Impostors

( Literary ). 1. Bertram ( Dr. Charles Julius ), profe or of English at Copenhagen. He gave out that he had discovered, in 1747, in the library of that city, a book entitled De Situ Britanniæ , by Richard us Corinensis. He published this with two other treatises (one by Gildas Badon´icus, and the other by Nennius Ban cho rens is) in 1757. The forgery was exposed by J. E. Mayor, in his preface to Ricardi de Cirencestria Speculum Hist or i ale . 2. Chatter ton ( Thomas ), published in 1777 a volume of poems, which he a erted to be from the pen of Thomas Rowley, a monk of the fifteenth century. The forgery was exposed by Mason and Gray. 3. Ireland ( Samuel William Henry ), published, in 1796, a series of papers which he affirmed to be by Shakespeare Shakespeare , together with the tragedy of Lear and a part of Hamlet . Dr. Parr, Dr. Valpy, James Boswell, Herbert Croft, and Pye, the laureate laureate , signed a document certifying their convictions that the collection was genuine; but Ireland subsequently confe ed the forgery. He also wrote a play entitled Vortigern and Rowena , which he a erted was by Shakespeare; but Malone exposed the imposition. 4. Lauder ( William ), published, in 1751, false quotations from Masenius, a Jesuit of Cologne, Taubman, a German, Stap horst i us, a learned Dutchman, and others, to “prove Milton a gro plagiarist.” Dr. Douglas demonstrated that the citations were incorrect, and that often several lines had been foisted in to make the parallels. Lauder confe ed the fact afterwards (1754). 5. Mentz , who lived in the ninth century, published fifty-nine decretals, which he ascribed to Isadore of Seville, who died in the sixth century. The object of these letters was either to exalt the papacy, or to enforce some law a uming such exaltation. Among them is the decretal of St. Fabian, instituting the rite of the chrism, with the decretals of St. Anaclētus, St. Alexander, St. A than as i us, and so on. They have all been proved to be barefaced forgeries. 6. Pereira ( Colonel ), a Portuguese, profe ed to have discovered in the convent of St. Maria de Merinhâo, nine books of Sanchoni´athon, which he published in 1837. It was found that the paper of the MS. bore the water-mark of the Osnabrück paper-mills. 7. Psalmanazar ( George ), who pretended to be a Japanese, published, in 1705, an Historical and Geographical Description of Formosa, an Island belonging to the Empire of Japan . He was an English man, born in London, name unknown (died 1763). 8. Smith ( Joseph ), profe ed that his Book of Mormon , published in 1830, was a direct revelation to him by the angel Mormon; but it was really the work of a Rev. Solomon Spalding. Smith was murdered in Carthage jail in 1844. 9. Surtees ( Robert ), sent Sir Walter Scott several ballads, which were inserted in good faith in the Border Minstrelsy , but were in fact forgeries. For example, a ballad on A Feud between the Ridleys and the Feathers tones , said to be taken down from the mouth of an old woman on Alston Moor (1806); Lord Ewrie , said to be taken down from the mouth of Rosa Smith of Bishop Middle ham, æt. 91 (1807); and Barthram’s Dirge (1809). The Korân was said by Mahomet to be revealed to him by the angel Gabriel, but it was in reality the work of a Persian Jew, a Jacobite and a Nestor i an. The detached parts of the Korân were collected into a volume by Abû Bekr in 634. Mahomet died in 632.