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Rh , or from Major through the French. But since this note was writing I have met with the word in the Laws of Hywel Dda, Maer. Wotton renders it Præpositus. Owen in his Dictionary derives it from Ma-er, but of the former of these words, he gives so wide and indefinite an explanation, that any thing may be derived from it. Terms of civil polity in the Welsh, are most likely of Roman origin. But when the word is found with such slight variations, in Hebrew, Arabic, the Keltic, and (as Holinshed implies) the Teutonic dialects also, the Roman word likewise must be supposed to have proceeded from the same primitive language.

  Because the Latin text says oves instead of arietes, Vieyra takes it for granted that ewes are meant, not rams, and 