BARM1/1

Corpus Refs:Macalister/1945:414
Nash-Williams/1950:271
Site:BARM1
Discovery:first mentioned, 1736 Morris, L.
History:ONeil/1932, 105: `During the present work on the extension of the sea-wall at Barmouth workmen employed by the contractors discovered (February, 1931) a large block of local stone ...It was found buried in the sand twenty feet below high-water mark at latitude 52° 52"...

`Their attention was first drawn to the feature which, in all probability, also attracted the original users...

`To Mr. A. J. Hewins, of Barmouth...is due credit for realising at once...that this is no ordinary stone (nor the inscription modern) but almost certainly the `other stone' mentioned by Lewis Morris, c. 1737. To quote...`There was another formerly seen about ye place this lay, but it is now cover'd with sand and not to be found...'. The dimensions are not quite in agreement with those of the newly discovered stone [ONeil doesn't give the measurements of the found stone], but Morris was obviously writing from hearsay or, at most, personal recollection or old notes...

`Gratitude should also be expressed to...Barmouth Urban District Council, the owner of the stone, in promptly conveying and erecting it in Llanaber Church beside the Caelexti stone.'

Macalister/1945, 392: `Known to exist has far back as 1736, according to Lewis Morris's note, quoted above, but already covered and lost to sight. Only recently rediscovered.'

Nash-Williams/1950, 159: `Found buried in the sand twenty feet below high-water mark at latitude 52° 52".'

Geology:ONeil/1932, 105: `Cambrian grit'.
Dimensions:1.52 x 0.3 x 0.2 (converted from Macalister/1945)
Setting:in display
Location:other
Nash-Williams/1950, 167: `Inside church, mounted against N. wall of nave at W. end.'
Form:plain
Morris, c. 1737, cited in ONeil/1932, 105, if we accept it is the same stone: `The stone is about two yards long, one broad, more than a quarter of a yard thick, rough and unhewn.'

ONeil/1932, 105: `a large block of local stone...

`The long flat side is, as it were, framed on each side by a narrow vein of quartz, which runs or originally ran (before the fracture occured) the full length of the stone.

` ...The back and sides of the stone are certainly rough and the flat face on which is the inscription is due to natural splitting.'

Nash-Williams/1950, 167: `Rough pillar-stone'.

Condition:complete , good
Folklore:none
Crosses:none
Decorations:no other decoration

References


Inscriptions


BARM1/1/1     Pictures

Readings

O'Neil, B.H.St. J. (1932):A/ETERN[-- | ET | A/ETE/RN/E
Expansion:
AETERN[I] ET AETERNE
ONeil/1932 107 concise discussion
Macalister, R.A.S. (1945):A/ETERN[-- | ET | A/ETE/RN/E
Expansion:
AETERN[I] ET AETERNE
Macalister/1945 392 concise discussion
Nash-Williams, V.E. (1950):A/E/T/ERN[-- | ET | A/ETE/RN[E]
Expansion:
AETERN[I] ET AETERNA[E]
Translation:
(The stone of) Aeternus (PN) and Aeterna (PN) (?).
Nash-Williams/1950 167 concise discussion

Notes

Orientation:horizontal
Position:n/a ; broad ; n/a ; undecorated
Nash-Williams/1950, 167: `Latin inscription in three lines reading horizontally'.
Incision:inc
ONeil/1932, 106: `The letters have been `cut' as usual by hammering'.
Macalister/1945, 392: `pocked'.
Nash-Williams/1950, 167: `lightly cut'.
Date:400 - 533 (Nash-Williams/1950)
Language:Latin (rcaps)
Ling. Notes:ONeil/1932, 107: `...the monument of a man and a woman, perhaps a brother and a sister, possibly twins, as in parallel cases of such pairs of names, without patronymics'.

Macalister/1945, 392: `The stone commemorates Aeternus and Aeterna, presumably a brother and a sister, and most probably a pair of twins'.

Palaeography:ONeil/1932, 106: `The letters...although straight-sided in intention, have no well-defined edges. Their form, however, is absolutely certain.

`The inscription...shows for the most part good Roman letters with traces of degradation in only a few places. The R's have wedge-shaped downward stroke, the N's are inclined to to be off the line of the other letters and to sprawl, and the T's sometimes have a short upright not reaching far enough down. The remainder of the letters are well formed, although the ligatures are not always correctly done at the joints...

`Of two Welsh inscribed stones now at the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford...one supplies an almost exact parallel for the degraded letters on the new stone...A new rubbing of this Oxford stone is given...and it will be seen at once that the word `Eterni' on it has just the same T, R, N as the Barmouth example, having in addition not such good E's...

`It will be seen from Fig. 3 that a fracture has, in addition to destroying the last stroke of the N in the first line, carried away any final letter which originally existed there. At the end of the third line no fracture has occurred but the writer has been unable to discern any trace of a letter following the N. Professor R. A. S. Macalister, however, who has examined the stone and very kindly provided additional information, states that he reads the N in the first line as complete and in the space at the end of the third line ligatured to the N, and slightly less in height, an E.'

Macalister/1945, 392: `In the second name the ER (the E reversed) and the NE are ligatured...The use of the infrequent AE ligature on both these stones [BARM1/1 and BARM2/1] suggests that they are the work of the same craftsman: we see it again in the next stone, which is from a neighbouring parish.'

Nash-Williams/1950, 167: `Roman capitals, lightly cut, with three ligatures, including one of four letters in l. 1.'

Legibility:some
Lines:3
Carving errors:n
Doubtful:no

Names

References