PONTIUS PILATE'S BIRTHPLACE.

Otago Witness, Issue 2295, 24 February 1898, Page 49

PONTIUS PILATE'S BIRTHPLACE.

Oaa of the strangest ljnks with the past which can be found in this country is supplied by the obscure village of Fortingall, la Perthrshire, which tradition points out as tha birthplace of Pontius Pilate. Fortingall lies in a beautiful and sequestered mountain vale some 10 miles west of Aberfeldy, in a district rich in memories of Fingal, Wallace, and Bruce. Near the village are the remains o2 a, Roman camp, where, afc tha utgincicg of the Christian era, the soldiers oil fche erapug were posted to guaid the passage from t-he Highlands through Glenlyon. This encampment is probably not earlier than the time of Agricola, and before it was made the Scottish king Metallanns held his court at Fortingall, and received aa embassy from Augustus. i One of the ambassadors, we are told, was the rather of Poctius Pil&fce, and here the future Governor of Judea is said to have beea bora shortly before the Nativity of our Saviour. The embassy to Metallanus is sufficiently well authenticated in the following passage frorrT Hollinshed. It was sent afc a tima when Augustus &eems to have been pursuing , a scheme for universal poace by means of a sort of sarly Concert o£ Europe: — " Ambassadors came from Augustus to Cymbeline, King of Britain, exhorting him to keep his subjects iv peace with all theic neighbour, sith the whole world, through means of the same Augustus, was now in quiet, without; all wars or troublesome tumults. Thesa ambassadors went also unto Metellanus, the Kiag of the Scottishmen, exhotting him fco acknowledge a superioritie in. the Romane Empcrour, unto whom tho people inhabiting in the farthest parts of the East had sent their ambassadors with rich jewels to present to his person withal. Wherwith Metellanus, being partlie mooved to have a friendlie amitia with fche Romanes, ha sent iato Rome certeine presents to the Eeaperour, and to the- gods" in the Capitoll in BJgne of honour, by which means ha obtained an amitie with the Romane*, which continued betwixt them and his kingdom for a long time after. Thus a generall peace was thea reigning throughout the whole worW, it pleased the Giver and Authour oi all peace* to "be borne at the same time of that blessed Virgin Marie in the cltie of Bathiem in the tribe of Juda, which most blessed and salutiferous birth did come to passe in the 12th year of his reign (Metellanns) and in the 42nd of Augustus his empire." As the old historians record, Pilate's later years were clouded by misfortunes, and like Ovid, he was saat into exile soon after writing that famous epiatle to Tiberius, which is alleged to exist to this day in the depth of the Vatican library. He perished by suicide at Vienne in Dauphine, about 39 A.D., or, as. Cassiodorus 3ays,~" overwhelmed by grievous misfortune?, he turned his hand against himself and took away his own wicked life." Aft Fortiogall there is a venerable yew, 93tiaiated at 3000 yaars old, and called the oldest tree in Europe. Antiquaries from all countries have examined the tree, and articles in various periodicals during the past hundred yssir.3 attest the correctness of its elsim to have been a sturdy aapllng when Nebuchadnezzar ate grass like a bea&fc of the fiftld. Halt a century ago a visitor wrote of this prehistoric yew aa fellows: —" la the churchyard of Fortingall is a very ancient; yew tree of remarkable growth, the trunk o£ which is divided into two stems, between which is an interval of several feet. At a distance it appears like too distinct trees* and, though partly injured at an early period of its growth, ie has attained to such a sisa that the branches spread over an arsa of nearly 60ft in circumference." Some sohoolboys lit a fire in the tree at a later date and caused irreparable injury. The parent stems are now so far apart that a coach and four might drive between them ; and not; very long ago it was customary for funerals to pass through the enormous gap in the trunk. The old trie is still fail of life and vigoav, and .tends oufc fresh shoots which* have formed a, densa foliage overhead.—Lloyd's Weekly Newspaper.