and thine oxen: in all places where I record my name I will come unto thee, and I will bless thee. If thou wilt make me an altar of stone, thou shalt not build it of hewn stone; neither shalt thou go up by steps to my altar." Such were the general directions. For the tabernacle, a moveable altar was prepared, made of shittim wood, and covered with brass; the form a square of five cubits, the height three. Four horns or pinnacles made of wood, adorned the four corners. The altar for the temple of Solomon was a square of twenty cubits; the height ten. After the captivity, the altar was of unhewn stone, a square of forty cubits, of height fifteen. The prohibition against using hewn stone in the construction, was intended to prevent the use of altars of enormous size, such as the pyramids of Egypt, and other like structures. The square form was, according to the principles propounded in the introductory chapter, symbolical of the earth. The four horns were symbols of the strength or omnipotence of the Deity: many texts show that strength is the symbolical import of a horn. The forms of the altars of heathen nations were various; especially those of later ages. When constructed of hewn stone, as were the altars of the later Romans, they were quadrangular, and of height double the base. Such a form may be supposed to have been adopted with reference to the supposed parallelopiped form of the universe. Oblong altars are also noticed, which, like the oblong form of the naves of our churches, may be referred to the form of the ark or chest, by which the Egyptians represented the world, or rather their world, in the rites of Osiris. The most ancient or primary form, was that of a circular cone, the apt symbol of the hill of the Garden of Eden, and of the world, according to the ideas entertained in the first ages of the life of Adam. The materials used in making these altars, varied from the b Exodus xx. 24, 25, 26. c 2 Chronicles iv. 1.-Calmet. cespes vivus, the fresh turf, mentioned by Horace, to the most costly marbles, and even metals highly wrought and ornamented. The first altar of which a particular description is given, is that raised by the patriarch Jacob and his family, when a conciliatory compact was made between him and Laban, the father of his two wives. "Jacob said unto his brethren, Gather stones; and they took stones, and made an heap. And Jacob offered sacrifice upon the mount, and called his brethren to eat bread: and they did eat bread, and tarried all night in the mount."d It appears from the particulars here recited, that this altar, being made up of stones gathered on the spot and altogether unwrought, was what antiquaries call a carnedd. Had it been formed of earth, it might have been called a barrow. It must have been of a size at least equal to ordinary barrows; for it was sufficiently large to afford a convenient abidance of the whole family of Jacob assembled on its sides keeping wake or watch all night around the area or platform of the summit, on which the sacrifice had been offered by the head of the family, the patriarch himself. The form of the structure must have been circular, for the rudeness of the materials would hardly admit of any other, neither does it appear that any other was intended. There is no reason to suppose that this structure differed from the customary form used by Abraham and the early patriarchs when they constructed altars, which have for good reasons been regarded as symbols, or rather, true representations of the altar at which Adam worshipped while dwelling in the Garden. This mount, raised by Jacob, differed in nothing from the common barrow. Had there been the opportunity of encompassing it with a grove, it would have formed a temple such as those used in the patriarchal ages. Being thus of d Genesis xxxi. 46, 54. early use and easy construction, barrows such as these may be expected to have been raised in considerable numbers in all parts of the earth. That they were so, a few authorities will shew, giving confirmation to the theory here vindicated. Artificial eminences of this kind abound in every country of Europe and of Asia.f Even what are now the wilds of America afford many instances of these structures. The scientific Humboldt writes, "We meet with tumuli, or barrows, in Virginia, in Canada, as well as in Peru.”g Again, "In the State of Kentucky are fortifications or camps of an oval form. Near them are lofty barrows, on which trees grow at least one thousand years old."h From the form of the fortifications, which is much more likely to be round than oval, it may be inferred that the barrows were the works of a Celtic, or rather Teutonic race. All the Danish camps in England are circular. It may farther be inferred. that the families which first entered the vast continent of America were of the race of Japhet; and their occupation of such extensive regions was an accomplishment of the prophecy of Noah, "God shall enlarge Japhet."i The barrows of the British Isles rarely exceed the height of ten or twenty feet. Their forms are various in regard to the curve of a perpendicular section, but, with the exception of some which are oblong, they are round. Travellers have found some in Asiatic Tartary of a quadrangular shape, or rather, which once had that form, but have now lost it. The earth of which they consist having mouldered The word barrow, according to the modern Celtic of the Welch language, is compounded of the word bar, which signifies high, and rhw, which sounds like roo, and signifies that which breaks out, or grows upwords aptly expressive of the form and manner of the construction of the barrow. f Clarke's Travels, vols. i. ii.-Pallas's Travels. h Ibid. vol. ii. p. 5. k Fosbrooke's Encycl. Antiq. chap. ii. down in the lapse of ages, leaves the question of their original shape to be determined by a boundary of stones, the outer fence or inclosure. The form of a perpendicular section of a great many barrows is oval or egg-shaped. Some are pointed cones; some are bounded at top by a raised border or fence, and are called hollow or bowl barrows. These have a small elevation or barrow in the centre. Most of the barrows now extant appear to have been used as places of interment. Such as had been dedicated to any god may be supposed to have been destroyed. The reason why the barrow should have been desired for interment, may be found partly in the belief, that the bodies of the dead would rest in safety from any annoyance of evil spirits, if interred within boundaries held to be sacred, and partly from the assurance, now found, from antiquarian researches, to be vain, that in such a sanctuary the bones would remain for ever safe from impious violation. Of these structures the bowl barrow has been supposed to have been the place of the interment of a Druid, from the small cups, small lance-heads, and beads of amber, jet, and glass found in them. The form of the top appears to intimate that the person there buried was of eminent sanctity, and had entered into the paradise of beatified spirits, which the form of the barrow seems intended to represent. It has certainly a form resembling Mount Merù, the paradise of the Sastra, evidently taken from the patriarchal traditions of the Garden of Eden. The raised border of the barrow is the ilavrati, the earthy circular boundary of Merù; the mound in the centre is the city of Amravati, the abode of blessed spirits. Let it not be thought strange that a barrow in England should be supposed to resemble the Hyperborean Mount. Druidism, or the Celtic religion, was once most certainly the religion pre-eminent in India, from whence it may be traced in its western progress to Western Europe and the British Isles. It appears from a verse of the Roman poet Catullus, that the conical barrow was given to women that died in maidhood; perhaps because this form, being more slender and elegant than others, accorded with the grace of female youth and beauty. The oval or egg-shaped barrow was used more generally than any other; being a symbol, not of the elliptic form of the earth's orbit, of which all the ancient astronomers had no conception, but because it represented the mundane egg of creation, a fable almost as old as it was of general acceptation. The long barrows, which are found by their contents to have been places of family interment, derived their form from a different mode of representing the world. The Egyptians, in the construction of their temples, gave an oblong rectangular form, divided into three divisions, of which the third, the farthest from the entrance, was the most sacred abode of the god. By this arrangement, they represented in an horizontal position the three regions, earth, sky, heaven, of the Hindùs, and the three of the Greeks, hades, earth, and heaven. That this theory was adopted in the long barrows of the Celts, appears at least probable; for in them the interment was made at one extremity, that which might be esteemed the most sacred, and intimating the hope or the belief that the persons there buried, had, like the Druid of the Bowl barrow, attained to the joys of paradise and the society of the immortal gods. The barrow, whatever may have been its form, was always surrounded, first by a level platform, encompassed by a vallum (TμEvos) or bank of earth, and also by a ditch. This obtained for these structures the general name of the inclosure, signifying a sacred inclosure. A term of this signification is still retained by the Celts in Wales, where the word llan, properly an inclosure, is used to signify a church. These barriers marked the boundary of the sacred place, and defended it 1 Fosbrooke. |