OGHAM LANGUAGE. The language of the Ogham in scriptions is the oldest form of Goidelic with which we are ac broad valley io m. up the canyon is Artesian park, where a cluster of 43 fountains spout water that is chemically pure, from a depth of I 5o ft., for the municipal supply. Ogden is the principal railroad centre of the region between the Rockies and the coast. Four roads maintain roundhouses and repair shops within its limits, and it is headquarters for much of the construction work in the western States. Its manufacturing industries are impor tant, with an aggregate output valued at $15,713,391 in 1927.
quainted. Some 30o inscriptions have been discovered in this alphabet, the majority of them hailing from the south-west of Ire land (Kerry and Cork). In Scotland 22 are known, whilst in Eng land and Wales about 3o have turned up. Most of the latter are in South Wales, but odd ones have been found in North Wales, Devon and Cornwall, and one occurs in Hampshire. The Isle of Man possesses two. The letters in the oldest inscriptions are form ed by strokes or notches scored on either side of the edge of an upright stone. Thus we obtain the alphabet on the preceding page.
This system, which was eked out with other signs, would seem to have been framed in the south-west of Ireland by a person or persons who were familiar with the Latin alphabet. Some of the inscriptions probably go back to the 5th century and may even be earlier. The simplest forms of Ogham inscriptions are : Doveti maqqi Cattini, i.e. "(the stone) of Dovetos son of Cattinos";
Trenagusu Maqi Maqi-Treni is rendered in Latin Trenegussi Fili Macutreni hic jacit; Sagramni Maqi Cunatami, "(the stone) of Sagramnos son of Cunotamos"; Ovanos avi Ivacattos, "(the stone) of Ovanus descendant of Ivacattus." In the oldest of these inscriptions q is still kept apart from k (c), and the final syllables have not disappeared (cf. maqqi, O.Ir. maicc) ; but it appears certain that in Oghamic writing stereotyped forms were used long after they had disappeared in ordinary speech. Several stones contain bilingual inscriptions, but the key to the Ogham alphabet is supplied by a treatise on Oghamic writing contained in the Book of Ballymote, a manuscript of the late 14th century.
See R. R. Brash, The Ogham Inscribed Monuments of the Gaedhil (5879) ; R. A. Stewart Macalister, Studies in Irish Epigraphy (3 vols., 1897-1907), and Archaeology of Ireland (1928). Welsh inscriptions are given in J. Rhys, Lectures on Welsh Philology (1879). The Scot tish stones have also been treated by Rhys in the Proceedings of the Scottish Society of Antiquaries (Edinburgh, 1892). See also G. M. Atkinson for the tract in the Book of Ballymote, Kilkenny Journal of Archaeology (1874). The Irish Christian inscriptions were published by Margaret Stokes as the annual volumes of the Roy Hist. and Archaeol. Association of Ireland (1870-77), and have been republished by R. A. Stewart Macalister.