Topic: THE OLD TESTAMENT IN THE LIGHT OF THE ANCIENT EAST (sumer) I

[Prometheus]

254
TRADITIONS OF THE DELUGE
EGYPT 1
In the Book of the Cow the following is recorded:—In the beginning the Sun-god was king of the earth. But, since he had grown old, men no longer believed in his authority. At his command the goddess Hathor began a slaughter amongst mankind. But he saved a few by cunning. He caused beer to be brewed and to be mixed with the blood. Hathor drank of the mixture and became drunk, so that she could no longer recognise mankind to destroy them.2
In the temple of Amon-Ra, erected by Darius I. at Hib in the Great Oasis, there is a hymn in hieroglyphics the ideas of which are quite in accordance with those of the Book of the Cow ; it says :3
Thy throne from of old was upon the high field of Hermopolis- Magna. Thou hadst left (the Island of the Blessed) the land of the oasis, and appearedst in the mists, in the hidden egg. Near to thee was the goddess Amente. Thou tookest a seat upon the cow and took hold of her horns and didst swim here upon the great flood of the sacred Meh-ur. There were no plants. He began, when he united (himself) with the earth and when the waters rose to the mountain.
The Theban Book of the Dead contains in the badly preserved chapter clxxv.4 mention of a flood, at the end of which Osiris became king of Heracleopolis.
SYRIA
According to the Pseudo-Lucian, De dea Syria, 12, a similar tradition was preserved at Bambyke in the Greek temple of Derceto in the form of a fable of the founding of the sanctuary. By naming the hero Deucalion the Greeks claimed the fable for their own primeval times. But the mutilated
1   Comp. Wiedemann, Religion of the Ancient Egyptians (revised edition of the German Religion der alien Agypter). The Deluge of the papyrus of Ebers is interpreted by Schaefer, A eg, Ztschr., xxxvi. 129 ff.
2   Compare with this the motif of the deluge of blood in the Edda tradition, p. 157.
3   Brugsch, Reise nach der grossen Oase El Khargeh, Leipzig, 1S78. Analogies are to be found in the hymns of Khnum, see Daressy in Rec. de travaux rel. a la phil. Egypt, xxvii., pp. 82 ff., 187 ff.
4   Treated by Naville, Proc. Soc. Bibl. Arch., xxvi. 251 ff., 2S7 ff.
IN SYRIA
255
surname ?,Kv9ea betrays Xisuthros, that is to say, Sisithros; according to Buttmann’s fine conjecture it should be read AevKaXiowa TOU hcrvOea and the second name be understood as patronymic. The fable relates (de Dea Syra) as follows :
The wickedness of men became so great that they had to be destroyed. Then the fountains of the earth and the floodgates of heaven were opened, the sea rose ever higher, the whole earth was covered with water and all men went under. Only the pious Deucalion (Xisuthros) was rescued, by hiding himself with his wives and children in a great chest “which he possessed.” When he entered there came in also, in pairs, every kind of four-footed thing, serpents, and whatever else lives upon the earth. He took them all in, and God caused great friendship to be amongst them. At last the water ran away through a small cleft in the earth. Deucalion opened the chest, built altars, and founded over the cleft in the earth the holy temple of the goddess.
Arks on the Coins of Apumeia.—A remarkable local stamp
is shown on the bronze1 coins of the Phrygian city Celaeme,
later named Apameia, the pseudonym
for which. Kifiwro?, “chest,” can be
traced back to the time of Augustus.
The coins (fig. 76) show two scenes of
the Deluge. On the right is the chest
upon waves of water, with a man and
woman raising themselves out of it,
and upon the open lid of it a dove
sitting, whilst a second (!) dove with
a branch flies towards it from the left. Fig- /^-Phrygian coin
from Apameia.
On the left stand the same figures
(in both presentments the woman wears a veil thrown back), with the right hand raised in prayer. The picture certainly illustrates an ancient Phrygian form of the fable, which the Greek Phrygians have used here.2 The coins were peculiar to Apameia, perhaps in memory of a certain historical event. The name Noah (NQE) rests upon Jewish (or Christian?) influence.
1   Fourth century A.D. Compare with this Usener, 4S ff.
2   A second Phrygian story of the Deluge will be spoken of under Sodom and Gomorrha (Baucis and Philemon, Ovid, Met., viii. 615 ff.).
 
256
TRADITIONS OF THE DELUGE
PERSIAN LEGENDS OF THE DELUGE
Vendidad ii. is mentioned p. 163. They are connected with the primeval hero Yima. He is commissioned by Ahuramazda, before the Flood, which comes as punishment for the wickedness of men, to save himself and to care for the preservation of creation. He hides the rescued in a walled-in place.1
INDIAN LEGENDS OF THE DELUGE 2
As far back as the Vedic age the fable was established in all essential features.3
The Brahmana “ of the hundred paths ” relates :
There came into the hands of Manu, the first man and son of the God of the sun, whilst he was washing, a fish, who said to him : “Take care of me and I will save you.” ‘‘'From what wilt thou save me ? ” “A flood will carry away all this creation, 1 will save thee from that.” Manu took care of the fish, which grew strong. When it had become a great fish (compare Ea in the Babylonian Deluge story) he put him into the sea. But before that it said: “ In such and such year the flood will come, so thou mayest prepare thyself a ship and turn (in spirit) to me : when the flood rises thou shalt enter the ship and I -will save thee.” Manu built the ship, entered it at the appointed time, and bound the rope to the horn of the fish, who had come back and was swimming near. Thereupon it (the fish) hurried away to the mountain in the north (Mountain of the World, see p. 266), then when the waters sank, the ship rested upon it. Therefore he called the northern mountain avasar-panam (“descent of Manu”). The flood had carried away every creature, only Manu remained. He lived in prayer and fasting, desirous of descendants. Then he instituted also the paka sacrifice. He offered butter and cream. And from this there arose a woman. She came to Manu. Manu said to her: “Who art thou?” “Thy daughter.” “How art thou my daughter, beautiful one ? ” “ From those sacrificial gifts hast thou begotten me. I am Ida (that is, ‘the benediction’). Turn to me when thou offerest sacrifice; then shalt thou become rich in children and
1   The catastrophe here is not rain, but cold, which, however, when the snow melts, causes an inundation.
2   Their independence, as an Iranian improvement upon an ancient Aryan myth of originally religious meaning, is emphasised by Lindner in Feslgntsz an R. Roth, 213 ff. This view is correct, contrary to the hypothesis of borrowing held by Noldeke and others. But the whole controversy falls with the acceptance of the material having travelled also to the Iranians. Whence it came is cnra posterior.
3   Usener, 25 ff.
INDIA -CHINA
237
in cattle. Whatever blessing thou desirest from me, that shall be given unto thee.” Mann lived with her in prayer and fasting, desirous of descendants. Through her he begot this generation, which is now called the generation of Mann. Whatever blessing he desired from her, that he received.
In the Vedic writings only one passage of the Kathaka has reference to the fable :
The water washed (the world) away,1 Manu alone survived.
The epic Mahabharata has amplified the old fable :
Manu is in this no more the first man, but a hero, who outdid his father and his grandfather in strength, power, and beauty and abstinence. He did penance for 10,000 years long, with raised arms, standing on one leg, with sunken head and never winking. A fish, glittering like moonlight, came to him, prayed to him for protection, told him of the flood which would overwhelm the world, and procured his rescue. With Manu seven Sages (Rishi) entered the ship. He brought every kind of seed “ as the Brahmans taught of old ” on board. For many years the fish guided the ship through the wide waters with his horn. “ No land was visible, and all directions were unrecognisable; all was water and air and sky.” The ship was anchored by the seven Sages upon the highest point of the Himalayas. The fish revealed himself to be “ Brahma, the Prajapati ” : “There is none greater than I; in the form of a fish I have rescued thee from this danger. And Manu, together with the gods, is to make everything, Asuras and men and all worlds and all that is in order or in disorder.”
THE CHINESE LEGENDS OF THE DELUGE 2
They existed when the earth (world, China) had long been an organised political state. The tradition appears even in its most ancient form (handed down metrically) to be a remembrance, grown fabulous, of the draining, canal-building, and regulating of the basin of the river Hoang-Ho. In the oldest form of the fable this draining is placed amongst the technical
1   Or “washed the world?” Is there here a simile as in I Pet. iii. 20 f. : the Deluge a cleansing of the world? According to H. Jacobi (Usener. 28), it was first in the epic Mahabharata and in the Puranas that the destruction of the world by water or by fire was founded upon the corruption of man.
2   Shu-king, i. 10, 11, and ii. 4, 1 (Legge, Chinese Classics, iii. 1, 24, and 77) ; comp, also iii. 1, 60. A fuller description in Mencius, iii. 1, iv. 7, iii. 2, ix. 3 (Legge, Chinese Classics, ii. 250, 279). I am indebted to Professor Conrady for these statements.
VOL. I.
17
258
TRADITIONS OF THE DELUGE
works of Yu,1 and onlv later (fourth century B.C.) the variant first appears—perhaps in itself older—of the help of the winged dragon in it; compare the poem of Ktih Yuan, p. 166.
A NORTHERN LEGEND OF THE DELUGE 2
One single passage of the Edda, which has been mentioned p. 170, gives evidence of this :
Countless winters before the creation of the earth Bergelmir was born ;
the earliest I know is, that the crafty giant was saved in a boat.3
Bergelmir is one of the older giants. Snorre’s Edda records (Gylfaginningi 7):4 “The sons of Bur killed Ymir, and there flowed from his body so much blood, that the whole generation of Frost giants was drowned. Only one escaped with his dependants. He entered into his boat and saved himself in it.”
THE GREEK LEGEND OF THE DELUGE
Recorded by Apollodorus, i. 712 ff. Zeus wished to destroy the generation of mankind of the previous age (!); but by the counsel of Prometheus, Deucalion made a chest, put food therein, and entered it with his wife Pyrrha. A few saved themselves by flight to the mountains. After nine days and nights Deucalion landed upon Parnassus. He came forth and offered a sacrifice to Zeus. Zeus permitting him to express a wish, he prayed for mankind ; and they arise by his throwing over his head “ the bones of the mother,” that is, the stones of the mountain, which are changed into men.5
1   Richthofen, China, i. 344 ff.
2   Lindner, “ Die iranische Flutsage,” in the Festgruszan R. v. Roth, 1S93, 213 ff. Oldenberg, in Religion der Jreda, inclines to a direct borrowing from Babylonia. Here also is a case of the Teaching having travelled.
3   Lindner, Wafthrttdnir, 35 ; Gehring, Edda, p. 64.
4   Gehring, p. 302 f.
5   The same motif as in the Slav legend of the rainbow ; see p. 270 The Odyssey, xix. 164, talks of the stones from which man is descended. Should we here think of the stones endowed with souls, the meteors (Baity-los = bet-ili), which as fallen stars are living beings? In Eusebius, Pnvp. Ev., i. 10, Betylos is the name of one of the four sons of Euranos (heaven) and the earth, and the
GREEK
259
Many other fables of the Deluge might be added, which point to one single tradition. A very interesting Slav story will be mentioned, p. 270. Riem, l.c., counts sixty-eight related fables of the Deluge, reducing the eighty-five reckoned by Andree (p. 24.5, li. l) to this number.
Baetyles arc described as the living stones which Euranos brought forth. It was such stones that Orion made to dance (music of the spheres), and with which Amphion built the cosmic Thebes. The seven or twelve children of Amphion, svho were changed into stones, are stars ; the seven are the planets, the twelve are the signs of the zodiac. From our point of view we must assume that here also we find ideas which refer back to one root. And then the Oriental origin of the Deucalion legend can no longer be doubtful. On the “living stones,’’ see pp. 79 ff.
CHAPTER X
THE BIBLICAL RECORD OK THE DELUGE
Yahvist.   Priestly Document.
1.   On account of the wickedness of mankind, God deter- ! mined to destroy man and beast
2.   Only Noah is to be spared
3.   Communication to Noah
4*. Command to build the Ark and measurements given
5. Inhabitants of the Ark   ,
(?)   Men
(?)   Beasts   1
(c) Provisions
6.   The command of God is carried out
7.   Yahveh closes the door
8.   Beijinninff of the
CT*   O
Deluge
Gen. vi. 5-7   Gen. vi. 11-13


vi.   8; comp,
vii.   6
vii.   4
vi.   9
vi. 13, 17
(„ vii. 1 — the „ vi. 14-16
Ark is already in existence    i
Gen. vii. 1
(Noah and his house)
Gen. vii. 2-3
(Of clean beasts and of birds, seven pairs of each ; of the unclean, one pair of each)
Gen. vii. 5, 7-9
„ vii. 16b
„ vi. 18
(Noah himself)
Gen. vi. 19, 20
(One pair of each kind)
Gen. vi. 21
vi. 22; 13, 16
vii.
„ vii. 4
(40 days’ rain)
„ vii. 11 (Water poured from the great Tehom and from heaven)
1 In the sources from which the editor of this Yahvist account drew, no doubt the command to build was also related. The chronicler has cleverly combined the sources, taking what is characteristic from each. Budde, in Die biblische Urgeschichte, 248 ff., was the first to attempt to re-establish the sources.
260
THE DELUGE
261
Yahvist.   Priestly Document.
9. The inundation
10. The duration
11.   End of the Deluge
12.   Destruction bv the flood
13.   Rest upon one of the mountains of Ararat
14.   Sending out of the birds
15.   Noah and his family leave the ark
16.   Noah offers sacrifice
17.   Resolution of God to destroy no more by flood
18.   Blessing the rescued
19.   Establishment of the bow as cove-
Gen. vii. 17
(All the earth flooded)
Gen. vii. 4,12, 17 and viii. 6-12
(40 and 10 (?) days
Gen. viii.2b-3%13b ,, vii. 22, 23
viii. 6-12
,,   viii. 20
„   viii. 21, 22
Gen. vii. 18-20
(Water 15 cubitsabove the highest mountains)
Gen. vii. 24; viii. 1-3, 5, 14
(The waters increase for 150 days; the Deluge lasts altogether 365 days)
Gen. viii. 1-2% 3b- 5, 13% 14 Gen. vii. 21
„ viii. 4
„ viii. 15-19
„ ix. 8-11
„ ix. 1-7 „ ix. 12-17
nant
1. In Gen. iv. it appears how wickedness has gained the upper hand. Also in the 6th chapter, 7 ff., the “ fall of the angels,-” who were of the generation of the giants, describes the deterioration. Gen. vi. 3 indicates that Yahveh had considered other punishments (shortening the length of life to 120 years) before proceeding to the uttermost. Thus the Deluge is connected with the stories of the Patriarchs.1 2
In the same way the Babylonian tradition connects the
1   P. 267, n. 2.
2   The killing of animals seems to be a sin according to the words of God at the conclusion of the Flood. We accept the interesting hypothesis of Winckler (F , iii. 396 f.) that the judgment also refers to the animal world (the end of all flesh is come), and find the fall of the animals in Gen. vi. 13, “behold, they ruin the (/. hiune-nam mashitim) earth.” Compare with this p. 268, and compare Jubil. v.
2, “ They all (the animals also) erred in their ways and began to devour each other. ”
262 THE BIBLICAL RECORD OF THE DELUGE
Deluge with the primeval kings. Certainly the history of the Flood worked into the epic of Gilgamesh says nothing about this; the poem has made a very free use of the material. But it may be concluded from Berossus that the connection existed in Babylonia. Xisuthros is the last of the primeval kings, and his connection with the sages of the primeval age is established by the fact that, according to Berossus, Xisuthros buried writings in Sippar1 before the Deluge, which were then dug up by the relations of the Babylonian Noah and spread abroad amongst men.
The Deluge appears as culmination of a succession of punishments in the group of Babylonian myth-poems mentioned p. 253. An epic fragment, probably having its source in Sippar, the writings on which belong to the period of Ammizaduga,2 one of the kings of the Hammurabi dynasty, and in which the hero of the Deluge, Atrahasis, is called “ Chief in prudence,” proclaims that other punishments preceded the Deluge, and that men again fell away. FI. Zimmern has rightly brought another text, which is a transcription out of the library of Assurbanipal, and where also Atarhasis3 is the hero, into connection with this. In this one, as in the other, Atarhasis converses with his Lord, i.e. Ea. He repeatedly speaks about the miseries which the punishments have brought upon mankind (first six years of famine, drought, unfruitfulness, then fever and ague, and then again sterility), and calls to remem
1   P. 246. The connection with Sippar gives on the one hand a play of words on shipnt (.sepher), “ book,” and on the other a yet unknown relation to religious . history, which should be sought for in the cultural meaning of the sun-city Sippar.
The Jewish fable also has the like burying of the Tables. In the Slav, God by two angels permits Enoch to bury the writings of Adam and of Seth, so that they shall not be destroyed in the Deluge. Similarly, in the Vita Adam et Eva, 49 f. (Kautzsch, Pseudepigr., 506 ff.). In a Persian story of the Deluge in Albiruni, Chronology (Sachan’s translation, p. 28), Tahmurath hides all books of science before the Flood ; see Boeklen, loc. cit., p. 35.
2   The stories of Ea and of Atrahasis perhaps represent a literary mixture of the materials of two myths. The Deluge story belongs to Babylonia proper (the scene of the inundations of the Euphrates ; Bel of Nippur, Lord of the Deluge; Shurippak, the dwelling-place of the Babylonian Noah : Sippar, according to Berossus, the place where the sacred books were preserved ; Babylon, the city to which the rescued then returned), whilst the Ea-Atrahasis myth belongs to Eridu.
3   Atarhasis is a variant of the name Atrahasis.
THE DELUGE
m
brance that men were yet made by the gods. The relationship of this tale with the before-mentioned fragment leads to the undoubted conclusion that here also the judgments for sins which were ordained by Inlil in the counsel of the gods “ because (sins) were not taken away, but increased from of old,” ended in the Deluge. The connection of the Flood with other previous judgments, which have vanished out of Genesis, is therefore plainly to be found in the Babylonian cycle of myths.
2.   Gen. vi. 9 : “Xoah was a righteous and perfect man in his reaps.1 Xoah walked with God” The Babylonian story sets forth (line 182 ff.) that Ut-napishtim was saved because of his piety. 7n the same wav Berossus sets forth that Kronos appeared to Xisuthros in a dream because he was God-fearing. He relates in the end that Xisuthros was taken away, and a voice (Xisuthros1?) spoke from the air to those saved, commanding them 2 that they should continue to fear God, as was fitting: see p. 246. Noali “ walked with God,11 like Enoch, Gen. v. 24: see p. 240. The rescue of Noah ( = Babylonian Ut-napishtim-Xisuthros) corresponds to the translation of Enoch ( = Enmeduranki). Should there be a tradition accord- ing to which the Biblical Xoah also (he lived, according to Gen. ix. 28, for 350 years after the Deluge) was translated? The expression of the Yahvist, Gen. vi. 8, “he found grace with Yah veil,” is specifically Israelite.
3.   In the Babylonian records and in Berossus the revelation is made in a dream. Also in Gen. vi. 13 it may mean a dream. Apocryphal poems of a later Jewish period drew pictures of the intercourse of God with Noah.
4.   Gen. vi. 14 ff. The measurements in the Babylonian records are at variance. But, as in the Bible, the ark is divided into stories, line 63. The six stories of line 61 may agree with the Biblical account of thirty cubits high.
In the description of the ark, Gen. vi. 14-16, the text is not in right order. This explains the exegetical difficulties. By a simple transposition of the words Winckler has given, according to our view, the true sense :—
1   To be read ran ; see Winckler, F., iii. 396.
2   On the voice at the Ascension, comp, also Rev. xi. 12.

[Prometheus]

264 THE BIBLICAL RECORD OF THE DELUGE
Make thee an ark of gopher-wood, and pitch it within and without with pitch. And this is how thou shalt make it: The length of the ark three hundred cubits, the breadth of it fifty cubits, and the height of it thirty cubits; to a cubit shalt thou finish it..1 A roof shalt thou make to the ark above, and a door shalt thou set in the side thereof In stories2 shalt thou build the ark, with lower, second, and third stories shalt thou build it.
The new Hilprecht fragment from Nippur, referred to p. 252, should be considered in connection with the command to build the ark; the relationship to the Biblical story, Gen. vi. 13-20,
vii.   5-11, is striking.
In the Babylonian story Ut-napishtim is mocked by the people for building the ark. This feature is also found in the Koran, Sura 11, and in the story of the rescue of Lot from the deluge of fire, Gen. xix. 14. Also the extra-Biblical Jewish traditions tell how Noah was mocked, as is shown by the Talmud Tractate Sanhedrim 323, fol. 1086. In this the people ask Noah whether a deluge of water or of fire is to come.
5.   In the Bible (Gen. vi. 18) the number rescued from amongst mankind is limited to Noah’s family—most likely in the interests of the unity of the human race, which should descend from one, as antediluvian mankind did from Adam. In the Babylonian record Ut-napishtim is translated, and mankind is descended from the others who were rescued, amongst whom were a steward and a skilled artisan.3 The Yahvist gives preference to the clean beasts, Gen. vii. 2 f. The division between clean and unclean beasts is common to the whole East, especially in the case of sacrifice (comp. Gen. viii. 20). The Babylonian Noah took all his possessions in with him, especially gold and silver; the provisions in P have been contracted to eatables.
7. Ut-napishtim closes the door. The Bible (Yahvist)
1   Similarly in the Assyrian measurements, for example, AWX ina ishten ammat, thirty to one cubit (measured by a cubit) (Winchler).
2   |p, “dwelling-place.” The ark corresponds to the terrestrial and celestial universe divided into three; see p. S.
3   They were counted after the animals ; they are part of property, as it is with the presents given by Pharaoh to Abraham, Gen. xii. 16 : sheep and oxen, and he-asses, and men-servants and maid-servants.
THE DELUGE
265
emphasises, Gen. vii. 16, the care of God:   Yahveh shut
the door.1
8.   This description of the breaking out of the Deluge differs essentially from the otherwise poetic and wonderful Babylonian record, which presents the natural phenomena mythologically as gods: together with Adad, god of storm and tempest, the four planet-gods work, Nebo, Marduk, Nergal, and Ninib: and the Anunnaki, who belong to the Underworld, light the scene with their torches. The source utilised in the Priestly Document also described the breaking out of the Deluge poetically in its way. V. 116 is one verse (Gunkel, 131 f.), and names the great Tehom (the ocean is meant, but the poetic expression recalls Primeval Chaos) as one of the sources of the Deluge.
9.   The Babylonian Deluge includes the whole created universe, even to the heaven of Anu. In the form in which we have it, the Biblical record only refers to the earth. But there are traces to be found that its transcriber had in mind the flooding of the whole cosmos. The slow sinking of the waters, Gen. viii. 3-5, is brought about by the ruak, who in Gen. i. broods over Tehom of the deep. The resting-place (manoah) from whence the dove takes the olive leaf is, in point of fact, the summit of the Mountain of the World; see p. 271, and comp. p. 256.
10.   For the sun number 365 in P, see p. 239, n. 8.
The numbers with the Yahvist are 40 and 3x7.   40 is the
number of the Pleiades, and indicates rain and winter-time; see p. 68. Winckler, F., iii. 96, counts besides, instead of the 3x7 of the “ancient sources,11 2 x 7; that would be 2x7 + 40 = 54 days, the time of a sidereal double month, that is, as long as the sun is in one of the six divisions of the heavens. The 2x7 would then correspond to the Babylonian duration of the Deluge ; the flood lasts seven days, and seven days it recedes.
12.   The moving lament over the destruction by the Deluge (Babylonian record, line 133 ff.) is omitted in the Bible.
13.   The waters sink. The length of time points to the
1   Or is Yahveh to be taken as a gloss, as Klostermann thinks, Pentateuch, p. 40, so that here also Noah shuts the door?
266 THE BIBLICAL RECORD OF THE DELUGE
original meaning being the Mountain of the World ; see p. 271. The cause of the shakak, the stilling (not sinking) of the waters, is the mail, that is, the same Spirit which in Gen. i. 3 “was brooding upon111 the face of the waters. In the Bible P says, “ upon one of the summits of Ararat.'’'' The scene of the story of Noah (the neighbourhood of Urartu in Armenia) is therefore approximately the same as that given by the Babylonian chronicler. The Yahvist also means the same neighbourhood ; comp. Gen. xi. 2. The Babylonian record gives the name of the highest peak of the mountains—Nisir. In the present day the peak Gudi, in the neighbourhood of Ararat, is held to be the mountain of the Deluge. The ark rested there seven days, as in the Babylonian record.
14.   According to Gen. viii. 6, it almost seems as though there had been a source which only tells of the raven. The sending out of the raven disturbs the coherence.2 “ Flew to and fro11 possibly means: it went repeatedly out and came repeatedly back until the waters were dried up, then the raven stayed out. This would coincide with the role of the raven in the cuneiform record, line 154 f. There remain, then, three despatches of birds.
The chronicler of the Babylonian record gives the order: dove, swallow, raven. The Biblical chronicler has the more significant: raven, swallow (the first dove has taken the place of this), dove. The climax is reached with the bringing of the olive leaf. The renewed sending out of the dove, which does not return, Gen. viii. 12. disturbs the sense. As a domesticated bird, the dove would come back in any case. Neither the Biblical nor the Babylonian chronicler has any longer understood the cosmic motif in the recension before us. The dove3 brings the olive leaf from the Tree of Life which stands upon the summit of the Mountain of the World, near the Tree of Death, the Tree of Knowledge; see p. 271, comp. p. 208 ff.
1   Winckler, F., iii. 399. In a mythologised story there came a messenger from God.
2   Wellhausen, /composition, p. 15 ; comp. Winckler, F., iii. 93 f.
0   Gunkel therefore is right when, in his Genesis, 60, he looks for traces of mythology in the dove. According to Plutarch, de sol. anim., 13, the dove is also to be found in the myth of Deucalion.
THE END OF THE DELUGE
267
If the last sending out of the dove is done away with, it also does away with the second seven days in the time reckoning. The Deluge lasts forty days (Pleiades number, time of want and during which no claim can be made to a relief fund ; see p. 6S). According to the Oriental calendar symbolism, we should now expect a term of three or ten days 1 to bring deliverance. Winckler, F., iii. 401, reckons the ten days thus : the raven is sent out on the forty-first day (viii. 7). It does not come back. Then follows the sending out of the swallow (dove), since the raven brings no message. It would certainly be done very soon—in the evening or the next morning, in any case on the following, therefore on the forty-second day. Now Noah waits seven days (Gen. viii. 10, “yet other” seven days; according to what we have said above, “yet other” is done away with). On the forty-ninth day he sends out the dove ; on the fiftieth day she brings the olive leaf.2
16.   Berossus: Xisu threw kissed the earth, built an altar, and offered to the gods.3 More in detail in the cuneiform record: “ The gods smelled the savour, the gods smelled the fragrance, they gathered themselves together like flies round the sacrifice.'” The Yahvist says (Gen. viii. 21): “Yahveh smelled the sweet savour.” That this is here simply a figure of speech, meaning “ God was well pleased,” is shown by Amos
v.   21 ; Lev. xxvi. 31. In more drastic form, 1 Sam. xxvi. 19 f. (David speaks to Saul): “ If it be Yahveh that hath stirred thee up against me, let him accept an offering of fragrance to smell.” Ezek. viii. 17 says of the heathen cult in Jerusalem : “ Surely they let the stink [of their offering] rise to my nose.” Equally bv this presentment of the sacrifice the “sweet savour of Christ” is explained, 2 Cor. ii. 15: comp. Phil. iv. 18.
1   The ten days is the motif in fixing the yom kippor as the day of liberation on the tenth day after New Year, which is held as judgment time ; see B.N. T., 70 f. Further, Rev. ii. 10.
2   The fifty here has the same calendar signification as the fifty between Passover and Whitsuntide, and which, on the ground of events in the life of Jesus, also divide the Christian festival of Easter and Whitsuntide. The division into 40 (Ascension) + 10 is perhaps brought into the right position on account of the calendar motif. The Ascension in reality did not fall upon the 40th, but upon the 42nd day, therefore upon a Sabbath, which is perhaps what the “ sabbath day’s journey,” Acts i. 12, indicates. Jesus appeared for the first time to his disciples at Easter evening, therefore at the beginning of the day following the resurrection, Luke xxiv. 29, 36; then “he let himself be seen for forty days,” Acts i. 3; the farewell would therefore fall upon the 42nd day, therefore upon one Saturday before Exaudi (see Lichtenstein in Saat auf Hofftmng, 1906, pp. 11S ff.).
! Compare also the Indian fable, pp. 256 f.
268 THE BIBLICAL RECORD OF THE DELUGE
Rabbinical theology speaks of three odours pleasing to God (the odour of sacrifice, of prayer, and of virtuous acts, the last being the most acceptable), Yalkut Rubeni, 806. Another poetic figure of speech of the “savour’1 is given by the presentment of the plant of life, which is smelled; see p. 215. And even if it were to be understood in an anthropomorphic sense (in the same sense as the repentance and grief of God in Gen. vi. 6), how far removed even that would be from the satirical description in the Babylonian story !
17.   With the decision of God in the Yahvist compare the
Babylonian record, line 180 ff. The words of Gen. viii. 22, pNrr   Ti?, have been translated, reading it as iod: “ hence
forth, all the days of the earth .... shall not cease.” The grammatical sequence requires the reading icicl, “till” (Septua- gint): 7retort? ra? tj/mepas yi/v- u Till all1 the days of the earth [are finished], seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night shall not cease.” That corresponds to the System of the Ages of the World. When the days of the earth are finished, the fire-flood will come; comp. 2 Pet. iii. 7, “ the former world was destroyed by a water flood .... but the present heaven and earth are set apart for fire.”
18.   With this blessing of the rescued compare the Babylonian record, line 200 ff. In Gen. ix. 2 animals are permitted for food, as, till then, were vegetables. Slaying and killing is allowed. The animals were included in the fall and in the judgment of the Deluge ; see p. 261, n. 2. Now begins what St Paul, in Rom. viii. 19 ff., calls the “ groaning of all creation,” which in like manner awaits redemption. Only the eating of flesh with blood in it is forbidden, Gen. ix. 4 (P). For such blood of the beast God will bring man into judgment. The meaning of Gen. ix. 5 is: God will avenge the blood of man upon every living thing (the beast also which kills man, pays the death penalty). If a man kills a man, God requires yet more; he requires of the murderer the life (the soul, nephesh) of his brother.2 Gen. ix. 6 adds to this a command, and
1   Winckler corrects to ivta i>\
2   The disentanglement of the text which proves this meaning is given by Winckler, F., iii. 402 f.
THE BOW AS SYMBOL
269
a theological foundation for it: man, made in the image of God, stands higher than the beast.
19.   The bow, which was naturally also already obvious to the mind of the Biblical chronicler, is to be the sign of remembrance for mankind. Gen. ix. 16: “ And the bow shall be in the cloud, and thou shalt see it to remember1 the covenant.” We find a sign given at Babylonian investitures. Compare, for example, the giving of symbols in the investiture documents of Merodaeh-Baladan; see fig. 189, p. 281, ii. (fruit? In German law an ear of corn is given).
What is the meaning of the bow ? Wellhausen, Prolegomena, 3rd ed., 327, concludes from the word qeshet (otherwise, bow to shoot with) that the weapon of war is symbolised by it, which the arrow-shooting god lays aside as sign of his wrath put away. The Arabs also take the rainbow to be the weapon of God : Gnzah shoots arrows from his bow and then hangs it in the clouds. In India the rainbow is called lndraijudha, the weapon of Indra,” as being the bow from which he hurls lightning arrows against the rebellious Asurs.
The following may be added as Babylonian material :—
1.   In the Babylonian record of the Deluge, Ifid ff'., Ishtar raises an object called Nim, which Anu had made by her wish, and swears she will remember this day to the furthest future.
2.   The Babylonian epic of creation (Table V. ?) speaks of the placing in the heavens of the weapon with which Marduk has conquered Tiamat:2
The net that he had made, the gods [his fathers] saw, they saw the bow, that it [was made] ingeniously, and the work that he had ended, they praised ....
Anu arose in the assembly of the gods .... he praised (?) the bow : “it is . . . .”
[The names] of the bow he called as follows :
“ Longwood ” is the one, the other . . . ., its third name “ Bowstar in the heavens . . . .” he made firm its place (?) ....
According to that, the “bow,” qeshet, has nothing to do with the rainbow. Qeshet is a weapon ; and the bow to shoot with, which is thin at the ends, does not really answer to the rainbow. Since the bow is in the heavens, we must look for an astral motif. And the crescent of the new moon does, in fact, coincide admirably. Boeklen,
1   To be read thus .HJVXI, in agreement with Winckler. Josephus seems to have already read it thus. Ant., i. 3, S : “The bow shall serve thee as a token of my mercy.” God does not require the reminder.
2   K.T., xii. 3.
270 THE BIBLICAL RECORD OF THE DELUGE
l.c., 123 ft'., has made the explanation very probable. Besides this, in Isa. xxvii. 1 (p. 195) the new moon, which proclaims the victory over the power of darkness, appears as the sickle-sword in the hand of Yahveh.1 The bow of the new moon, which was hailed with joy (Hilal!), is the sign of remembrance of the covenant of God with Noah.
But the tradition which makes the bow' the rainbow may also be proved correct. The original meaning may refer to a divine weapon, but certainly already the editor of the text in question was thinking of the rainbow. Also the late Jewish interpretation sees in the rainbo\v the divine comforter. Curiously, it appears thus in the Slav legends of the Deluge (Hanusch, SI a wise he Marchen, p. 23-1):—The Lord of the Universe saw from the window of heaven war and murder upon earth. So he let the earth be destroyed for twenty days and nights by water and wind. Only one old pair remained alive. To them he sent the rainbow as comforter (Liuxmine), which advised them to spring over the earth’s bones (stones). Thus arose new pairs of mankind, the primeval ancestors of the Lithuanian tribes.
Did the rainbow pass besides for the celestial bridge ? We found this celestial bridge in the Japanese cosmology, p. 167- In the Ed da, Heimdal guards the mythical bridge by which the Asa ascend to heaven, and which will be broken at the Twilight of the gods. And in the German fables souls are conducted to heaven over the rainbow.
That these bridges are of Oriental origin is showm by the conception of them as stairs (naturally with the seven-coloured steps). The rainbow with its seven colours “ corresponds to ” (comp. pp. 8 f.) the zodiac with the same seven planet colours, by the steps of w-hich the astral gods ascend to the heaven of Ann ; see pp. 15 f.
THE COSMIC AND ASTRAL MOTIFS OF THE STORY OF THE DELUGE
The Biblical chronicler clearly accepts the Deluge as corresponding to some historical event of primeval ages — an “ event, the most ancient and the most tremendous which has ever happened to man.'" 2 Also the Babylonian tradition, with its distinction between kings before or after the Flood (pp. 71, 238), seems to have an historical event in view. The Babylonian
1   Rev. xiv. 14 ft*., it becomes the sickle of the harvest of judgment.
2   Riem, Die Siiiflut: Eine ethnographisch-naturwissenschaflliche Untersuchung, Stuttgart, Kielmann, 1906. The fact cannot be established by means of historical criticism. In the critical examination of the Biblical story other issues will determine the decision for or against ; see pp. 80 f.
COSMIC AND ASTRAL MOTIFS
271
Deluge storv borrows its imagery from natural events which may be observed from time to time in the stormy floods in the plains of the Euphrates.1
But the presentment gives an echo of cosmic and astral motifs. The Teaching of the Ages of the Universe reckons with a deluge and with a fire-flood in the course of the moms, which will include the whole cosmos. When the precession of the spring point passes through the water region of the zodiac the deluge happens ; when the precession passes through the fire region of the zodiac the fire-flood happens; see pp. 70 f.2
The Babylonian record refers to the cosmic flood. The gods flee to the heaven of Anu, line 115, and cower under the kamati of that heaven. Therefore the tubnrjath the heavens of the seven planets, are overflowed. LR-napishtim is called hasisatra like Adapa ( = Marduk as hero ; see p. 107); he is the “ new Adapa,” the Bringer of the New Age.
But the Biblical chronicler also is aware of the cosmic flood. He lets echoes from the nature-mvth and the Teaching of the Ages of the Universe sound in his storv; together they form the 44 scientific ” background to his record of the Deluge (see pp. 80, 175). We may indicate the following points:—
1.   The inclusion in the Ages ; see pp. 26J f. and 267 f. Noah is one of the Bearers of revelation who inaugurate the Ages.3
2.   The 44 chest,” Hebrew tebah. The same word designates the basket in which Moses was exposed. This chest is inevitable in the myth of the New Age. The Bringer of the New Age is always rescued in a chest; see Exod. ii.4
3.   The resting-place of the dove, Gen. viii. 9, Manoah, upon which the olive tree grows, is the summit of the Mountain
1   The mode of expression used by the historical documents, which announce an annihilating destruction “ like a flood ” {abubn) falling upon the enemy, no doubt also refers to such cyclones.
2   The Biblical conception protests against the iron fate of the teaching of the seons. There shall be no return of the Deluge, Gen. ix. 15 ; comp. Isa. liv. 9 : “ I have sworn that the waters of Noah should go no more over the earth.” But comp. 2 Pet. iii. 6 f., p. 26S, above, and B.N. T, 116.
3   See Gunkel, Genesis, p. 130. Further, see point 4, p. 272.
4   Compare also B.N.T., p. 9 f., 30 ff. Egyptian: the ship of Isis and Osiris.
272 THE BIBLICAL RECORD OF THE DELUGE
of the World.1 The slow sinking of the waters, viii. 3b-5, shows it was talking of a gigantic height.
4.   Noah is endowed with the motifs of the Bringer of the New Age. This is shown in the name and in the motive in giving the name, Gen. v. 29, which correspond to the motifs2 of the Expectation of the Redeemer; see p. ISO. For this reason the discovery of wine by Noah is emphasised, the vine being the symbol of the New Age.3 4
5.   The Deluge corresponds to the great deep, to Tehom, in the earlier aeon (comp. Gen. vii. 11 : the fountains of the great deep were broken up ; see p. 265, and compare the ruah who causes the sinking, p. 265). After the Deluge a new world is built. Perhaps a faint hint of the new creation lies in the words of Gen. viii. 22 and ix. 1 IF.
6.   The late Jewish conception places the Deluge together with the fire-flood. The passage before referred to in the Sanhedrin says that the people asked Noah whether the water or fire-flood would come. According to 4 Ezra vii., the “ path of the present aeon” lies “ between fire and water.1’1 The Christian Sibvll, vii. 9 (Hennecke, Xeut. Apukr., p. 323) says : “The earth shall be flooded, the mountains shall be flooded, the air also shall be flooded. All shall be water, by water shall all come to destruction. Then the winds shall be calmed and there shall arise a new age.” Line 25 ft‘.: “ God, who will work by many stars, .... will measure (?) a column
1   Comp. p. 265, and see Winckler, F., iii. 6S. Play of words on the redeemer motif mj ; see n. 2.
2   Play of words on the motif nu and cm. Compare p. 132, the consolation in the Attis cult; compare also p. 130 with Gen. iii. 17.
3   “Vine and fig tree” = rulership of the world, Overworld and Underworld ; see p. 209 and B.N.T., 33. Myth of Dionysus, Bacchus. The New Year motif of drunkenness belongs to this. The drunken Lot after the fire-flood corresponds to the drunken Noah. A fuither motif is generation. The motif is travestied. The behaviour of Ham corresponds to the behaviour of the daughters of Lot.
4   Kautzsch, Pseudepigr., 36S. Not water and fire ! and that is correct. The precession (Gemini-Taurus-Aries-Pisces) moves towards the water region and comes from the fire region. The incongruity in the Babylonian reckoning agrees with the reversal Marduk = Nebo. The passages in the Sanhedrin speak of “hot water” like the Deluge in the Koran, mixing therefore water and fire-flood. The Kabbalists (Yalkut Rubeni, 32b) know the fire-flood which is to follow the water- flood ; see p. 303.
COSMIC AND ASTRAL MOTIFS
273
of mighty fire, the sparks from which shall destroy the generations of man, which have done evil." And in the Vita Adam et Eva (Kautzsch, Pseudepigr., 506 ft“.) it is said that God will twice bring wrathful judgment upon man, fust with water, then with fire.
7.   Noah’s cultivation of the vine, and drunkenness, are motifs of the new age. In the fire-flood story of Sodom and Gomorrha, Lot’s drunkenness corresponds. The sexual stories, which indicate the new life (Ham, Lot’s daughters), belong to this class of motif.
The modern interpretations of the story of the Deluge as a solar mvth (Usener), or a lunar myth (Boeklen),1 are to be corrected according to this. To find a solution in myths is, in my opinion, going too far; so are also the interpretations by Stricken and by AVinckler, who see in the Deluge only a “ celestial occurrence.” Since it is dealing with cosmic motifs, solar as well as lunar motifs are to be expected. The cycles of the sun and of the moon correspond to the cycle of the aeons. In the duration of the Deluge, 365 days in P, and in the numbers 40 and 10 (see p. 267) in the Yahvist, lie solar motifs (p. 265).2
Concluding Words on the Deluge
The story in both the Biblical recensions shows a relationship to the Babylonian tradition, and certainly by far a closer relationship than does the story of creation. In the same way, here also one must be careful of the acceptance of the idea of a borrowed literature. The material has travelled. Inspection of the Babylonian cuneiform tables would not then be needed by a Biblical chronicler; besides which, he would have rejected a literary dependence upon religious grounds.3
In any case, here also the religious value does not lie in
1   Usener, Sintflutsagen ; Boeklen in the Archiv jiir Relig. IViss., vi. i and 2.
2   Boeklen has shown numerous lunar motifs.
;t Gunkel judges likewise in Genesis, 67 f., only that he credits ancient Israel with too little civilisation of its own. He holds that they adopted the primeval myths “ when they became incorporated in the Canaanite civilisation.” But sue know of no uncivilised time of Israel. See p. 314.
VOL. I.
18
274 THE BIBLICAL RECORD OF THE DELUGE
what is common to the Bible and to Babylon, but in that wherein they differ.
In place of the mythological world of gods, who deceive and outwit each other, and capriciously abuse mankind; who appear in childish fright of the flood, and then again reappear in greedy curiosity at the sacrifice of Noah, we find in the Bible the wrathful God who judges the world, and who has mercy upon the righteous. The Biblical story of the Deluge possesses an intrinsic power, even to the present day, to awaken the conscience of the world, and the Biblical chronicler wrote it with this educational and moral end in view. Of this end there is no trace in the extra-Biblical records of the Deluge.
CHAPTER XI
THE NATIONS
GENESIS, 10th chapter, mirrors in its fundamental basis the geographical and ethnological picture of the world as it presented itself to the Israelites in the eighth century B.C. It has been considered an “ impossible task to reconstruct a map of the world according to the statements of the tables of the nations (Socin, in Guthe’s Bibelw'orterbiich). We hope to be able to set aside this prejudice, and to show that the Biblical writers were well informed in the political geography of their time. The tables of nations from P sources, 10. la, 2-7, 20, 22-23, 31-32, correspond, like the relation of the districts of the country, drawn from other sources, 10. 15-18% to the state of political geography in the eighth century B.C.
Dillmann, Genesis (see p. 165), thinks that the Israelites had close relations with only a very few of the nations placed together in Gen. x. This is due to the point of view that Canaan was a land relatively much cut off from tribal intercourse. The monuments of the Near East have disclosed to us that the states of the Mediterranean stood in active communication with each other and with the surrounding world.1
A map (No. I.), most kindly drawn, from the following reading of Gen. x., by Oberst. a D. Billerbeck, will make the review easier.
Gen. x. 2 : u The soils of Japhetli were: Gomer, and Magog, and Madal, and Javan, and Tubal, and Mesech, and Tiras."
GOMER.—That is, the Cimmerians, as in Ezek. xxxviii. 6, where
1 Wellhausen says in Israelitische und jiidische Geschichte, 1901 {thirteen years after the discovery of the Amarna Letters) : “Till then ^about 750] there existed in Palestine and Syria a number of small tribes and kingdoms bickering and quarrelling amongst themselves, with no wider outlook than their nearest neighbours, and unconcerned with the outer world, each revolving on its own axis ”
275
276
THE NATIONS
thev are also named tog-ether with the house of Tog-arm ah—the Gamir or Gimirrai of the Assyrian inscriptions. They belong to the Indo-Germanic tribes (Medes, Ashkuza, Cimmerians), who in the Assyrian inscriptions are often named by the collective noun Man da, and whom Herodotus calls Scythians. Homer, in the Odyssey, xi. 14, looks for the Cimmerians in Northern Europe. In Assyrian territories they appeared first in the time of Sargon. They then overthrew the kingdom of Uradhu1 and settled themselves there.2 The letters to his father written by the young Sennacherib during the time of his supreme command of the northern provinces on the borders of Uradhu. and the letters from one of his generals, tell of these wars; further, the questions addressed to the Oracle of the Sun-god in the time of Esarhaddon. Upon pressure by Esarhaddon, they were driven away from the Assyrian border by the Ashkuza, who were in alliance with Assyria, and pressed towards the west. The Asianic tradition which records this is confirmed by statements of Assurbanipal. In Asia Minor they overthrew the kingdom of the Phrygians under Midas, likewise of Lydia, under Gyges. Gradually they were overpowered by the newly reinforced civilised people of Asia Minor.
Poets of Asia Minor have sung of the horrors of this time. For a while the Cimmerian ascendancy was so strong that the greater part of Asia Minor was called Gomel- Also the wars in Uradhu have left their traces. The Crims (of the Cimmerian Bosphorus) owe their name to the Gimirrai, and the Armenians call Cappadocia, the scene of the above-mentioned battles between the Ashkuza and the Gimirrai, Gamir.3 Compare now, Hommel, G.G.G., 210 ff.
1   Armenia of to-clay ; the name is preserved in that of the mountain Ararat.
2   They did not therefore first break in from Europe in the beginning of the seventh century, as Ed. Meyer supposes. Holzinger, in his Genesis, p. 95, holds firmly to that supposition, although the material of the inscriptions has in the meantime been brought forward. For the history of the Cimmerians, as for that of the Ashkuza, comp. H. Winckler, F., i. 484 ff., and Helmolt’s IVeltgeschichte, iii. 1, p. 132.
3   This Armenian designation must surely be a supplement taken from the Bible, from the passages in Genesis and Ezekiel. The Armenians are proud of the mention of their country in the Bible. Thus they have given a Christian colour, to the story of the sons of Sennacherib, who murdered their father and “ escaped to the land of Ararat” (2 Kings xix. 37), and honour them as a sort of national heroes; see Chalatianz, “Die armenische Heldensage,” in the Zeitschrift des Vereins fiir Volkskunde in Berlin, 1902, vol. ii. ff
MAGOG—MADAI
277
MAGOG.—In Ezek. xxxviii. f. King Gog of the land of Magog appears as the uncanny- foe of popular expectation. That Gog is an old name for the barbarian of the farthest North, like the Cimmerians, in Homer’s Odyssey, as mentioned above, is shown by the letter from Nimmuria to Ivadashman-Bel in the fifteenth century B.C., found in Tel Amarna (K.B., v. 5). The writer of the letter is suspicious as to whether the wife being sent to him from afar will be a real princess. He says:—
Who is to know, then, whether she is not the daughter of a slave, or of an (inhabitant) of the land of Ga-ga (Ga-ga-ai, a Gagaean), or a daughter of the land of Hanigalbat, or who knows that she does not come from Ugarit, she whom my messengers succeed in seeing?
He falls back therefore in his suspicions from Gaga, which is certainly Gog, upon Hanigalbat, and from thence upon the probably still nearer Ugarit. Gog means here also a fabulous land, like the land of the Scythians in the classics.
MADAI (Assyrian, likewise Greek, Mi/oot or M«<Sot) is the name of a race which from the middle of the ninth century appears in Western Asia in the territory of Anzan. The Assyrians call them “the far Medes of the East” (Madai rmjuti sha ?sit shamshi), “ the never vanquished Medes ” (la Arinsuti).1 They are first reckoned amongst the Umman-Manda, that is, the collective noun for the people of the north-east, who somewhat correspond to the (eastern) “Scythians” of the classics, and who throng against Assyria and Babylonia “like locusts.” What Assur- banipal says of the related Cimmerians applies equally to the Manda: “ No interpreter understands their language.” Their tribes are under the leadership of hazandti, they dwell “like robbers in the desert.” They are the first of the advancing Indo-Germanic people.2 In Genesis the Madai belonging to the Manda are counted to Japheth. They come, like the Hittites, from Europe and move back again behind the Hittite migrations.
The foundation of the kingdom of the Medes took place in the latest Assyrian period. Herodotus places it in an earlier age.
1   K.B., ii. 39, 41, 43, 55 ; comp. p. 67.
2   Herodotus, vii. 62 : “from days of old they were named Apioi.
278
THE NATIONS
But in the founder of the State., Deioces, and in the chief city, Ecbatana in Herodotus, we have traces of historical treasure. Ecbatana was probably a centre of unification ; the name of the city, Bit-Daiakku, answers for a popular hero Daiakku. We cannot yet judge of his successor Phraortes. We must look upon Cyaxares as the true founder. He was the Uvakshatara of the Inscription of Darius at Behistun, who appears as legitimate representative of the kingdom, whilst a pretender to the throne sets aside his name. Cyaxares was followed by Astyages, then came Cyrus, founder of the kingdom of Persia. In 2 Kings xvii. 6, xviii. 11, Israelites were deported to the mountains (Septuagint iv opois) of the Medes. In Isa. xiii. 17 ff. ; Jer. xxv. 25, li. 11, 28, it appears as a kingdom. In the Books of Daniel, of Esther, and of Judith men were aware of Jews descended from these banished people. The First Book of Maccabees shows Media first under Syrian (vi. 56), then under Parthian (xiv. 2 ; comp. Josephus, Ant., xx. 3, 3), rule. The Whitsun legends name it amongst the Diaspora lands ; Acts ii. 9- Further detail of the legends in the article on Nineveh in Hauck, R.Pr.Th,, 3rd ed.
JAVAN.—These are the Greeks (Greek, Jaon, Jaones, with Digamma) who are here called by the Israelites, as they were by the Assyrians and later by the Persians, by the name they bore on the coasts of Asia Minor. Here and at Cyprus they learnt to know them; to Western Asia, Greece proper was a dim hinterland of very secondary consideration.1 Whether Gen. x. 2 also includes European Greece cannot be proved owing to the misty nature of the geographical ideas, nor from “ the sons of Javan,” v. 4. In the Assyrian inscriptions we meet with Ionians (Jamania, Jamnai) first under Sargon. We learn that they made inroads upon the Cilician coasts. Sargon says:2 “ The brave warrior, who in the midst of the sea caught the Ionian with the net (?) like a fish and to Que and Tyrus brought peace.” He defeated them, therefore, in a sea fight, in any case with the help of ships of Tyre, since Tyre itself, or much more probably Tyrian colonies in Cyprus, were threatened by the Ionians. Here it is a case of Ionian kings in Cyprus.3 From thenceforward Cyprus became tributary to Assyria. Later,4 Sargon
1   In just the same way the Greeks call Canaan and its hinterland after the nearest coast region : Palaestina, that is, Philistineland.
2   K.B., ii. 43-
3   ButKittim, Gen. x. 4, is not Chition, contrary toSchrader, K.A.T., 2nd ed.,Sl.
4   K.B., ii. 75-
EXCURSUS ON LIST OF NATIONS OF DARIUS 279
mentions in this sense seven kings of “ Ja,‘” a district of the land of Jatnana (which is a name for Cyprus); Assurbanipal names ten such kings by name.1 The Greeks proper, even with the special differentiation of those of Asia Minor and the European Greek—both under the name of Jamania—were named in the Inscriptions of Darius.
EXCURSUS ON THE LISTS OF NATIONS OF DARIUS 2
The tomb of Darius at Naqsh-i-Rustem represents the thirty nations conquered by him and counts them in the Inscription. The
 
figures on the tomb have suffered very much from the disintegration of the rock, and have become partially unrecognisable. Happily, the other Achaemenid tombs found in the same place are an exact copy of the tomb of Darius. Fig. 77 shows the tomb of Xerxes, which is the best preserved. The nations counted in the Inscription can be verified by the figures, so that the interpretation of the list may be held as fully assured, and at the same time the great
1   ii. 173.
According to the debates at the International Congress of Orientalists, 1902, in Hamburg, lecture by Professor Dr F. C. Andreas; compare also Hommel, G.G.G., 199, n. 3. (See Appendix.)
280
THE NATIONS
reliability of the descriptions of the nations by Herodotus is proved.
In the Inscription on the tomb thirty nations are counted, in the following groups:
1.   The people between the mountain range bordering the plain of Mesopotamia on the one side, and the chain of the Pamir and the Indus on the other side : (l) Medes, (2) Chuzians, (3) Parthians, (4) Areiens, (5; Bactrians, (6) Sogdianians, (7) Chorasmians, ( Zar- angians, (9) Arachosians, (10) Sattagydens, (11) Gandaritae, (12) Indians, (13) Sacians, (14) Haumavarken (’ApYpyioi of Herodotus, up to now wrongly taken to be an epithet for Sacians), (15) pointed-hatted Sacians.
2.   The natives of South-Western Asia: (16) Babj'lonians, (17) Assyrians. (IS) Arabians, (19) Egyptians.
3.   The nations of the north of Western Asia: (20) Armenians, (21) Cappadocians, (22) Lydians, (23) Greeks of Asia Minor.
4.   The nations of Europe : (24) Scythians or Scolotans of Pontus, (25) Thracians, (26) the Greeks who bear the Petasos (Persian, Yauna Takabara), that is to say, Macedonians (possibly this designation includes the European Greeks).
5.   The tribes of Africa; (A) in the south: (27; Putans, that is, the Biblical Put, Punt of the Egyptians, the Ethiopians of Herodotus; (28) Cush, that is, the Negro races; (B) in the west: (29) Maxyer, and (30) Carthagenians (these two figures stand outside the panoply of the throne on the right hand and on the left).
The dominating race of the Persians is naturally not to be found amongst the figures representing the conquered nations supporting the throne of Darius, it is represented by the figure of the king himself, as also by the six side figures, which show us the heads of the six races of Parsa, standing alongside the kingls family, the Achsemenids. There must originally have been an inscription over each of these figures, noting the name and rank of the person ; only two of these are known up to the present, the remainder have been perhaps destroyed. By these we know that the top figure on the left is Gobryas, lance-bearer of Darius, and the under figure bearing shield and battle-axe is Aspathines, his shield-bearer (Persian Vursawara). From the record of a Byzantine historian (Petrus Patricius, fragment 14) we learn that amongst the Persians the king’s shield-bearer was also Captain of the Bodyguard.
TUBAL.—This means the Tabal of the cuneiform Inscriptions. They belong to the last batch of the “ Hi Hites,” of whom we find first the Kummukh (from whom later Commagene is named), then the Muski, Tabaheans and Ivaski, making an inroad into Northern Mesopotamia under Tiglath-Pileser I. We first meet with Tabal as a country under Shalmaneser II. Sargon (Annals,
TUBAL—MESECH
281
170 ff.) gives his daughter as wife to the king Ambaridi, of Tabal, with Hilakki as her dower.1 Later the Tabalaeans were forced into Lesser Armenia. The Tibarenes of Herodotus (iii. 94, vii. 78), named here together with the Mosher, that is, the Muski-Mesech, who dwelt in the hill country to the southeast of the Black Sea, were remnants of the Tabalaeans. Since these hill tribes were celebrated in ancient times (compare for example Ezek. xxvii. 13), as they are still celebrated, for their brass and copper work, we may conjecture that the monstrous un-Hebraic form of name of the patriarch Tubal - Cain is connected with it. To the name of Cain, which signifies “smith,11 “instructor of eveiy artificer in copper and iron11 (Gen. iv. 22), they added, as a pendant to Jubal, the name of the celebrated copper-worker Tubal.
MESECH.—These are the Muski of the Assyrian royal Inscriptions. They belong, like Tabal, to the batches of Hittites who appeared under Tiglath-Pileser I. After the Kummukh, who had settled themselves in Northern Mesopotamia in the territory of the sometime kingdom of Mitanni, had been subjugated by Tiglath-Pileser I., the laud was threatened by the Muski, about 1100, and behind them pressed the Tabalaeans, just spoken of above, and the Kaski. Later the Muski established themselves in Phrygia; they aspired to enter into possession of the ancient kingdom of Hatti. We find appearing as an opponent of Sargon, Mita of Muski in the list of former kings of the Hatti. This Mita is Midas of Phrygia.2
In the later prophets the same groups of nations repeatedly appear as in Gen. x. 2. In Ezek. xxvii. 13, Javan, Tubal, and Mesech are named as traders in slaves and copper ware. In Ezek. xxxii. 26 and elsewhere Mesech and Tubal are named as warlike people. In Isa. lxvi. 19, according to the Septuagint, Mesech, Tubal, and Javan are likewise named together.
Ezek. xxxviii. 2 ft’., comp, xxxix. I ff., “Son of man, set thy face
1   This is, however, not Cilicia, but a part of Cappadocia, southward, on the Halys.
2   See H. Winckler, K.A.T., 3rd ed., lxviii. 74. Therefore also the last king of Karkemish, which province was the last remnant still left of the ancient Hittite glory, sought help from this conqueror of the ancient lands of the Hatti. The Indo-Germanic Cimmerians were overthrown by Midas. In place of Phrygia, Lydia became the chief power in Asia Minor.
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towards Gog, in the land of Magog, the prince of [gloss : RoshJ Mesech and Tubal, prophecy against him and say: Thus saith the Lord Yahveh: Verily, against thee will I, Prince of (Rosh) Mesech and Tubal . . . .1 Gomer and all his hordes, the house of Togarmah, the uttermost parts of the north, and all his hordes—many people [are] with thee.”
This march of Gog described by Ezekiel is usually looked upon as a prophetic vision of the Scythian invasion which broke over Asia in the time of Josiah; Herodotus, i. 103.
The historic geographical picture at the root of this eschatological description is the same which in Gen. x. 2 and 3 floats before the mind of the compiler of the tables of the nations. As may be seen from the previous and the following notes on Gen. x. 2 and 3, only the eighth century fits to this description. This gives a fixed point for the literary-historical criticism of the tables of the nations.
Till AS lies between the Muski-Phrygians and the west coast of Asia Minor. There, somewhere about the territory of Lydia and Troas, remnants of a seafaring people, the Tyrseni, settled, who were reported in ancient times to be pirates, and of whose connection with the Italian Tyrseni there is no reasonable ground for doubt. Egyptian inscriptions of the time of Mernephta name them as Turusha.2 The name in the table of nations is therefore a later witness to the movement of the seafaring people, which in ante-Greek times played a like role as did the Greeks later. Though we as yet have no fuller details of the course of this movement, it is worth noting.3
Gen. x. 3: “ And the softs of Gomer, Ashkenaz, Riphath, and Togarmah.^
1   The ethnological supplement, “ Paras, Cush, and Put are with them,’’ and so on, is obviously inserted later, probably also taken from the table of nations, Gen. x. 6.
2   In his Atifs. u. Abh., pp. 317 {., Hommel draws the conclusion that the mention of the seafaring people points to the main root of Gen. x. being in the Mosaic epoch. In this conclusion he overshoots the mark ; it can only be vindicated by the (loc. cit.) following observations of Hommel himself, according to which parts of the main root show the Abraham and ante-Abraham epochs. When Elam appears amongst the sons of Shem (v. 22), that does not point to the time “when Elam still possessed a preponderating Semitic population” (third millennium), but only reflects the fact that Elam belonged politically and intellectually to the mighty Babylonian empire This connection, however, lasted through all ages, and perhaps still is shown in the division of the spoil after the fall of Nineveh ; see pp. 293 and 301. According to texts made accessible by P. Scheil, Susa seems to have fallen to Babylon.
:1 An Etruscan inscription found at Lemnos (!) is an important witness.
ASHKENAZ—TOG ARMAH
283
ASHKENAZ is the Indo-Germanic population of the Ashkuza,1 which in the time of Esarhaddon was situated to the south-east of the lake Urumiya, to the east of the Cimmerians. The Hebrew name is mutilated bv an error.2 Bartatua, king of the Ashkuza, who appears in Herodotus as the Scythian king Protothyes, became son-in-law to the Assyrian royal house through Esarhaddon. One of the inquiries made by Esarhaddon of the Sun-god3 is whether Protothyes will remain a loyal friend to Assyria if he is given the daughter. The king of Assyria made use of the Ashkuza in the war against the remaining hordes of the Manda—first against the Cimmerians (see above), then against the Medes. Madyes, son of Bartatua, tried to come to the help of Nineveh at the last moment; and together with the Assyrians, the Ashkuza were subdued by the Medes. The oracle in Jer. li. 27 names the kingdom of Ashkuza together with the kingdoms of Ararat (Urardhu), Minni (Assyrian Mannai), and the Medes, and calls upon them all against the hated land. Here all the Indo-Germanic hordes are taken together, who since the time of Sargon stormed against the Assyrian kingdom. The oracle must therefore have its source in Assyrian times; after the fall of Nineveh the summons would be groundless.
TOGARMAH4 are the inhabitants of Tilgarimmu, which by Sargon is named together with Kammanu, in northerly Taurus,5 6 and by Sennacherib together with the people of fiilakkiin both passages Tilgarimmu is conquered by the Assyrian king. The country of the Taurus, in the neighbourhood of which Kammanu and Togarmah are to be looked for, is called Muzri7 by Shalmaneser I. and by Tiglath-Pileser I.
1   Assyrian Ash-gu-za-ai in Esarhaddon’s inscriptions and Ish-ku-za-ai in the Inquiries to the Sun-god oracle of the same time.
2   Knudtzon, Gebete an dem Sonnengott, p. 131.
3   No. 29 in Knudtzon’s publication. Comp. Winclcler, F., i. 484 ff.
4   Septuagint, Thergama, Thorgama, Thorgoma. The placing of the small Togarmah together with the mighty Cimmerians and Ashkuza remains remarkable.
3   K.B., ii. 63.
6   Not Cilicia, but a district on the Halys ; comp. pp. 2S1 f.
7   Named by Shalmaneser II. together with Que, lying to the south of it, our Cilicia.
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From hence Solomon imported his horses. It is said in 1 Kings x. 28 = 2 Chron. i. l6 f.: “The horses which Solomon had [were brought] out of Muzri and Que, the king’s merchants bought them out of Que at a price.” 1 Ezek. xxvii. 14 agrees with this. Here we find Togarmah named as the special market for horses : “they of the house of Togarmah brought spans and war-horses and mules from thy mart.” In the Persian time Cilieia was still the neighbourhood for horse trade.
Gen. x. 4: “ A nd the sons of Javan ; Elishah, Tarshish, Kittim, and Dodanini”
ELISHAH.—According to the Septuagint, the neighbourhood of Carthage is meant. This agrees with the historical- geographical situation of the passage. In any case, we know Carthage bore a more ancient name, and we may call to mind the legends of its founding by Dido-Elissa.2 Elissa is, then, here meant as representative of the Phoenician colonies on the coast and in the islands of North Africa.3
When Ezek. xxvii. 7 says that Tyre brought its people stuffs from the isles of Elishah, it is very remarkable, since Tyre is the primeval home of purple, and with Tyre also the fables of the discovery of the Tyrian purple dye are connected. It must have been referring to some particular stuff’, such as is found in the island Meninx, south-east from Carthage. The Elishah in the passage in Ezekiel may be explained as meaning another district which is also celebrated for purple, and tvhich equally fits the situation— Southern Italy. In fact, the Targum does understand by Elishah in Ezek. xxvii. 7 a city of Italy. But this idea may also rest upon later interpretation, as in 1 Macc. i. 1 and viii. 5, where it speaks of Chittim-Macedonia as the starting-point of Alexander, that is to say, as the kingdom of Perseus.4
TARSHISH is the name of the mountainous district in the south of Spain. It denotes the extremest west,5 as Gog denotes the extremest north. The “Ancient East” has at present nothing to bring to the elucidation of the question of Tarshish.
1   The passage was later referred to Egypt, which was quite unsuitable for horsetrading (see Winckier, Altt. Untersuchungen, pp. 172 ff., the starting-point of his search for Muzri; p. 172, ibid., it would surely be better to put the position of Muzri to the north instead of to the south of the Taurus).
2   See Ed. Meyer, Geschichte, i. 2S2 n.
3   According to H. Grimnte, in Lit. Rundschau, 1904, p. 346 = Alashia of the Amarna Letters = Cyprus. Against this see under Kittim, p. 285.
4   See for this and for the following, “ Kittim,” H. Winckier, F., ii. 422, 564 ff.
5   Comp. Jonah i. 3, iv. 2, according to which it is arrived at in a ship.
TARSHISH—KITTIM—DODANIM
285
P. Haupt, in a lecture at the Hamburg Oriental Congress, 1902, has asserted that the stones of Tarshish mentioned in the Old Testament are cinnabar crystals from Almada, in Spain, from which colours for tattooing are manufactured, and that the passage, Song of Songs, v. 14, says the brown, bronze-coloured arms were tattooed with vermilion, and the ivory body, which was protected from the sun, with azure colour. Tattooing had already been conjectured by Winckler, F., i. 293. In Isa. lx. 9, and Ps. lxxii. 10 Tarshish appears as it does here grouped with the “ Isles.”
KITTLM.—That the name points to Cyprus1 must be given up. The Greek name of the chief city, Chition, is no strong argument. The city is called Qarthadasht (Carthage) on the Assyrian inscriptions ; it is only in the Phoenician inscriptions originating in the Persian age that it is called Chiti. The Amarna Letters name the island itself Alashia, Egyptian Alas or Asi; under Sargon it is called Ja and Jatnana. In Isa. xxiii. 1 and 12 Kittim is the goal of the ships of Tarshish. In Dan. xi. 30 Kittim specially means Rome. Therefore Southern Italy is meant by Kittim, especially Sicily, which then passed as chief representative of the western islands, and with Elishah-Africa represents the principal territories of the Phoenician colonies.
DODANIM.—In 1 Chron. i. 7 (transcript from Gen. x. 4) it is Rodanim. Since it at the same time belongs to the children of Javan, therefore to the western lands and islands, we may think of Rhodes, which in ancient times was of great importance. Another conjecture left unnoticed in 1 Chron. is: Doranim = Doria. Greece proper would then be named as a son of Javan, which would correspond to the naive geographical idea, to which the Ionians, the Greeks of Asia Minor, were closer at hand.
Gen. x. 5 : “ Of these (of Elishah-Carthage, Tarshish-Spain, Kittim-Southern Italy, Rodanim-Rhodes [?]) were the isles of the heathen divided,” that is, the islands and colonies of the Mediterranean. That gives a clear geographical picture.
Gen. x. 6 : “ And the sons of Ham were: Cush, and Mizraim, and Put, and Canaan.”
CUSH corresponds to the old idea of Ethiopia, the Nubia of
Thus still, according to Kautzsch in Isa. xxiii. i, and l Macc. i. i.
286
THE NATIONS
to-day, and a portion of the Soudan, about including Khartoum.1 First in the time of Sennacherib this territory comes into clear view on the Israelite horizon with the appearance of Tirhakah (Isa. xxxvii. 9), king of Cush. The people of Western Asia, however, named thus that tract of Arabia which had to be passed on the way through to the dark hinterland of Africa, just as they named the northern region of Arabia, where it goes “ through ” to Egypt, Muzri, because they thought of Arabia in connection with those parts of Africa opposite it.2 The nomenclature corresponds to the misty geographical ideas of antiquity, when, it is to be kept in mind, Egypt at least was reckoned as belonging to Western Asia; the dark parts of the earth began first on the far side of the desert. That Cush is here thought of as part of Arabia, as Glaser first announced, is shown by the sons descended from Cush, of whom some of the names can be identified as Arabian local names. Also, the wife of Moses, spoken of in Numb. xii. 1, is in this Arabian sense a woman of Cush ; the Cushite Zerah, 2 Chron. xiv. 9, is an Arabian captain. Particularly significant is the meaning of the name Cush in Isa. xlv. 14, where, along with the merchandise of Cush, the “ Sabeans, men of stature/’ are named. Possibly in Hab. iii. 7 also Cushan may be taken as a slip of the pen for Cush;3 it stands here as parallel to the tent-curtains of the Midianites.4
MIZRAIM is Egypt. It is the same here as with Cush- Nubia. Mizraim is a geographical collective noun, which, as H. Winckler has recognised, also includes a part of Arabia, and even just that region where it leads “through” to Egypt. Since by Cush, as shown by the Arabian sons, Arabian country is certainly thought of, and since the kingdom Punt (Pudh ; see below) is included, it might have seemed to go without saying
1   See Spiegelberg, Agyptologische Randglossen, p. io.
In like manner the distinction is still made in connection with the nomenclature of the classic age, between the right bank of the Nile as “ Arabian Desert ” in opposition to the ‘‘ Libyan Desert.”
3   Or South Arabian formation — ancient article ? Comp. Midian ; further, Muzran from Muzur.
4   See upon this, H. Winckler, K.A.T., 3rded., 144, who presents material from the inscriptions on the subject; and comp. Hommel, Au/s. u. Abk., 208 ff.
MIZRAIM—PUT
287
that here also Arabia is meant. But the author of verse 13 was thinking, as the “ sons11 show, of Egypt proper. The geographical-political situation answers for the correctness of Muzri- Arabia. The Arabian country concerned is called in the cuneiform inscriptions Muzri (Hebrew, therefore perhaps Mozar), in the Minaean inscriptions Muzran (always with article). Here there was a trading colony of the kingdom Ma4in (Minaeans), whose chief articles of merchandise were incense and myrrh. It is the Biblical Midian.1 The “Midianite” merchants of the history of Joseph are Minaeans, and the Midianite father-in-law of Moses, Jethro, is a Minaean. At the time of the fall of the Minaean kingdom the colonies in Muzri became independent.2 When in the eighth century—therefore at the time in which the author of our passage was writing —the Assyrian kings came to North Arabia, Muzri was still independent. To this period (according to Hommel, about 1000 B.C.) belongs, according to Winckler and others, the celebrated Glaser inscription 1155 = Halevy 535,3 4 which speaks of the governor of Muzran and of the Minaeans of Muzran, who undertook a commercial journey to Egypt, A’shur (Edom, according to Hommel) and Ibr naharan, and which shows us the Sabaeans (see p. 289) on the march towards the south.
PUT.—The Septuagint gives Put in Ezekiel and Jeremiah together with “Libya.” It means the kingdom of Punt (Egyptian, Pwnt), which included the country on both sides of the Red SeaJ It had already had intimate commercial dealings with Egypt, and in the eighth and seventh centuries stood, like Cush, in close relation to Egypt. This Punt stretched far into Arabia, and on the African side far northwards across the straits of Bab-el-Mandeb; here again it is to be kept in mind that this part of Africa, inclusive of Egypt, was accounted as Asia by the ancients. Ed. Glaser, M.V.A.G., 1899, 3, 51 ff.,
1   According to Grimme in Lit. Rundschau, 1904, 346, Midian is much more likely the M-d-j of the Glaser inscription 1155 mentioned. Latest upon the question of Muzri, see M.V.A.G., 1906, 102 ff.
2   It was dissolved in the seventh century by the Sabaeans out of the north ; see under Saba, p. 2S9.
3   M. F.A.G., 1898, table on p. 56, comp. p. 20; A.O., iii. 1.
4   See W. M. Muller, Asien itnd Europa, 106 ff.
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THE NATIONS
thinks that, from the Egyptian standpoint, the nations of South Arabia and of the east coast of Africa are to be understood as included under Punt, and on account of this he thinks that in the Bible Cush, rather than Put, reproduces this collective idea. In any case there lies a dim geographical, not ethnological, idea as foundation of the Put of the Tables of the Nations; which also explains why the Tables omit any subdivision.
CANAAN.—Canaan stands here, as also elsewhere, for Ham. The Ham population is the world of slaves which is to serve the Shem population (Gen. ix. 26 f.). The author of our passage puts Canaan for this, that is, the population that in its own country, as a primitive subjugated people, plays the part of slaves. From this political point of view it is here perhaps spitefully interpolated amongst the “ southern lands.11
Gen. x. 7: '?'Seba, and Havilah, and Sabtah, and Raamah, and Sabteca: and the sons of Ram ah; Sheba and Dedan.”
The names Seba, Havilah, and Dedan suffice to show that we find ourselves here in Arabia, not on Egyptian ground, as Hol- zinger in Genesis thinks in regard to Seba. That districts of Arabia appear as “sons of Cush” is explained by what has been said on Mizraim, Cush, and Put (see also under x. 8 f.). HAVILAH represents the region of Central and North-East Arabia; see Glaser, Skizze, ii. 323 ff‘. In SABTAH (Sabteha as variant ?) we think of Sabota, chief town of Hadramaut, the South Arabian region eastward of Yemen, where the country and ruins are latterly being much travelled over and examined (writings by Guthe, Bibekobrterbuch, p. 244). Glaser, Skizze, ii. 252, thinks Sabtah is the district mentioned by Ptolemaeus, on the Persian Gulf.1 HADRAMAUT (Hazarmaveth) is, it is true, specially mentioned in verse 26, but it does not belong there, for there it is no longer counting people and races, but (with exception of the twelve sons of Joktan; see pp. 301 f.) heroes ; it has possibly gone astray from its place here to verse 26. RAAMAH (1 Chron. i. 9, Raama, Septuagint Regina) is named as here, together with Saba. On the Minaean inscription mentioned above (Glaser, 1155) it is recorded at line 2 that the gods showed themselves grateful to the 1 Otherwise in Hommel, Aufs. u. Abh., 315.
SABA—DEDAN
289
governors of Muzr and of Main (Minsean colony in Muzr; see p. 287) for building a terraced tower, and they “ protected it from the assaults with which they assaulted Saba and Haulan upon the way (?) between Ma‘in and Ragmat (chief town of Nedjran), and from the war which took place between the .... of the south and those of the north." Consistency of sound apparently forbids a connection with the Biblical Ramah.
SABA.—-The Sabmans are meant, who later inherited the Minsean kingdom (see the convincing deductions by Glaser, Skizze, i.). The a kingdom of Saba” did not yet exist when Gen. x. was written. In the Assyrian Inscriptions of Tiglath- Pileser III. and Sargon the Sabseans appear as allies of the Aribi,1 and are not yet in possession of Yemen, but are in the North Arabian Jowf. The Minsean Inscription mentioned above speaks of the Sabaeans as a threatening enemy. Since at the time of writing of our passage the Sabaeans were not yet in possession of any settled domain, SHEBA perhaps may be explained as variant: the writer vaguely meant some part of the Sabaeans.
DF.DAX must equally be looked for in North Arabia. In the time of Ezekiel (Ezek. xxv. 13; comp. Jer. xxv. 23, xlix. their territory bordered upon Edom. Glaser, ii. 329 IF., probably rightly, looks for them in the districts stretching northwards from Medina to the borders of Edom. Possibly they are also mentioned in the 31st line of the Mesa Inscription.
Gen. x. 8 f. : “ And Cush begat Nimrod: he began to be a mighty one in the earth. He Teas a mighty hunter before Yahveh, wherefore it is said, Like Nimroda mighty hunter before Yahveh."
Since, according to the foregoing conclusions, we are in Arabia in verse 7, so, at any rate in the mind of the editor of our passage, which is drawn from another source, the nationality of NIMROD is decided: he is the eponymous hero of the Semitic
1 There is no connection with Jareb, Hosea v. 13 ; Hommel, Aufs. u. Abh., 230 ft'. The later chief city of the Sabteans was called Marjab, but see upon Jareb, p. 302. See upon the Sabseans also "VVinckler, M. V.A.G., 1898, xS. 22 f,, and Weber, A. 0., iii. 1.
VOL. I,
19
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THE NATIONS
people rising up from amongst the nations of Arabia. It would agree with this that, according to verse 8, he is proverbially upon Canaanite ground.1
On Babylonian ground we meet with the mighty hunter in the person of Gilgamesh (Izdubar). Gilgamesh is hero of Light.2 Baby- lonianised, the name may be called Namir-uddu, that is, “glittering light.'”3 The figure frequent upon seal cylinders (with seven ringlets!), who playfully strangles a lion (figs. 78-80), most probably represents Gilgamesh-Nimrod.
 
Gunkel, 146, translates it: “a mighty hunter in spite of Yahveh,” and sees in it a myth of Orion, who, “in spite of Yahveh ” that is, dares to hunt in the heavens, and in consequence is bound to the heavens, Job xxxviii. 31b. In fact, Nimrod is identified with Orion amongst the Persians according to Chron. pasch., n. ' 11\ .   64, and according to Cedremus, xxvii. 28,
<£rr^' : ~Ey,,'' T~~J   amongst the Assyrians; see Stucken,
F,c, 7S.-Gilgamesh, the ^ralmylhen, p 27 f. It may equally be lion-slayer. Relief from said : °rlon 1S the hunter Osins (amongst Sargows palace.   the Egyptians Osiris is often thought of
as the ruler of Orion; see Gen. xxxii. 11) or the hunter Tammuz. The rising and setting of Orion falls together with the critical Tammuz points, the solstitial points (compare with this pp. 96 ff., 125 ff.). The double meaning may well be intentional in our passage ; but the proverb which glorifies a hero does not fit the exclusive rendering, “in spite of Yahveh.”
1   We may venture to conjecture besides that the still extant Arabian tradition of Nimrod is not connected only with Gen. x., but is, at least partially, of extra- Biblical origin, just as is the tradition of Nimrod of the Talmud.
2   Sun or moon or Tammuz according to the form of the myth, comp. pp. S6 f. ; in any case Zajjad, “hunter,” that is to say, “hunting tyrant” (gibbor = gabbdr). See upon this Winckler, Gesch. Isr., ii. p. 2S6, n. 3; F., iii. 403 f. ; and also previously Izdubar-Nimrod, Leipzig, B. G. Teubner, 1S91, pp. 1 fif.
3   See Izdubar-Nimrod, p. 5. We must also support the conjecture that the same name reversed is to be found in Uddushu-namir, that is, “his light shines,” name of the messenger of the gods in the descent of Ishtar into Hades. Compare with this Hommel, Gesch. Bab. u. Assyr., 394, n. 4, who now points to the flmu- namri Gudama of the first Kassite king Gaddash,
SHINAR
291
Gen. x. 10: “ And the beginning of his (Nimrod's) kingdom teas Babel, and Erech, and Accad, and Calneh, in the land of Shinar.'"’
The name SHINAR is possibly identical with Sumer, the
 
Fio. 79.—Gilgamesh fighting the lion. Babylonian seal cylinder, British Museum.
cuneiform designation of the most ancient Babylonian civilisa- tion in the southern Euphrates territory. It is certainly not Shanhar of the Amarna letter (letter from Alashia-Cvprus),
 
FIG. 80.—Gilgamesh fighting the lion. Assyrian seal cylinder, British Museum. Wax impression in the author’s possession.
the Sanqara of the Egyptians, by which they mean much more the territory between Taurus and Antitaurus — what the Assyrians name Muzri.1 In any case Shinar designates the
1 See Winckler, F., ii. 107, and K.A.T., 3rd ed., 238 ; and comp. pp. 285 f., above.
THE NATIONS
292
whole Babylonian territory, therefore Sumer (South Babylonia) and Akkad (North Babylonia). Josephus, Ant., i. 4, says (but very likely speaking according to Gen. xi. 2) “ Plains of Shinar.” L
BABEL.—The North Babylonian city of Babylon (upon the name, see p. 205) was from the time of Hammurabi metropolis of the Babylonian kingdom, and later, after the fall of Nineveh, it was metropolis of the Babylonian-Chaldean empire extended over the greater part of the world (“ Mother of the Chaldseans,” Jer. 1. 12 ; “ Chaldaicarum gentium caput,” in Pliny, Hist. Nat.,
vi.   30). But also during the intervening period of Assyrian ascendancy, Babylon was recognised as a political and intellectual centre. The Assyrian kings grasp “the hands of Bel” (Marcluk) in Babylon, and proclaim themselves by this solemn ceremony as lords of the empire of the world. “ King of Babylon ” was, from the time of the Hammurabi dynasty onwards, the most important title of the kings of Western Asia. Its most ancient history is still A ery dim. The founder of the city was possibly that Sargon of Agade whose seal (fig. 86) shows by the goats the Gemini motif which pr

[Prometheus]

 preceded the era of Babylon, the stories of the foundation of which, however, were already connected with the motifs of the Taurus age. (The child of the sun is persecuted and exposed, and rescued by the Queen of Heaven.)   The List of Dates of Sargon I., interpreted by
Thureau-Dangin, mentions Babylon : the Omina of Sargon seem, in a passage, mutilated indeed, to speak of the building of the city. Certainly Sargon raised Babylon to a foremost position.   From the remotest times Babylon and Borsippa
formed sister cities. First after the union of the city-kingdoms of South and North Babylonia by Hammurabi—therefore in a comparatively late time,—Babylon attained the distinctively prominent historical meaning which rises to our minds at the sound of the name.
In the Assyrian period the antagonism between the intellectual, that is to say, the hierarchical importance of Babylon and its political dependence led not seldom to severe conflicts. Senna- 1
1 He quotes Hestiseus : “The rescued priests came with the holy relics of Zeus Enyalios to Sennaar in Babylonia. ”
BABEL
293
cherib made a mighty attempt to limit the pretensions of Babylon to intellectual prominence. In order to raise Nineveh to the position of chief city of the whole kingdom and commercial centre of the world, he destroyed Babylon in a barbaric way in 682, declared the city to be waste land, and removed the statues of the gods to Assyria. His son Esarhaddon, son of a Babylonian mother, was upon the side of the Babylonian hierarchy. In 681, probably from Babylon, he obtained the throne by fighting, and gave command to rebuild the destroyed city. His plan, to make Babylon the centre of the kingdom, was crossed by the Assyrian party. They compelled him to make his son Assurbanipal coregent (he succeeded him on the throne in 668). The nomination of his other son Shamash-shum-ukim to be rival king of Babylon made a civil war unavoidable. After severe fights, in which the Elamites took a decided part in helping the Babylonians, the city was conquered and Assurbanipal had himself crowned king of Babylon under the name of Kandalanu. But in this victory lay the seed of the fall of the Assyrian power. The destruction of their sworn foe Elam broke down the dam which had held back the Indo-Germanic tribes. After the overthrow of Assyria there began for Babylon a new' and brilliant epoch. Since about the eleventh century some Chaldean tribes had settled in Babylonia. They formed at first a country population, under their own princes, but they had always striven from earliest times to obtain possession of Babylon, and with that the claim to rule the world. After Chaldean kings had repeatedly reigned temporarily in Babylon, they definitely attained their goal under Nabopolassar during the Assyrian time of confusion. Under the Chaldean dynasty beginning with him, Babylon became again independent and allied herself with the newly formed Median kingdom.   After the fall of
Nineveh the spoil was divided between the Babylonians and the Medes. The Chaldean Neo-Babylonian kingdom of Nebuchadnezzar (b'05-562) which thus arose formed the continuation of the Assyrian kingdom. Nebuchadnezzar founded great fortifications and waterworks, restored the temples, chiefly the temple of Marduk at Esagila with the tower of stages, and built for himself a gigantic palace. Upon the further political history, see Chap. XXII. Cyrus besieged Babylon on the f 6th Tishri 539; without battle or slaughter” he entered, after the city had been betrayed to him. But once more the Babylonian civilisation proved its indestructible power by overcoming the conqueror. Cyrus himself became •• Babylonian.” Darius introduced an opposite policy. Desiring to give precedence to the eastern part of the kingdom, he therefore emphasised the Persian cult of Ahuramazda in opposition to the Babylonian cult of Marduk, and he made Susa, ancient city of the Elamites, sworn foes to Babylon, the metropolis. A revolt in Babylon was quenched. Babylon opened her gates to Darius, and a part of the fortifications were razed. The records by Herodotus of the sieges by Cyrus and Darius are ornamented with fable
294
THE NATIONS
Shortly after Darius, Babylon lost her importance, which she had till then retained as rival of Susa. The temple of Esagila was destroyed by Xerxes, the statues of Marduk were dragged away to Susa (Herodot., i. 183). Babylon lost thereby both her political and religious importance. The title "king of Babylon” disappears after Xerxes, the centre of commerce (comp. Ezek. xvii. 4: " Babylon a land of traffic and a city of merchants ”), was transferred to Opis, later to Seleucia, finally to Baghdad. "Babylon ad solitudinem rediit exhausta vicinitate Seleuciee,” says Pliny (vi. 30). Yet once again the light of Babylon flickered up when, under Alexander the Great, Greek culture passed on its way to the East. Babylon recognised Alexander’s policy, and expected that he would restore her old prestige. The German excavations have brought to light a Greek theatre of the Hellenistic period. Alexander wished to make Babylon metropolis of his rule of the world, and to rebuild the temple of Marduk.1 But he died in Babylon too soon. Seleucus removed the royal residence to Antioch in Syria. With this the Hellenistic attempt to revivify the Ancient-Oriental empire was renounced. After the death of "Alexander, the son of Alexander,” the last gleam was extinguished. The sanctuary of Marduk with its priesthood still long retained great influence. Strabo, xvi., says that the remnant that remained over from the Persian period came to their end in consequence of persecutions by the Macedonians; and the city became a great wilderness. In the time of the Parthians, however, it could not have been quite deserted. In the year 127 the Parthian king Evemerus sent many families from Babylon to Media and burnt great buildings which were still extant.'2 At the beginning of the Christian era Babylon was the seat of a strong Jewish Diaspora and of a Jewish high school.3 According to the Excerpts of Diodorus, p. 785, Trajan instituted at Babylon a sacrifice in honour of Alexander. Cyril of Alexandria says that in the beginning of the fifth century Babylon w;as changed into a swamp in consequence of the bursting of the canal banks.4 Comp. St Croix, Acad, des Inscr, et Belles Lettres, 48, where all the passages on the fall of Babylon are collected together.
1   Arrian, Exp. Alex., vii. 17. He wished to use the idle army for this purpose. The priests, who may perhaps have feared a disturbance of their sinecure, seem themselves to have hindered the work. Ep. Jerem. gives in Baruch vi. 10, 11, 28, interesting disclosures of their proceedings.
- Diod. Sic., Fragm. 34, 21; Justinian, xlii. 1 ; Athenseus, xi. p. 463, see Layard, Nineveh and Babylon, p. 407.
3   Upon the later age comp. Funk, Die [uden in Babylonien 200-500, Berlin, 1902. The hatred of Babylon, which is so strongly marked in the Apocalypse, shows itself also in the Rabbinical writings ; for example, Kidduschin 72, where Babylonian cities are mentioned as places of iniquity (see Nork, Rabb. Quellen, pp. cxviii. f.).
4   Isa. xiv. 23 : “I will make Babylon into a lake of water ” ; Jer. li. 42: “A sea is come up over Babylon.”
ERECH—AKKAD—CALNEH
295
The ruins of Babylon are situated in the neighbourhood of the little town Hillah. Systematic excavations were carried on from 1849 to 1S55 by Loftus and Taylor, also experimentally by Layard ; from 1851 to 1854 by the Frenchmen Fresnel and Oppert, whose treasures were lost in the Tigris on 23rd May 1855. In the year 1S79 systematised excavations were begun by which the springs and aqueducts, piers and ruins of terraces (hanging gardens as in Nineveh?) were brought to light, and which we have to thank for the discovery of the Cyrus cylinder, by Hormuzd Rassam. Since Easter 1899 the German Orientgesellschaft has been systematically excavating in the Kasr. They opened up some chambers of Nebuchadnezzar’s palace and discovered, amongst other things, the processional avenue leading to the temple of Esagila. Further detail, see in the article on “Niniveh und Babylon,” R.Pr. Th., 3rd ed., and Hommel, G.G.G., 298 ff.
ERECH is the Uruk of Babylonian literature (it is also written Arku), the ’Opxou of the classical authors, and lies buried under the ruins of Warka of to-day.1 The city was the chief place of the Anu and Ishtar cult and is the scene of the heroic acts of Gilgamesh-Nimrod.
AKKAD is the Agade of the cuneiform writings, city of the elder Sargon, and then the name for the North Babylonian kingdom, whose chief city was Agade. Its identification with Agade has now been assured by the Inscriptions K 9906, Bezold, Catalogue iv. 1049, and comp. Weissbach, Z.D.M.G., 1899,
p. 661.
CALNEH (not to be confused with the North Syrian city Caine, Amos vi. 2 = Calno of Isa. x. 9 = Kullani of the cuneiform ?) cannot be as yet certainly proved by the cuneiform.
Jensen, Theol. Lit. Zig., 1895, pr. 510, takes as an error in the text = Kullaba, an Ancient-Babylonian city named in the cuneiform. Hilprecht’s hypothesis, that Calneli is really the ancient Nippur, is daring. Hommel, supplementing, thinks that Ki + Illin, that is, Bel-Enlil (TAAiros of Damascius), is hidden in it. Nippur however, is the ancient city of Bel. The Talmudic tradition to which Hilprecht appeals is perhaps Yoma vii. 9b and 10, where, amidst entirely confused interpretations of Gen. x., Calneh is designated “1213. The mention of Nippur is, in fact, to be expected in this connection; see Hommel, G.G.G., comp. Hilprecht, Excavations in Bible Lands, 410 f., and Kittel in R.Pr.Th., 3rd ed., article on Nimrod.
Gen. x. 11 : “ Out of that land he went forth into Assur (?), and huilded Nineveh, and Rehoboth-Ir, and Calah, and Resen between Nineveh and Calah—[the same is the great ciiy].”2
1 For the cuneiform mention of it, comp. Delitzsch, IVo lag das Paradies,
pp. 221 ff.   2 The last sentence is a gloss, see p. 298.
296
THE NATIONS
Micah v. 6, where the “ land of Nimrod is said to belong to Assyria, not to Shinar, agrees with the information that Nimrod built the city of Nineveh away from Babylon, in the country of ASSUR. Upon Babylonia as antithesis to “ the land of Assur," comp. Clement, Recognitiones, i. SO.
NIXKVEH, Assyrian Ninua, Nina, Hebrew Nineveh, Septuagint NWw, and 1) NiVo? of the classical writers, takes its name probably from Ninib as that of the summits deus in Ninua (his feminine counterpart is Ishtar of Ninua). Ninus, son of Bel = Ninib, son of Bel; see Hommel, G.G.G., p. 41, n. 1. Historical evidence does not take us back to the orio-in of Nineveh. From
O
its situation on the route of the caravans leading across the Tigris to the mouth of the Choser the place may, from times of yore, have been of importance as a trading colony and then naturally also as an intellectual centre. Originally it was certainly an outlying branch of a Babylonian city of the same name, Ninua-ki, which is always spoken of in connection with Ki-nu-nir-ki (Borsippa ?), and which is very probably identical with the city Ninua-ki of the temple lists of Telloh.1
When the South Babylonian king, Gudea of Lagash, relates that he built a temple of Ishtar at Nineveh, possibly the Babylonian Nineveh is meant. But the Assyrian Nineveh was already then of some importance. In the Louvre there is an inscription of the second king of Ur (Dungi, about 2700) found in Nineveh, recording the building of a temple of Nergal, which could hardly have been dragged in additionally. H.C., iv. 60, names it together with Assur as belonging to the districts under his rule, and mentions the temple of Ishtar. And according to the statements upon the votive bowls of Shalmaneser I., which are supplemented by the historical reminiscences of the annals of Tiglath-Pileser I., the Assyrian king Samsi-Ramman I., son of Ishme-Dagan (about 1820), had already renovated the temple of Ishtar in Nineveh, which then Ashuruballit and Shalmaneser I. himself (about 1300) repaired. It is equally certain that the Nineveh of the earliest age known to us belonged neither to Babylon nor to Assyria.
1   Unless we assume that there were two Babylonian Ninevehs. Also the Arabian geographer Yaqut knows of a Babylonian Ninawaj.
NINEVEH
29'
It is much more likely that it was the centre of one of the independent States lying in Mesopotamia proper, forming for a time the kingdom of the Kishshati, and which, as intermediary for Babylonian civilisation to the bordering nations, particularly Assyrian, fulfilled a very important task.
In the Tell el-A mania period (about 1450) Nineveh belonged to the kingdom of the (Hittite) Mitanni, who had overflowed the Kishshati kingdom. The Mitanni king, Tushratta, must have possessed Nineveh, for he sent a statue of the goddess of the city to Egypt, in homage, and in another Mitanni letter Nineveh is called the city of the goddess Sha-ush-[bi]: this, however, is the Mitanni name for Ishtar. Then the kings of Assur conquered Nineveh, earliest under Ashuruballit. The Assyrian kings of the fourteenth-twelfth centuries repeatedly mention the building of temples in Nineveh. Assur was chief city of Assyria, and residence of the king, fourteen hours'1 journey south from Nineveh ;1 later it was Kelach. Nineveh remained for the time being an inconsiderable city.
Nineveh has to thank King Sennacherib for its period of brilliance. He had destroyed Babylon, and wished to raise Nineveh to the position of first city of the East. The inscription in one of his buildings says (K.A. T., 3rd ed ,75):   Then I enlarged the borders of
my residence Nineveh. I changed her streets—the way - king’s road ’—and built them magnificently. I built rampart and wall with skill, and mountain high, 100 large ells wide did I make her ditches. Upon both sides I had inscriptions placed : 6-2 large ells wide have I measured the width of the king’s road to the park gate. If anyone of the inhabitants of Nineveh rebuilds his old house and builds a new one, and lets the foundation of his house touch upon the king’s road, he shall be hanged upon a beam on his house.”
Under Esarhaddon and Assurbanipal Nineveh became a great, "'lofty city.” As the most beautiful, and possibly the largest, city of the East she filled the world with astonishment and fear for a hundred years. From hence went out throughout the world the victorious armies and the messengers demanding tribute (Nahum ii. 13). She was the centre of commerce (Nahum iii. 16, Nineveh’s merchants more in number than the stars of heaven”). The full hatred
1   The ruins of KaTa Sherkat were presented to the German Emperor in 1902, for excavation ; they promise valuable information upon the most ancient history of Assyria. The excavations have been conducted since 1902 by the German Orientgesellschaft. Comp. 31. D. 0. G., 1903 ff.
298
THE NATIONS
and scorn of the nations enslaved by the Assyrians poured itself upon Nineveh. Under Sennacherib’s son and successor Esarhaddon, however, and under Assurbanipal, the convulsions began which destroyed the Assyrian kingdom about 60S. The hatred against Nineveh may well have grown still more intense under Assur- banipal. Nineveh became then truly a “ bloody city ” (Nahum iii. 1). But she became also a high school for “ Chaldean wisdom.” Assurbanipal, Sardanapalus of the Greeks, formed in his palace a library of Babylonian literature, in the treasures of which we still study to-day the Babvlonian-Assyrian intellectual world.1 Under his son Sarakos, Nineveh was destroyed 607-606. That she was not totally annihilated is proved by the condition of the mounds of the ruins. The dialogue between Mercury and Charon, by that Lucian who comes from Samosata (!) : “My good boatman, Nineveh is so destroyed that no one can say where it stood; there remains no trace of it,” is founded upon exaggeration.2
The mounds of ruins which hide ancient Nineveh lie opposite the present city of Mosul, on the left bank of the Tigris, at the mputh of the Choser. The pioneer of excavation in Nineveh was James Rich ; after him Emile Botta and Victor Place worked, and, chief of all, Austen Henry Layard. The excavation has been only half done up to the present day ; it has lately, however, been taken up anew. Botta was disappointed by the first excavations. A peasant directed his attention to Khorsabad, which lay four hours more to the north. Here the residence of the king Sargon was found who (722) conquered Samaria. Henry Layard, later connected in the work with the English Consul at Mosul, Hormuzd Rassam, found, southward from Nineveh in Nimrud (the Biblical Calah), in the district of Nineveh, the palace of Sennacherib with seventy-one chambers. Hormuzd Rassam in 1S54 reached the palace of Assurbanipal, the Greek Sardanapalus. In the Hall of the Lion Hunt he found, in thousands of fragments of baked clay tablets, a part of the royal library mentioned above. This discovery forms to the present day “ the chief treasure of cuneiform inquiry.”
The extent and size of the ancient city of Nineveh cannot up to the present be given from the excavations. The statements in Jonah iii. 3, iv. 11 are scarcely likely to be exaggerations. Against this the statement of the text before us : “Nineveh and Rehoboth-Ir, and Calah, and Resen between Nineveh and Calah—the same is the great city,” rests upon an error of the glossator. “ The same is the great city ” is an interpolation of the glossator.3 REHOBOTH-IU is probably the rebit Nina of the cuneiform, and is very likely to be looked for
1   Bezold, Zentralblatt fiir Bibb. Wesen, Juni 1904. And my essay in Katalog II. : der Alte Orient, by Rudolph Haupt, Halle u. I. Saale, 1906 ; Die IViedcr- entdeckuno Ninivehs und der Bibliothek Asurbanipals.
2   For further detail of the history of Nineveh, see article on “ Niniveh und Babylon” in R.Pr.Th., 3rd ed., and Zehnpfund in A.O., v. 3.
3   The glossator is thinking of the much-feared Nineveh. According to Hommel it might be a gloss to Resen, a play of words upon the chief temple E-gal-mah.
CALAH—RESEN—PATHRUSIM—CASLUHIM 299
on the site of the present Mosul, opposite to Nineveh, for which it served to a certain extent as tete de pont (Billerbeck). CALAH is Kelah, the above-mentioned city under the mound of the ruins of Nimrud at the mouth of the Upper Zab. Shalmaneser I. made it, about 1800, the chief city in place of Assur. Sargon also resided here till he had built his own residence (see above), which was consecrated in 706, a year before he was murdered. Sennacherib raised Nineveh to be his residence. RESEN was an independent place, which may be looked for under one of the mounds of ruins between Nineveh and Nimrud. Hommel identifies Resen with Nisin, the Larissa of Xenophon.
Gen. x. 18 and 14 : “ And Mizrciim begat Ladim, and Anamim, and Lehabim, and Xaphtukim, and Pathrusim, and Casluhim, it'hence xcent forth the Philistines [and Caphtorim]A
From the mention of the PATHRUSIM (Upper Egypt, Thebes) it was always rightly concluded that Egyptian territory is meant, though other names point to nations of the Mediterranean. W. M. Muller in O.L.Z., 1902, pr. 471 If., has announced the acceptable conjecture that Pathrusim is a gloss, introduced by a reader probably after the mention of Pathros in the prophets, and that this gloss has proved a mare’s nest, in that it has led the critics astray upon barren Egyptian paths. It is not dealing with Egyptian provinces, but with neighbouring outlying possessions and vassals of the Egyptians.1 Instead of CASLUHIM we may read Kasmonim, according to the Septua- gint. W. M. Muller amends this reading in the first sound (k and n are very near alike in Hebrew) and calls to mind the Nasamonen, a tribe in the neighbourhood of the great oasis of Ammon, situated in the farthest north. In ‘ANAMIM he reads k as the first sound, instead of the aspirate (also this disfiguring of the letters would be easily explicable), and thinks of the inhabitants of the southernmost and greatest oasis, that of Knmt (the t is found in the Septuagint, Enemetieim), which is what Brugsch, in his Reise nach der grossen Oase, p. 68, had
1   I had already conjecturally announced and enlarged upon this in connection with the mention of the Libyans before the clear-sighted essay by W. M. Muller came under my notice.
300
THE NATIONS
already conjectured on his own account. In NAPHTUHIM one would then willingly look for the third great oasis, lying between those of Ammon and Knmt. This middle oasis, the 44 Land of the Cow,” is that of Farafra. W. M. Muller raises a conjecture which at first sight appears very bold : he construes 44 Land of the Cow ” into an Egyptian name, which at anv rate in Hebrew might be written Naphtuhim. The LUDJM are possibly the Lydians (Septuagint, Gesenius), who later appear in Asia Minor, and were there annihilated by Cyrus. The Lubim, westward from Cyrene, who in Nahum iii. 9 are mentioned together with Put (Punt; see above, p. 287), are probably certainly to be found in the Lehabim (Lebu of the Inscriptions).
44 And CAPHTORIM ” is a gloss taken from Amos ix. 7, suggested by the mention of the Philistines.1
Gen. x. 15 ff. : THE NATIOXS OF CAN A AX. By Canaan is here meant the whole territory from Lebanon to Nahal Muzri. SIDOX designates Phoenicia (the Phoenicians called themselves Sidonians), HETHITES (Ilittim, who shortly after the Tell el- Amarna period passed into Syria and Phoenicia (see p. 339); Syria is for this reason called in Assy) ia the land of Haiti. They pressed on as far as the northern boundary of later Israel (Hennon forms the boundary), JEBUSITES (in the district of Jerusalem), AMOIUTES (remnants of the Amurri). The ARKITES are the Irgata of the Amarna texts ; the Ar-qa-(a) of Tiglath-Pileser
III., which in III. R. 9 and 10 is twice named together with Simirra as a North Phoenician city, still flourishing in the time of the Roman empire.2   SINITES—Siannu, mentioned by
Tiglath-Pileser III. (K.B., ii. 26 f.) in the neighbourhood under consideration. The statements, verse 19, 44 unto Gerar11 and 44 unto Gaza,” are identical; it is the boundary district at Nahal Muzri. The ARVADITES (verse 18) are the people of the 44 state ” of Arvad. This was on an island in North Phoenicia, cuneiform A-ru-a-di-(a) (Sennacherib : Qabal tamti, situated in the midst of the sea). Ezek. xxvii. 8, 11 describes them as
1   This seems to me to be more probable than the view earlier brought forward that the remark “ whence came the Philistines” belongs as gloss after Caphtorim.
2   IV. R. 34, No. 2, 58, mat I-ri qa-at-ta, Hommel, Assyrian Notes, 9, P.B.A.S., 1895, 202.
THE NATIONS OF CANAAN
301
sailors and brave warriors. After the campaign of Tiglath- Pileser III., presently to be mentioned, the district remained independent.
The ZE.MARITES are the Zimirra of Assyrian inscriptions, their position is not yet determined. Tiglath-Pileser III.1 names Zimirra amongst the nineteen cities seized from Hamath. It belongs, therefore, to the North Syrian province of Assyria, whose first prefect was the later king Shalmaneser. Probably the city is identical with Zumur (Zumur = Zimir as Muzur = Mizir), often named in the Amarna Letters (letters of Rib-Addi of Gebal), according to which, after Aziru (opposed by Rib- Addi), coming from the north, had taken Irqata (= Arqa), he was prevented by Zumer from pressing on against Gebal. It lay, therefore, between Arqa and Gebal. Tiglath-Pileser names besides, together with Zimirra, another North Phoenician city, Zimarra—that is, Simvra, lying to the south of Arvad, and therefore not to be confounded with Zimirra, which lay to the north.2
The HAMATHITES represent the Syrian Hamath. The above- named provinces of Arvad and Zimirra took part, together with Damascus and Samaria, in 720 in the rising of Ja’ubidi of Hamath against Sargon.
The enumeration of the kingdoms of the Smites (Siannu), Arvadites (Aruad), Zemarites (Zimirra), and Hamathites corresponds, therefore, with the political situation of the Syro- Phoenician minor states in the time of Tiglath-Pileser III. (second half of the eighth century), and of his successor ; the writer of Gen. x. 15 ff. must have lived about this time. So the addition of verse 18b belongs to a later redaction.
Gen. x. 22: “The sons of Shem; Elam, and Asshur, and Arpuchshad, and Lad, and Aram" It is with good reason that Elam is named amongst the sons of Shem, and shows a knowledge of political geography. Semitic Babylonia always laid claim to Elam, and from most ancient times it belonged to Babylonian civilisation. In Arpachshad (Arpakeshad ?) is hardly to
1   Kl. Inschriflen, i. 2.
2   Gen. x. 5 is a curious choice of “nations of slaves,” which, however, the author has not systematically worked out.
302
THE NATIONS
be found Arrapha (+Kesed = Ivasdim ?), the name of the district between Media and Assyria, which formed in pre-Assyrian times a separate kingdom, then, under Sargon, appears as the provinces of Arpaha, but upon the stele of Nabonidus again comes forward as an independent province. With this connection a purely Babylonian designation is to be expected.1
LUD is the Lubdi2 of the cuneiform (easily explicable error in writing), the country between the Upper Tigris and the Euphrates, northwards from Mons Masius, or its western continuation. Adadnirari I. says he extended his conquests from Lubdi to Rapiqu. Samsi-Adad I. names it amongst the rebellious Assyrian provinces. The Ludim, however, in verse 13 are to be distinguished from this Lud. From verse 24 onwards (verse 21 belongs to this part) another line begins, which names no more nations, but heroes. As sons of Joktan, however, some Arabian provincial names are interspersed.3 That HAZARMAVETH = Hadramaut of the South Arabian inscriptions, has been moved from elsewhere to verse 26 has already been remarked, p. 288. Possibly also Sheba, verse 28, and Ophir (the land of gold in South Arabia, to be looked for in Elam, in agreement with Htising, or in India ?), Havilah, and Jobab, verse 29, are all moved. We cannot resist the conjecture that in JOBAB the long-sought Arabian provincial name of Jareb 4 may be found. Halevy considered the name Juhaibib on Sabaean inscriptions.
The frontier places of MESHA and SEPHAR, verse SO, cannot be decided with certainty. Dillmann reads Massa (in North Arabia) ; Sephar is possibly the Saprapha of Ptolemy and Pliny, Safar of to-dav, in the middle of the south coast of Arabia.5
1   Comp. Jensen, Z.A., xv. 226 (=arb-kishadi, “land of four coasts”), and likewise previously Delitzsch, Parodies, 255 f.
2   Jensen, D. Lit. Ztg., 1S99, p. 936; upon Lubdi, see Winckler, F., ii. 47, and Streck, Z.A., xiv. 167 f.
3   According to Hommel, Aufs. u. Abh., 316, n. 6, twelve sons.
4   Hosea v. 13, “King [of] Jareb” ; see K.A.T., 3rd ed., 150 f.
5   Hommel, Atifs. a. Abh., 293 f., looks for the mountain ( = is:y Numb, xxxiii. 23 f.) between ‘Aqaba and Qadesh.
CHAPTER XII
THE TOWER OF BABER
GEN. xi. 2 : “And it came to pass, as they journeyed from qedem j that they came2 to a plain (biqa‘a) in the land of Shincir; ~ and they dwelt there (sham).” With this begins the post-Deluge age. The connection with the System of the Ages is no longer recognisable. The kabbalistic Yalkut Rubeni, 32&, suggests that possibly the tower was built after the Deluge as a place of refuge in the expected fire-flood (iBN ^ VQC). Cosmic motifs lie in qedem and sham?
Gen. xi. 4 f. : “ Go to, ice will build a city, and we will erect a migdal4 there, -whose top shall reach anto heaven, so that zee may not be scattered abroad over the -whole earth.'''1 They wished to form a strong political organisation. Hammurabi Cod., ii. 42 ff., “made the summit (of the temple tower) E-an-na (in Uruk) high, and amassed provisions for Anu and Ishtar (the goddess of Uruk); he was the protector of his land, who gathered together again the scattered inhabitants (mupaljhir nishi shaphatim) of Isin, and so on.” Here we find the two antitheses together. A tower (that is to say, niigdcil—that is, a stronghold with temple tower) as symbol of state organisation ; antithesis to it, the “ scattering ” of the inhabitants.5 For this reason the
1   Upon the meaning of this statement of direction, see p. 204. Likewise Gen. xxv. 6.
2   See Winckler, F., iii. 312 ; xsa, not “they found/’
3   Shdm is a catchword, comp. v. 7, 8, 9 ; see Winckler, F., iii. 405, also xxxv. 15. In antithesis to qedem, south (p. 299), shdm is north, as the Arabians, according to pre-Islamic designation, denote the northern region (Syria) with shdm (in antithesis to the southern Yemen). The usual addition of Maghrib and Mashriq shows that the Babylonian Kibla towards the east lies at the root.
4   Following vj? we add, with Winckler, loc. cit., the cc 11^ n'S’i’i from its wrong place ; a&, not “ name,” but shdm, catchword, see n. 3.
5   See Winckler, loc. cit., 404 f.
303
304
THE TOWER OE BABEL
“gathering together of the scattered” (mupahfyii• shaphdti) belongs also to the motif of the expected redeemer. On the boundary stone in the Berlin Museum, Merodach Baladan II. causes himself to be glorified as the redeemer called by the gods, of whom the oracle spoke: “This is the shepherd who will mend the broken ” (mupahhiru shapljdti). Therefore it is also said of Cyrus, hailed as saviour in Isa. xliv. 26 ff.: “ He shall build again the cities of Judah; he shall be the shepherd that saith of Jerusalem : She shall be built, and of the temples, Thy foundation shall be laid anew ! ” And in Ezek. xi. 17 and elsewhere the “gathering together of the scattered” is the motif of the expected redemption.1 “Jligclal, zchose top shall reach the heaven.” A purely Babylonian form of building. The tower in the temple of every town was the central point.2 Of the Tower of Babel it was repeatedly said when it was renovated: Its top shall reach the heaven.3 Nebuchadnezzar raised the summit of the tower of stages at Etemenanki, “ so that it rivalled the heaven.” The author is describing Babylonian architecture. “ We zoill make brick" (comp. Exod. i. 14, same words in Assyrian, labdnu libittu, comp. Nahum iii. 14, malben, brick-mould). Nebuchadnezzar explicitly says that he had the tower of Babylon restored with brick and mortar; another time he records that he overlaid it with enamelled bricks, and made the summit of uknu-stone {K.B., iii. 2,
1   As in the Babylonian gathering and scattering in the picture of the shepherd, Ezek. xii. 15, Matt. xxvi. 31, and other passages. Upon the dispersal (motif word pr, that is to say, pn), compare in addition Isa. xxxiii. 3, possibly also Zech. iii. 10. Upongathering, compare the name she'ar jashub, “ the remnant shall be gathered (we hold with Erbt, Ebrder, 133, the passive signification to be secondary) ; and the name Josep-el, “El is gatherer ” (zb. 37).
2   The three- or seven-storied temple tower (see p. 17) is characteristic of the most ancient civilisation known to us of Western Asia. The Egyptian Pyramids appear to have their origin in the tower of stages (see Hommel, Geschichte, p. 17, Aufs. u. Abh., 391 ff., G.G.G., 126 f,). The step pyramid of Sakkarah (Pharaoh Zoser of the third dynasty, see fig. Si), built of baked bricks, was originally of seven stages; so were the Medum pyramids of Snofru (fourth dynasty). Together with these there were three-storied pyramids, as in Babylonia ; compare the picture on the vase in de Morgan’s Recherches sur les origmes de VEgypte, ii. 236. After the time of Cheops the Egyptians built pyramids in place of the earlier mastabas.
3   Nabopolassar, i. 36 f. {K.B., iii. 1, 5), and Neb. Hilpr. (clay cylinder), ii. 5 ; see B.A., iii. 548.
BABYLONIAN TEMPLE TOWERS
305
pp. 15, 31). The oldest ruins of the tower at Nippur, built out of unbaked rectangular bricks, show to the present dav the remains of the bitumen (Gen. xi. 3. hemar, “ asphalt” : Assyrian A npru, as in the ark; Gen. vi. 14, kopher; Aramaic kuphra), which was used as building material.
Herodotus, i. 179., describes the method of building quite correctly in his account of the building of the walls of Babylon. He describes the Avails, Avhich had already been carried aAvav, but is mistaken in the measurements; see Billerbeck,vLO., i. 4, p. 7,note:—
“ They prepared bricks from earth which Avas throAvn out from the trenches ; and after they had formed a large number of bricks,
 
FIG. 8I.—The step-pyramid of Sakkarah.
they burnt them in ovens. After\A-ards, hoAvever, they took for mortar hot asphaltum, and betAA'een every thirty layers of brick stuffed a layer of AVOA'en reeds.”
The description is exact. The interlayers of reed have been found in the ruins of Babylon.
The ruins of such temple toAvers are found upon every large mound in the Delta. The ascent uas by a Avinding Avay, or bv steps ; often both together (see p. 30T). The toAver of Nebo at Borsippa (see fig. 82) still stands forty-eight metres above the hill of Birs Nimrud. It Avas composed of seAren stages, corresponding to the seven planets, and to the present day the remains of the planet colours are to be seen.1 It goes Avithout saying
1 Por further detail, see Kampf tun Babel u. Bibel, p. 40, and previously in the monograph on Nebo in Roscher’s Lexikon der Mylhologie. Compare also Hommel, Bufs. 7i, Abh., 384 f. u. 457 f., and Zimmern, K.A.T., 3rd ed., 616 f., n. 7.
VOL. I.   20
306
THE TOWER OF BABEL
that these gigantic ruins were enveloped in fable, even in the post-Babylonian age. Thus it is quite explicable that the Jewish tradition (Beresch. Rabba, 38; comp. Shabbath, 36a) connected Gen. xi. with the temple of Borsippa instead of with the temple of Bel-Merodach of Babylon, and that Alexander Polvliistor and Abydenus connected a tradition corresponding to the account in Genesis (and dependent upon it P) with the gigantic ruins of Birs Nimrud.1
The architect Chipiez in 1S79 exhibited in the Paris Salon reconstructions of such temple towers, according to_ Herodotus
 
FIG. 82.—The ruins of the tower of Nebo at Borsippa.
and the cuneiform records; they are described and drawn by Perrot and Chipiez in Histoire de Fart dans /'Aniiquite, ii. 879 ff. An authentic drawing has been found on an alabaster relief in Nineveh (see fig. , and upon the reproduction of the Merodaeh- Baladan stone (fig. , where the tower of stages stands amongst serpents and dragon monsters. Upon fig. 8 compare Bischoftj Im Reiche der Gnosis, p. 80. Upon the ruins of the temple tower of Nippur, opened by the American expedition, see fig. 83, and comp. Hilprecht, Die Ausgrabungen im Bel-Tempel zu Nippur. Upon the ruins of the step-temple of Assur, see M.D.O.G., 1905.
Herodotus, i. 181 f., gives a description of the temple of Mavduk in Babylon, proved to be accurate on the whole by the records of the excavations :
1 Other temple towers were mentioned earlier at pp. 31 and also 138 ; see also p. 307, n, 3.
BABYLONIAN TEMPLE TOWERS
307
As centre of each of the two parts of the city there is, in one part, the royal castle surrounded by a great and strong wall, in the other the sanctuary of Zeus-Belus with bronze gates: this was extant even in my time, a square of two stadia each way; in the middle of the sanctuary is built a tower, of stone, the length and breadth being one stadium ; upon this tower is built another tower, and upon this again another, till there are eight (!) towers; you ascend by steps winding round the outside of all these towers (!). About midway of the ascent is a resting-place with seats, where they who ascend sit down to rest: in the last tower is a great temple : in this temple is a large, well-cushioned couch, and by it stands a golden table: but there is no image of any god erected there, also no one may remain there throughout the night except one woman, a native, one chosen by the god from amongst all the others, as the Chaldeans assert the priests of this god are chosen. These same assert also, what they have not convinced me of, that the god himself comes to the temple and rests upon the couch, just as he is said to do in Thebes, according to the Egyptians. For there also a woman sleeps in the temple of the Theban Zeus. These two, they say, converse with no man. It is the same in the Patara of Lycis with the priestesses of the god during the time when the oracle speaks : this does not happen all the time; but when it happens, then they are shut up in the temple through the night with the god.
What was the purpose of the Babylonian temple towers ? Like all the temple sanctuaries, they were the type of a heavenly (cosmic) sanctuary. As the astrological pictures upon the boundary stones represent “ houses ” (that is to say, thrones),1 for the planet divinities, so the boundary stone of Merodach- Baladan 2 shows a tower of stages in the heaven. The temple towers of seven stages are types of the heavenly tower of stages,3 which the circles of the planet courses (tubuqati) form above the zodiac, and to ascend which is a work well-pleasing to the divinity; p. 57.
1   Compare, for example, p. II, fig. 2.
2   P. II, fig. 3, see above.
3   Also the other temple towers have names bearing reference to the cosmos. “ House of the fifty” (that is, the cycle of the universe, see above, p. 31) was the temple at Girsu. The temple of Marduk at Babylon was called E-temen-an-ki, “ House of the foundation of heaven and earth ” ; the temple tower of Nippur was called, amongst other things, E-sag-ash, “ House of fate,” probably in the sense of the decision of destinies. The seven-storied temple of Bel at Nippur was called, amongst other things, Dur-an-ki, ‘ ‘ Band of heaven and earth ” (Hommel, G. G. G., 35b n. 2).
308
THE TOWER OF BABEL
We may assume that this purpose was also emphasised later. The temple towers would then represent the attempt to drcitc nearer to the divinity. The chi'onicler in Gen. ii. seems to have taken it this way, only he brands such a design as heathen foolhardiness and sacrilegious insolence.
It may be taken for granted that the temple towers, whose summits represent the entrance into heaven, were crowned with a sanctuary. Nebuchadnezzar records that he built upon the summit of the temple towers of Babylon and Borsippa a gleaming sanctuary as a “ well-appointed chamber.”1
How far the description in Herodotus applies cannot be decided with the material at present available. It is very probable that the service of the “ wife of Marduk ” spoken of in the Code of Hammurabi is connected with these temple chapels.
Seeing the high estimation in which astronomy was held in Babylon, it is further to be expected that the towers also served for astronomical purposes.2 The inscriptions up to the present, however, give no indication of this. But Apollonius of Tyana (i. 25), who seems to have gathered his description of Babylon from good sources, may have had the temple tower in mind when he speaks of a great building of brick, overlaid with bronze, and says that in it there was a chapel gleaming with gold and sapphires which represented the firmament (the star heaven ?).
Lastly, it might be expected that the towers served for burial purposes. The temple of Bel at Nippur (see fig. 83) is surrounded by graves, like the Pyramids; one of its names is E-gigunu, “ house of the graves.” The classical writers, as is known, assert that the temple of Babylon contained a tomb of the god Bel, and with this agrees the inscription of Nabonidus which calls the tower at Larsa the “ grave of the Sun-god.” 3 Perhaps also the grave of Ningirsu in the temple at Lagash, erected by Gudea, and the grave of Malkat at Sippar, which Hammurabi
1   Mashtaku taqni, A’./J., iii. 2, 31.
2   The Pyramids likewise, according to late statements, had passages for the observation of the solstices.
3   K.B., iii. 2, p. 90, line 16 ; see Hilprecht, loc. citp. 71.
BABYLONIAN TEMPLE TOWERS
809
in the introduction to his Code of Laws decorates with green, the colour of resurrection (see p. 121) may be sought in the temple towers. They are the sanctuaries of the divinity embodying the death and resurrection of natural life (moon, sun, or the cycle). But at the same time we have to do with the graves of the kings,
 
I'lG. 83.—Remains of a tower of stages in Nippur.
as in the case of the Pyramids.1 The Aneient-Babylonian kings were held, like the Pharaohs, as the incarnation of the divinity. Naramsin, Gudea, and Dungi bear the divine determinative.2 The Egyptians said to the mummy of the king: “Thou art Osiris,” that is to say, “ Thou wilt rise again ” (p. 89). And
1   Hilprecht, in Die Ausgrabuugen ini Bel-Tempel zu Nippur, 68 ft., sees in the stage towers the presentation of a fine cosmic religious idea : the upper part representing the divine majesty, the middle part the place of worship of mankind dwelling upon earth, and the lower part, reaching down into Hades, the place of the dead. This construction of Hilprecht’s does not altogether agree with the Babylonian idea of the universe ; modern religious presentments are mixed in with it which demand too much from antiquity.
- Thus Hommel in G.G.G., p. 126 ; comp. Au/s. u. Ab/i., 390 ff.
810
THE TOWER OF BABEL
doubtless the same idea was connected with the graves of the kings in the Babylonian temple towers.
Traditions outside the Bible
In the Sibylline Oracles (quoted in Theophilus, ad Autolycum) it is said in the third book (Kautzsch, Pseudepigr., 187 f.):
“ When they”1 2 built the tower in the land of Assyria—they were, however, all of one language, and they desired to climb even to the starry (!) heaven. But forthwith the Immortal “laid mighty compulsion upon the winds,” and the storms threw down the great tower “from on high ” and roused the mortal strife amongst them; therefore men gave the name of Babylon to the city. But when the tower was fallen and the speech of men had changed into many languages, and the earth was filled with death, while the “kingdoms” were divided, it was the tenth generation of men after the Deluge, and Kronos, Titan, and Japetos (!)- were their rulers.
Alexander Polyhistor (Syncellus, 41) connects the fable with the battle of Titan and Prometheus against Ivronos, and says likewise that the gods overthrew the tower and gave to everyone a different language. He founds his assertions upon the Sibyls, which are also otherwise called the Sibyls of Berossus. It may be assumed that a like story was to be found in Berossus. Josephus, Ant., i. 1, 4, knows of the same source. He relates it, using the same words (4i the gods raised a storm,” etc.), but he omits the Greek names. He records previously, however, in the same chapter, the Jewish tradition of the building of the tower, which puts the “ wrath and scorn of God” upon Nebrod (Nimrod), grandson of Chamas, the son of Noah : “ for he was bold, and his hands were strong.”
The historian Eupolemos says, according to Euseb., Pncp. ev., ix. 17 :
Those saved from the Deluge built first the city of Babylon. They were, however, giants, and they built the celebrated tower (!). When this, however, was overthrown by the will of God (!), the giants were scattered throughout the whole world.
1   The passage in quotation marks is from Theophilus.
2   This may be supplemented by the other Sibylline evidence here adduced, which, like the Bible, links on the confusion of tongues.
TRADITIONS OUTSIDE THE BIBLE
311
Moses of Chorene, the Armenian historian (fifth century A.D.), relates:1
From them (the divine beings Avho in the first ages inhabited the earth) sprang the race of giants, strong of body and of monstrous size. Filled -with pride and defiance, they made the sacrilegious plan of building a high tower. But whilst they were occupied with the building a frightful wind, raised by the wrath of God, destroyed the monstrous building, and threw amongst the men unknown words, by means of which disunion and confusion arose amongst them.
The Book of Jubilees, preserved by the Ethiopians, chap. x. (Kautzsch, Pseiidepigr., v. 9), relates:
And in the thirty-third Jubilee, in the first year of the second week of vears, Peleg took a wife named Lomna, of the daughters of Shinar, and she bare him a son in the fourth year of this week of years. And he called his name Reger, for he said: Behold, the children of men are become wicked through the godless scheme to build for themselves a city and a tower in the land of Shinar. For they had wandered out of the land of Ararat towards the east in the land of Shinar. And in his days they built the city and the to Aver, saying : Come, Ave Avill ascend into heaven by it! And they began to build; and the fourth Aveek of years they burned bricks Avith fire, and the bricks served them for stone, and for a Avash with Avhich they washed, they used asphalt, Avhich comes from the sea and from the springs of Avater in Sinai. And they built it: forty and three years they built it: “ there Avere 203 bricks in its Avidth, and the height (of a brick) Avas the third of one ” : its height rose to 54-33 ells, 2 hands, and 13 stadia. And the Lord our God spake to us : Behold, (they are) a people and have begun to act, and now is no (thing) more impossible to them. Come, let us descend and confuse their language, so that none may understand the speech of the other, and they Avill be scattered into cities and into nations, and until the Judgment Day they shall never again be of one mind. And God descended, and Ave descended Avith him, to see the city and the toAver which the children of men had built. And God confused their speech, and none understood the other any more, and they ceased for ever from building the city and the toAver. And therefore the Avhole land of Shinar Avas called Babel; for here God confused the language of the children of men, and from hence they scattered themselves into their cities each according to his city and to his nation. And God sent a strong Avind against the toAver and overtimeAV it to the earth, and behold it (was) betAveen Assur and Babylon in the land of Shinar; and they called its name
1 Upon these last evidences, see Lueken, p. 314
312
THE TOWER OF BABEL
,f Ruin.” In the fourth week of years, in the beginning of the first year, in the thirty-fourth Jubilee, they were scattered throughout the land of Shinar.
Of the fables outside Asia, we draw attention to the Mexican. The tower is pure Babylonian, and corresponds to the Mexican temple towers, whose relation to the Babylonian already struck A. von Humboldt.
One of the rescued giants built of bricks an artificial hill as a memorial, on Mount Tlalok in Cholula. The gods saw this building, whose summit was to reach the clouds, with disfavour, and they hurled fire upon the pyramid; therefore the pyramid of Cholula is incomplete.
As early as the sixteenth century, after the rediscovery of America, Pedro de los Rios mentioned the fable and recorded of it that it was recited in a song containing treasure of the vanished Mexican language during a dance round the temple of stages (Humboldt, Cordillercn, i. 42).1
The Greek fable of the giants, who piled Ossa upon Olvmpus, in order to storm the heavens, and who were destroyed by Zeus by lightning, is also worth mention because Julian the Apostate asserted that Gen. xi. 1-9 was borrowed from the Greek myth.
Up to the present there has no cuneiform record been found of a Babylonian story of the building of a tower. In the monograph on Nebo in Roscher’s Lexikon, iii. 54 f., reference is made to the ever-recurring error arising from the “ Chaldsean Genesis ” by Smith-Delitzsch.
The there adjoined text Iv 3657 (Bezold, Cat., ii. 552) has nothing to do with the tower.2 It can also hardly be assumed
1   The value of the fable has been doubted, and it has been said it mixes up familiar traditions with Biblical histories (E. B. Tylor, Anahuac. London, 1S61, 276 ; Andree, 104 f.). But the stories are just as likely to be Ancient-Oriental as the Pyramids, the origin of which they relate. They must not be placed upon the same level as the poetised illustrations of the Mexican picture-writings—like, for example, the dove which carried abroad language after the Deluge (see Lueken, Tafel iii. ; compare with it Andree, pp. 105 ff.).
2   It is speaking of a time of decline and ruin in Babylon (distress in consequence of the Elamites ? ), as has already been shown in the article on Nebo in Roscher’s Lcxikon. “The people of Babylon were held to forced labour.” The hero desires, as it seems, to free the land from tyrants. “ All day he was troubled by their cry, he found no rest upon his bed by reason of their laments, he lost
TRADITIONS OUTSIDE THE BIBLE
SIS
that such a story will be found in cuneiform. The point of the story of the tower is directed against the proud Babylon. •‘This great Babylon, which I have built,” Dan. iv. SO, indicates the proverbial Babylonian pride; compare the figure of speech used about the tower, “ its top shall reach the heaven,” pp. 304 ff. The origin of the storv should undoubtedly be looked for outside Babylon. Stade's hypothesis, that the Hebrew chronicler made use of an accepted literarv Babylonian copy, seems a priori untenable. The purpose of the story is religious—it is no question here of an historical event. Possibly the story is a protest against the astral religion represented by the towers.1
The tradition of the confusion of tongues and division ot nations has been linked on to the story of the tower.- Herder says in his Geist dcr hebraischen Pocsie: “ Something definite must have occurred to throw these people into contention; philosophic deductions are not satisfactory.” Perhaps the definite thing is the veiled fact in civilised history conveyed in form of the story that the land of tihinar is in fact the cradle of all civilisation.
reason in his wrath ; his mind was set upon the overthrow of the government.'" The text now in King, The Seven Tablets of Creation, ii., FI. lxxiii. f. ; in addition, ib., i. 219 f.
1 Compare the Greek fable of Atlas, the discoverer of astrology, who was changed into a mountain as punishment.
- The 143rd fable of Hyginus relates only the confusion of tongues: ‘‘Many hundred years ago men led a life without cities or laws, speaking only one language. But after Mercurius (Nebo !) had made many tongues amongst men and also had divided the nations, discord began to reign, which was displeasing to Jupiter.'’
CHAPTER XIII
PRE-ISRAELITE CANAAN (-See APPENDIX)
Babylonia and the “ Westland11
GEN. xii. 1 : “ Get thee out of thy country unto the land that I will .shore thee."' The goal of the migration is the Biblical Canaan. Let us try, with the help of the sources open to us, to construct a picture of the land which was the goal of the Abraham migration, and later was the stage for the history of the “ Children of Israel.'”
The coast-land of the Mediterranean, to which Canaan belongs in the narrow sense, is separated from Babylonia bv the Syro- Arabian desert, and from its geographical position was known to the Babylonians as the “ Westland.11 For its designation the same ideogram is used as for the west wind—Martu, interpreted in syllables as A-mur-ru-u.1 This “ Westland11 forms, from the most ancient times known to us, the bridge between the'Euphrates districts and Egypt.2 In particular, it was to Babylonia the longed-for 45 wav to the sea,11 to the ports of the Mediterranean, especially in the time when the passage to the Persian Gulf was closed by the mighty “ sea land,11 a term the historical meaning of which is still unknown. The Babylonian caravans and armies travelled there over the same route as is
1   Not Aharru, as was formerly read;. the Amarna Letters write A-mu-ur-ri. Upon Amurru, “ land of the Amorites,” see p. 336.
2   The passage quoted in note, p. 275, from Wellhausen’s Geschichte Israels und ludas, shows how difficult it is for the old idea, which looked upon the Bible country as an isolated district, to take these facts of monumental evidence into account and to give up the old supposition. It is said in Lohr’s Geschichte Israels: “Canaan was the bridge of the world’s intercourse betiveen Asia and Africa, yet it was at the same time an isolated land, withdrawn from intercourse.”
BABYLONIA AND THE “WESTLAND”
315
given in the migration of Abraham, through Harran, crossing the Euphrates at Biredjik.
Lugalzaggisi, king of Erech (about 2700), says in a record written in Sumerian :
.... When he had conquered (the countries) from the rising to the setting, the god Inlil had made smooth his path from the
 
FIG. 84.—Marble head of a “ Sumerian.”   FIG. 85.—Figure of a woman from
Telloh, time of Gudea.
lower sea (Tigris and Euphrates) to the upper sea; from the rising to the setting has Inlil [given] him.
The interests of Babylonia, therefore, reached already as far as the Mediterranean in the oldest period of our records.
Lists of dates1 show that also the kings of Ur, which is held to be the home of Abraham (p. 6, ii.), had intercourse with the “ Westlands.” 2 Gudea, prince of Lagash, records that he brought wood for building from the mountains of Amanu. Intercourse
1   Scheil in Recueil de Travaux (T archeologie Jgypt. assyr., vol. xvii.
3   With Arabia also ? The local juxtaposition by Hommel in Anc. Heb. Trad., 37, of Imgi, Shabu, and Ki-mash (according to Scheil, the two last towards Elam), is not satisfactorily proved. Upon the relations between Ur and the “West- land,” see loc, cit., p. 57 ; and H. Winclder, Gesch, fsr., ii, 296.
316
PRE-ISRAELITE CANAAN
with Arabia is also attested: he brings ushu wood and iron from Meluh and diorite from Magau.* Omina, reaching back
 
FIG. 86.—Seal of King Sargon I.
to about 3000, often deal with the countries through which
the military road towards




the west passed (the kingdom of the Kishshati, to which Harran belonged and Suri) and with the “ Westland1'' itself.1
III. R. 59, 5 :   If ail
eclipse of the moon on the 14th Adar begins in the first watch of the night, it is an omen for the king of the Kishati, Ur, and Mar-tu (Annimi). -
III. R. 58, 1 : If the moon shows itself on 30th Dhebet, Suri the aft la-mu (nomads) will arm, a strange people will conquer the land
FIG. S7.—Naramsin, son of Sargon I. (Ilil- °1 Mar-tu (Amurril). preclit, II. R. xxiii., Old Babylonian Inscriptions.')   .   ,
lhere is a special record by the Babylonian king Sargon (about 2800), and by his son
 

[Prometheus]

1   “The Westland” is named ten times in astrological connection in the fragments of the library of Assurbanipal ; see RI.V.A.G., 1903, 48. Matt. ii. shows (he same interest in the “Westland.” The Magi read in a constellation in the East an event in the “ l Vest land” which was of importance to them also ; see B.N. T., 50 ff.
2   This oracle contains the three stations of the Abrahamic migration, for Harran belonged to the kingdom of the Kishati ; compare the article on Harran in K.P.Th., 3rd ed.
BABYLONIA AND THE “ WESTLAND
317
Naramsin, of an extension of the dominion towards the u West-
land ” and beyond,1 told in such a form as to show that it had
long belonged to the natural interests of Babylonia. Their deeds are, unfortunately, only preserved for us in fragments as “Omina" in the library of Assur- banipal, and, indeed, with each event the constellation is given under which it occurred.
In the documents recording the rebuilding of Babylon by Sargon it is said:—
Sargon, who under the omen . . . . the government [to the realms of] Babylon re[moved], took away the mounds in the neighbourhood (?) of the Tuna gate .... [after the pattern (?)] of Agade built a city, named it [Babijlu   
A further Omina document records the overthrow of Elam :
 
Fio. SS.—Stele of victory
He overthrew the sea and turned   of Naramsin.2
towards Gutium (Armenia), he overthrew Gutium and turned towards Elam, he overthrew Elam and ....
Then it is said in a document:
Sargon, who (under the omen . . . .) went up, found no foe able
1   Fig. S6, Sargon's seal. Upon the legends of the birth of Sargon, see Exod. ii. Fig. S7, Naramsin ; Fig. 88, campaign of Naramsin, strikingly related in presentment to the Mycenaean battle memorial, fig. 89. See upon this, and the following, Winckler, A.O., vii. 2, p. 12. Sargon stood for the type of Babylonian rule. The founder of the last Assyrian dynasty called himself Sargon II. He wished to open a new era; 350 (universe lunar year) kings had reigned before him. Following the example of Sargon I., he placed his statues in Chition in Cyprus.
2   It represents the triumph of the Babylonian over the Elamite. Later, this stele of victory was carried away to Elam as plunder, the Babylonian inscription was partially erased, and replaced by an inscription of the Elamite ruler Shut- ruknahunte. The astral gods upon fig. 88 may also be held to be “ regents of the world/’
318
PRE-ISRAELITE CANAAN
 
FIG. S9.— Fragment of a silver goblet from a Mycenaean tomb. After Perrot-Chipiez, Histoire de Part.
 
FIG. go.—Ancient-Babylonian head of a goat. According to Hilprecht, from Fara near Babylon.
to withstand him, his fear over . . . ., passed over the sea of the West, [tarried] three years in the West, conquered [the country], united it, [ere]cted his statues in the West, took them prisoners in crowds over the sea.
Whence had Sargon the ships ? Did he build them himself? or did the cities of the coast supply them to him ? In any case the later Phoenician cities had long been in existence. In an in-
BABYLONIA AND THE “ WESTLAND11
319
scription which refers to Sargon or to his son Naramsin, it is said that “ kings of the sea-coastv of thirty- two cities obeyed him.
Our figs. 91-96 illustrate the civilisation of Babylonia,the influences of which, since the oldest times known to us, over-   > yy*
spread also the region
of the later Bible lands.1   .
 
A mighty monumental FIG. 91.— Ancient-Babylonian spinning-woman evidence reaching down (time of Gudea). Discovered in Susa.2
 
FIG. 92.—Vase-holder of the time of Gudea. Third millennium B.C. Discovered in Telloh.
 
FIG. 93,   FIG. 94.
Publisher’smark of an edition of Theocritus which appeared in Rome in the sixteenth century A. D.
into our own time, for the passage of the Egyptian and Babylonian armies through the “ Westland/’ is the defile of Nalir el Kelb (Dog- River) at Beirut (comp. Boscawen, sketch-map of the Nalir el Kelb, vol. vii.), where Pharaohs of Egypt and kings of Assyria have carved their pictures and inscriptions in the rock. Fig. 96 shows an early
1   Figs. 93 and 94 show a most instructive example of the centuries old “arms" motifs. The staff of ^-Esculapius and the war eagle upon vases of Gudea and Entemena (fig. 95). For another example of the migration, see p. 317, and in Hommel, G.G.G., p. 122, n. 1 (the two lions). Hommel, id., 112, n. 4, draws attention to an ancient Egyptian pendant to the arms on the Gudea vase.
2   Behind the royal (?) spinner stands a slave with a fan. The spinner sits upon a stool, with crossed legs. The picture bears out our observations on Gen. xviii. 4.
320
PRE-ISRAELITE CANAAN
representation of the rock groups on the left bank of the Dog River. So far as we know, there is no later picture of it. A road
now leads across ; the ancient
 
military road by the carvings is almost impassable. On the right bank an inscription by Nebuchadnezzar II. was found (published in D.O.G., part v., Leipzig, Hinrichs). Fig. 97 shows two monuments, one Egyptian and one Assyrian (Esarhaddon). Unfortunately the others are not yet published. An accurate registration of the monuments treated by Benzinger is to be found in Baedeker’s Palestine, 1910, p. 248. Figs. 98 and 99 illustrate travelling on the caravan road. Judging by the date- palm tree, fig. 9S does not refer to Assyria, but to Babylonia.
Since the - Westland ” counted as an important
FIG. 95-—Silver vase of Entemena of part   of Babylonian do-
Lagash, with the arms of Lagash.   . .   .
(Gudea age.) Discovered in Telloh. million, it very soon appears
 
? ^               =^=ag8eyoroi.
FIG. Q6 —The headland at the Nahr el Kelb. After a drawing from the middle of the nineteenth century.
BABYLONIA AND THE “ WESTLAND
321
as a political factor. From the correspondence of the Hammurabi age1 we learn that the name Amurru originally signified a tribe (like the Biblical Amorites), for it speaks here of Amurru in the Syrian desert, who play the same part as later the Suti, AramaeansJ and Arabs in the same region. But at this period Amurru also denotes a certain territory, including the later Phoenicia,
Palestine, and Coele Syria.2 Arad-Sin is named before Rim-Sin.
It is doubtful whether it is a case of a double name of the same king, or whether it is a brother.
The Sumerian correspondence to Arad-Sin would be Eri-aku; possibly to be identified with the Arioch, king of Ella- sar (= Larsa ?), of Gen. xiv. He names himself
ad-ricl of the Westland.3 FIG. 97.—Monument from the Nahr el Kelt).
After Bezold, Niniveh ttnd Babylon.
 

 
1 Comp. Peiser in M. V.A.G., vi. 144 ff. 2 Winckler, K.A.T., 3rd ed., 17S. 3 It probably means king, or something of the sort, possibly veiling the idea “ guardian.” A passage in Peiser’s Urkunden, p. 37, leads me to this conjecture. VOL. I.   21
322
PRE-ISRAELITE CANAAN
But Hammurabi, his contemporary and conqueror, who united South and North Babylonia (Sumer and Akkad) into one kingdom, calls himself, in an inscription upon a stone plate which bears his likeness (fig. 100), and which is dedicated to the West- land Ishtar (Ashratu), “ king of Mar-tu (Amurn'i),1' and one of his letters is addressed to Ahati, wife of Sin-idina, who appears as rcibian (commander) of Mar-tu.*1 And the king Ammiditana,2 3 of
 

 
FIG. 99.—A Semitic family desiring permission to dwell in Egypt. An Egyptian presentment of the middle kingdom (about 1900 B.c.)."
the same dynasty, reigning about 2000, says : “King of Babylon, king of the city of Ivish, king of Sumer and Akkad, king of Daganu,4 the hill country of Mar-tu, am L’1 It is easy to see that the “ Westland ” played a very prominent part in the growth of the Babylonian kingdom.* Nebuchadnezzar I. (about 1100) names V. R. 55, 10 the A-mur-ri-i between Lulubi and Kashshi, and in a passage, unfortunately mutilated, mentions in
1   King, No. 98. Mar-tu can only be a designation for “Westland” in the sense in which we take it. The mention of Ashrat in the inscription upon the stone slab of Hammurabi (fig. ioo) answers for this.
2   To be read thus, and not Ammisatana ; see Ranke, Personal Names, p. 65.
3   Formerly interpreted as “entry of Jacob into Egypt.” Comp. W. M. Muller, Asien tend Europa, p. 36.
4   According to Hommel, G.G.G., 10, S9, 390, n. 2, it is plainly da-ga-mu in the original ; comp. King, Letters, iii. 207.
THE HITTITES AND THE “WESTLAND” 323
a conversation with Marduk, after his victory over Elam, the land Mar-tu.* 1
Whether the specific Biblical country, the “ Land of Promise ” (Gen. xii. 1), was included, in the political sense, in Amurru in the Babylonian age is not known. It possibly lay beyond the southern boundary of the dominion of the Babylonian kings.
 
1- 1G. ioo.—-Stone tablet from the British Museum, with a likeness of Hammurabi.
During the centuries of its dominion over the “ Westland,” naturally Babylonian civilisation and thought spread throughout the land. The discoveries at Amarna offer surprising evidence of this, showing that in the middle of the fifteenth century B.C. they used Babylonian cuneiform writing in this “ West- land.” We will deal further with this later (p. 3S5). Only
1 Meissner, Berl. Ph. W'., 1902, pr. 980, takes it there was a western and an eastern Amurru. At most it could only be a matter of the shifting of a political- geographical idea, but see previously Winckler, Unters. zur altar. Gesch., p. 37, n. 2, and A. A. T., 3rd ed., 179, where, besides line 20 f., there is a confusion in the printing, and Hommel, G. G, G., p. 242, n. 2.
324
PKE-ISRAELITE CANAAN
one other civilised power could compete with the Babylonian influence in that ancient time—Egypt. That the intellectual influence of Egypt also was felt in Canaan is certain. But it is equally certain that specifically Babylonian influence predominated. In Palestine evidence of both is given by the latest discoveries at Taanak and Mutesellim (Megiddo); p. 342. That Egypt won political ascendancy over Syria and Palestine even soon after the age of Hammurabi, we already knew from the Egyptian records. The Amarna age has illustrated vividly the circumstances of Egyptian ascendancy in the middle of the fifteenth century.1
Egyptian Evidence
The kings of the first dynasties had already come in conflict with Asiatic Semites in the district of Sinai, a peninsula whose mines were worked by the Pharaohs who were buried in Abvdos Senoferu, founder of the fourth dynasty, boasts in the Annals of Palermo of his victory over the nomads. The “ princes’’ wall,” “ designed to keep off the Asiatics,” perhaps came into existence then. The kings of the mighty fifth dynasty made the rocky defiles accessible. The eastern mountains, the “ land of incense,” of Punt, was the goal of the expeditions. Under Pepi (Apopy) I. (sixth dynasty, about 2500) the first campaign against Asia is recorded. His intimate friend Une relates in his epitaph the victorious campaign against the Amu, Syrian nomads :—
This army was happy, and cut up the land of the Bedouins this army was happy, and destroyed the land of the Bedouins this army was happy, and overthrew their fortresses this army was happy, and cut down their fig-trees and vines this army was happy, and threw fire into all their villages this army was happy, and slew there many hundreds of thousands of troops
this army was happy, and brought home prisoners in great crowds.
1   Upon the Egyptian and Babylonian relations spoken of in this chapter, compare previously Fr. Hoinmel, Anc. Heb. Trad.
EGYPT AND CANAAN
325
 
If we may conclude from this that already, before the sixth dynasty, therefore in the time of the great pyramid- builders, Palestine was tributary to Egypt, so we have, on the other hand, an indirect evidence that in the following period, during the political weakness of the seventh- eleventh dynasties (2500-2000 B.C\), powerful states arose in Syria. We must conclude this from the fact that the monuments of the mighty twelfth dynasty show no trace of any influence upon Syria, and we And the fact confirmed by the respectful manner in which a story, come down to us from this age, speaks of the Syrian princes.
We have to thank an Egyptian papyrus manuscript for some detailed information about the land to which Canaan in the narrow sense belongs,
which relates the life of Sinuhe,1 a prince and VlG- .IDI- — A‘
1   monte prisoner
adherent at the court of of Rameses
Usertesen I. (about 2000 ln‘ B.C.). The poem, which the Egyptians accounted amongst their classical literature, and used for many centuries in their schools for a specimen copy, gives us a lifelike and at the same time, for
i.-,- T, j (“ the following inquiry, very welcome I-IG. 102.—Bedouin of ‘A-mar-a   °   1 y -7
(land of the Amorites) as a presentment of Bedouin life in ancient prisoner in Egypt, LD 209. Palestjue_ Sinuh(!i for sonle reas01]]
fled from the court over the Isthmus of Suez into Asia (“ over the princes’ wall”).2 He first stayed about half a year in Qedem,3 where he found Egyptians settled (as merchants ?),
 
1 P. 3022 of the Berlin Museum, last translated by Erman-Krebs, Aus den Papyrus der Kdnigl. Museum zu Berlin, pp. 14 ff. Comp, also W. M. Muller, Asieu und Europa, pp. 3S ff., and Hommel, Alt is. UberL, 48 ff.
- The historical background of the flight of Moses from the court of Egypt into Midian must have been very like this. He had become a politically unwelcome personage, perhaps upon religious grounds. The Biblical tradition shows a trace of that in the story of the murder of the Egyptian. The legends tell more about it. In fact, this was certainly only the excuse, not the reason for the exile of Moses.
That is, probably the region round about the Dead Sea; comp. Hommel, Au/s. n. Abh., 293, n. 4.
326
PRE-ISRAELITE CANAAN
and then he came to the prince “ of Upper Tenu.111 He placed Sinuhe “ at the head of his children,11 and married him to his eldest daughter. Then it says :
He chose out for me a part of his land, from the most exquisite of his possessions, upon the borders of another country. It was the beautiful land of Yaa.- Figs grew there and grapes, and it has more wine than water; it is rich in honey and has much oil, and all kinds of fruits are upon its trees. There is barley there and wheat, and cattle innumerable. And much besides came to me . . . . when he made me into a prince of his race, of the most exquisite of his land. I made bread for daily food and wine for daily drink, cooked meat and goose for roast. In addition there was also wild venison of the desert, caught for me in traps and brought to me, besides what my hounds captured. They brought much to me .... and milk in every form. Thus I lived for many years, and my children grew strong, each one a hero of his race. The messenger who marched to the north or who journeyed southwards to the court, rested with me. 1 entertained all; I gave water to the thirsty, and put the wanderers upon their road and restrained the robbers. When the Bedouins marched abroad . ... to war against the princes of the nations, I counselled their campaign. This prince of Tenu made me for many years the commander of his army, and in every country to which I marched, I was a hero .... upon the meadows by its streams (1); I captured their herds, I carried away their people and plundered their stores; I slew the men with my sword and my bow, by my marches and by wise plans.
This pleased him and he loved me ; he knew how brave I was and set me at the head of his children. He saw the power of my arm.
There came a mighty man from Tenu and scoffed at me in my tent; he was a .... , who had no equal and who had vanquished all Tenu. He said he would fight with me ; he thought to slay me ; he thought to have my herds for his prey .... for his tribe.
Then that prince took counsel with me and I said: “ I know him not. . . . He attacks me like a raging bull in the midst of the cows, goaded by a bull of the herd .... a bull, when he loves fighting . . . ., does he fear him who would prove him ? If his heart desires battle, so let him speak his wish.” 1 2
1   Erman thinks this is very likely the same country that about 1500 E.e. was called the “ Upper Retenu,” and means Palestine. 'It is in two districts, the southern part, called Ken‘ana, and the northern, ’Ernur (Canaan and the land of the Amorites). By the “ Lower Retenu ” they meant the Syrian plains. Iveft is not Phoenician (Erman, Agyplen, p. 680), but Caphtor = Crete, as W. M. Muller has shown.
2   Cyprus was thus called by Sargon. He says : “ana Ya-’ nage sha mat Yatnana ” ; that is to say, “ towards Ya’, the island of Yatnana.”
THE STORY OF SINUHE
327
In the night I strung my bow, I made ready my arrows, I sharpened (?) my dagger, I polished my weapons.1 When the day broke, Tenu came out and its tribes were gathered together, and the neighbouring countries had joined with them. When they thought of this combat, every heart burnt for me, the men and the women shouted and every heart pitied me. They said : “ Is there no other mighty man who would fight against him ? ”
Then he seized his shield, his lance, and his armful of spears. But after I had drawn out his weapons, I let his spears fly past me and fall useless upon the earth, one after another. Then he rushed (?) upon me, and I shot him, so that my arrow stuck in his neck. He shouted and fell upon his nose, and I slew him with his lance. I struck out my shout of victory from his back (!), and all Asia shouted. I praised the god Month, but his people mourned for him. This prince Amienshi folded me in his arms. Then I took his goods and his herds, and what he had thought to do to me, that I did to him. I took what was in his tent and plundered his camp. From this I became great and rich in treasure and in my herds.
Later Sinuhe was again received into favour at the Egyptian court. After he had given over his possessions to his children, so that the eldest son became leader, the tribe and all its goods belonging to him, his servants and all his herds, his fruits and all his sweet (date) trees, he journeyed to the south (home to
Egypt)-
The Bedouin tribes of Palestine therefore stood in close relationship to the civilised land of Egypt. According to the evidence of the papyrus, their Sheikhs habitually frequented the court of the Pharaohs, and were well acquainted with all events going on in Egypt (also previously there is mention of a Bedouin who was in Egypt). Ambassadors journeyed with written messages to and fro between Egypt and the Euphrates. These Asiatic Bedouins were by no means barbarians; the barbaric nations warred against by the king of Egypt were expressly named in opposition to them. The Bedouin Sheikhs themselves gather together into armies against “ the princes of the nations,1; in our poem Sinuhe was their leader and adviser, like Abraham in Gen. xiv. in the war against the kings.
* After the expulsion of the Hyksos by Amosis (capture of the chief city, Avaris) the Egyptians pressed into Syria. We learn 1 In many of its features the story resembles that of David and Goliath.
328
PRE-ISRAELITE CANAAN
by pictorial representations from the time of his son Amenophis I. that this king led campaigns into Asia.1 The records of his successor Thothmes I. already speak of the Euphrates and of “the reversed water, by which one travels to the north, if one goes up-stream.112 Thothmes III. (about 1600) again undertook an offensive campaign. He conquered Megiddo and pressed on as far as Naharina (Mesopotamia), and left upon the
 
FIG. 103.—Lists of Thothmes upon the wall of the temple of Amon in Karnak ; outer wall of the holy of holies.
wall of the temple of Karnak in Thebes a list of the Canaanite cities subjugated by him (see fig. 103).3 Amongst the names we find the Biblical places Akzib, Beth-anath, Gibea, Hazor, Ibleam, Laisa, Megiddo, Ophra, the seaport cities Acco, Beirut, Joppa, also Damascus and others. Also Negeb is mentioned, the “ south-country11 later belonging to Judah. The most
1   See Niebuhr in Helmolt’s IVeltgeschichte, iii. 617.
2   The opposite to the Nile.
3   Latest treated by Maspero, Sur les noms de la lisle de Thutmes III., comp. Histoire ancienne, p. 256 ; and W. H. Muller, Asie/i laid Europa, 161 f., iyi, 196.
EGYPT AND CANAAN
329
remarkable name amongst the conquered places is Ja^kob-el.1 The Egyptians also, like the Babylonians and Assyrians, brought wood, preferable from the mountains of Syria (see fig. 104).
* Sethi I. (about 1400), father of Rameses II., names on the temple wall at Karnak, amongst his conquests, Beth-anath (Joshua xix. 38 ; Judges i. 33) and Ivirjath- Anab (“ the city of grapes,” Joshua xi. 21) and Jenuhim (fig. 103),2 also the Phoenician city of Tyre.
Rameses II. (about 1240), who latterly has again been looked on as the Pharaoh of the oppression, has left us in his inscriptions a detailed description of his victory over the Hittites in the battle of Kadesh.3 We learn here that the Hittite king gathered around him the subjugated hosts “ out of all countries, those who belong to the region of Chetaland, and of the country of Naharena, and of all the land of Kedah,” and Rameses complains 14 that the overseers of the peasantry and the great ones to whom the land of the Pharaohs is committed ” have not informed him of it. The battle of Ivadesh did not bring
J W. H. Mtiller, Asien und Europa, looks for this place in Central Palestine; Shanda in V.A.G., 1902, 90 ff., tries to find it at Jabbok, and explains it as a variant of Penuel. Identification with the Jacob of the history of the Patriarchs is very uncertain, because the name Ja‘kub-ilu, that is to say, Ja‘kub, occurs also in Babylonian contracts of the Hammurabi age. The other much-debated name is Ishpar, which should be read Joseph-el. Also here it must be noted that Jashup- ilu occurs in Hammurabi contracts: comp. Hommel, Altisr. Uberl., 95, in, passim. Spiegelberg, in Der Aufenthalt Israels in A gyp ten, speaks of a Hyksos king Jacob-el and of another Hyksos prince’s name which should read as Simeon. He takes it that the migrations towards Egypt embodied in Abraham and Jacob belong to the Hyksos migrations (beginning about 1700). (Upon the Semitic origin of the Hyksos, see Spiegelberg, O.L.Z., 1904, 130 ff.)
2 Is Janfin also meant here? Comp. p. 334, n. I.
:J See Erman, Agypten, pp. 696 ff. One of the monuments at Nahr el Kelb (p. 321) belongs to him, likewise a monument in the country east of Jordan.
 
Fit;. 104.—The princes of Lebanon felling trees for Sethi I. (Ros.
46).
330
PRE-ISRAELITE CANAAN
the separation. The final treaty of peace which ended the war between Egyptians and Hittites on Canaanite ground was ratified by a political treaty written upon a silver tablet. (For further detail, see Chap. XXV.)
To the time of Rameses II. also belongs the satirical literary article used in the schools (!) on the Anastasi Papyrus I.,1 in which the journey through Syria of a Mahar (envoy) of Rameses II., named Nechsotep, is related. He transported monuments for the king, destroyed obelisks in Syene, and with four thousand soldiers put clown an insurrection in the quarries of Hammamat. The Mahar described his journey to his friend, “ an artist in the sacred writings, a teacher in the hall of books.” The friend did not find the letters written in good style, and repeated them in rhetorical style with satirical little side-thrusts at the adventures of his friend. We reproduce a passage of the text, as the story gives us an insight into the geographical and intellectual circumstances of Canaan about 1400 B.C.
He accompanies his friend in imagination through all the stages of the journey :
I am a writer and a Mahar, thou sayest repeatedly. Well, what thou sayest is true. Come along. Thou seest after thy teams, the horses are fast as jackals, like a tempest when they are let go. Thou seizest the bit, takest the bow,—now we shall see what thy hand doest. I will describe to thee what happens to a Mahar and will tell thee what he does.
, Art thou not come to the land of Cheta, and hast thou not seen the land of ’Eupa? ^Jaduma, knowest thou not his form? And likewise Ygadiy, what is its condition ? D’ar of the king Sesostris —which side of it lies the city of Charbu ? And what is the condition of its ford ?
Dost thou not journey to Kadash '2and Tubache?3 Dost thou not come to the help of the Bedouins with troops and soldiers ? Didst thou not pass on the road towards Magar ? where the heaven is dark by day because it is overgrown with oaks high as heaven and cedars (?) where lions are seen oftener than the jackal and hyena, and where the Bedouins surround the way.
1   Treated by Chabas, Voyage d'un Egyptien en Palestine; some passages are translated by Erman, Agypten, pp. 508 ff. ; where the polemic object of the writing is recognised, see also \V. M. Muller, Asien und Europa, pp. 54, 172 ff., 394. A new collation and complete translation of the text is in preparation.
2   The Syrian Kadesh, not the Israelite (Muller, loc. cit., 173), is probably meant.
3   Tubich of the Amarna Letters (Db^u of the Thothmes lists?).
EGYPT AND CANAAN
331
Hast thou not climbed the mountain Shana ?1 . . . . When thou returnest at night all thy members are ground to powder and thy bones are broken, and thou sleepest. When thou wakest, it is the sad night time, and thou art quite alone. Has not a thief been, to steal from thee ? . . . . The thief has escaped in the night and has stolen thy clothes. Thy stableman has waked in the night, has noted what has happened, and has taken away with him what was left over. He has then gone amongst the wicked, has mixed with the tribes of the Bedouins, and has fled to Asia. ... I will also tell thee of another mysterious city, which is called Kepuna (Gubna, Gebal). What is it like ? its goddess— another time. Hast thou not been there ?
I call: Come to Barut’e (Beirut), to D’i(du)na (Sidon) and D’arput’e (Sarepta). Where is the ford of Nat’ana ? 2 Where is ’Eutu ? 3 They lie above another city on the sea, it is called D’ar (Tyre) of the coast; water is brought to it in ships, she is richer in fishes than in sand .... whither goes the road from 'Aksapu ? 4 To what city ?
1 call : Come to the Mount User.5 6 What is its summit like ? Where is the mountain of Sakama ?,J Who will possess it? The Mahar. Where does he march towards Hud’aru ? What is his ford ? Show me, where they go to Hamat’e7 (Hamath), Degar and Degar-’ear, the place whence the Mahar issues.
It says further, after having asked in the above way where the ford of the Jordan is, where Megiddo lies, whether it also "'ill not be given to so brave a Mahar:
Pass along, along the ravine with the precipice two thousand ells deep, full of boulders and rubble. Thou makest a detour. Thou graspest the bow and showest thyself to the good princes (that is, the allies of Egypt), so their eyes are fatigued by thy splendour. “’Ebata kama, ’ear mahar lramu,” thev sav, and thou winnest for thyself the name of a Mahar, of the best officer of Egypt. Thy name is celebrated amongst them like that of Gad’ardey, prince of ’Esaru, when the hyenas found him in the jungle, in the defile which was barred bv the Bedouins; they were hidden under the bushes, and many of them measured four ells from nose to heel, they had fierce eyes, their heart was unfriendly,
1   In the annals of Tiglath-Pileser, iii. 126, is Sa-u-e.
2   Nahr el Kasimije, Leontes, in the present Upper Lithuania.
* Usu, Paketyrus ; see Winckler, Gesch. Isr., i. 201.
4   Akzib of the Thothmes list, p. 195 ; Ekdippa in Eusebius.
0   This must be the Scala Tyriorum.
6   Sichem, therefore Ebal or Gerizim? See Muller, loc. cit., 394.
7   The pass '‘where one goes towards Hamath,” the boundary of the Hittite, then of the Egyptian, then of the Assyrian power, the northernmost point of the kingdom of Israel.
332
PRE-ISRAELITE CANAAN
 

   
r?.«.ll * A^Si f* »   

 

r«tt:aat
! ilia-y M±=sfll
^sZZtFj
Hi
:£v!5 (??•••’
..^-...:^mmmmma

mmm,
 
issssasi,
n<I^LLTi-

mMMJvmmrnm ;^=un:Mwm
FIG. 105.—The so-called Israel stele, 1250 B.C. From Spiegelberg’s Aufenthall Israels in Agypten.
EGYPT AND CANAAN
333
and they listened to no flattery. Thou art alone, no one sees thee, no army follows thee, and thou findest no one to show the way. Thou must go alone, yet thou knowest not the way. Then anxiety seizes thee, thy hair stands on end and thy soul lies in thy hand. Thy road is full of boulders and rubble, thou canst not go forward because of the ’Esbururu and Qad’a bushes, because of the Naha bushes and because of the aloes. Upon one side of thee is the precipice, upon the other the mountain-wall, and so thou climbest.
The end of this bad journey is that the horses shy, and their traces break ; the poor Mahar has to go on foot in the heat of the sun, oppressed with thirst and fear of ambushed foes. He is followed by misfortune upon his journey.
“When thou enterest Joppa,” records the mocking author, ffthou findest the garden blooming in its season. Then thou pressest in, to eat, and findest there the lovely maiden who guards the vineyard ; she joins thee as thy companion and bestows her charms upon thee.”
A thief takes advantage of the hour to cut the horses from the chariot of the Mahar and to steal his weapons. Finally it says:
Look kindly upon this, so thou shalt not say I have made thy name of bad odour with other people. Behold, I have only described to thee how it fares with a Mahar; I have run through Syria for thee, I have brought before thee the countries and the cities with their customs. Be gracious to us and look upon it calmly.
From Egyptian material1 2 a specially important inscription, discovered by Flinders Petrie, dating about 1250,* should also be laid stress on, which names ‘•Israel” as inhabitants of the country, belonging to Canaan, and in which Merneptah is glorified as a king, who has conquered and “ pacified ” countries (fig. 105):
The princes are thrown to the ground
and say shalomf
none amongst the stranger people raises his head.
Libya is desolated,
Cheta is pacified,
Canaan is conquered in all evil (?),
1   Figs, ioi f. represent prisoners from the land of the Amorites.
2   A foreign Semitic word in the Egyptian text (Spiegelberg). The well-known greeting, here = a prayer for peace ; Assyrian, sha'alu shulmi.
334
PRE-ISRAELITE CANAAN
Ascalon is led away,
Gezer is overpowered,
Y-nu-bn1 is annihilated,
Y-si-r-’-l2 is wasted (?) without fruit;3 all lands together are at peace ;
everyone that wavered has by King Merneptah .... been chastised.
It cannot be decided Avith certainty in what relationship the
 
FIG. 106.—Amenophis III. Relief from a Theban tomb, Berlin.
Israel named here stands to the tribes which migrated out of Egypt under Moses and Joshua. According to some, Merneptah is the Pharaoh of the oppression, see p. 90, ii. If that is true, then the Israelites mentioned here are Hebrews in the sense indicated at p. 339, with whom the tribes who migrated from
1 This is probably the Janoah of Joshua xvi. 6 f., the present Janun, south-east of Sichem. Can it be the same city whose conquest by Sethi is glorified upon the outer wall of the Hall of Statues in Karnak ; see fig. 109, to the left, at the top.
2   “ Israel ” with the determinative for men.
3   The last lines are according to SteindorfPs translation. Spiegelberg, loc. cit., p. 39, says : “ Palestine is become a widow (comp. Lam., i. 1) for Egypt.”

[Prometheus]

CANAAN IN THE AMARNA PERIOD
335
Goshen afterwards allied themselves on the ground of former attachment, or they are the Bene Israel themselves who migrated from Goshen. There must be some sort of connection with the Israelites of the Mosaic time who opposed the Pharaoh.1
As already indicated, the most important information on the circumstances of Canaan in pre-Israelite times is preserved to us by the clay tablets found in the year 1887 in the ruins of
 
FIG. 107.—Amenophis IV. and his family (limestone). Berlin. Relief from a tomb in Amarna,
Chut-Aten, the present TEL-EI.-AMARNA. They are political documents from the reigns of Pharaoh Amenophis III., and especially of Amenophis IV. (Chuenaten ; see figs. 106 and 107), therefore about 1450 B.C.,2 consisting of letters from
1   Comp, Erbt, Ebrder, pp. 1 ff., who believes he can prove precise relations.
2   So far as at present known (about three hundred fragments) they are preserved in the Berlin Museum, in the Museum of Gizeh (Cairo), and in the British Museum, and some are private property. Winckler and Abel have published those in Berlin and Cairo, Der Tontafelfund von el-Amarna, 1SS9-90 ; those in the British Museum were published by C. Bezold, The Tel-el-Amarna Tablets in the British Museum, 1892. A transcription and translation was given by H. Winckler, K.B., v. A new German complete critical edition in transcription and translation
PRE-ISRAELITE CANAAN
336
Western Asiatic kings (of Mitanni, Babylonia, and Assyria), which show that Egypt was recognised as the dominating power, and of reports from Canaanite Amelu (princes) and Egyptian Rabis (administrators, governors) to the Egyptian ruler; besides these they contain some mythological passages
and the circular epistle from an unknown Western Asiatic ruler to the governor of Canaan.
The name Canaan (Ivinahni and Ivinahhi, see p. 337) signifies here, as also formerly in the Egyptian accounts,1 the southern part of Syria, Phoenicia, and Palestine ; the name Amurru is limited to the region of Lebanon.2
A letter of Burnaburiash to Amenophis IV. shows that in times of war the land of Canaan formed a political uni t. It says there :
FIG. 108.—Motif from a wall decoration in the palace of Amenophis IV. (About In the time of Kurigalzu, my 1450 B.C.) Related to Japanese art. father, the Canaanite (Ki-na-ha-
ai-u), all together wrote to him : We wish to go out against the boundaries of the country (therefore probably towards Negeb, that is to say, towards Egypt) and make an invasion ; we wish to unite ourselves with you.3
When Amos speaks of “the land of the Amorites ” and of the “Amorites” who formerly possessed the land, and when the Elohist names the original inhabitants of the land “Amorites,” and when it is said satirically in Ezek. xvi. 3, and comp. xlv. : “Thine (Jerusalem) origin is of the land of the Canaanite ; the Amorite
has now been published by A. Jeremias and H. Winckler in Knudtzon’s Vorder- asiatischen Biblioihek, with notes by O. Weber.
1   Comp. W. M. Muller, Asien und Eitropa, pp. 205 ft'. The Egyptians always call it, with the appellativep\-K\-n'-n, “the Canaan.”
2   The Egyptian inscriptions show this nomenclature : Ken'ana is the south, ’Emur the north point of the “ Upper Retenu” ; see p. 326, n. 1.
Therefore a union of the Canaanites, as in Hezekiah’s time, against Sennacherib.*
 
THE AMARNA PERIOD
337
was thy father and thy mother was an Hittite,” it shows therefore a knowledge corresponding entirely to the facts of ancient historical ethnographical circumstances. For though also possibly in the cuneiform records Amurru (“Westland”) and^Aimirru (“land of the Amorites”) are not always identical, yet both names are closely related linguistically as well as in political geography.
Later, when the Amorites vanished from the northern parts of the “'Westland/’ the name Canaan seems to have embraced also a more northern territory, and then (perhaps with the giving of the name Palestina1 to the southern part) seems to have, become limited to Phoenicia. A Tyrian coin of the Greek period calls a city of Laodicea “Chief city of Canaan ” (Em be-kanaan) This is, however, probably the city of Laodicea in Lebanon, and Philo of Byblos calls Phoenicia Chna.
The designation Canaan in the 9th and 10th chapters of Genesis corresponds to the nomenclature of the Amarna period, and so does the designation of the original inhabitants as “ Canaanites ” by the Yahvists, which therefore is equally correct historically as is the designation “Amorites” by the Elohists, reminiscent of more ancient circumstances.
Some of the letters come from the prince and governor Abdhiba from (Jrusalim, i.e. Jerusalem,2 they contain petitions to the Egyptian king, like the other letters from Palestine and Syria. As for the rest, the cities mentioned in the Amarna tablets lead to the conclusion that just the actual region of later Israel was comparatively little inhabited. The names printed in red on our map No. II. give a summary of the names mentioned on the Amarna tablets, so far as they can be identified.
It may be seen that chiefly cities of the coast and seaports were named, which already in those days wrere points of flourishing trade.
This desirable country %vas therefore in those times under the political rule of Egypt.* But it was, and it also remained during
1   The name Palestine (Palaistine in Herodotus; Hebrew, Peleshet) denotes, after the immigration of the Philistines, the coast country lying in front of Judea, the plain of Saron up to the neighbourhood of Jaffa. The Greeks extended the name, Karuan (?), of this coast region south of Phoenicia to the whole hinterland : Israel-Judah, together with Edom, Moab, and Ammon. Just as the Persians called Greece Ionia, after the nearest coast to them of Asia Minor, so the Greeks called the whole country after the strip of coast. We still designate as Palestine the whole region of the “ Holy Land.”
2   In the popular Israelite etymology the name is interpreted as “city of peace” ; comp. Shalem, Ps. cx. It should, however, be noted that Shalem originally = Sichem ; see p. 30, n. I, ii. and p. 29, ii.
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22
338
PRE-ISRAELITE CANAAN
the Egyptian hegemony, under Babylonian intellectual influence, for all the letters out of Canaan are in Babylonian language and written in cuneiform character; some of the documents still show the ink-points of the Egyptian reader, by which the Egyptian receiver sought to make the reading easier, since cuneiform character has no separation of words. Babylonian language and cuneiform writing dominated public intercourse
 
FIG. 109.—Sethi fights the Hittites. Outer wall of the Hall of Columns at Karnak.1
in Syria and Palestine. The Hittite king writes to the Pharaoh in Babylonian, and the archive of Boghazkoi shows that Babylonia also influenced the intellectual sphere.2
If, however, “ Babylonian ” was the language of intercourse, the country must have been for centuries before under
1   To the left, at the top, the conquest of Jenu‘am is glorified ; comp. p. 334, n. I.
2   Also the king of the Mitanni, Tushratta, forces his barbaric Hittite (?) native language into the Babylonian word and syllable writing. He writes, for the rest, in signs, in the Assyrian Dnktns: Mesopotamia passed on Babylonian civilisation to Assyria.
THE AMAKNA PERIOD
339
the influence of Babylonian culture, and also have been politically dependent upon Babylon. This also agrees with the information given pp. 314 ff. from ancient Babylonian periods.
At the time of the composition of the Tell-Amarna Letters, therefore about 1400 B.C., according to the evidence of these documents two interior foes in particular gave the inhabitants
 
FIG. IIO.—Sethi leads Hittite prisoners before the Triad of Thebes.
of the cities of Syria and Palestine some trouble. One was the llatti, the Hittites; the others were called amelu IJabiri, the people of Habir'i. Both groups represent tribes who had the idea of settling there.
The progress of the Hittites is clear to us without further detail. They are the Cheta of the Egyptian Inscriptions (see fig. Ill, and comp. fig. 46) who at that time pressed into Syria and Palestine from Cappadocia, in the course of the next centuries conquered Syria, as far as Hermon, and still in the thirteenth century repeatedly gave trouble to Egypt. A remnant
340
PRE-ISRAELITE CANAAN
of these Hatti maintained themselves at Karkemish on the Euphrates till the year 717 A.D.1
When for the burial of Sarah, according to the record in Gen. xxiii., the burial-place had to be bought from the Hittites, who possessed country and city, and when it is said in Ezek. xvi. 3 (see above, p. 336), “the Amorite was thy father, and thy mother was an Hittite,” and when Esau takes Hittite wives (Gen. xxvi. 34 f.), it all agrees with the conditions of which we have witness in the Amarna Letters. It cannot be doubted that the Hittites had then made their rights of ownership felt as conquerors also in Palestine. We should not assume here an artificial “ archaism ” 2
 
FIG. 111. —Hittite stag hunt. Original in the Louvre.
but should allow that the written sources drawn from were well informed in history.3
1   Compare the article “ Karkemisch ” in Hauck’s R.Pr.Th,, 3rd ed. This tribe of the Hatti belongs to a group of people neither Semitic nor Indo-Germanic, the name of which we do not know, but which we commonly call Hittite. This designation of Hittite’’ in the wide sense is often interchanged with that of the true Hatti. One of the first groups of these Hatti in the wide sense, which pressed into Syria, were the Mitanni, who also play a great part in the Amarna Letters. They broke the Babylonian power in the Westland, and likewise became the pioneers of Egyptian government in Canaan. See upon this Messerschmidt, A.O., iv. 1.
2   Thus Holzinger in Marti’s Handkommentar, with Stade, Geschichte Israels, i. p. 143, n. 1, because “the Hittites, at the time of the Biblical codification of the so-called P, had vanished,”
3   The author of Judges i. 10 names Canaanites as possessing Hebron. This is no contradiction, but it even corresponds to later circumstances. Besides, the P only contains the story of the Hittite cave of Machpelah (according to Sept, a double cave, from the exploration of which, up to the present prevented, we may await much ; comp. Gautier, Souvenir de ter re sainte, 1898). The P shows also otherwise much ancient wisdom and ancient memories. It may be true to a certain extent that its Abraham appears as an idealised figure, but the Abraham of its original sources, lost to us, must certainly have been of flesh and blood.
THE AMARNA PERIOD
341
Who are the people of jfabiri ? From the very first the decipherers ot the Amarna Letters have shown that the sound of the name answers to that of the Hebrews. The names are certainly identical. It is, however, quite another question what relation the Ilabiri of the Amarna Letters bear to the Biblical “Hebrews.” It denotes here the migratory tribes who seemed to be a danger to the city population. In the same sense Abraham in Canaan is called “the Hebrew” (Gen. xiv. 13), thereby in the story of Abimelech indicating his relation to the city dwellers ; and in Egypt Joseph was called “ the Hebrew.”1
The language of Canaan in the Amarna Letters is, as we have said, Babylonian for official purposes. But that was not the proper language of the country. We find for that much more a sort of dialect, a mixture of Babylonian with a native language. We get an idea of the formation of the native language from glosses which were added here and there to the Babylonian texts. It proved, as might be expected, practically identical with the dialect called in Isa. xix. 18 “the language of Canaan,” and which we call Hebrew.2
Quite lately evidences from pre-Israelite times have been brought to light in Canaan itself.3
The Palestine Exploration Fund made excavations by Flinders Petrie in 1890, and later by Bliss in South-Western Palestine. They found in the neighbourhood of Umm Lachish, under the mound Tell el Hasi, the remains of the city of Lachish. An accidental discovery brought to light a cuneiform letter which twice mentions the name of Zimrida, who, according to the Amarna Letters, was governor of Lachish, and of Sipti-Ba‘al, who is also known from the Amarna Letters.
1   Gen. xl. 15, xli. 12 ; see p. 6S, ii. Upon the Habiri in the Amarna Letters, comp. Winckler, F., iii. 90 ff. Upon the SA-GASH (identical with tdabiri) = “ robber ” = Gad (compare the play of words in Gen. xlix. 19, 'ish geditdim, Hosea vi. 9, transferred to the Babylonian ?) see Erbt, Hebriier, 41 f.
2   For further details see Zimmern, ICA.T., 3rd ed., 651 ff., and chief of all in Bohl, Die Sprache der A tnamabriefe.
:i We pass over here the partial opening up of the walls of David and Solomon by the English excavations under Warren (The Recovery of Jerusalem, 1871), and the continuation of this excavation by the German Palestine Society under H. Guthe (Z.D. V F., v.); likewise the continuation of the work by Bliss, 1894-97 (Bliss and Dickie, Excavations at Jerusalem, 1S98), chiefly concerning the pre-Byzantine walls.
S42
PRE-ISRAELITE CANAAN
The writer of the letter informs the “ Great One/’ i.e. the Egyptian overseer and corn-market administrator Janhamu, whose position notably recalls that of Joseph in Egypt (pp. 72, ii. ff), that a certain Shipti-Addi has rebelled against Zimrida of Lachish and has written to him to the same effect.
Bliss and Macalister discovered in South-Western Palestine in 1899 and 1900, in four mounds (Tell-el-Safi = Gath ? Tell Zakariya = Azekah ? Tell Sandahannah = Mareshah, Tell el Judeideh), the remains of old castles and cities partly from ancient Canaanite periods.1 In 1902-1905 and 1907, Macalister excavated for the English Palestine Exploration Fund at Tell Abushusha, three hours east of Jaffa, the site of the Biblical Gezer, that Solomon received from Pharaoh as a marriage portion with his daughter (1 Kings ix. 16).2 The most important find here in regard to our question consists of three seals with mythological representations, of which one is certainly Babylonian (prayer to a star), and of an Assyrian stele in Tell-el-Safi,3 4 an Egyptian stele inscription in Tell-el-Safi1 and in Gezer;5 likewise in Gezer some Egyptian statues of gods (amongst them Isis with a child), vases, and incense dishes.6 German work has in the past few years been particularly rich in result.
TVannek in North Palestine, site of the Biblical Taanak in the Plain of Jezreel, not far from Megiddo, has been excavated during the years 1902 to 1904 by E. Sellin with rich result.7 He opened up a city there which must have existed about 2000-600 B.C. and was protected by four castles. In one of the buildings of unpolished, polygonal, hard limestone, and recognised as of ancient Canaanite period chiefly by the external wall
1   Bliss and Macalister, Excavations in Palestine, London, 1902.
" Records in the Statements of the Palestine Exploration Fund, 1902 ff. For further progress compare for the future also the Altertwns-Berichte aus dein Kulturkreis des ilfitielmeers, which since May 1906 have appeared in each number of the O.L.Z. Upon the following combination, comp. Sellin, Die Ertrag der A usgrabungen.
3   See Bliss and Macalister, Joe. cit., 41 ; upon the seal, comp. 153.
4   Loc. cit., p. 43.
5   Palestine Exploration Fund, 1903, p. 37.
H Bliss and Macalister, loc. cit., fig. 24 ff. ; comp. Bliss, A Mound of Many Cities, passim.
7 Sellin, Tell Talannek, 1904 ; Nachlese aufdcm Tell Ta‘annek, 1906. Comp. Sellin, Ertrag der Ausgrabungen im Orient, Leipzig, 1903.
EXCAVATIONS IN CANAAN
343
being built in stories, Sellin found a book chest (comp. Jer. xxxii. 14) belonging to the prince of Ta‘annek, which unfortunately only still contained two clay tablets, lists of inhabitants; near by were found two letters, and then another six clay tablets, all written in Babylonian cuneiform character. One of the lists is of the heads of families which can supply two or three men. The use of the other is doubtful; it is said in one place, “ 20 men of Adad,” in another apparently “ 20 men of Amon," so it may be a list of priests, or a list of castles, that is to sav, buildings, dependent upon the temple. One of the first letters found runs as follows :1—
To Ashirat-jashur: Guli Addi. Live happy. May the gods guard thy health, the health of thy house and of thy children.
 
FIG. 112.—Seal cylinder discovered in Ta‘annek.
Thou hast written to me in regard to the money, and behold I will give thee 50 pieces. . . . Why hast thou not sent hither thy greeting? All that thou mavest have heard, write unto me, that I may have information. If the finger of Ashirat shows itself, then note it and follow it ! And let me know of the sign and of the event. As regards Biuti-Kanidu who is in Rubutu, know she is well taken care of. When she is grown, then give her to the .... that she may belong to a husband.
The second letter, likewise addressed to Ashirat-jashur, the Prince of Ta'annek, from a man named Guli-Addi; it begins with the greeting: “The Lord of the Gods protect thy head.” The rest of its meaning is obscure.
1 The first translations were given by the Assyriologist Hrozny, in Sellin, loc. cit.
344
PRE-ISRAELITE CANAAN
The writing and the language of the documents, composed
by various scribes, is Babylonian and gives evidence that the Canaanites of the fifteenth century (for the Amarna discoveries are of about this date) were not only in diplomatic intercourse with Egypt, but spoke and wrote in Babylonian amongst themselves. This, however, presupposes centuries of intercourse with Babylonian culture and thought. The view, supported by the Amarna Letters, that the t wants of the cities from vanity kept scribes who could more or less understand and write the Babylonian language, can no longer be held after the discovery of these private documents at TVannek.
On religious grounds the following Ta‘annek discoveries may be named :—
1. A stone altar in a burying ground for children of ancient Canaanite period (Sellin, Tell Ta‘annek, p. 3d). It is hewn in a step (compare against this the command in Exod. xx. 25 f.).
2.   Two columns in the chief street, which are shown to be sacrificial columns by saucer-like holes.
3.   Rows of columns below the North castle (two rows of five each), columns at the entrance to houses, which were probably sprinkled with oil or blood.
4.   Statues of Ishtar, and also nineteen of certain untraceable types (see fig. 1131); four of anomalous types. Further detail p. 349.
5.   A seal cylinder, bearing in Ancient-Babylonian cuneiform of the character of the Hammurabi age the inscription: “ Atana-hili, son of Habsi, servant of the god Nergal,” and beside this some Egyptian hieroglyphics expressing a blessing (see fig. 112). This entirely corresponds with the expectation : ancient Canaan
 
FIG. 113.—Ishtar of Ta'annek.
1 This and the following figures are after Sellin, Tell Ta'annek.
EXCAVATIONS AT TAfANNEK   345
"'as dominated intellectually by Babylonia and Egypt simultaneously.
6.   A clay altar of incense, which for altar horn has the horn of a ram (not of a bull). It has upon each side three figures, with beardless face, the body of a beast, and wings, and which apparently stride towards the person standing in front of the altar. Lions lie between them (four altogether), whose front paws rest upon the head of the nearest monster. L'pon the left side a boy wrestling with a serpent, which has reared itself in front of him
 
FIG. I 14.—Tree of life, with ibexes, on the so-called altar of incense at Ta'annek.
with open jaws, is put in amongst the figures. A relief upon the front wall shows the tree of life with two ibex. According to Sellin the altar, the measurements of which agree partly with those given in Exod. xxx. 2, and the form of which narrows towards the top in a peculiar way, may date from the classic Israelite period, somewhere about the eighth century, but the pattern is undoubtedly older, and originates in a strange land. The explanation as altar of incense is doubtful. It may have reference to an oven. An altar would be larger. (See figs. 115 and 116.)
Sellin thinks he can establish also an original Canaanite culture, chiefly from the evidence of some ceramic art, which is
346
PRE-ISRAELITE CANAAN
distinguished by hatching and peculiarly arched handles and certain decorations. What proves to be original from the Israelite era (therefore since about 1200) is ungainly and clumsy,
and corresponds to the expectation : in all matters of culture Israel was dependent.
Sellin believes he has observed that Babylonian influence ceased in the Israelite era. But we can scarcely think that possible. Certainly the power of Babylonia declined then, but Assyrian and Babylonian culture was identical. Besides which,there is evidence to the contrary in the Babylonian lion on the seal of Megiddo;
FIG. 115.—Altar of incense at Ta'annek. Original further, the contract in in the Museum at Constantinople.   Cuneiform character 1
found in Gezer, and the Assyrian-Babylonian seal cylinder found in Sebaste. We shall also find traces in the Bible showing that Babylon made its influence felt still later both in language and writing.
The excavations in Palestine have shown, besides Babylonian and Egyptian, yet a third factor of civilisation in the Bible land, making itself felt since the fourteenth century—namely, the so-called Mycenaean?
We have pointed out an example at pp. 317 f. showing here also a close relationship to Babylon. Besides, when a certain
1   Palestine Exploration Fund, 1904, 229 ff. ; comp. Sellin, loc. cit., 28.
2   An influence of this kind would be explained also by an immigration of a seafaring people such as the Philistines (Crete-Keft-Caphtor).
 
EXCAVATIONS AT TA‘ANNEK
347
emancipation from Babylon and Egypt shows itself, that agrees with the fact that at this time (since the thirteenth century) the States of Palestine had more scope for free development. It is, indeed, just the period when the Hebrew alphabet forced itself in,1 which superseded the cuneiform character in Canaan. This civilisation is known from fragments of pitchers decorated with so-called ladder pattern, geometrical patterns, fish, birds, animals, particularly the ibex (see figs. 117 and 118). Such pitchers are also found in Cyprus and in Egypt, and are designated
 
FIG. 116.—Altar of incense at Ta'annek. Original in the Museum at Constantinople.
Phoenician ; they resemble, however, pots from Mycenae and Rhodes, which mav be considered a ware manufactured there.2
 
?rtfnY-
FIG. 117.
Seal cylinders from Tell Hesy.
 
FIG. IIS.
(Bliss, A Mound of Many Cities, p. 79.)
The excavations of the German Palestine Society inMcTESELLivi (Megiddo), 1903-1905. Schumacher, Tel el Mutesellbn, published by the German Palastinaverein, vol. i., 1909, have brought to light mighty ancient Canaanite castles and equally important
1 Upon their origin in a much older time, see Hommel, G.G.G., p. 28.
- According to Sellin, Ertrag der Ausgrabungen, pp. 26 f.
348
PRE-ISRAELITE CANAAN
single items. The Ancient-Hebrew seal of “Shema% the servant of Jeroboam,"”1 reproduced in fig. 119, belongs to this discovery.
We draw attention also to the following:
An Egyptian incense-burner (represented M.D.P.J., 1901, p. 55), a Babylonian seal cylinder of jasper, a Babylonian seal with the tree of life and griffins and other beasts, the tree of life with griffins also upon a white enamel amulet, figures of Astarte, carved stones as in Tafannek, ruins of a rock altar.
In both mounds were found jugs with the remnants of masses
of bodies of children. Sellin and others have concluded child .sacrifices. IIV xcish emphatically to differ from this hypothesis. They buried the children in the houses, which is certified by the latest graves found in Assur, and when it was possible, in the neighbourhood of the sanctuaries. Also the “passing through fire” of the first-born was not human sacrifice but was a ceremony of the solstice festival. Human sacrifice, spoken of with horror of the King of Moab (2 Kings iii. 27), must have only taken place very occasionally.*
The Religion of pre-Israelite Canaan
The history of the cults reflects in Canaan, as everywhere else, the course of various conquests. Political changes are identified by the cults. In Western Asiatic realms it must, however, be borne in mind that at the back of various cults is the same religious teaching. When Osiris appears for Tam muz, Ba‘alat of Gebal for Ishtar, Amon for Baeal, it is nothing but a change of name. We can only speak in this sense of a “ mixed
1 Kaulzsch, Mitilg. u. Nachr. des D.P.V., 1904, 1 f. The complete records upon Mutesellim may be found in the numbers of the years 1904 ff.
 
FIG. 119.—The seal of “ Shema‘, the servant of Jeroboam.” Upon “ servant ” = minister, see p. 248, ii. upon 2 Kings xxv. S. (Enlarged.) After M.D.P. V., 1904, p. 2.
RELIGION OF PRE-ISRAELITE CANAAN 349
religion.111 The seal cylinder reproduced p. 343 with Babylonian picture and Babylonian legend, and with a blessing in hieroglyphics, corresponds to the political situation: Egypt and Babylonia striving for the mastery in Syria.
The Canaanite gods Ba‘al and Moloch, affirmed in the Bible, probably correspond to the Upperworld and Underworld appearances of the Canaanite astral divinity.2 They are the Sun-god in the two halves of the cycle—the one bring'in'*' blessing, the other destruction.
According to the Amarna documents,-" Addu is prominent in all districts of Canaan (see p. 86). He is the representation of the cycle of nature, emphasised in storm phenomena (p. 124), corresponding to the Babylonian Adad-Ramman; or, what is ultimately the same thing, he is Marduk according to certain phases of his personality, and he is the Hittite Teshup (p. 124, figs. 45 and 46). The Greeks said : Jupiter Dolichenus (p. 125). Br. 149.   13 ff. :4 “The king lets his voice sound in the
heaven like Addu, so that the whole land trembles at his voice.11 He is the Ramman of Halrnan (Aleppo) to whom Shalmaneser II. sacrificed when he entered Syria/’
The feminine correspondence L Ishtar, worshipped in every place of worship under a special t* pe.c In Ta‘annek were found
1   Comp. F. Jeremias in Chantepie de f 4 Satissaye, Religionsg., 3rd ed., 348 fi. x\lso Sellin’s presentation of the religions of Canaan, founded upon the discoveries at Ta'annek, loc. dpp. 105 ff., is still dominated by the old idea, which ’"'-.ores the ultimate unity of the cults. More fatal, however, is the error of “ omginal” primitive religious conditions: of stone-worship, tree-worship, and animal-worship (Sellin, p. 107, “Ancient Religious Worship of Animals”; p. 109, “Primeval Tree-worship ”). This contains the germ of the evolutionary theory.
2   Ba‘al is the Babylonian bSlu, “ Lord.” In Molech (1 Kings xi. 7, formerly always with article) probably the “ Babylonian ” divine attribute malik, “Judge ” is veiled. The pronunciation of Molech is, according to analogy, a wilful corruption of bosket. The sacrificial places (Isa. xxx. 33) have not to do with Molech, but with Malka—that is, Ashera ; see Erbt, Die Ebrcier, p. 235. The gruesome Moloch finally disappeared from the scene.
3   See Trampe, “ Syrien vor dem Eindringen der Israeliten,” in Wtssensch. Bei- lage zum Jahresbericht des Lessing- Gymnasiums, 1S98 and 1901. A very able treatment of the letters from their cultural side ; in regard to the religion the same old theory is held here, which speaks of the “ later Baal,” etc.
4   Still quoted according to the edition in K.B. J\
5   K.B., i. 172 f. Complete material in my article “ Ramman,” in Roscher’s Lexikon der Mylhologie.
6   We may recall the various Marys of Catholic worship, who all represent the same Queen of Heaven. Upon the pictures see my article “Die verschleierte Gottin von Tell Halaf,” in B.A., vii.
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PRE-ISRAELITE CANAAN
nineteen fragments of statues of Ishtar of the same characteristic type, four of other types. The goddess is called Ashtarti, or, probably in a special cult, Ashera, Ashirta, Ashratum.1 Ba‘alat of Gebal (Bvblos) was held in particular veneration (Br. 57. 4. etc.). Her relation to Tammuz-Adonis has been spoken of p. 126.
Further appears in proper names the divine name /hi, spoken of p. 12, ii. (that is to say, Ilanu); further in theophorous names appears Ninib (Bit-Ninib city near Gebal, 55. 31 ; and in Urusalimmu, Br. 183. 15), Dagon, Br. 215 f., in Dagan-takala. Of the names of Egyptian gods appears Amon (an inhabitant of Berut, Br. 128. 3, is called Am-mu-nira, and Amanhatbi, Br. 134 f.). The scribes call preferably upon him for the Pharaoh : 44 Amana, the god of kings ” (Br. 54. 4). Belit of Gebal (Br. 67. 5) appears as his partner; she corresponds to Isis. In Br. 87. 64 ff. Rib-Addi writes : 44 Ilfmi [plural of Ilu, like Elohim. see p. 13, ii.] was thy father, and Shamash and Belit. for Gebal.” In Babylonia Amon-Re corresponds on the one hand to Marduk. on the other to Shamash. Abimilki of Tyre says (Br. 150. 6 ff.): •k O kino;, thou art like unto Shamash, like unto Addu art thou in the heaven.” Pharaoh appears as incarnation of the sun, and as such is called Shai vasli in the letters. Br. 144.16 ff. : 44 My lord is the sun in heave • ; as upon the rising of the sun in heaven, so do the servants wait upon the word out of the mou'-b of his (!) lord.” Br. 138 calls Pharaoh mar .shamash, 44 son of tiie sun.” Br. 208. 18 ff. : 44 The king, the sun of heaven, son of the sun, beloved of Shamash.”2
1   Ashvat upon the Hammurabi Inscription as Lord of the Westland, see p. 322. Arn-Br. 40. 3, Abd-ash-ta-[ar]-ti (error in writing : ashtati); variant Br. 38. 2, Abd-(ilu)-ash-ra-tum; 124, 6, Abdashirta : variants 58. 19, 137. 60, 65. 10, Abd-ashratum and Abd-ashrati.
2   Shalmajati appears as tutelary god of Tyre (Br. 152. 31 f., 40. 51 f.). Trampe, loc. cit., has expressed the conjecture that Melkarth is only an epithet: Melek- karth, “ king of the city ” ; comp. Hommel, Anc. Heb. Trad., 223 f. ; G.G.G., 160, n. 4, and Shargant-shar-ali (ilu shar ali previously in Urnina). Winckler has brought the name of Jedidiah, the son of David (Solomon, vassal of Tyre), into connection with it; see Winckler, K.A.T., 3rd ed., 195, 236, and Erbt, Ebrder, pp. 74 and 152. According to Hommel, Shalmajati (plural Maj. of Shalmai, comp. Nabajati of Nabin), and also the Arabian feminine name Salmai, may be taken into comparison.
RELIGION OF PRE-ISRAELITE CANAAN 351
As summits dens the divinity appears as Ba4al. This carries out the principle that succour could be obtained from other gods, which is apparently shown in the story of Jonah (Jonah i. 5 f.). In Br. 14*6. 14 ff. Ittahama writes : “ If thy gods and thy Shamash move on before me, I shall bring back the cities.” It was the duty of the vassal, therefore, to honour the gods of his overlord. In Br. 213. 9 f. from Ascalon : “ I guard for my lord (?) the gods of the king, my lord.” Conquests were confirmed by the images of the gods being carried away, as they were to Assyria and Babylon, and so the land left without a lord, or by the king placing his own name upon the images (example: Br. 138, Rev. xviii. ff. 29). An angry god left the land (compare the idea of the Jewish people: “ Yahveh sees us not, Yahveh hath forsaken the land,” Ezek. ix. 9). Br. 71. 61 speaks of temples and of treasures of the temples.
The worship in Gebal was ruled by priestesses* of whom two are mentioned by name in Br. 61. 54 and 69. 85.
The discoveries of IVannek and Mutesellim naturally show the same character. We have spoken of the types of Ishtar. The seal cylinder with the picture of Nergal (fig. 112) can scarcely be held to be an evidence of a cult of that god. Besides Ishtar, that is to say, Ashirat, of whose cult there is particular evidence here, and whose oracle was much consulted, there appear also Bel, Adad, and Anion (Annina, that is to sav A man in the name Ama-an-an-ha-sir).
A highly interesting document from the point of view of religious history is the letter of Ahi-Jami to Ashitar-jashur,1 reproduced p. 343. Whether the later Israelite name for god is to be found in Jami may be left out of the question.2 The deep religious feeling of the letter leads to the conjecture that it has to do with a worshipper of God, in close connection with the “ Children of Israel,” whether he belonged to the “ Hebrews ” who had preserved the old religion (p. 5, ii.), or whether he were
1   See O.L.Z., May 1906.
2   mi (it is not wi there) is variant of the post-positive ma, which is also found elsewhere in proper names; Zimmern’s conjecture in Sellin certainly is correct. Sellin compares c.vn.x, 2 Sam. xxiii.fjj, with the name.
352
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an adherent of an Israelite tribe, which had immigrated earlier than the tribes under Joshua.1 “May the lord of the gods protect thy life”; there is more in this than a monotheistic undercurrent. And this leads us to the following chapter.
1 Asser ? (Hommel, Anc. Heb. Trad., 228 ; W. M. Muller, Asien und Enropa, 236 f.; Erbt, Ebrder, 46.) Or previously one of the tribes of Leah which came from Egypt (Steuernagel, Die Einivandentng der israel. Stdmme, 115 ff.) ? Comp. Judges v. 17 f. (Sellin, loc. cit., 108 f.). For the religious estimate of the letters, see F. Jeremias in Chantepie de la Saussaye, 3rd ed., i. 353 ; and Baentsch, Monotheismits, p. 57.
END OF VOL. I.