Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 7.djvu/273

Rh English charters of the Saxon period have forms in many respects different from those of foreign diplomas. Variations have been already noticed, as, that the king signed neither with his name nor with his monogram, but only with a cross, and that they were dated from the incarnation. It would appear, indeed, that the charters were not drawn up by an officer of the chancery, as in France, but were composed and written by ecclesiastics, whose services were employed for the occasion. In the grant of the monastery of Reculver to Christ Church, Canterbury, by King Eadred, in, to which Dunstan, then abbot of Glastonbury, and one of the king's principal ministers is a witness, he states that he both drew up the form and wrote the document with his own hand. It is on this account that we find in English charters before the Conquest a variety of styles of writing, even in those of the same date ; whereas on the Continent the writing is uniform in the several states. In the absence of a strictly official character, the grant was attested by numerous witnesses, varying from four or five, the more ordinary number in the earlier times, to from 30 to 100 subsequently. For it was always an object with the religious houses in whose favour a grant was made to fortify its authority and secure its recognition by impressive solemnities. They made the benefaction a religious act by inviting the grantor to offer the charter to God on the altar of their church; and they obtained the approval and attestations of the members of the court, or of the council over which the king might be at the time presiding. The names which are subscribed to the English charters add greatly to their historical value. A difference in another respect from the foreign type is attended with advantage to the study of both the language and manners of the time. The property conveyed was defined by a minute description of its boundaries, written in English; and, as the documents are dated and can generally be referred to special localities, dialectic differences and the formation of names, with other incidental lights on subjects of antiquity, are preserved. In English charters of as early a date as the, and from that time onwards, is sometimes found, at the top or the bottom, the upper or lower half of an inscription. It is often the word chirographum, but some times other words, or merely letters. It was used when it was an object that two parties to a contract should each have a copy of the deed, which accordingly was written in duplicate on one skin ; the inscription was written in large letters between the copies, and the skin was then divided. The line of division was at a later period generally in dented, and the document was called an indenture. The custom was not introduced into France until. The practise of forging and falsifying diplomas, ecclesiastical constitutions, and documents of all kinds is traced back to very early times. The laws of the Visigoths of the enact severe punishments on offenders of this class, as do the of Charlemagne. The English chronicler Hoveden, under, gives an account of wholesale forgeries of papal bulls and briefs by an agent of the archbishop of York. A decretal of Innocent III. (–) gives rules for detecting fabricated bulls (Epist. i. 201, ed. Baluz.). It was so easy to impose upon the ignorance of people, and the temptations to falsify were so great, that we cannot doubt it was done extensively. The science of diplomatics professes to give the power to detect these forgeries. The two concluding books of the Nouveau Traité de Diplomatique treat of the subject at great length, but the rules given for distinguishing the true from the false document can only be applied by one who is practically versed in the study. In passing judgment on a professed original, not only the formulas, historical facts, and date have to be tested, but the external features have to be regarded the material, the ink, the forms of abbreviation and character of writing, and the seal ; and the properties and characteristics of these cannot well be learnt from written instruction. They are treated of in works on the general subject of.

1em  DIPPEL, (–), a German theologian and alchemist, who assumed as an author the name “Christianus,” was born at the castle of Frankenstein, near Darmstadt, his father being a Lutheran clergyman. He studied at Giessen, where he took the degree of master in philosophy in. After a short visit to Wittenberg he went to Strasburg, where he delivered lectures on astrology and chiromancy, and occasionally preached. He gained considerable popularity, but was obliged after a time to quit the city, owing to his irregular manner of living, and the suspicion attaching to him of having been concerned in a murder. He had up to this time espoused the cause of the orthodox as against the pietists, and had justified his gay and worldly habits on the ground that he intended to make a practical protest against pietism ; but in his two first published works, Orthodoxia Orthodoxorum and Papismus vapulans Protestantium, he assailed vehemently the funda mental positions of the Lutheran theology, denying the inspiration of Scripture, the efficacy of the sacraments, and the doctrine of justification by faith. He held that religion consisted not in dogma but exclusively in love and self- sacrifice. To avoid persecution he was compelled to wander from place to place, and he resided successively in various towns of Germany, Holland, Denmark, and Sweden. He took the degree of doctor of medicine at Leyden in. From he devoted himself to experiments in alchemy, which wasted a considerable fortune, and he was frequently imprisoned for debt. He made several valuable discoveries in chemistry, one being Prussian blue, and another an oil, still known as Dippel's animal oil, which he offered as a panacea, and which has useful medicinal properties of a more limited kind. Provoked by false reports of his death, he published in an intimation that he would live until. In spite of this, however, he died at Berleburg on the 25th April.

1em  DIPSOMANIA. See.  DIPTERA (Aristotle, from Si, double, and irrcpa, wings), an Order of the Insecta, containing the &quot; flies,&quot; properly so called, with which, also, in spite of not possessing its chief characteristic, the sub-order Aphaniptera (fleas), a part of the obsolete Aptera, is now incorporated. The Diptera proper (with the exception of the apterous Nycteribiidas, and a few aberrant species of other families, to which the majority of the characters given will not strictly apply, but which cannot, from their general structure, meta- 