94 NOTICES OF NEW PUBLICATIONS.

documents is wholly denationalized by the influence we have named ; on the contrary, the exotic phraseology occasionally employed serves to exhi- bit to great advantage that primitive, and frequently highly imaginative language, which may be remarked also in our Anglo-Saxon diplomata. The illustrations of costume supplied by this collection ai"e numerous, •and highly valuable for comparative purposes. For example, in the wills of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries fibulae of silver are frequently mentioned, which, from the value attached to them, seem to have been of large size, and similar to those which have been found in Ireland. As antiquaries are guided in estimating the genuineness of these relics by the character of their form and design, among other data, we may remark that in 1291 a testator bequeathed a fibula of silver fashioned "■ like a star." Such a form, it is believed, has not hitherto occurred, among the numerous discoveries of these objects which have happened in recent times. There are frequent notices of armour, and the different parts of that defensive habi- liment. By an ancient law, every landholder was compelled to keep a good horse worth at least forty marks Swedish, and those arms both for his body and legs by which a " good man"' could defend himself. An annual inspec- tion took place yearly before St. Peter's day, and if any one of the rural population aspired to an immunity from the land tax, he had only to pre- sent himself to the royal inspectors, who, upon considering his bearing, character, horse and arms, and how far his possessions were adequate to his due support as a man at arms, were empowered to enrol him among the military tenants of the crown ^. In this law considerable resemblance may be traced to the periodical arraj's and musters which prevailed in Eng- land to a comparatively recent period. There was this difierence, however, between the two, that in Sweden the class holding by military tenure ap- pears to have been more numerous than in England, and hence the mention of armour is more frequent in Swedish than in English wills of contempo- rary date. The intimate connection maintained with France, to which we have already alluded, prepares tlie reader for the appearance in these docu- ments of French names applied to parts as well of civil as of military cos- tume. Thus a Swedish landholder bequeaths his war-horse with a " cupar- thyr tester'" or copper testiere, the covering for tlie horse's head; and an- other directs his armour " cum sorcorcio,"' i. e. the surcote to be sold to sup- ply funds for the education of his sons. Hauberks with hoods are frequently mentioned. For information I'especting ecclesiastical ornaments the most valuable wills are those of INIagnus, king of Sweden, A.D. 1285, and of Heniy bishop of Lincoping; of the last there are two copies; the one being the testamentary disposition which the prelate made at Marseilles, en route to the Holy Land, the other that which he dictated at St. Jean d'Acre : both are dated A.D. 1283. It is worthy of observation that in the latter carpets are expressly mentioned as floor-coverings. He bequeathed to his cathedral church " tres carpitas, scilicet pavhnenialia. This will disposes of many

• SueciiE regni leges provinciates. Hohiiia", 1672. f'ol. p. 12.