Page:Archaeological Journal, Volume 29.djvu/123

 THE ROYAL ARCHAEOLOGICAL INSTITUTE. 03 Bt3-lo of art displayed in these Coptic cliurches. This memoir will be given in a future number of this Journal. The Slcuetary then read an "Account of a Block of Tin, dredged up in Falmouth Harbour, and now in the Museum of Truro ;" by ^Lajor- General Sir Henry James, K.E., Director of the Ordnance Survey (printed in vol. xxviii. p. 19G). Sir E. Smiuke remarked that the writer's sug- gestion of the peculiar form of the block was very ingenious, as uo block had been made of that shape for the last five hundred years, but he could not so readily assent to the latter ])art of the memoir that St. Michael's Mount was the " Vectis " of the Komans. It would present a good subject for discussion at the Southampton meeting. •anttquilif^ niift tWarft^ of Itrt evljtbttclf. By the Rev. Pi. P. Coates. — An Abyssinian Cross, entrusted to him for exhibition by the Piev. H. Morland Austen, Bector of Crayford, in the church of which jiarish it is kcjjt. The recent history of this Cross is soon told. It was brought to England by one of the chajilains to the forces sent against Magclala (Bev. Mr. Feunell), and presented by him to the Church of St. Paulinus, Crayford. This may seem a very unsuitable object of " loot," and Mr. Coates observed that he was happy to be able to explain, on the testimony of Professor Wright, confirmed by the Bev. H. A. Stern, that its appearance in this country is not due to plundering of churches— at first hand at least — for the Act is that King Theodore had plundered many, and kept the sacred vessels, &,c., in his palace, under pretence of a vow to found a magnificent cathedral, of which, however, only the meanest instalments were visible. Our soldiers looted the palace, and thus these tilings came first into their hands, then into those of others. Of the anticpiity of the Cross Mr. Coates was miable to speuk confidently : the best judges are not disposed to refer it to a date earlier than the beginning of the last century, pronouncing the ornamentation to be in the main Western, and derived from the Portuguese missionaries, probably through rude wood-cuts. The same date must be assigned to the other Crosses in the British Museum, and to most of the MSS. Were the work indeed Oriental in origin it might be carried back, in design at least, much further, perhajis — such is the persistence of Eastei'u tradi- tions — five hundred years, just as the Russian eikous of the present day exactly represent their Byzantine prototypes. The Cross itself has a kind of scroll underneath, of rather coarser workmanship seemingly, on each side of which arc eight seraphim with wings 0[ien and closed alternately. This scroll is fastened to the Cross, and the socket for the pole, also of late and coarse character, by plain j^ieccs of brass and eight rivets, some of copper. On what may bo called the obverse of the Cross, in the upper limb is engraved a figure of our Lady with the Divine Child seated on her lap, holding out His right hand with the gesture of blessing (Western form ?) and having in His left a book. Both have rayed nimbs. On the Virgin's right shoulder is a star, and under- neath something which has been conjectured to be a string of anudets. . On the right arm of the Cross is the decollation of St. John the Baptist (or perhajjs St. Ceorge, a favourite .Ethiopic saint), a kneeling figure, with arms and feet bound, and his head already severed by a ncgi'o with a scimitar ; behind him is what has been considered to be a palace : in