another modification of these diagonal designs, and is of common occurrence on the Llantwit and other early decorated stones.

The head of the cross is of elegant proportions, the four arms of equal size, short, widened at the ends, with the spaces between the arms sunk, the depressed parts with a raised boss. in the centre of each, as is also the case with the centre of the cross itself, which is ornamented with an interlaced ribbon pattern, as is also the narrowed space at the base of the

cross.

With reference to the date of this cross, it is difficult in the absence of direct evidence to arrive at anything like a precise idea. I have stated that both in its palæographic and ornamental characters it agrees with the Llantwit stones and MSS. of the seventh and eighth centuries, but its general form agrees rather with that of the later Irish crosses; and as in such outlying districts as Nevern it is likely that little change was made until the Norman period. led to the introduction of Gothic art, it is not impossible that this cross may be as recent as the tenth, eleventh, or early part of the twelfth century. I do not think a more modern date can be assigned to it than the latter of these periods, but would rather refer it to the former.

The church of Nevern,' as we learn from Fenton's Pembrokeshire,' 'is dedicated, as are most of the churches in this district, to St. Byrnach, who flourished in the sixth century, and was a contemporary of St. David. He is reported to have lived an eremetical life in the neighbourhood of a certain mountain 1 of Cemaes, where legend says he was often visited by angels, who spiritually ministered to him, and that the place was thence denominated "Mons Angelorum," which could be no other than that which is now called Carn Engylion, or as it is corrupted Carn Englyn, overhanging the principal church of all those consecrated to him, and which in compliment was founded near the palace of the Regulus of the country, probably Meurig, one of Arthur's courtiers, who is said to have held his sanctity in such veneration, that he gave him all his lands free to endow his churches with.' (p. 542.)

Fenton adds the following notice of a legend respecting this cross :- George Owen has a whimsical reference to this stone, when talking of the patron day of this parish, the 7th of April, on which day the cuckoo is said to begin his note, saying "I might well here omit an old report as yet fresh, of this odious bird, that, in the old world, the parish priest of this church would not begin mass until this bird, called the citizen's ambassador,' had first appeared and began her note on a stone called St. Byrnach's Stone, being curiously wrought with sundry sorts of knots, standing upright in the churchyard of this parish: and one year staying very long, and the priest and the people expecting her accustomed coming (for I account this bird of the feminine gender), came at last, lighting on the said stone, her accustomed preaching-place, and being scarce able once to sound the note, presently fell dead. This vulgar tale, although it concern in some sort church matters, you may either believe or not without peril of damnation." (p. 542.)

1 The chief resort of the hermit-saint is supposed to have been at a place above Cerni Meibion Owen, in the mountain by the road side, where there is a well compassed round with a curtiledge of stone wall five or six feet thick, called Buarth Byrnach, Byrnach's fold.'

The west side of the Nevern cross was very inaccurately figured in the Journal of the British Archæological Association, vol. i. p. 145. The west side was first figured by myself in Journ. Arch. Institute, 1846, p. 71, vol. iii, and Proceed. Oxford Archit. Society, May 15, 1861, and all the sides in my memoir in Arch. Cambrensis, 1860, p. 48. It is formed of a single stone, except the cross at the top, which had formerly been fixed with an iron spike. The shaft is 10 feet long, but, according to the parish clerk, it is buried six feet in the earth; the cross at the top is 2 feet 10 inches high. In the first-mentioned work, vol. i. p. 320, the Rev. J. Jones (Tegid) published drawings of the two inscriptions.

PLATE LI. FIG. 2.

THE LOST WHEEL-CROSS AT NEVERN.

In Gibson's Camden, p. 639, and Gough's Camden, ii. p. 521 (ed. 2. vol. iii. p. 151), mention is made of a stone said to be pitched on end in Nevern Church, 2 feet high, round at the top, with a series of letters round the top of a form unlike that of any of the other early inscriptions, and what might at first be mistaken for Runic or Bardic letters. These are represented in my plate as given by Gibson. It is No. 105 in Prof. Hübner's work, p. 37, in the Appendix to which, p. 90, he ingeniously suggests the reading

i. e. S(anctus) Io(h)anne(s). In company with Tegid I searched in vain for this stone.

PLATE LI. FIG. 8.

THE VITALIANUS STONE.

In Gibson's Camden, p. 638 (Gough's Camden, ii. p. 521; ed. 2. vol. iii. p. 151), a stone is described as standing on the north side of the church of Nevern, 2 yards high, triquetrous in form, and inscribed in Roman capital letters

VITALIANI

EMERET

the A and L in the upper line being conjoined and the N reversed. Tegid and I searched in vain for this stone as stated in the Archæologia Cambrensis (1860, p. 52), where it was added that some years previously a cross (possibly one of two described above) had been moved from Nevern to Cwm Glöyn, a farm two miles distant, by Mr. Owen. Here ten years later it was discovered by Prof. Rhys, who has placed in my hands the rubbing from which my figure is drawn, the letters being between 3 and 4 inches high and occupying 17 inches along the front of the stone.

From the rubbing it appears that the second name should be read EMERITO rather than EMERETO as given by Prof. Rhys (Arch. Camb., 1873, p. 387, and 1874, p. 20). The stone is now used a gate-post as you turn from the Cardigan road to go to Cwm Glöyn farm, and I respectfully submit that it ought to be restored to Nevern churchyard, from which it had been sacrilegiously stolen, notwithstanding Prof. Rhys's doubt that the stone had ever stood in Nevern churchyard. He adds that an Ogham inscription most accurately cut and spaced, reading VITALIANI, exists on the angle on the right, near the top of the stone.

Dr. Ferguson, who had also visited the stone, states that the Vitaliani of the Latin text is certainly echoed by an Oghamic Fitaliani, from which he had obtained a cast (Arch. Camb., 1874, p. 331).

Prof. Rhys's rubbing, from which my figure was made, showed no traces of these Ogham letters.

PLATE LI. FIG. 4.

ROMAN INSCRIPTION IN NEVERN CHURCH.

Whilst engaged with Tegid in hunting for the two last described stones in Nevern church we found a fragment of a Roman inscription built into the inside of the south wall of the church, measuring 14 inches by 5, and inscribed with the letters TH-WI-MI—IM, of which I can offer no explanation. The w in the second line has the two middle strokes crossed at the top, the two м's have the two middle strokes only reaching half the length of the side strokes, and the I in the third line is well tipped at top and bottom as well as dilated in the middle. The letters are nearly 3 inches long. I can find no previous notice of this stone (J. O. W., in Arch. Camb., 1860, p. 52).

PLATE LXI. FIG. 4.

THE WHEEL-CROSS IN NEVERN CHURCH.

The interior of the church of Nevern contains another early relic of British Christianity, in a large slab now used as part of the pavement on the north side of the chancel, inscribed with a Maltese cross (with equal short limbs dilated at the ends, inscribed within a circle), the two outer incised lines forming which are extended downwards, below the bottom arm, so as to form a long stem or shaft to the cross. The diameter of this cross is 28 inches, and the width of the stem running down the middle of the slab is 10 inches. Numerous other instances of similar incised crosses occur in Pembrokeshire and Cardigan

PLATE LXI. FIG. 3.

ST. BRYNACH'S NEVERN ROCK CROSS.

Nevern lies on the pilgrim's route from Holywell in Flintshire to St. David's, and was their last halting-place before reaching Menevia, two pilgrimages to which were considered equally meritorious with one to Rome itself.

From the Roman inscriptions found at Nevern, described above, it was evidently an important station, and St. Brynach or Byrnach, an Irish missionary contemporary with St. David, founded the church here.

On the southern face of the rock near the church is carved a plain cross in relief with equal-sized limbs, with a corresponding hollow below cut out to serve as a kneeling-place. It is on the right-hand side of a narrow road running at right angles to the line of the main road, and at present leading nowhere, being now blocked up, and there being some doubt whether this was the actual pathway of the pilgrims. The cross, however, visited by myself and Tegid, and also by the members of the Cambrian Archæological Association during the Cardigan Meeting in 1859, is dedicated by common tradition to St. Brynach 1, and it is figured and described by the Rev. E. L. Barnwell in the Archæologia Cambrensis, 1873, pp.

370-374.

PLATE LI. FIG. 3.

THE LITTLE TREFGARNE INSCRIBED STONE.

This stone was accidentally discovered in September, 1875, by J. Romilly Allen, Esq., by whom it is described and figured in the Arch. Camb., 1876, p. 54, used as a gate-post on the road leading up to Little Trefgarne, a few hundred yards from the farm-house a mile and a half from Trefgarne bridge, near the brow of the hill forming the east side of the pass over Trefgarne rocks. There are two inscriptions, one in debased Roman capitals differing somewhat in character from the majority of the Carmarthenshire stones. Thus the first letter I regard as a N rather than H, many Anglo-Saxon and Irish inscriptions and MSS. showing that form of the N; the third letter G is also unlike both the ordinary 3 and the Carmarthenshire formed G's. The inscription will therefore be read

1 The church of Nevern is dedicated to St. Brynach or Byrnach, and Tegid states that this Rock Cross is also called Croes Byrnach, and a well about a quarter of a mile N. E. of the latter is called Ffynan Byrnach, and the adjoining fall of a small rivulet into the sea is called Pistyll Byrnach. Another well in the neighbourhood is called Ffynon Ddovn, but which Tegid states should be Ffynon Dwynven or Ffynon Dwyn, from Dwynwen, daughter of St. Brynach, to whom a church is dedicated, whilst Llanvrynach in Pembrokeshire is dedicated to St. Brynach. A holy well is also dedicated to St. Brynach near to Henry's Moat, or Castell Hendre, on the east side of the road leading from Cardigan to Haverfordwest, a few miles south of the Preseleu mountains. Close to the well is an upright stone marked with a cross, and the ruins of a chapel dedicated to the saint. St. Brynach's fold on Carnau Melbion, on the side of the mountain by the highway, is described in Fenton's Pembrokeshire, p. 355.

Р

NOGTIVIS FILI
DEMETI.

The Oghams are carved on a very symmetrically cut angle of the face of the stone. If read from the bottom they seem to form the word OGTENS, which would reduce the initial of the Roman inscription to H instead of N.

The stone is a fine monolith of greenstone, 6 feet high above the ground, with two holes for hinges of a gate. I am indebted to Mr. Romilly Allen for careful drawings and rubbings of this stone, which have been used with his own engraving in preparing my figure.

PLATE LII. FIG. 1.

THE CALDY ISLAND STONE.

It appears to have been a very prevalent custom among the early Christians, both in Great Britain and Ireland, to establish their communities upon small islands adjoining the coast, where, free from the chances of sudden attack, they could pursue the quiet objects of their existence unmolested and undisturbed. The great establishment of Lindisfarne on the Northumbrian coast, of various religious establishments on Ireland's Eye, the Skellig, and other small islands on the coast of Ireland, may be cited as instances of this practice, whilst Bardsey Island, the chapel island of St. Tecla at the mouth of the Wye, Barry Island on the Glamorganshire coast, Ramsay Island near St. David's, and Caldy Island near Tenby, have been more or less celebrated in Wales for the religious establishments which have existed upon them.

On the last-named island are still the ruins of a priory, founded in the twelfth century. Here however, as at Bardsey, proof of the religious occupation of the island at a period long antecedent to any indication afforded by the architectural peculiarities of the existing ruins has been obtained in the discovery of an inscribed slab of stone, dug up in the ruins of the priory, subsequently used as a window-sill, and which, in 1810, was found in Mr. Kynaston's garden (Fenton's Pembrokeshire, p. 458), for an excellent rubbing of which I am indebted to Mr. Mason of Tenby. And it is here proper to remark upon the value of these rubbings, since Mr. Mason informs us that during the short period which has elapsed since the rubbing was made the stone itself has been rendered much less legible than it then was, from exposure to weather since its removal to its present position, having been built into the wall of the chapel on the suggestion of the Rev. Mr. Graves. The stone is a red sandstone, 5 feet high and 16 inches wide, the top of the incised cross reaches to the top of the stone, and with the inscription itself occupies three feet of the upper part, leaving the remaining lower portion plain, apparently for the purpose of being affixed in the earth similar to the head-stone of a modern grave.

The inscription on this stone is a very remarkable one, not only on account of its palæography, but also of its orthography and formula.

Its Christian character is at once shown by the plain Latin cross, a foot in height, incised on its upper portion. The extremities of the two limbs of the cross, which remain