Evemerus, a Messenian, or, according to some writers, a Sicilian, a cotemporary of Cassander, king of Macedon, seems to have been the first who attempted this kind of fraud; for he pretended to have found on a golden column, in an ancient temple in the island of Panchæa, a genealogical account of a family that had once reigned there, in which were comprised the principal deities then worshipped by the Greeks. Not only were their lives recorded, but also their deaths; and thus a deadly blow was aimed at their divinity. This fable was translated into Latin by Ennius. Annius of Viterbo, who was born at Viterbo, in 1432, and whose real name was John Nanni, has been charged with framing inscriptions from his own imagination, and burying them in certain places, that, when they had acquired an appearance of antiquity, he might pretend to find, and might vend them. He is also said to have manufactured medals of an early date. Both these charges are, however, erroneous. It is nevertheless certain that, accompanied by his own commentaries, he presented to the world, as genuine, the pretended works of several exceedingly ancient authors; for this he has incurred much odium, but it is believed, by many learned men, that, instead of being a forger, he was himself deceived by forged manuscripts. This fraud gave rise to a violent controversy, in which many of the most eminent literary men were engaged. The great uncertainty relative to the genuineness of inscriptions on ancient statues originated in the ignorance or fraud of those who restored them. Even Phædrus, in the application of a fable at the beginning of his fifth book, alludes to this practice in his time by mercenary artists. “The name of Apollodorus, on the plinth of the Venus de Medicis,” says Mr. Dallaway, “has been detected as a modern forgery. The statues which have been dug up in a mutilated state, and placed in the hands of venal or ignorant artists, have always had the name of some eminent character given to them. Doubts of genuineness are at least allowable, and often justified, of those statues the hands of which have been evidently engrafted.” The fabrication of spurious coins for the market was neither a modern contrivance nor of unfrequent occurrence. The collection of medals belonging to Dr. Hunter affords some examples. One of a leaden coin, cased in silver, as remote as the time of Selcucus, king of Syria, may be seen in that cabinet; and also a similar coin of the city of Naples. In the Roman series, Neumann makes mention of a remarkable instance from Schulzius, of a leaden coin of Nero, which had been anciently circulated for brass, in which metal it was enclosed. In Dr. Hunter’s cabinet are two examples of leaden coins covered with gold; one of the Emperor Trajan, the other of his successor.