is supposed to have been a native and a priest at Magdeburg,
whence he was translated by Archbishop Adalbert to a benefice in the
cathedral of Bremen, he must, from his comparative proximity to the
spot, be supposed a competent witness; and there is not reason to
suppose why he should not have been also a creditable one. He died about
1072, and the _legends_, if any, concerning this famous place, here
described as the most extensive in Europe, must have been subsequently
framed.

For about one hundred years later (1184) we have from Helmold, the
parish priest of Boesan, a small village on the eastern confines of
Holstein, a repetition of Adam's words, for a place which he calls {283}
"Veneta," but always in the past tense as, "quondam fuit nobilissima
civitas," etc.; so that it is plain from that and his expression
"excidium civitatis;" as well as, "Hanc civitatem opulentissimam quidam
Danorum rex, maxima classe stipatus, fundetus evertisse refertur." The
great question is, Where was this great city? and, are the _Julin_ of
Adam and the _Veneta_ of Helmold identical? Both questions have given
rise to endless discussions amongst German archaeologists. The published
maps, as late at least as the end of the last century, had a note at a
place in the Baltic, opposite to the small town of Demmin, in
Pomerania:--"Hic Veneta emporium olim celeberr. aequar. aestu absorpt."
Many, perhaps the majority, of recent writers contend for the town of
Wallin, which gives its name to one of the islands by which the Stettin
Haff is formed,--though the slight verbal conformity seems to be their
principal ground; for no _rudera_, no vestiges of ancient grandeur now
mark the spot, not even a tradition of former greatness: whilst Veneta,
which can only be taken to mean the _civitas_ of the Veneti, a nation
placed by Tacitus on this part of the coast, has a long unbroken chain
of oral evidence in its favour, as close to Rugen; and, if authentic
records are to be credited, ships have been wrecked in the last century
on ancient moles or bulwarks, which then rose nearly to the surface from
the submerged ruins. But the subject is much too comprehensive for the
compressed notices of your miscellany. I hope to have shortly an
opportunity of treating the subject at large in reference to the
Schiringsheal which Othere described to King Alfred, about two hundred
years earlier.

An edition of Adam and Helmold is very desirable in England, even in a
tr