(see Plate XVII.). The annus Domini, or vulgar era, first became common about this period; and the date of this charter (704 A.D.) is perhaps one of the earliest examples of its use. The specimen, illustrative of the style of the Anglo-Saxon charters of the ninth century is from a deed of the reign of Alfred, preserved in the British Museum (Plate XVII. No. 9). It would appear, from the absence of the usual +, that the signature to this deed is wholly in the king's own handwriting; a supposition borne out by the fact that it differs in style from other portions of the deed, being written in a more free and cursive manner. This king's scholar-like attainments render it. indeed improbable that he should have signed charters in the ordinary regal manner, with a +. Another monument of the Anglo-Saxon hand of this period, of high interest, is also preserved in the British Museum, namely, a charter, evidently written by the hand of St. Dunstan, or rather "by the action of his own fingers," as he graphically expresses it at the end of the document. It is carefully and evenly written throughout, but with a certain decision and boldness that seem in keeping with his well-known character. In the same national collection, among many other interesting documents of the period, is a charter of Canute, or rather, as it is written, Cnut, standing thus : "+ Ego Cnut Rex signo Santa Crucis Christi roboravi et subscripsi ;" but as the writing of the tenth century does not materially differ from that of the ninth, I must pass at once to the reign of the last Saxon king (except the usurper Harold), Edward the Confessor, who was, like his predecessor Alfred, a scholar, and whose own signature appears at the foot of a charter written in a character somewhat resembling the rustic Roman capitals of an earlier epoch, while the rest of the deed is in the more careful writing of the period. It is dated "Anno mil-quadra gessimo-quinto (1045)." (See Plate XV. No. 10, where a part of the last line is engraved). The illuminations of Anglo-Saxon MSS. appear to have been founded on the Irish style, described in speaking of the Book of Kells and the Durham Book, though afterwards modified to a considerable extent through the influence of the style of Aix-la-Chapelle, described in the preceding chapter; but up to the ninth century it presented the peculiar dotted character, which is evidently derived from the Irish school. The dotting is generally red, a double or treble row of small red spots surrounding the outline of each capital letter. About the tenth century a style of rich calligraphic decoration arose, which has been deemed strictly national, and by some termed the Winchester school, from the finest known specimens having been executed there. A capital B:, marked tenth century, in Plate XXIII., will serve as an example of this style. THE ABBREVIATIONS used about this period and long afterwards, cause considerable difficulty in the correct interpretation of many passages; but their adoption is excusable when we consider the labour of writing complete copies of the Bible by hand, especially as in most cases such contractions are so evident, that to those accustomed to read old MSS. they occasion little difficulty. The most common is the dñs, or ds, for dominus, which, when once learnt, is never mistaken; and this and every other contraction is invariably marked by a dash above the word, as may be seen in the example No. 4, Plate XVI., where gra is used for gratia. The abbreviation of the word plenam (specimen 3, Plate XV.), in cursive Saxon, is less evident, one line serving for the n, and the m being omitted; so that the sense alone can supply the omissions. The abbreviation for the word that,, (see Specimen 4, Plate XVIII.), is almost arbitrary; but such signs are few in number, and easily remembered. In the charter of Sebbi (Plate XVIII. No. 7), the word Saxonum is only written Sax, with the usual sign of abbreviation; but the already-cited examples will be sufficient to shew the manner in which such abbreviations. were indicated. Contractions similar to these, with those of the Latin terminations unt, int, erunt, &c., are the most usual, the latter being found written as regt, for regunt; fuert, for fuerunt, &c. &c. ορς, Some of the most remarkable mistakes which have occurred in consequence of the contractions used in medieval MSS. may be illustrated by the following examples: "Christus est veritas" was eventually written for " Spiritus est veritas," from the circumstance that the two words, as abbreviated in Greek MSS. only differed apparently in one letter, Spiritus being written ops, and Christus kpc; for the Latins preserved the Greek letters in the name of Christ, and ignorant scribes mistook the Greek rho, p, for the Latin p. By a similar error the Greek name IHOTZ (Jesus) abbreviated as IHZ, became IHS, the Greek sigma being written in the form of the Roman S. Afterwards, from the similarity of the Greek eta to the Roman H, the Latin scribes of the time took the liberty of writing it with the minuscule Roman h; thus depriving it of all its original meaning. The monogram, reduced to this form, has been sometimes interpreted, Iesus Hominum Salvator. The dash, or mark of abbreviation, above, was also submitted to a similar estrangement from its original purpose; and being considered a portion of the "cross," was eventually completed in the following manner: IS. In Greek MSS. this mode of abbreviation was not usual, the words Inoovs Xporos being generally written is xs. But on the Greco-Roman coinage of the family of Constantine the Great, the word XPITOΣ was abbreviated in the manner of a monogram, sometimes used as the principal type of the coin, in the form of the annexed woodcut. Some have considered that this confusion was, to a certain extent, intentional, and the following rebus, Christus pax, X, has been forwarded to me by a valued correspondent as an example. The absence of any dot over the 1, and the great similarity in the mode of writing u, v, m, and n, with the use of u for v and vice versa, render the reading of words in which these letters occur somewhat uncertain, as may easily be imagined, when it is considered that the word minimum was written, apparently with fifteen parallel strokes, and could only be made out by the sense of the context. It is from this cause that the dispute has arisen, whether the paleographic term uncial should not be inicial, or rather initial. It was only in the twelfth century that the i began to be distinguished by a small hair-stroke, and not till the fifteenth that a conspicuous "dot" was used. As an illustration of another kind of mistake consequent on contractions, and the unsettled form of early cursive writing, I may cite the well-known example of the eleven thousand virgins of the calendar, at the twelfth of the kalends of November. Some blundering reader made out of the first word of “Undecimilla, virgo et martyr," Undecim mille, or cleven thousand; and subsequent transcribers accepting such a tempting enrichment of the calendar as eleven thousand virgins and martyrs, altered also the last two words, and wrote boldly, "Undecimille virgines et martyres." Thus, instead of a single victim, the unfortunate Undecimilla, a diminutive of Undecima, the name of a girl so called, possibly from being the eleventh child of her parents, the calendar became enriched with the record of eleven thousand martyrdoms. Many such mistakes or forgeries have occurred in the process of putting Greek MSS. into Latin; the seventh verse of the fifth chapter of St. John's Epistles now well known to be spurious, being in fact a passage from St. Cyprian, and not found in the more ancient Greek MSS. of St. John's Epistles. 138 CHAPTER XIII. THE PROGRESS OF THE ART OF WRITING, AND ILLUMINATION, IN ENGLAND, FROM THE NORMAN INVASION TO THE INVENTION OF PRINTING. THE HE writing introduced by the Normans differed but slightly in its main features from that in use among the Anglo-Saxons. But it was derived more directly from the debased Roman or Italic style, which had remained in use in France ever since the fall of the Roman Empire. The same kind of Italic writing had also been in use in Scotland and Ireland when writing Latin, especially in deeds and charters, and occasionally even in England, though the careful development of the Anglo-Saxon had, to a certain extent, superseded it. The specimen of English writing in the reign of the first Anglo-Norman king (Plate XVI. No. 1) is in a style which had already occasionally appeared in the reign of Edward the Confessor, and seems to foreshadow the establishment of the fine angular writing, termed the modern Gothic, which gradually developed itself towards the end of the twelfth century, and attained its greatest regularity and perfection in the fourteenth. But there are other specimens of the reign of William I., in which this approaching transition is not so remarkable, as in the smaller writing from a deed of the same period, engraved immediately below in the same Plate (No. 3). This deed commences, the abbreviations being supplied, "Willielmus Rex Anglorum H. de Portu et omnibus fidelibus suis Francigenis et Anglicis salutem," which may be rendered "William, King of the English, to H. de Portu, and all his faithful (subjects), French and English, health," &c. In the reign of Henry I. the writing, as exhibited in the specimen (Plate XVI. No 4) shews the same transitional aspect, but not in so marked a manner; while other specimens of the period exhibit a set Norman character. The specimen, Plate XVI. No. 2, is from a book of inquisitions made in the county of Lincoln, about the year 1104, for Robert of Caen, a natural son of Henry I. It reads, "Nigellas de Abaneio habet," &c.; and in expression and calligraphy is of completely Norman character, with scarcely an admixture of Saxon style, though only fourty-four years after the Conquest. The next specimen of charter writing is of the reign of Stephen. It begins to exhibit a steady Norman influence, the fine regularity of the best specimens of Anglo-Saxon having disappeared (Plate XVIII. No. 5). The set upright hand used in careful manuscripts of this period, especially religious books, is well exemplified by the example from a Psalter, written in |