I

FOR THE YEAR 1808.

Embellished with a Perspective View of the Ruins of LINDISFARNE ABBEY.

Mr. URBAN, Dec. 21. SEND a view of the ruins of you an antient Abbey in Lindisfarne, or the Holy Island; for the history of which it may be sufficient to refer to Mr. Gough's edition of Camden, 1789, vol. II. p. 744; or to Hutchinson's History of Durham, vol. III. p. 363. Yours, &c.

"W WUL

M. G.

FIRST DISCOVERY OF A PASSAGE TO THE WHITE SEA. (Continued from p. 997.) ULFSTAN said, that he went from Heathum to Truso in seven days and nights, and that the ship was running under sail all the way. Weonodland was on his right, and Langland, Læland, Falster, and Scania, on his left, all which land is subject to Denmark. "Then on our left we had the land of the Burgundians (Bornholm), who have a king to themselves. Then, after the land of the Burgundians, we had on our left the lands that have been called from the earliest times Elekingey, and Meore, and Eowland, and Gotland; all which territory is subject to the Swedes; and Weonod

land was all the way on our right, as far as Weissel-mouth (Wisselmunde). The Weisselb (Vistula) is a very large river, and near it lie Witland and Weonodland. Witland belongs to the people of Eastland; and out of Weonodland flows the river Weissel, which empties itself afterwards into Estmere. This lake, called Estmere, is about fifteen miles broad. Then runs the lifing east [of the Weissel] into Estmere, from that lake on the banks of which stands Truso. These two rivers come out together into Estinere; the Ilfing east from Eastland, and the Weissel, south from Weonodland. Then the Weissel deprives the lfing of its name, and, flowing from the west part of the lake, at length empties itself northward into the sea; whence this point is called the Weissel-mouth. This country called Eastland is very extensive, and there are in it many towns, and in every town is a king. There is a great quantity of honey and fish; and even the king and the richest men drink mare's milk e, whilst the poor and the slaves drink mead. There is a vast deal of war and contention amongst the

a It seems very clear from this expression of we, that when King Alfred came to that part of the history of Orosius, which describes the geography of the North, he consulted Ohthere and Wulfstan, who had lived in the Northern parts of Europe, which the antients were so little acquainted with, and that he took down this account from their own mouths. For the same reason, it is not improbable that there may be some mistakes in the King's relation, as, though these Northern travellers spoke a language bearing an affinity to the Anglo-Saxon, yet it was certainly a dialect with material variations. For proof of this, let a chapter of the Speculum Regale, written in the old Islandic, or Norwegian, be compared with the Anglo-Saxon. This very curious work was published at Soroe, in 1768. D. B.

b I have adopted the modern name of this river, Weissel, in preference to the Vistula of the antient geographers, or the Wesel of Mr. Barrington; though, perhaps, King Alfred's orthography (Wisle) is the best, as it approaches nearest to the Vistula of the antients, and the modern Wisla of the Poles. Poland is also called Wisland by King Alfred, p. 60. J. I.

Mr. Barrington translates it Willand; but he has printed Witland twice in the Saxon, as I find it in the MSS. It is now probably Witepski in Lithuania, to the East

of Wilno, J. I.

Now generally called Estonia; I have, therefore, called the inhabitants Estonians. J. I.

e See the same custom reported of the Scythians by Herodotus, and of the Tartars and other rude nations by modern travellers; particularly in Hakluyt's Collection of Voyages, &c. vol. I. p. 97. fol. Lond. 1598. Mr. Barrington seems to have overlooked the word myran in the original. Vid. not, in locum, "Lac equinum bibunt," Lat. Vers. J. I.

GENT. MAG. Supplement, 1808.

A

different

different tribes of this nation'. There is no ale brewed amongst the Estonians, but they have mead in profusion 5.

"There is also this custom with the Estonians, that when any one dies, the corpse continues unburnt, with the relations and friends, for at least a month; sometimes two; and the bodies of kings and illustrious men, according to their respective wealth, le sometimes even for half a year before the corpse is burned, and the body continues above ground in the house; during which time drinking and sports are prolonged, till the day on which the body is consumed i. Then, when it is carried to the funeral pile, the substance of the deceased, which remains after these drinking festivities and sports, is divided into five or six heaps; sometimes into more; according to the proportion of what he happens to be

worth. These heaps are so disposed, that the largest heap shall be about one mile from the town; and so gradually the smaller at lesser intervals, till all the wealth is divided, so that the least heap shall be nearest the town where the corpse lies.

"Then all those are to be summoned together who have the fleetest horses in the land, for a wager of skill, within the distance of five or six miles from these heaps; and they all ride a race toward the substance of the deceased. Then comes the man that has the winning horse toward the first and largest heap, and so each after other, till the whole is seized upon. He procures, however, the least heap, who takes that which is nearest the town; and then every one rides away with his share, and keeps the whole of it. On account of this custom, fleet horses in that country are wonderfully dear. When the

f Gewinn, Sax. "Multum vini est etiam inter eos". - according to the Latin translation; (Ælfredi Magni Vita, p. 208,) and, as the royal Geographer is here enumerating the liquors which the Estonians used, it appears at first sight more natural that he should mention wine than war. But the word win is generally used for wine, without the prefix ge; and perhaps the only wine of these people was mead; meddi, Br. Melv, Gr. The other fact, respecting the want of ale, and the art of brewing, though it may appear trifling now, was considered remarkable and important enough to be noticed in the days of Alfred; and, indeed, ale or beer was afterwards a considerable article of commerce between the Flemings and the Estonians. See a Poem written in the reign of Henry the Sixth, On the Policy of keeping the Sea, c. 5. printed in Hakluyt, vol. p. 192, Sigismund of Herberstein, says of the Russians in his time: Their common drinke is mead; the poorer sort use water, and a third drinke called quasse, which is nothing else (as we say) but water turned out of his wits, with a little branne meashed with it." Hackluyt, vol. I. p. 496. Cur moriatur homo cui quassia? J. I.

g Here Wulfstan's voyage ends in Hakluyt. D. B. Vid. Voyages, &c. vol. I. p. 6. ed. 1598. Somner printed the remainder of it in his Saxon Dictionary, except the last sentence. Vid. voc. Gedrync, Som. Dictionar. Sax. Lat. Angl. Ox. 1659. J. I. h The following curious particulars, relating to the manners of the Estonians, in the ninth century, the preservation of which we owe to the diligent pen of King Alfred, form a valuable supplement to the short sketches of aboriginal manners delineated by Cæsar and Tacitus. They also tend to illustrate the history of some obscure antiquities in our own island. Perhaps the veil of mystery which has so long enveloped the remains of Stonehenge, Abury, &c. is here removed. See note 1, p. 1139, &c.

i This ceremony was so important among the Northern nations, that they regulated their chronology, not on the Newtonian system of eclipses, but by the burning of some particular hero or heroine. A person's age was also tolerably well ascertained, not by parochial registers, but by his having been present at the burning of some great man. Queen Mary attempted to introduce a worse chronology into this country, not many centuries ago, attended with circumstances of much greater atrocity, ignorance, and barbarism. J. I.

* More than equivalent to three two-mile heats in the present day! If any custom can be ennobled by antiquity, the friends of the turf may here find an argument of their favourite diversion. Equestrian exercises, and all the public games of competition, were antiently connected with rites and ceremonies of the most serious and important nature. See Homer, and his faithful copyist Virgil. Jornandes (c. xlix.) gives an interesting description of the funeral of Attila, which was celebrated with all that strange mixture of grief and festivity, of pomp and cruelty, of funeral solemnity and tumultuous joy, which characterizes such a ceremony in a rude state of society. J. I.

wealth

above ground without putrefying P, on which they produce this artificial cold; and, though a man should set two vessels full of ale or of water, they contrive that either shall be completely frozen over; and this equallythe same in the summera as in the winter."

Now will we speak about those parts of Europe that lie to the South of the river Danube; and first of all, concerning Greece. The sea which flows along the Eastern side of Constantinople (a Grecian city) is called Propontis. To the North of this Grecian city, an arm of the sea shoots up Westward from the Euxine; and to the West by North the mouths of the river Danube empty themselves South East into the Euxiner. To the

This custom of the Estonians will forcibly recal to the mind of the classical antiquary the following passage in Cæsar's Commentaries (de Bello Gallico, lib. vi. c. 19.) Funera sunt pro cultu Gallorum magnifica et sumptuosa; omnia que, quæ vivis cordi fuisse arbitrantur, in ignem inferunt, etiam animalia; ac paullo supra hanc memoriam servi, et clientes, quos ab iis dilectos esse constabat, justis funeribus confeéti (al. confectis) unà cremabantur." The custom of burning the dead, Expoxavoria, or cremation, was almost universal among rude nations from the age of Homer to that of Alfred. See the HEATHEN BURIAL-PLACE, as it is called in a Charter of King Athelstan, with its Hippodrome, &c. on Salisbury plain, vulgarly called STONEHENGE, a corruption of STONE-RIDGE. J. I.

m That is, by the consequential expences. D. B.

ní. e. the relations of the deceased; or, perhaps, the whole tribe; as King Alfred made a whole hundred in England pay for any public outrage, or notorious violation of the laws. J. I.

"hi hit sceolan miclum gebetan," Sax. literally, "they shall it mickle boot." Mr. Barrington, supposing, perhaps, that the word gebetan here was the same with our present verb to beat, and that beating implies anger, translates the passage feebly and erroneously thus: "It is a cause of anger!" Boot is still understood, both as a noun and as a verb; to give to boot, &c. "Alas! what boots it with incessant care," &c. Milton's Lycidas. Mr. Barrington, one might suppose, had his eye on a passage in Tacitus, where, speaking of these same Estonians, he says, "rarus ferri, frequens fustium usus !" (Tac. Germ. c. 45.) J. I.

p Phineas Fletcher, who was ambassador from Queen Elizabeth to Russia, gives an account of the same practice continuing in some parts of Moscovy. "In winter time, when all is covered with snow, so many as die are piled up in a hovel in the suburbs, like billets in a wood-stack; they are as hard with the frost as a very stone, till the spring-tide come and resolve the frost, what time every man taketh his dead friend, and committeth him to the ground." See a note to one of Fletcher's Eclogues, p. 10, printed at Edinburgh, in 1771, 12mo. See also a poem written at Moscow, by G. Turberville, in the first volume of Hakluyt, p. 386, where the same circumstance is dwelt upon, and the reason given, that the ground cannot be dug. Bodies, however, ́are now buried at Moscow during the winter, D. B.-As the poem of G. Turberville, to which Mr. Barrington refers, in Hakluyt, is addressed to so great a poet as Spenser, those readers who happen not to have a copy of Hakluyt's Voyages, may be amused, perhaps, with the following specimen of it:

"Perhaps thou musest much, how this may stand with reason,
That bodies dead can uncorrupt abide so long a season!

Take this for certaine trothe; as soone as heate is gone,

The force of colde the body binds as hard as any stone,
Without offence at all to any living thing;

And so they lye in perfect state, till next returne of springe."

J. I.

a Mr. Walker, of Oxford, has recently published a treatise on the means of producing artificial cold, &c. J. I.

Into the South-east part of the Euxine, according to Mr. Barrington's translation; for the correction of which I refer the reader to the original, and to the first map of Europe that he happens to lay his hand on. Three lines below, for East read West. J. I.

South