Stick
Stick
(עֵוֹ, ets, a piece of wood, for fuel, Nu 15:32; 1Ki 17:10; 2Ki 6:6; La 4:8; φρύγανον, a twig, Ac 28:3). The use of billets or staves of wood for writing upon, as illustrated in Eze 37:16-20, is a frequent practice with primitive nations. This, indeed, is not the first instance of the practice in Scripture; for, so early as the time of Moses, we find a parallel example of writing upon rods (Nu 17:6). The custom existed among the early Greeks; as we are informed that the laws of Solon, preserved at Athens, were inscribed on billets of wood called axones. The custom has also existed in various applications in England and other Northern countries. The ancient Britons used to cut their alphabet with a knife upon a stick, which, thus inscribed, was called Coelbren y Beirdd, "the billet of signs of the bards," or the Bardic alphabet. And not only were the alphabets such, but compositions and memorials were registered in the same manner. These sticks were commonly squared, but sometimes were three-sided, and consequently a single stick would contain either three or four lines. The squares were used for general subjects and for stanzas of four lines in poetry; the trilateral ones being adapted to triads and to a peculiar kind of ancient meter called Triban, or triplet, and Englyn-Milwyr, or the warrior's verse. Several sticks with writing upon them were united together in a kind of frame or table, in the manner of a book. This was called Peithynen, or Elucidator, and was so constructed that each stick might be turned for the facility of reading, the end of each running out alternately on both sides. A continuation, or different application, of the same practice was offered by the Runic clog (a corruption of log) almanacs, the use of which has been preserved to a comparatively recent period, being described by Dr. Plot in his History of Staffordshire (1686) as still in common use in that county; some, of large size, being usually hung up at one side of the mantel tree of the chimney, while others were smaller and carried in the pocket. Other examples of the use of notched or marked sticks for the purpose of records are the Reine Pole, still or lately used in the island of Portland for collecting the yearly rent paid to the sovereign as lord of the manse, and the Exchequer Tally, which still gives name to the office of certain functionaries in England known as the "tellers" (talliers) of the exchequer. SEE ROD; SEE STAFF; SEE WALK.
