_A Sounding Name._--At the church of Elmley Castle, Worcestershire, is a record of one John Chapman, whose name, it is alleged, "sounds in (or throughout) the world," but for my own part I have never been privileged to hear either the original blast or the echo. Perhaps some of the readers of "N. & Q." can inform me who and what was the owner of this high-sounding name. Was he related to Geo. Chapman, the translator of Homer? The inscription is as follows: "Memoriæ defunctorum Sacrum [Greek: kai tuphônia] Siste gradum, Viator, ac leges. In spe beatæ Resurrectionis hic requiescunt exuviæ Johannis Chapmanni et Isabellæ uxoris, filiæ Gulielmi Allen de Wightford, in Comitat. War. ab antiquo Proavorum stemmate deduxerunt genus. Variis miseriarum agitati procellis ab strenue succumbentis in arrescenti juventutis æstate, piè ac peccatorum poenitentia expirabant animas. Maij 10 Die Anno Domini 1677. Sistite Pierides Chapmannum plangere, cujus Spiritus in coelis, _nomen in orbe sonat_." J. NOAKE. Worcester. * * * * * Queries. ROMAN SEPULCHRAL INSCRIPTIONS. In the year 1847 I brought from the Columbaria, near the tomb of Scipio Africanus at Rome, a small collection of sepulchral fictile vessels, statuettes, &c., in terra cotta. Among these was a small figure, resembling the Athenian Hermæ, consisting of a square pillar, surmounted by the bust of a female with a peculiar head-dress and close curled coiffure. The pillar bears the following inscription: "[Greek: YST] [Greek: RAN] [Greek: S] [Greek: ANI] [Greek: KÊT] [Greek: O.]" --a translation of which would oblige me much. Another, in the form of a small votive altar, bears the heads of the "Dii Majores" and their attributes, the thunderbolt, two-pronged spear, and trident, and the inscription-- "DIIS PROPI M HERENNII VIVNTIS" (_i.e._ vivantis). Of the meaning of this I am by no means certain; and I have searched Montfaucon in vain, to discover anything similar. A third was a figure of the Egyptian Osiris, exactly resembling in every point (save the material) the little mummy-shaped figures in bluish-green porcelain, which are found in such numbers in the catacombs of Ghizeh and Abousir. As the Columbaria were probably the places of sepulture of the freedmen, these various traces of national worship would seem to indicate that they were still allowed to retain the deities peculiar to the countries from which they came, through their master might be of a different faith. E. S. TAYLOR. Ormesby, St. Marg., Norfolk. * * * * * CHAPEL PLASTER.