Holinshed Chronicles: England, Scotland, and Ireland. Volume 1, CompleteHolinshed, Raphael
History
Holinshed Chronicles: England, Scotland, and Ireland. Volume 1, Complete
Holinshed, Raphael
Great Britain -- History -- To 1485; Great Britain -- History -- Tudors, 1485-1603
Aldermarie burie, of some called Aldermanburie, of 32. inches and
rather more, whereof the symmetrie hath beene taken by some skilfull
in that practise, and an image made according to that proportion,
which is fixt in the east end of the cloister of the same church, not
farre from the said bone, and sheweth the person of a man full ten or
eleuen foot high, which as some say was found in the cloister of
Poules, that was neere to the librarie, at such time as the Duke of
Somerset did pull it downe to the verie foundation, and carried the
stones thereof to the Strand, where he did build his house. These two
bones haue I séene, beside other, whereof at the beholding I tooke no
great heed, bicause I minded not as then to haue had any such vse of
their proportions, and therefore I will speake no more of them: this
is sufficient for my purpose that is deliuered out of the christian
authors.
Now it resteth furthermore that I set downe, what I haue read therof
in Pagane writers, who had alwaies great regard of their credit, and
so ought all men that dedicate any thing vnto posteritie, least in
going about otherwise to reape renowme and praise, they doo procure
vnto themselues in the end nothing else but meere contempt and
infamie. For my part I will touch rare things, and such as to my selfe
doo séeme almost incredible: howbeit as I find them, so I note them,
requiring your Honour in reading hereof, to let euerie Author beare
his owne burden, and euerie oxe his bundle.
[Sidenote: _In vita Sertorij de Antheo._]
Plutarch telleth how Sertorius being in Lybia, néere to the streicts
of Maroco, to wit, at Tingi (or Tanger in Mauritania, as it is now
called) caused the sepulchre of Antheus, afore remembred to be opened:
for hearing by common report that the said giant laie buried there,
whose corps was fiftie cubits long at the least, he was so far off
from crediting the same, that he would not beleeue it, vntill he saw
the coffin open wherein the bones of the aforesaid prince did rest. To
be short therefore, he caused his souldiers to cast downe the hill
made sometime ouer the tombe, and finding the bodie in the bottome
coffined in stone, after the measure therof taken, he saw it
manifestlie to be 60. cubits in length, which were ten more than the
people made accompt of, which Strabo also confirmeth.
Pausanias reporteth out of one Miso, that when the bodie of Aiax was
found, the whirlebone of his knée was adiudged so broad as a pretie
dish: also that the bodie of Asterius somtime king of Creta was ten
cubits long, and that of Hyllus or Gerion no lesse maruelous than the
rest, all which Goropius still condemneth to be the bones of monsters
of the sea (notwithstanding the manifest formes of their bones,
epitaphes, and inscriptions found ingrauen in brasse and lead with
them in their sepulchres) so far is he from being persuaded and led
from his opinion.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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