardly be thought the work of chance. If the Saxons had not been accustomed to use that eftimate, they would most probably have settled this fine in round numbers by the hundred, as the Danes afterwards did their tributes, at 200 or 300 pounds; that these Saxon laws were formed upon the particular proportion of the Greek talent can be no queftion; fince Mr. Folkes has informed us, that the talent weight continues in our mint to this very day : they have there from time immemorial weighed off all their filver by the talent weight: every journey (as they call it) or quantity of filver weighed off at one time, being always 60 pounds. The moneyers did this for fo many ages, only becaufe it was cuftomaty; but no reafon can be affigned for such a custom, except this, that thofe ancestors of ours, who began this ufage of the Greek talent in their mints, had it from the Greeks.' The The common way of reckoning money among the Saxons has an appearance of coming from the fame country. They did not compute fums of money, as the Romans ufually did, and moft of the European nations do at this day, by placing the whole fum under fome leffer denominations, and fo many festerces, livres, milrees, crowns, florens, dollars, &c. but by placing it under different articles, by Pounds, Shillings, and Pence; juft as the Minae, Drachmae, Oboli of the Greeks. For in their computations, the parts of the obolus were confidered, as the parts of the penny are in ours.' Mr. Clarke next proceeds to fhew the remarkable affinity fubfifting between the Greek and Saxon languages, of which he gives a variety of inftances. Though in different parts of his book he seems fond of this analogy, we are inclined to think, that some critics upon the Celtic have, with great justice, proved the Greek itfelf to be no more than an idiom of that language; and if the Greek is, why not the German and the Saxon? It is an inconteftible truth, that the Gaelic, or old Erfe language, which was that of the antient Britons, and which is fo near expiring now in Scotland, contains an astonishing number of Greek words, all derived from the Celtic, the mother-tongue. This has led Mr. Innes, (though otherwife a very able antiquarian) into a capital' error in his enquiry; for he fuppofes the Irish language, as now spoken in Ireland, to have owed a great number of words to the Latin, by which he endeavours to difcredit the antiquities of Ireland. The truth, however, is, that the Latines themselves, and even the Tufcans, owed those words to the Celtic, to which the prefent Irish language undoubtedly approaches much nearer than thofe of Greece and Rome. We do not mention this as any impeachment of what Mr. Clarke has offered upon this fubject; but we think his difquifition would have been more full and fatisfactory, if he had carried up his obfervations to the fimilarity between the Celtic and the German, or Saxon languages, especially as he has quoted Lhwyd's Archæologia Bri- · tannica, and might have been affifted by fome excellent modern dictionaries of the fame kind. Many very pertinent ob、 fervations to this purpose, too long to be inferted here, and too instructive to be abridged or mutilated, appear in the work before us. Our author has adduced many striking paffages from Ovid, to prove that the language of the Greeks, and Getes or Goths, had a great affinity to each other. Of this there can be no manner of doubt ; but it can be accounted for on no other principle than that there was a radical language, we mean that of the Celts, which was split among the nations of Europe, and |