Maitland Club > Works of Sir Thomas Urquhart

153
PR^NOSCENDUM.
The figures in the rows above the proper names, are to be understood thus :
the first denotes the yeer of the world wherein such a one was born, to
which effect, at the top of the page, just above that figure, are set down
the letters A. M. designing Anno Mundi. The second shews their number
or series, in order from their first fore father, and to this effect the word
Series is placed above it, at the upper end of the page. The third signi-
fies the difference of yeers betwixt any two predecessors as thev follow
one another, for which cause the words Common Difference is posited above
it, at the beginning of the page ; it being termed Common Difference for
no other reason, but that by adding and abstracting it from the epochs of
the world and incarnation, in the nativities of any one of the list, it will
afford the true foresaid epochs in the birth of his successor. Lastly, the
fourth number expresseth the epoch of Christ, either before or after the
incarnation, and to this purpose are supraposited the words Ante Chr.
Anno Christi. As for example, Esormon was born in the yeer of the
world 1810, was the sixteenth from Adam, he was 32 yeers younger then
his father Pasiteles, and lived 2139 yeers before the incarnation, &c.