And now there remained but one more document to be examined--namely, the
ancient black-letter transcription into mediæval Latin of the uncial
inscription on the sherd. As will be seen, this translation was executed
and subscribed in the year 1495, by a certain "learned man," Edmundus
de Prato (Edmund Pratt) by name, licentiate in Canon Law, of Exeter
College, Oxford, who had actually been a pupil of Grocyn, the first
scholar who taught Greek in England.[*] No doubt, on the fame of this
new learning reaching his ears, the Vincey of the day, perhaps that same
John de Vincey who years before had saved the relic from destruction and
made the black-letter entry on the sherd in 1445, hurried off to
Oxford to see if perchance it might avail to dissolve the secret of
the mysterious inscription. Nor was he disappointed, for the learned
Edmundus was equal to the task. Indeed his rendering is so excellent
an example of mediæval learning and latinity that, even at the risk of
sating the learned reader with too many antiquities, I have made up my
mind to give it in fac-simile, together with an expanded version for the
benefit of those who find the contractions troublesome. The translation
has several peculiarities on which this is not the place to dwell, but I
would in passing call the attention of scholars to the passage "duxerunt
autem nos ad reginam _advenaslasaniscoronantium_," which strikes me as
a delightful rendering of the original, "ἤγαγον δὲ ὡς
βασίλειαν τὴν τῶν ξένους χύτραις
στεφανούντων."

[*] Grocyn, the instructor of Erasmus, studied Greek under
Chalcondylas the Byzantine at Florence, and first lectured
in the Hall of Exeter College, Oxford, in 1491.--Editor.

_Mediæval Black-Letter Latin Translation of the Uncial
Inscription on the Sherd of Amenartas_