Mr. Hawkins, l. c., notices “many leaden bullets for slings, found among the ruins of Eryx,” [in Sicily], “some of which are inscribed with imprecations. (See Captain Smyth’s ‘Sicily and its Islands,’ p. 242.)” He gives as an instance “one of these inscriptions, which is translated: Your heart for Cerberus.”
No sling-bullets have, so far as I am aware, been discovered in Great Britain. There are, however, peculiar leaden objects, bearing devices and inscriptions, which have been found at Felix-Stowe, in Suffolk, and at Brough-upon-Stanmore, in Westmoreland. It is not clear to what age they belong, or for what purpose they were intended. See Mr. C. R. Smith’s Collectanea Antiqua, iii. p. 197, and Journal of Archæological Institute, 1863, p. 181. Mr. Smith appears to regard them as “Roman seals fastened to merchandize of some kind,” but observes that “their general character seems to bespeak a Phœnician origin.”
I do not see sufficient grounds for either of these opinions.
P. S.—Since the foregoing article was in type, I have noticed a report, in the Gentleman’s Magazine for June, 1863, of the proceedings at a meeting of the Society of Antiquaries of London, on May 7th.
From this report it appears that the inscription on the glans exhibited by the Count d’Albanie was deciphered by Mr. Franks, who was “of opinion that the βουστροφηδόν character of the inscription was due to Phœnician influence,—the bullet having been found in a lead-mine in Granada.” In this opinion of the learned Director I cannot concur: the inversion of the letters in this instance, as in Mommsen’s n. 646, seems to me to be merely the result of a blunder of an unskilled or careless workman, who had not inverted the letters on the mould so as to give an impression that could be read in the usual direction. There are examples, however, of another kind of inversion, whereby the letters are turned upside down, which seems to have been intentional and not due to accident or mistake. See Mommsen’s nn. 682, 694.
