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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria,
+Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 6 (of 12), by G. Maspero
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 6 (of 12)
+
+Author: G. Maspero
+
+Editor: A.H. Sayce
+
+Translator: M.L. McClure
+
+Release Date: December 16, 2005 [EBook #17326]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HISTORY OF EGYPT, CHALDAEA ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by David Widger
+
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: Spines]
+
+[Illustration: Cover]
+
+HISTORY OF EGYPT CHALDEA, SYRIA, BABYLONIA, AND ASSYRIA
+
+By G. MASPERO, Honorable Doctor of Civil Laws, and Fellow of Queen's
+College, Oxford; Member of the Institute and Professor at the College of
+France
+
+Edited by A. H. SAYCE, Professor of Assyriology, Oxford
+
+Translated by M. L. McCLURE, Member of the Committee of the Egypt
+Exploration Fund
+
+
+CONTAINING OVER TWELVE HUNDRED COLORED PLATES AND ILLUSTRATIONS
+
+Volume VI.
+
+
+LONDON
+
+THE GROLIER SOCIETY
+
+PUBLISHERS
+
+[Illustration: Frontispiece]
+
+[Illustration: Titlepage]
+
+
+[Illustration: 001.jpg Page Image]
+
+_THE CLOSE OF THE THEBAN EMPIRE--(continued)_
+
+_RAMSES III.: MANNERS AND CUSTOMS--POPULATION--THE PREDOMINANCE OF AMON
+AND HIS HIGH PRIESTS._
+
+_The Theban necropolis: mummies--The funeral of a rich Theban: the
+procession of the offerings and the funerary furniture, the crossing
+of the Nile, the tomb, the farewell to the dead, the sacrifice, the
+coffins, the repast of the dead, the song of the Harper--The common
+ditch--The living inhabitants of the necropolis: draughtsmen, sculptors,
+painters--The bas-reliefs of the temples and the tombs, wooden
+statuettes, the smelting of metals, bronze--The religions of the
+necropolis: the immorality and want of discipline among the people:
+workmen s strikes._
+
+_Amon and the beliefs concerning him: his kingdom over the living and
+the dead, the soul's destiny according to the teaching of Amon--Khonsu
+and his temple; the temple of Amon at Karnak, its revenue, its
+priesthood--The growing influence of the high priests of Amon under
+the sons of Ramses III.: Hamsesnakluti, Amenothes; the violation of the
+royal burying-places--Hrihor and the last of the Ramses, Smendes and the
+accession to power of the XXIst dynasty: the division of Egypt into two
+States--The priest-kings of Amon masters of Thebes under the suzerainty
+of the Tanite Pharaohs--The close of the Theban empire._
+
+[Illustration: 003.jpg Page Image]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I--THE CLOSE OF THE THEBAN EMPIRE--(continued)
+
+
+_Ramses III.: Manners and Customs--Population--The predominance of Amon
+and his high priests._
+
+
+Opposite the Thebes of the living, Khafitnibus, the Thebes of the dead,
+had gone on increasing in a remarkably rapid manner. It continued to
+extend in the south-western direction from the heroic period of
+the XVIIIth dynasty onwards, and all the eminence and valleys were
+gradually appropriated one after the other for burying-places. At the
+time of which I am speaking, this region formed an actual town, or
+rather a chain of villages, each of which was grouped round some
+building constructed by one or other of the Pharaohs as a funerary
+chapel. Towards the north, opposite Karnak, they clustered at
+Drah-abu'l-Neggah around pyramids of the first Theban monarchs, at
+Qurneh around the mausolae of Ramses I. and Seti I., and at Sheikh
+Abd el-Qurneh they lay near the Amenopheum and the Pamonkaniqimit,
+or Ramesseum built by Ramses II. Towards the south they diminished
+in number, tombs and monuments becoming fewer and appearing at wider
+intervals; the Migdol of Ramses III. formed an isolated suburb, that of
+Azamit, at Medinet-Habu; the chapel of Isis, constructed by Amenothes,
+son of Hapu, formed a rallying-point for the huts of the hamlet of
+Karka;* and in the far distance, in a wild gorge at the extreme limit
+of human habitations, the queens of the Ramesside line slept their last
+sleep.
+
+     * The village of Karka or Kaka was identified by Brugsch
+     with the hamlet of Deir el-Medineh: the founder of the
+     temple was none other than Amenothes, who was minister under
+     Amenothes III.
+
+[Illustration: 004.jpg THE THEBAN CEMETERIES]
+
+Each of these temples had around it its enclosing wall of dried brick,
+and the collection of buildings within this boundary formed the Khiru,
+or retreat of some one of the Theban Pharaohs, which, in the official
+language of the time, was designated the "august Khiru of millions of
+years."
+
+[Illustration: 005.jpg THE NECROPOLIS OF SHEIKH AND EL-QURNEH]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph by Beato.
+
+A sort of fortified structure, which was built into one of the corners,
+served as a place of deposit for the treasure and archives, and could be
+used as a prison if occasion required.*
+
+     * This was the hliatmu, the dungeon, frequently mentioned in
+     the documents bearing upon the necropolis.
+
+The remaining buildings consisted of storehouses, stables, and houses
+for the priests and other officials. In some cases the storehouses were
+constructed on a regular plan which the architect had fitted in with
+that of the temple. Their ruins at the back and sides of the Ramesseum
+form a double row of vaults, extending from the foot of the hills to
+the border of the cultivated lands. Stone recesses on the roof furnished
+shelter for the watchmen.* The outermost of the village huts stood among
+the nearest tombs. The population which had been gathered together there
+was of a peculiar character, and we can gather but a feeble idea of its
+nature from the surroundings of the cemeteries in our own great cities.
+Death required, in fact, far more attendants among the ancient Egyptians
+than with us. The first service was that of mummification, which
+necessitated numbers of workers for its accomplishment. Some of the
+workshops of the embalmers have been discovered from time to time at
+Sheikh Abd el-Qurneh and Deir el-Bahari, but we are still in ignorance
+as to their arrangements, and as to the exact nature of the materials
+which they employed. A considerable superficial space was required, for
+the manipulations of the embalmers occupied usually from sixty to eighty
+days, and if we suppose that the average deaths at Thebes amounted to
+fifteen or twenty in the twenty-four hours, they would have to provide
+at the same time for the various degrees of saturation of some twelve to
+fifteen hundred bodies at the least.**
+
+     * The discovery of quantities of ostraca in the ruins of
+     these chambers shows that they served partly for cellars.
+
+     ** I have formed my estimate of fifteen to twenty deaths per
+     day from the mortality of Cairo during the French
+     occupation. This is given by R. Desgenettes, in the
+     _Description de l'Egypte_, but only approximately, as many
+     deaths, especially of females, must have been concealed from
+     the authorities; I have, however, made an average from the
+     totals, and applied the rate of mortality thus obtained to
+     ancient Thebes. The same result follows from calculations
+     based on more recent figures, obtained before the great
+     hygienic changes introduced into Cairo by Ismail Pacha, i.e.
+     from August 1, 1858, to July 31, 1859, and from May 24,
+     1865, to May 16, 1866, and for the two years from April 2,
+     1869, to March 21, 1870, and from April 2, 1870, to March
+     21, 1871.
+
+Each of the corpses,moreover, necessitated the employment of at least
+half a dozen workmen to wash it, cut it open, soak it, dry it, and
+apply the usual bandages before placing the amulets upon the canonically
+prescribed places, and using the conventional prayers.
+
+[Illustration: 007.jpg HEAD OF A THEBAN MUMMY]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph by Emil Brugsch-Bey.
+
+There was fastened to the breast, immediately below the neck, a stone
+or green porcelain scarab, containing an inscription which was to be
+efficacious in preventing the heart, "his heart which came to him from
+his mother, his heart from the time he was upon the earth," from rising
+up and witnessing against the dead man before the tribunal of Osiris.*
+There were placed on his fingers gold or enamelled rings, as talismans
+to secure for him the true voice.**
+
+     * The manipulations and prayers were prescribed in the "Book
+     of Embalming."
+
+     ** The prescribed gold ring was often replaced by one of
+     blue or green enamel.
+
+The body becomes at last little more than a skeleton, with a covering of
+yellow skin which accentuates the anatomical, details, but the head, on
+the other hand, still preserves, where the operations have been properly
+conducted, its natural form. The cheeks have fallen in slightly, the
+lips and the fleshy parts of the nose have become thinner and more
+drawn than during life, but the general expression of the face remains
+unaltered.
+
+[Illustration: 008.jpg THE MANUFACTURE AND PAINTING OF THE CARTONNAGE]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, after Rosellini.
+
+A mask of pitch was placed over the visage to preserve it, above
+which was adjusted first a piece of linen and then a series of bands
+impregnated with resin, which increased the size of the head to twofold
+its ordinary bulk. The trunk and limbs were bound round with a first
+covering of some pliable soft stuff, warm to the touch. Coarsely
+powdered natron was scattered here and there over the body as an
+additional preservative. Packets placed between the legs, the arms and
+the hips, and in the eviscerated abdomen, contained the heart, spleen,
+the dried brain, the hair, and the cuttings of the beard and nails. In
+those days the hair had a special magical virtue: by burning it while
+uttering certain incantations, one might acquire an almost limitless
+power over the person to whom it had belonged. The ernbalmers,
+therefore, took care to place with the mummy such portions of the hair
+as they had been obliged to cut off, so as to remove them out of the way
+of the perverse ingenuity of the sorcerers.
+
+[Illustration: 009.jpg WRAPPING OF THE MUMMY, UNDER THE DIRECTION OF THE
+"MAN OF THE ROLL"]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from Rosellini.
+
+Over the first covering of the mummy already alluded to, there was
+sometimes placed a strip of papyrus or a long piece of linen, upon which
+the scribe had transcribed selections--both text and pictures--from "The
+Book of the going forth by Day:" in such cases the roll containing the
+whole work was placed between the legs. The body was further wrapped in
+several bandages, then in a second piece of stuff, then in more bands,
+the whole being finally covered with a shroud of coarse canvas and a
+red linen winding-sheet, sewn together at the back, and kept in place by
+transverse bands disposed at intervals from head to foot. The son of the
+deceased and a "man of the roll" were present at this lugubrious toilet,
+and recited at the application of each piece a prayer, in which its
+object was defined and its duration secured. Every Egyptian was supposed
+to be acquainted with the formulas, from having learned them during his
+lifetime, by which he was to have restored to him the use of his limbs,
+and be protected from the dangers of the world beyond. These were
+repeated to the dead person, however, for greater security, during the
+process of embalming, and the son of the deceased, or the master of the
+ceremonies, took care to whisper to the mummy the most mysterious parts,
+which no living ear might hear with impunity. The wrappings having
+been completed, the deceased person became aware of his equipment, and
+enjoyed all the privileges of the "instructed and fortified Manes." He
+felt himself, both mummy and double, now ready for the tomb.
+
+Egyptian funerals were not like those to which we are accustomed--mute
+ceremonies, in which sorrow is barely expressed by a furtive tear:
+noise, sobbings, and wild gestures were their necessary concomitants.
+Not only was it customary to hire weeping women, who tore their hair,
+filled the air with their lamentations, and simulated by skilful actions
+the depths of despair, but the relatives and friends themselves did not
+shrink from making an outward show of their grief, nor from disturbing
+the equanimity of the passers-by by the immoderate expressions of their
+sorrow. One after another they raised their voices, and uttered some
+expression appropriate to the occasion: "To the West, the dwelling of
+Osiris, to the West, thou who wast the best of men, and who always hated
+guile." And the hired weepers answered in chorus: "O chief,* as thou
+goest to the West, the gods themselves lament." The funeral _cortege_
+started in the morning from the house of mourning, and proceeded at a
+slow pace to the Nile, amid the clamours of the mourners.
+
+     * The "chief" is one of the names of Osiris, and is applied
+     naturally to the dead person, who has become an Osiris by
+     virtue of the embalming.
+
+The route was cleared by a number of slaves and retainers. First came
+those who carried cakes and flowers in their hands, followed by others
+bearing jars full of water, bottles of liqueurs, and phials of perfumes;
+then came those who carried painted boxes intended for the provisions
+of the dead man, and for containing the Ushabtiu, or "Respondents." The
+succeeding group bore the usual furniture required by the deceased
+to set up house again, coffers for linen, folding and arm chairs,
+state-beds, and sometimes even a caparisoned chariot with its quivers.
+Then came a groom conducting two of his late master's favourite horses,
+who, having accompanied the funeral to the tomb, were brought back
+to their stable. Another detachment, more numerous than the others
+combined, now filed past, bearing the effects of the mummy; first the
+vessels for the libations, then the cases for the Canopic jars, then the
+Canopic jars themselves, the mask of the deceased, coloured half in gold
+and half in blue, arms, sceptres, military batons, necklaces, scarabs,
+vultures with encircling wings worn on the breast at festival-times,
+chains, "Respondents," and the human-headed sparrow-hawk, the emblem of
+the soul. Many of these objects were of wood plated with gold, others
+of the same material simply gilt, and others of solid gold, and thus
+calculated to excite the cupidity of the crowd. Offerings came next,
+then a noisy company of female weepers; then a slave, who sprinkled at
+every instant some milk upon the ground as if to lay the dust; then
+a master of the ceremonies, who, the panther skin upon his shoulder,
+asperged the crowd with perfumed water; and behind him comes the hearse.
+
+[Illustration: 012.jpg THE FUNERAL OF HARMHABI]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, after a coloured print in Wilkinson.
+     The cut on the following page joins this on the right.
+
+The latter, according to custom, was made in the form of a
+boat--representing the bark of Osiris, with his ark, and two guardians,
+Isis and Nephthys--and was placed upon a sledge, which was drawn by a
+team of oxen and a relay of fellahin. The sides of the ark were, as
+a rule, formed of movable wooden panels, decorated with pictures and
+inscriptions; sometimes, however, but more rarely, the panels were
+replaced by a covering of embroidered stuff or of soft leather. In
+the latter case the decoration was singularly rich, the figures and
+hieroglyphs being cut out with a knife, and the spaces thus left filled
+in with pieces of coloured leather, which gave the whole an appearance
+of brilliant mosaic-work.*
+
+     * One of these coverings was found in the hiding-place at
+     Deir el-Bahari; it had belonged to the Princess Isimkhobiu,
+     whose mummy is now at Gizeh.
+
+[Illustration: 013.jpg THE FUNERAL OF HABMHABI]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from the coloured print in
+     Wilkinson. The left side of this design fits on to the right
+     of the preceding cut.
+
+In place of a boat, a shrine of painted wood, also mounted upon a
+sledge, was frequently used. When the ceremony was over, this was left,
+together with the coffin, in the tomb.*
+
+     * I found in the tomb of Sonnozmu two of these sledges with
+     the superstructure in the form of a temple. They are now in
+     the Gizeh Museum.
+
+The wife and children walked as close to the bier as possible, and
+were followed by the friends of the deceased, dressed in long linen
+garments,* each of them bearing a wand. The ox-driver, while goading his
+beasts, cried out to them: "To the West, ye oxen who draw the hearse,
+to the West! Your master comes behind you!" "To the West," the friends
+repeated; "the excellent man lives no longer who loved truth so dearly
+and hated lying!"**
+
+     ** The whole of this description is taken from the pictures
+     representing the interment of a certain Harmhabi, who died
+     at Thebes in the time of Thfitmosis IV.
+
+     * These expressions are taken from the inscriptions on the
+     tomb of Rai
+
+[Illustration: 014.jpg THE BOAT CARRYING THE MUMMY]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from pictures in the tomb of
+     Nofirhotpu at Thebes.
+
+This lamentation is neither remarkable for its originality nor for its
+depth of feeling. Sorrow was expressed on such occasions in prescribed
+formulas of always the same import, custom soon enabling each individual
+to compose for himself a repertory of monotonous exclamations of
+condolence, of which the prayer, "To the West!" formed the basis,
+relieved at intervals by some fresh epithet. The nearest relatives
+of the deceased, however, would find some more sincere expressions of
+grief, and some more touching appeals with which to break in upon the
+commonplaces of the conventional theme. On reaching the bank of the Nile
+the funeral cortege proceeded to embark.*
+
+     * The description of this second part of the funeral
+     arrangements is taken from the tomb of Harmhabi, and
+     especially from that of Nofirhotpu.
+
+[Illustration: 015.jpg THE BOATS CONTAINING THE FEMALE WEEPERS AND THE
+PEOPLE OF THE HOUSEHOLD]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from paintings on the tomb of
+     Nofirhotpu at Thebes.
+
+They blended with their inarticulate cries, and the usual protestations
+and formulas, an eulogy upon the deceased and his virtues, allusions
+to his disposition and deeds, mention of the offices and honours he had
+obtained, and reflections on the uncertainty of human life--the whole
+forming the melancholy dirge which each generation intoned over its
+predecessor, while waiting itself for the same office to be said over it
+in its turn.
+
+The bearers of offerings, friends, and slaves passed over on hired
+barges, whose cabins, covered externally with embroidered stuffs of
+several colours, or with _applique_ leather, looked like the pedestals
+of a monument: crammed together on the boats, they stood upright with
+their faces turned towards the funeral bark. The latter was supposed to
+represent the Noshemit, the mysterious skiff of Abydos, which had been
+used in the obsequies of Osiris of yore.
+
+[Illustration: 016.jpg THE BOATS CONTAINING THE FRIENDS AND THE FUNERARY
+FURNITURE]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from paintings on the tomb of
+     Nofirhotpu at Thebes.
+
+It was elegant, light, and slender in shape, and ornamented at bow and
+stern with a lotus-flower of metal, which bent back its head gracefully,
+as if bowed down by its own weight. A temple-shaped shrine stood in
+the middle of the boat, adorned with bouquets of flowers and with
+green palm-branches. The female members of the family of the deceased,
+crouched beside the shrine, poured forth lamentations, while two
+priestesses, representing respectively Isis and Nephthys, took up
+positions behind to protect the body. The boat containing the female
+mourners having taken the funeral barge in tow, the entire flotilla
+pushed out into the stream. This was the solemn moment of the
+ceremony--the moment in which the deceased, torn away from his earthly
+city, was about to set out upon that voyage from which there is no
+return. The crowds assembled on the banks of the river hailed the dead
+with their parting prayers: "Mayest thou reach in peace the West from
+Thebes! In peace, in peace towards Abydos, mayest thou descend in peace
+towards Abydos, towards the sea of the West!"
+
+[Illustration: 017.jpg A CORNER OF THE THEBAN NECROPOLIS]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a stele in the Gizeh Museum.
+
+This crossing of the Nile was of special significance in regard to
+the future of the soul of the deceased: it represented his pilgrimage
+towards Abydos, to the "Mouth of the Cleft" which gave him access to
+the other world, and it was for this reason that the name of Abydos is
+associated with that of Thebes in the exclamations of the crowd. The
+voices of the friends replied frequently and mournfully: "To the West,
+to the West, the land of the justified! The place which thou lovedst
+weeps and is desolate!" Then the female mourners took up the refrain,
+saying: "In peace, in peace, to the West! O honourable one, go in peace!
+If it please God, when the day of Eternity shall shine, we shall see
+thee, for behold thou goest to the land which mingles all men together!"
+The widow then adds her note to the concert of lamentations: "O my
+brother, O my husband, O my beloved, rest, remain in thy place, do not
+depart from the terrestrial spot where thou art! Alas, thou goest away
+to the ferry-boat in order to cross the stream! O sailors, do not hurry,
+leave him; you, you will return to your homes, but he, he is going away
+to the land of Eternity! O Osirian bark, why hast thou come to take away
+from me him who has left me!" The sailors were, of course, deaf to her
+appeals, and the mummy pursued its undisturbed course towards the last
+stage of its mysterious voyage.
+
+The majority of the tombs--those which were distributed over the plain
+or on the nearest spurs of the hill--were constructed on the lines of
+those brick-built pyramids erected on mastabas which were very common
+during the early Theban dynasties. The relative proportions of the parts
+alone were modified: the mastaba, which had gradually been reduced to
+an insignificant base, had now recovered its original height, while the
+pyramid had correspondingly decreased, and was much reduced in size. The
+chapel was constructed within the building, and the mummy-pit was sunk
+to a varying depth below. The tombs ranged along the mountain-side were,
+on the other hand, rock-cut, and similar to those at el-Bersheh and
+Beni-Hasan.
+
+[Illustration: 018.jpg PAINTING IN THE FIFTH TOMB OF THE KINGS TO THE
+RIGHT]
+
+The heads of wealthy families or the nobility naturally did not leave to
+the last moment the construction of a sepulchre worthy of their rank and
+fortune. They prided themselves on having "finished their house which is
+in the funeral valley when the morning for the hiding away of their body
+should come." Access to these tombs was by too steep and difficult a
+path to allow of oxen being employed for the transport of the mummy: the
+friends or slaves of the deceased were, therefore, obliged to raise the
+sarcophagus on their shoulders and bear it as best they could to the
+door of the tomb.
+
+[Illustration: 019.jpg THE FAREWELL TO THE MUMMY, AND THE DOUBLE
+RECEIVED BY THE GODDESS]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from the paintings in the Theban
+     tombs.
+
+The mummy was then placed in an upright position on a heap of sand, with
+its back to the wall and facing the assistants, like the master of some
+new villa who, having been accompanied by his friends to see him take
+possession, turns for a moment on the threshold to take leave of
+them before entering. A sacrifice, an offering, a prayer, and a fresh
+outburst of grief ensued; the mourners redoubled their cries and threw
+themselves upon the ground, the relatives decked the mummy with flowers
+and pressed it to their bared bosoms, kissing it upon the breast and
+knees. "I am thy sister, O great one! forsake me not! Is it indeed thy
+will that I should leave thee? If I go away, thou shalt be here alone,
+and is there any one who will be with thee to follow thee? O thou
+who lovedst to jest with me, thou art now silent, thou speakest
+not!" Whereupon the mourners again broke out in chorus: "Lamentation,
+lamentation! Make, make, make, make lamentation without ceasing as loud
+as can be made. O good traveller, who takest thy way towards the land of
+Eternity, thou hast been torn from us! O thou who hadst so many around
+thee, thou art now in the land which bringest isolation! Thou who
+lovedst to stretch thy limbs in walking, art now fettered, bound,
+swathed! Thou who hadst fine stuffs in abundance, art laid in the linen
+of yesterday!" Calm in the midst of the tumult, the priest stood and
+offered the incense and libation with the accustomed words: "To thy
+double, Osiris Nofirhotpu, whose voice before the great god is true!"
+This was the signal of departure, and the mummy, carried by two men,
+disappeared within the tomb: the darkness of the other world had laid
+hold of it, never to let it go again.
+
+The chapel was usually divided into two chambers: one, which was of
+greater width than length, ran parallel to the facade; the other, which
+was longer than it was wide, stood at right angles with the former,
+exactly opposite to the entrance. The decoration of these chambers
+took its inspiration from the scheme which prevailed in the time of the
+Memphite dynasties, but besides the usual scenes of agricultural labour,
+hunting, and sacrifice, there were introduced episodes from the public
+life of the deceased, and particularly the minute portrayal of the
+ceremonies connected with his burial.
+
+[Illustration: 021.jpg NICHE IN THE TOMB OF MENNA]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Insinger.
+
+These pictorial biographies are always accompanied by detailed
+explanatory inscriptions; every individual endeavoured thus to show
+to the Osirian judges the rank he had enjoyed here upon earth, and to
+obtain in the fields of lalu the place which he claimed to be his due.
+
+The stele was to be found at the far end of the second chamber; it was
+often let in to a niche in the form of a round-headed doorway, or else
+it was replaced by a group of statues, either detached or sculptured in
+the rock itself, representing the occupant, his wives and children, who
+took the place of the supporters of the double, formerly always hidden
+within the serdab. The ceremony of the "Opening of the Mouth" took
+place in front of the niche on the day of burial, at the moment when the
+deceased, having completed his terrestrial course, entered his new home
+and took possession of it for all eternity. The object of this ceremony
+was, as we know, to counteract the effects of the embalming, and to
+restore activity to the organs of the body whose functions had been
+suspended by death. The "man of the roll" and his assistants, aided by
+the priests, who represented the "children of Horus," once more raised
+the mummy into an upright position upon a heap of sand in the middle of
+the chapel, and celebrated in his behalf the divine mystery instituted
+by Horus for Osiris. They purified it both by ordinary and by red water,
+by the incense of the south and by the alum of the north, in the same
+manner as that in which the statues of the gods were purified at the
+beginning of the temple sacrifices; they then set to work to awake the
+deceased from his sleep: they loosened his shroud and called back the
+double who had escaped from the body at the moment of the death-agony,
+and restored to him the use of his arms and legs. As soon as the
+sacrificial slaughterers had despatched the bull of the south, and cut
+it in pieces, the priest seized the bleeding haunch, and raised it
+to the lips of the mask as if to invite it to eat; but the lips still
+remained closed, and refused to perform their office. The priest then
+touched them with several iron instruments hafted on wooden handles,
+which were supposed to possess the power of unsealing them.
+
+[Illustration: 023a.jpg COFFIN-LID]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by M. de Mertens.
+
+[Illustration: 023b.jpg COFFIN-LID]
+
+The "opening" once effected, the double became free, and the
+tomb-paintings from thenceforward ceasing to depict the mummy,
+represented the double only. They portrayed it "under the form which he
+had on this earth," wearing the civil garb, and fulfilling his ordinary
+functions. The corpse was regarded as merely the larva, to be maintained
+in its integrity in order to ensure survival; but it could be relegated
+without fear to the depths of the bare and naked tomb, there to remain
+until the end of time, if it pleased the gods to preserve it from
+robbers or archaeologists. At the period of the first Theban empire
+the coffins were rectangular wooden chests, made on the models of the
+limestone and granite sarcophagi, and covered with prayers taken from
+the various sacred writings, especially from the "Book of the Dead";
+during the second Theban empire, they were modified into an actual
+sheath for the body, following more or less the contour of the human
+figure. This external model of the deceased covered his remains, and
+his figure in relief served as a lid to the coffin. The head was covered
+with the full-dress wig, a tippet of white cambrio half veiled the
+bosom, the petticoat fell in folds about the limbs, the feet were shod
+with sandals, the arms were outstretched or were folded over the breast,
+and the hands clasped various objects--either the _crux ansata_, the
+buckle of the belt, the _tat_, or a garland of flowers. Sometimes, on
+the contrary, the coffin was merely a conventional reproduction of
+the human form. The two feet and legs were joined together, and the
+modelling of the knee, calf, thigh, and stomach was only slightly
+indicated in the wood. Towards the close of the XVIIIth dynasty it was
+the fashion for wealthy persons to have two coffins, one fitting inside
+the other, painted black or white. From the XXth dynasty onwards they
+were coated with a yellowish varnish, and so covered with inscriptions
+and mystic signs that each coffin was a tomb in miniature, and could
+well have done duty as such, and thus meet all the needs of the soul.*
+
+     * The first to summarise the characteristics of the coffins
+     and sarcophagi of the second Theban period was Mariette, but
+     he places the use of the yellow-varnished coffins too late,
+     viz. during the XXIInd dynasty. Examples of them have since
+     been found which incontestably belong to the XXth.
+
+[Illustration: 024.jpg THE MUMMY FACTORY]
+
+Later still, during the XXIst and XXIInd dynasties, these two, or even
+three coffins, were enclosed in a rectangular sarcophagus of thick wood,
+which, surmounted by a semicircular lid, was decorated with pictures and
+hallowed by prayers: four sparrow-hawks, perched on the uprights at the
+corners, watched at the four cardinal points, and protected the body,
+enabling the soul at the same time to move freely within the four houses
+of which the world was composed.
+
+[Illustration: 025.jpg THE PARAPHERNALIA OF A MUMMY OF THE XXth TO THE
+XXIInd DYNASTIES]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from Mariette.
+
+The workmen, after having deposited the mummy in its resting-place,
+piled upon the floor of the tomb the canopio jars, the caskets, the
+provisions, the furniture, the bed, and the stools and chairs; the
+Usha-btiu occupied compartments in their allotted boxes, and sometimes
+there would be laid beside them the mummy of a favourite animal--a
+monkey, a dog of some rare breed, or a pet gazelle, whose coffins were
+shaped to their respective outlines, the better to place before the
+deceased the presentment of the living animal.
+
+[Illustration: 026.jpg THE FUNERAL REPAST--MUSIC AND DANCING]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a fragment in the British
+     Museum. The scene representing the funeral repast and its
+     accompanying dances occurs frequently in the Theban tombs.
+
+A few of the principal objects were broken or damaged, in the belief
+that, by thus destroying them, their doubles would go forth and
+accompany the human double, and render him their accustomed services
+during the whole of his posthumous existence; a charm pronounced over
+them bound them indissolubly to his person, and constrained them to obey
+his will. This done, the priest muttered a final prayer, and the masons
+walled up the doorway.
+
+[Illustration: 027.jpg THE COFFIN OF THE FAVOURITE GAZELLE OF
+ISIMKHOBIU]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Emil Brugsch-
+     Bey.
+
+The funeral feast now took place with its customary songs and dances.
+The _almehs_ addressed the guests and exhorted them to make good use of
+the passing hour: "Be happy for one day! for when you enter your tombs
+you will rest there eternally throughout the length of every day!"
+
+Immediately after the repast the friends departed from the tomb, and the
+last link which connected the dead with our world was then broken. The
+sacred harper was called upon to raise the farewell hymn:*
+
+     * The harper is often represented performing this last
+     office. In the tomb of Nofirhotpu, and in many others, the
+     daughters or the relatives of the deceased accompany or even
+     replace the harper; in this case they belonged to a priestly
+     family, and fulfilled the duties of the "Female Singers" of
+     Amon or some other god.
+
+"O instructed mummies, ennead of the gods of the coffin, who listen to
+the praises of this dead man, and who daily extol the virtues of this
+instructed mummy, who is living eternally like a god, ruling in Amentit,
+ye also who shall live in the memory of posterity, all ye who shall
+come and read these hymns inscribed, according to the rites, within
+the tombs, repeat: 'The greatness of the under-world, what is it? The
+annihilation of the tomb, why is it?' It is to conform to the image
+of the land of Eternity, the true country where there is no strife and
+where violence is held in abhorrence, where none attacks his neighbour,
+and where none among our generations who rest within it is rebellious,
+from the time when your race first existed, to the moment when it shall
+become a multitude of multitudes, all going the same way; for instead
+of remaining in this land of Egypt, there is not one but shall leave it,
+and there is said to all who are here below, from the moment of their
+waking to life: 'Go, prosper safe and sound, to reach the tomb at
+length, a chief among the blessed, and ever mindful in thy heart of the
+day when thou must lie down on the funeral bed!'" The ancient song
+of Antuf, modified in the course of centuries, was still that which
+expressed most forcibly the melancholy thought paramount in the minds of
+the friends assembled to perform the last rites. "The impassibility of
+the chief* is, in truth, the best of fates!"
+
+     * Osiris is here designated by the word "chief," as I have
+     already pointed out.
+
+[Illustration: 029.jpg ONE OF THE HARPERS OF THE TOMB OF RAMSES III.]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph taken Byjnsinger in
+     1881.
+
+"Since the times of the god bodies are created merely to pass away, and
+young generations take their place: Ra rises in the morning, Tumu lies
+down to rest in the land of the evening, all males generate, the females
+conceive, every nose inhales the air from the morning of their birth
+to the day when they go to their place! Be happy then for one day, O
+man!--May there ever be perfumes and scents for thy nostrils, garlands
+and lotus-flowers for thy shoulders and for the neck of thy beloved
+sister* who sits beside thee! Let there be singing and music before
+thee, and, forgetting all thy sorrows, think only of pleasure until the
+day when thou must enter the country of Maritsakro, the silent goddess,
+though all the same the heart of the son who loves thee will not cease
+to beat! Be happy for one day, O man!--I have heard related what befell
+our ancestors; their walls are destroyed, their place is no more, they
+are as those who have ceased to live from the time of the god! The walls
+of thy tomb are strong, thou hast planted trees at the edge of thy pond,
+thy soul reposes beneath them and drinks the water; follow that which
+seemeth good to thee as long as thou art on earth, and give bread to him
+who is without land, that thou mayest be well spoken of for evermore.
+Think upon the gods who have lived long ago: their meat offerings
+fall in pieces as if they had been torn by a panther, their loaves are
+defiled with dust, their statues no longer stand upright within the
+temple of Ra, their followers beg for alms! Be happy for one day!"
+
+     * Marriages between brothers and sisters in Egypt rendered
+     this word "sister" the most natural appellation.
+
+Those gone before thee "have had their hour of joy," and they have put
+off sadness "which shortens the moments until the day when hearts are
+destroyed!--Be mindful, therefore, of the day when thou shalt be taken
+to the country where all men are mingled: none has ever taken thither
+his goods with him, and no one can ever return from it!" The grave did
+not, however, mingle all men as impartially as the poet would have us
+believe. The poor and insignificant had merely a place in the common
+pit, which was situated in the centre of the Assassif,* one of the
+richest funerary quarters of Thebes.
+
+     * There is really only one complete description of a
+     cemetery of the poor, namely, that given by A. Rhind.
+     Mariette caused extensive excavations to be made by Gabet
+     and Vassalli, 1859-1862, in the Assassif, near the spot
+     worked by Rhind, and the objects found are now in the Gizeh
+     Museum, but the accounts of the work are among his
+     unpublished papers, vassalli assures me that he sometimes
+     found the mummies piled one on another to the depth of sixty
+     bodies, and even then he did not reach the lowest of the
+     pile. The hurried excavations which I made in 1882 and 1884,
+     appeared to confirm these statements of Rhind and Vassalli.
+
+Yawning trenches stood ever open there, ready to receive their prey;
+the rites were hurriedly performed, and the grave-diggers covered the
+mummies of the day's burial with a little sand, out of which we receive
+them intact, sometimes isolated, sometimes in groups of twos or threes,
+showing that they had not even been placed in regular layers. Some
+are wrapped only in bandages of coarse linen, and have been consigned
+without further covering to the soil, while others have been bound round
+with palm-leaves laid side by side, so as to form a sort of primitive
+basket. The class above the poorest people were buried in rough-hewn
+wooden boxes, smaller at the feet than towards the head, and devoid of
+any inscription or painting. Many have been placed in any coffin that
+came to hand, with a total indifference as to suitability of size;
+others lie in a badly made bier, made up of the fragments of one or more
+older biers. None of them possessed any funerary furniture, except the
+tools of his trade, a thin pair of leather shoes, sandals of cardboard
+or plaited reeds, rings of terra-cotta or bronze, bracelets or necklets
+of a single row of blue beads, statuettes of divinities, mystic eyes,
+scarabs, and, above all, cords tied round the neck, arms, limbs, or
+waist, to keep off, by their mystic knots, all malign influences.
+
+The whole population of the necropolis made their living out of the
+dead. This was true of all ranks of society, headed by the sacerdotal
+colleges of the royal chapels,* and followed by the priestly bodies, to
+whom was entrusted the care of the tombs in the various sections,
+but the most influential of whom confined their attentions to the old
+burying-ground, "Isit-mait," the True Place.**
+
+     * We find on several monuments the names of persons
+     belonging to these sacerdotal bodies, priests of Ahmosis I.,
+     priests of Thutmosis I., of Thut-mosis II., of Amenothes
+     II., and of Seti I.
+
+     ** The persons connected with the "True Place" were for a
+     long time considered as magistrates, and the "True Place" as
+     a tribunal.
+
+It was their duty to keep up the monuments of the kings, and also of
+private individuals, to clean the tombs, to visit the funerary chambers,
+to note the condition of their occupants, and, if necessary, repair
+the damage done by time, and to provide on certain days the offerings
+prescribed by custom, or by clauses in the contract drawn up between
+the family of the deceased and the religious authorities. The titles of
+these officials indicated how humble was their position in relation to
+the deified ancestors in whose service they were employed; they called
+themselves the "Servants of the True Place," and their chiefs the
+"Superiors of the Servants," but all the while they were people of
+considerable importance, being rich, well educated, and respected in
+their own quarter of the town.
+
+[Illustration: 032.jpg PAINTINGS AT THE END OF THE HALL OF THE FIFTH
+THE TOMB]
+
+They professed to have a special devotion for Amenothes I. and his
+mother, Nofritari, who, after five or six centuries of continuous
+homage, had come to be considered as the patrons of Khafitnibus, but
+this devotion was not to the depreciation of other sovereigns. It is
+true that the officials were not always clear as to the identity of the
+royal remains of which they had the care, and they were known to have
+changed one of their queens or princesses into a king or some royal
+prince.*
+
+     * Thus Queen Ahhotpu I., whom the "servant" Anhurkhau knew
+     to be a woman, is transformed into a King Ahhotpu in the
+     tomb of Khabokhnit.
+
+[Illustration: AMENOTHES III. AT LUXOR]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph by Gayet.
+
+They were surrounded by a whole host of lesser
+functionaries--bricklayers, masons, labourers, exorcists, scribes (who
+wrote out pious formulae for poor people, or copied the "Books of the
+going forth by day" for the mummies), weavers, cabinet-makers, and
+goldsmiths. The sculptors and the painters were grouped into guilds;*
+many of them spent their days in the tombs they were decorating, while
+others had their workshops above-ground, probably very like those of our
+modern monumental masons.
+
+     * We gather this from the inscriptions which give us the
+     various titles of the sculptors, draughtsmen, or workmen,
+     but I have been unable to make out the respective positions
+     held by these different persons.
+
+They kept at the disposal of their needy customers an assortment of
+ready-made statues and stelae, votive tablets to Osiris, Anubis, and
+other Theban gods and goddesses, singly or combined. The name of the
+deceased and the enumeration of the members of his family were left
+blank, and were inserted after purchase in the spaces reserved for the
+purpose.*
+
+     * I succeeded in collecting at the Boulak Museum a
+     considerable number of these unfinished statues and stelae,
+     coming from the workshops of the necropolis.
+
+These artisans made the greater part of their livelihood by means of
+these epitaphs, and the majority thought only of selling as many of them
+as they could; some few, however, devoted themselves to work of a higher
+kind. Sculpture had reached a high degree of development under the
+Thutmoses and the Ramses, and the art of depicting scenes in bas-relief
+had been brought to a perfection hitherto unknown. This will be easily
+seen by comparing the pictures in the old mastabas, such as those of Ti
+or Phtahhotpu, with the finest parts of the temples of Qurneh, Abydos,
+Karnak, Deir el-Bahari, or with the scenes in the tombs of Seti I. and
+Ramses II., or those of private individuals such as Hui. The modelling
+is firm and refined, showing a skill in the use of the chisel and an
+elegance of outline which have never been surpassed: the Amenothes III.
+of Luxor and the Khamhait of Sheikh Abd el-Qurneh might serve for models
+in our own schools of the highest types which Egyptian art could produce
+at its best in this particular branch. The drawing is freer than in
+earlier examples, the action is more natural, the composition more
+studied, and the perspective less wild. We feel that the artist handled
+his subject _con amore_. He spared no trouble in sketching out
+his designs and in making studies from nature, and, as papyrus was
+expensive, he drew rough drafts, or made notes of his impressions on the
+flat chips of limestone with which the workshops were strewn.
+
+[Illustration: 035.jpg KHAMHAIT]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph by M. de Mertens.
+
+Nothing at that date could rival these sketches for boldness of
+conception and freedom in execution, whether it were in the portrayal of
+the majestic gait of a king or the agility of an acrobat. Of the latter
+we have an example in the Turin Museum. The girl is nude, with the
+exception of a tightly fitting belt about her hips, and she is throwing
+herself backwards with so natural a motion, that we are almost tempted
+to expect her to turn a somersault and fall once more into position with
+her heels together.
+
+[Illustration: 026.jpg SKETCH OF A FEMALE ACROBAT]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph by Petrie.
+
+The unfinished figures on the tomb of Seti I. shows with what a steady
+hand the clever draughtsman could sketch out his subjects. The head from
+the nape of the neck round to the throat is described by a single line,
+and the contour of the shoulders is marked by another. The form of the
+body is traced by two undulating lines, while the arms and legs are
+respectively outlined by two others. The articles of apparel and
+ornaments, sketched rapidly at first, had to be gone over again by the
+sculptor, who worked out the smallest details. One might almost count
+the tresses of the hair, while the folds of the dress and the enamels of
+the girdle and bracelets are minutely chiselled.
+
+[Illustration: BAS-RELIEF OF SETI I., SHOWING CORRECTIONS MADE BY THE
+SCULPTOR]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from photographs by Insinger and
+     Daniel Heron.
+
+When the draughtsman had finished his picture from the sketch which he
+had made, or when he had enlarged it from a smaller drawing, the master
+of the studio would go over it again, marking here and there in red the
+defective points, to which the sculptor gave his attention when working
+the subject out on the wall. If he happened to make a mistake in
+executing it, he corrected it as well as he was able by filling up with
+stucco or hard cement the portions to be remodelled, and by starting to
+work again upon the fresh surface. This cement has fallen out in some
+cases, and reveals to our eyes to-day the marks of the underlying
+chiselling. There are, for example, two profiles of Seti I. on one of
+the bas-reliefs of the hypostyle hall at Karnak, one faintly outlined,
+and the other standing fully out from the surface of the stone. The
+sense of the picturesque was making itself felt, and artists were
+no longer to be excused for neglecting architectural details, the
+configuration of the country, the drawing of rare plants, and, in fact,
+all those accessories which had been previously omitted altogether or
+merely indicated. The necessity of covering such vast surfaces as the
+pylons offered had accustomed them to arrange the various scenes of one
+and the same action in a more natural and intimate connexion than their
+predecessors could possibly have done. In these scenes the Pharaoh
+naturally played the chief part, but in place of choosing for treatment
+merely one or other important action of the monarch calculated
+to exhibit his courage, the artist endeavoured to portray all the
+successive incidents in his campaigns, in the same manner as the early
+Italian painters were accustomed to depict, one after the other, and on
+the same canvas, all the events of the same legend. The details of these
+gigantic compositions may sometimes appear childish to us, and we may
+frequently be at a loss in determining the relations of the parts, yet
+the whole is full of movement, and, although mutilated, gives us even
+yet the impression which would have been made upon us by the turmoil of
+a battle in those distant days.
+
+The sculptor of statues for a long time past was not a whit less skilful
+than the artist who executed bas-reliefs. The sculptor was doubtless
+often obliged to give enormous proportions to the figure of the king, to
+prevent his being overshadowed by the mass of buildings among which the
+statue was to appear; but this necessity of exaggerating the human form
+did not destroy in the artist that sense of proportion and that skilful
+handling of the chisel which are so strikingly displayed in the sitting
+scribe or in the princess at Meidum; it merely trained him to mark out
+deftly the principal lines, and to calculate the volume and dimensions
+of these gigantic granite figures of some fifty to sixty-five feet high,
+with as great confidence and skill as he would have employed upon any
+statue of ordinary dimensions which might be entrusted to him.
+The colossal statues at Abu-Simbel and Thebes still witness to the
+incomparable skill of the Theban sculptors in the difficult art of
+imagining and executing superhuman types. The decadence of Egyptian art
+did not begin until the time of Ramses III., but its downward progress
+was rapid, and the statues of the Ramesside period are of little or no
+artistic value. The form of these figures is poor, the technique crude,
+and the expression of the faces mean and commonplace. They betray the
+hand of a mechanical workman who, while still in the possession of the
+instruments of his trade, can infuse no new life into the traditions of
+the schools, nor break away from them altogether.
+
+[Illustration: 040.jpg THE KNEELING SCRIBE AT TURIN]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Petrie; the
+     scribe bears upon his right shoulder, perhaps tattooed, the
+     human image of the god Amon-Ra, whose animal emblem he
+     embraces.
+
+We must look, not to the royal studios, but to the workshops connected
+with the necropolis, if we want to find statues of half life-size
+displaying intelligent workmanship, all of which we might be tempted to
+refer to the XVIIIth dynasty if the inscriptions upon them did not fix
+their date some two or three centuries later. An example of them may be
+seen at Turin in the kneeling scribe embracing a ram-headed altar:
+the face is youthful, and has an expression at once so gentle and
+intelligent that we are constrained to overlook the imperfections in the
+bust and legs of the figure. Specimens of this kind are not numerous,
+and their rarity is easily accounted for. The multitude of priests,
+soldiers, workmen, and small middle-class people who made up the bulk of
+the Theban population had aspirations for a luxury little commensurate
+with their means, and the tombs of such people are, therefore, full
+of objects which simulate a character they do not possess, and are
+deceptive to the eye: such were the statuettes made of wood, substituted
+from economical motives instead of the limestone or sandstone statues
+usually provided as supporters for the "double."
+
+[Illustration: 041a.jpg YOUNG GIRL IN THE TURING MUSEUM]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph by Petrie.
+
+[Illustration: 041b.jpg THE LADY NEHAI]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph by M. de Mertens.
+     Enamelled eyes, according to a common custom, were inserted
+     in the sockets, but have disappeared.
+
+The funerary sculptors had acquired a perfect mastery of the kind of
+art needed for people of small means, and we find among the medley of
+commonplace objects which encumber the tomb they decorated, examples of
+artistic works of undoubted excellence, such as the ladies Nai and Tui
+now in the Louvre, the lady Nehai now at Berlin, and the naked child at
+Turin. The lady Tui in her lifetime had been one of the singing-women of
+Amon. She is clad in a tight-fitting robe, which accentuates the
+contour of the breasts and hips without coarseness: her right arm falls
+gracefully alongside her body, while her left, bent across her chest,
+thrusts into her bosom a kind of magic whip, which was the sign of her
+profession. The artist was not able to avoid a certain heaviness in the
+treatment of her hair, and the careful execution of the whole work was
+not without a degree of harshness, but by dint of scraping and polishing
+the wood he succeeded in softening the outline, and removing from the
+figure every sharp point. The lady Nehai is smarter and more graceful,
+in her close-fitting garment and her mantle thrown over the left elbow;
+and the artist has given her a more alert pose and resolute air than we
+find in the stiff carriage of her contemporary Tui. The little girl in
+the Turin Museum is a looser work, but where could one find a better
+example of the lithe delicacy of the young Egyptian maiden of eight or
+ten years old? We may see her counterpart to-day among the young Nubian
+girls of the cataract, before they are obliged to wear clothes; there is
+the same thin chest, the same undeveloped hips, the same meagre thighs,
+and the same demeanour, at once innocent and audacious. Other statuettes
+represent matrons, some in tight garments, and with their hair closely
+confined, others without any garment whatever.
+
+[Illustration: 043a.jpg a soldier]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph by M. de Mertens.
+
+[Illustration: 043b.jpg STATUE IN THE TURIN MUSEUM]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph by Petrie.
+
+The Turin example is that of a lady who seems proud of her large
+ear-rings, and brings one of them into prominence, either to show it
+off or to satisfy herself that the jewel becomes her: her head is
+square-shaped, the shoulders narrow, the chest puny, the pose of the
+arm stiff and awkward, but the eyes have such a joyful openness, and her
+smile such a self-satisfied expression, that one readily over looks the
+other defects of the statue. In this collection of miniature figures
+examples of men are not wanting, and there are instances of old
+soldiers, officials, guardians of temples, and priests proudly executing
+their office in their distinctive panther skins. Three individuals in
+the Gizeh were contemporaries, or almost so, of the young girl of the
+Turin Museum. They are dressed in rich costumes, to which they have,
+doubtless, a just claim; for one of them, Hori, surnamed Ra, rejoiced in
+the favour of the Pharaoh, and must therefore have exercised some
+court function. They seem to step forth with a measured pace and firm
+demeanour, the body well thrown back and the head erect, their
+faces displaying something of cruelty and cunning. An officer, whose
+retirement from service is now spent in the Louvre, is dressed in a
+semi-civil costume, with a light wig, a closely fitting smock-frock
+with shirt-sleeves, and a loin-cloth tied tightly round the hips and
+descending halfway down the thigh, to which is applied a piece of stuff
+kilted lengthwise, projecting in front. A colleague of his, now in the
+Berlin Museum, still maintains possession of his official baton, and is
+arrayed in his striped petticoat, his bracelets and gorget of gold.
+A priest in the Louvre holds before him, grasped by both hands, the
+insignia of Amon-Ra--a ram's head, surmounted by the solar disk, and
+inserted on the top of a thick handle; another, who has been relegated
+to Turin, appears to be placed between two long staves, each surmounted
+by an idol, and, to judge from his attitude, seems to have no small idea
+of his own beauty and importance. The Egyptians were an observant
+people and inclined to satire, and I have a shrewd suspicion that the
+sculptors, in giving to such statuettes this character of childlike
+vanity, yielded to the temptation to be merry at the expense of their
+model.
+
+The smelters and engravers in metal occupied in relation to the
+sculptors a somewhat exalted position. Bronze had for a long time been
+employed in funerary furniture, and _ushabtiu_ (respondents),* amulets,
+and images of the gods, as well as of mortals, were cast in this metal.
+Many of these tiny figures form charming examples of enamel-work, and
+are distinguished not only by the gracefulness of the, modelling, but
+also by the brilliance of the superimposed glaze; but the majority of
+them were purely commercial articles, manufactured by the hundred from
+the same models, and possibly cast, for centuries, from the same moulds
+for the edification of the devout and of pilgrims.
+
+     * Bronze _respondents_ are somewhat rare, and most of those
+     which are to be found among the dealers are counterfeit. The
+     Gizeh Museum possesses two examples at least of indisputable
+     authenticity; both of these belong to the XXth dynasty.
+
+[Illustration: 045.jpg FUNERARY CASKET IN THE TURING MUSEUM]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph.
+
+[Illustration: 046.jpg SHRINE IN THE TURIN MUSEUM]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Lanzone.
+
+We ought not, therefore, to be surprised if they are lacking in
+originality; they are no more to be distinguished from each other than
+the hundreds of coloured statuettes which one may find on the stalls of
+modern dealers in religious statuary.
+
+[Illustration: 046b.jpg The Lady Taksuhit]
+
+     From a bronze in the Museum at Athens
+
+[Illustration: 046b.jpg-text]
+
+Here and there among the multitude we may light upon examples showing
+a marked individuality: the statuette of the lady Takushit, which now
+forms one of the ornaments of the museum at Athens, is an instance. She
+stands erect, one foot in advance, her right arm hanging at her side,
+her left pressed against her bosom; she is arrayed in a short dress
+embroidered over with religious scenes, and wears upon her ankles
+and wrists rings of value. A wig with stiff-looking locks, regularly
+arranged in rows, covers her head. The details of the drapery and the
+ornaments are incised on the surface of the bronze, and heightened
+with a thread of silver. The face is evidently a portrait, and is that
+apparently of a woman of mature age, but the body, according to the
+tradition of the Egyptian schools of art, is that of a young girl,
+lithe, firm, and elastic. The alloy contains gold, and the warm and
+softened lights reflected from it blend most happily and harmoniously
+with the white lines of the designs. The joiners occupied, after the
+workers in bronze, an important position in relation to the necropolis,
+and the greater part of the furniture which they executed for the
+mummies of persons of high rank was remarkable for its painting and
+carpentry-work. Some articles of their manufacture were intended for
+religious use--such as those shrines, mounted upon sledges, on which the
+image of the god was placed, to whom prayers were made for the deceased;
+others served for the household needs of the mummy, and, to distinguish
+these, there are to be seen upon their sides religious and funereal
+pictures, offerings to the two deceased parents, sacrifices to a god or
+goddess, and incidents in the Osirian life. The funerary beds consisted,
+like those intended for the living, of a rectangular framework, placed
+upon four feet of equal height, although there are rare examples in
+which the supports are so arranged as to give a gentle slope to the
+structure. The fancy which actuated the joiner in making such beds
+supposed that two benevolent lions had, of their own free will,
+stretched out their bodies to form the two sides of the couch, the
+muzzles constituting the pillow, while the tails were curled up under
+the feet of the sleeper. Many of the heads given to the lions are so
+noble and expressive, that they will well bear comparison with the
+granite statues of these animals which Amenothes III. dedicated in his
+temple at Soleb. The other trades depended upon the proportion of their
+members to the rest of the community for the estimation in which they
+were held. The masons, stone-cutters, and common labourers furnished
+the most important contingent; among these ought also to be reckoned
+the royal servants--of whose functions we should have been at a loss
+to guess the importance, if contemporary documents had not made it
+clear--fishermen, hunters, laundresses, wood-cutters, gardeners, and
+water-carriers.*
+
+     * The Cailliaud ostracon, which contains a receipt given to
+     some fishermen, was found near Sheikh Abd el-Qurneh, and
+     consequently belonged to the fishermen of the necropolis.
+     There is a question as to the water-carriers of the Khiru in
+     the hieratic registers of Turin, also as to the washers of
+     clothes, wood-cutters, gardeners and workers in the
+     vineyard.
+
+[Illustration: 048.jpg THE SWALLOW-GODDESS FROM THE THEBAN NECROPOLIS]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Lanzone.
+
+Without reckoning the constant libations needed for the gods and the
+deceased, the workshops required a large quantity of drinking water for
+the men engaged in them. In every gang of workmen, even in the present
+day, two or three men are set apart to provide drinking-water for the
+rest; in some arid places, indeed, at a distance from the river, such
+as the Valley of the Kings, as many water-carriers are required as there
+are workmen. To the trades just mentioned must be added the low-caste
+crowd depending oh the burials of the rich, the acrobats, female
+mourners, dancers and musicians. The majority of the female corporations
+were distinguished by the infamous character of their manners, and
+prostitution among them had come to be associated with the service of
+the god.*
+
+     * The heroine of the erotic papyrus of Turin bears the title
+     of "Singing-woman of Amon," and the illustrations indicate
+     her profession so clearly and so expressively, that no
+     details of her sayings and doings are wanting.
+
+[Illustration: 049.jpg THE GODDESS MABITSAKBO]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Lanzone.
+
+There was no education for all this mass of people, and their religion
+was of a meagre character. They worshipped the official deities, Amon,
+Mut, Isis, and Hathor, and such deceased Pharaohs as Amenothes I.
+and Nofritari, but they had also their own Pantheon, in which animals
+predominated--such as the goose of Amon, and his ram Pa-rahaninofir,
+the good player on the horn, the hippopotamus, the cat, the chicken,
+the swallow, and especially reptiles. Death was personified by a great
+viper, the queen of the West, known by the name Maritsakro, the friend
+of silence. Three heads, or the single head of a woman, attached to the
+one body, were assigned to it. It was supposed to dwell in the mountain
+opposite Karnak, which fact gave to it, as well as to the necropolis
+itself, the two epithets of Khafitnibus and Ta-tahnit, that is, The
+Summit.*
+
+     * The abundance of the monuments of Maritsakro found at
+     Sheikh Abd el-Gurneh, inclines me to believe that her
+     sanctuary was situated in the neighbourhood of the temple of
+     Uazmosu, but there was also on the top of the hill another
+     sanctuary which would equally satisfy the name Ta-tahnit.
+
+Its chapel was situated at the foot of the hill of Sheikh Abd el-Qurneh,
+but its sacred serpents crawled and wriggled through the necropolis,
+working miracles and effecting the cure of the most dangerous maladies.
+The faithful were accustomed to dedicate to them, in payment of their
+vows, stelas, or slabs of roughly hewn stone, with inscriptions
+which witnessed to a deep gratitude. "Hearken! I, from the time of my
+appearance on earth, I was a 'Servant of the True Place,' Nofirabu, a
+stupid ignorant person, who knew not good from evil, and I committed
+sin against The Summit. She punished me, and I was in her hand day and
+night. I lay groaning on my couch like a woman in childbed, and I made
+supplication to the air, but it did not come to me, for I was hunted
+down by The Summit of the West, the brave one among all the gods and all
+the goddesses of the city; so I would say to all the miserable sinners
+among the people of the necropolis: 'Give heed to The Summit, for there
+is a lion in The Summit, and she strikes as strikes a spell-casting
+Lion, and she pursues him who sins against her! 'I invoked then my
+mistress, and I felt that she flew to me like a pleasant breeze;
+she placed herself upon me, and this made me recognise her hand, and
+appeased she returned to me, and she delivered me from suffering, for
+she is my life, The Summit of the West, when she is appeased, and she
+ought to be invoked!'" There were many sinners, we may believe, among
+that ignorant and superstitious population, but the governors of Thebes
+did not put their confidence in the local deities alone to keep them
+within bounds, and to prevent their evil deeds; commissioners, with the
+help of a detachment of Mazaiu, were an additional means of conducting
+them into the right way. They had, in this respect, a hard work to
+accomplish, for every day brought with it its contingent of crimes,
+which they had to follow up, and secure the punishment of the authors.
+Nsisuamon came to inform them that the workman Nakhtummaut and his
+companions had stolen into his house, and robbed him of three large
+loaves, eight cakes, and some pastry; they had also drunk a jar of beer,
+and poured out from pure malice the oil which they could not carry
+away with them. Panibi had met the wife of a comrade alone near an
+out-of-the-way tomb, and had taken advantage of her notwithstanding her
+cries; this, moreover, was not the first offence of the culprit, for
+several young girls had previously been victims of his brutality, and
+had not ventured up to this time to complain of him on account of the
+terror with which he inspired the neighbourhood. Crimes against the dead
+were always common; every penniless fellow knew what quantities of gold
+and jewels had been entombed with the departed, and these treasures,
+scattered around them at only a few feet from the surface of the ground,
+presented to them a constant temptation to which they often succumbed.
+Some were not disposed to have accomplices, while others associated
+together, and, having purchased at a serious cost the connivance of the
+custodians, set boldly to work on tombs both recent and ancient. Not
+content with stealing the funerary furniture, which they disposed of to
+the undertakers, they stripped the mummies also, and smashed the
+bodies in their efforts to secure the jewels; then, putting the remains
+together again, they rearranged the mummies afresh so cleverly that
+they can no longer be distinguished by their outward appearance from the
+originals, and the first wrappings must be removed before the fraud can
+be discovered. From time to time one of these rogues would allow himself
+to be taken for the purpose of denouncing his comrades, and avenging
+himself for the injustice of which he was the victim in the division
+of the spoil; he was laid hold of by the Mazaiu, and brought before the
+tribunal of justice. The lands situated on the left bank of the
+Nile belonged partly to the king and partly to the god Amon, and any
+infraction of the law in regard to the necropolis was almost certain
+to come within the jurisdiction of one or other of them. The commission
+appointed, therefore, to determine the damage done in any case, included
+in many instances the high priest or his delegates, as well as the
+officers of the Pharaoh. The office of this commission was to examine
+into the state of the tombs, to interrogate the witnesses and the
+accused, applying the torture if necessary: when they had got at the
+facts, the tribunal of the notables condemned to impalement some half
+a dozen of the poor wretches, and caused some score of others to be
+whipped.* But, when two or three months had elapsed, the remembrance of
+the punishment began to die away, and the depredations began afresh. The
+low rate of wages occasioned, at fixed periods, outbursts of discontent
+and trouble which ended in actual disturbances. The rations allowed to
+each workman, and given to him at the beginning of each month, would
+possibly have been sufficient for himself and his family, but, owing to
+the usual lack of foresight in the Egyptian, they were often consumed
+long before the time fixed, and the pinch soon began to be felt. The
+workmen, demoralised by their involuntary abstinence, were not slow to
+turn to the overseer; "We are perishing of hunger, and there are still
+eighteen days before the next month." The latter was prodigal of fair
+speeches, but as his words were rarely accompanied by deeds, the
+workmen would not listen to him; they stopped work, left the workshop in
+turbulent crowds, ran with noisy demonstrations to some public place to
+hold a meeting--perhaps the nearest monument, at the gate of the temple
+of Thutmosis III.,** behind the chapel of Minephtah,*** or in the court
+of that of Seti I.
+
+     * This is how I translate a fairly common expression, which
+     means literally, "to be put on the wood." Spiegelberg sees in
+     this only a method of administering torture.
+
+     ** Perhaps the chapel of Uazmosu, or possibly the free space
+     before the temple of Deir el-Bahari.
+
+     *** The site of this chapel was discovered by Prof. Petrie
+     in the spring of 1896. It had previously been supposed to be
+     a temple of Amenothes III.
+
+Their overseers followed them; the police commissioners of the locality,
+the Mazaiu, and the scribes mingled with them and addressed themselves
+to some of the leaders with whom they might be acquainted. But these
+would not at first give them a hearing. "We will not return," they would
+say to the peacemakers; "make it clear to your superiors down below
+there." It must have been manifest that from their point of view their
+complaints were well founded, and the official, who afterwards gave an
+account of the affair to the authorities, was persuaded of this. "We
+went to hear them, and they spoke true words to us." For the most part
+these strikes had no other consequence than a prolonged stoppage of
+work, until the distribution of rations at the beginning of the next
+month gave the malcontents courage to return to their tasks. Attempts
+were made to prevent the recurrence of these troubles by changing
+the method and time of payments. These were reduced to an interval of
+fifteen days, and at length, indeed, to one of eight. The result was
+very much the same as before: the workman, paid more frequently, did not
+on that account become more prudent, and the hours of labour lost did
+not decrease. The individual man, if he had had nobody to consider but
+himself, might have put up with the hardships of his situation, but
+there were almost always wife and children or sisters concerned, who
+clamoured for bread in their hunger, and all the while the storehouses
+of the temples or those of the state close by were filled to overflowing
+with durrah, barley, and wheat.*
+
+     * Khonsu, for example, excites his comrades to pillage the
+     storehouses of the gate.
+
+The temptation to break open the doors and to help themselves in the
+present necessity must have been keenly felt. Some bold spirits among
+the strikers, having set out together, scaled the two or three boundary
+walls by which the granaries were protected, but having reached this
+position their hearts, failed them, and they contented themselves with
+sending to the chief custodian an eloquent pleader, to lay before him
+their very humble request: "We are come, urged by famine, urged by
+thirst, having no more linen, no more oil, no more fish, no more
+vegetables. Send to Pharaoh, our master, send to the king, our lord,
+that he may provide us with the necessaries of life." If one of them,
+with less self-restraint, was so carried away as to let drop an oath,
+which was a capital offence, saying, "By Amon! by the sovereign, whose
+anger is death!" if he asked to be taken before a magistrate in order
+that he might reiterate there his complaint, the others interceded for
+him, and begged that he might escape the punishment fixed by the law
+for blasphemy; the scribe, good fellow as he was, closed his ears to the
+oath, and, if it were in his power, made a beginning of satisfying their
+demands by drawing upon the excess of past months to such an extent as
+would pacify them for some days, and by paying them a supplemental wage
+in the name of the Pharaoh. They cried out loudly: "Shall there not be
+served out to us corn in excess of that which has been distributed to
+us; if not we will not stir from this spot?"
+
+At length the end of the month arrived, and they all appeared together
+before the magistrates, when they said: "Let the scribe, Khamoisit,
+who is accountable, be sent for!" He was thereupon brought before the
+notables of the town, and they said to him: "See to the corn which thou
+hast received, and give some of it to the people of the necropolis."
+Pmontuniboisit was then sent for, and "rations of wheat were given to
+us daily." Famine was not caused only by the thriftlessness of the
+multitude: administrators of all ranks did not hesitate to appropriate,
+each one according to his position, a portion of the means entrusted
+to them for the maintenance of their subordinates, and the latter often
+received only instalments of what was due to them. The culprits often
+escaped from their difficulties by either laying hold of half a dozen
+of their brawling victims, or by yielding to them a proportion of
+their ill-gotten gains, before a rumour of the outbreak could reach
+head-quarters. It happened from time to time, however, when the
+complaints against them were either too serious or too frequent, that
+they were deprived of their functions, cited before the tribunals, and
+condemned. What took place at Thebes was repeated with some variations
+in each of the other large cities. Corruption, theft, and extortion had
+prevailed among the officials from time immemorial, and the most active
+kings alone were able to repress these abuses, or confine them within
+narrow limits; as soon as discipline became relaxed, however, they began
+to appear again, and we have no more convincing proof of the state of
+decadence into which Thebes had fallen towards the middle of the XXth
+dynasty, than the audacity of the crimes committed in the necropolis
+during the reigns of the successors of Ramses III.
+
+The priesthood of Amon alone displayed any vigour and enjoyed any
+prosperity in the general decline. After the victory of the god over the
+heretic kings no one dared to dispute his supremacy, and the Ramessides
+displayed a devout humility before him and his ministers. Henceforward
+he became united to Ra in a definite manner, and his authority not only
+extended over the whole of the land of Egypt, but over all the countries
+also which were brought within her influence; so that while Pharaoh
+continued to be the greatest of kings, Pharaoh's god held a position
+of undivided supremacy among the deities. He was the chief of the two
+Bnneads, the Heliopolitan and the Hermopolitan, and displayed for
+the latter a special affection; for the vague character of its eight
+secondary deities only served to accentuate the position of the ninth
+and principal divinity with whose primacy that of Amon was identified.
+It was more easy to attribute to Amon the entire work of creation when
+Shu, Sibu, Osiris, and Sit had been excluded--the deities whom the
+theologians of Heliopolis had been accustomed to associate with the
+demiurge; and in the hymns which they sang at his solemn festivals they
+did not hesitate to ascribe to him all the acts which the priests of
+former times had assigned to the Ennead collectively. "He made earth,
+silver, gold,--the true lapis at his good pleasure.--He brought forth
+the herbs for the cattle, the plants upon which men live.--He made to
+live the fish of the river,--the birds which hover in the air,--giving
+air to those which are in the egg.--He animates the insects,--he makes
+to live the small birds, the reptiles, and the gnats as well.--He
+provides food for the rat in his hole,--supports the bird upon the
+branch.--May he be blessed for all this, he who is alone, but with many
+hands." "Men spring from his two eyes," and quickly do they lose
+their breath while acclaiming him--Egyptians and Libyans, Negroes and
+Asiatics: "Hail to thee!" they all say; "praise to thee because thou
+dwellest amongst us!--Obeisances before thee because thou createst
+us!"--"Thou art blessed by every living thing,--thou hast worshippers in
+every place,--in the highest of the heavens, in all the breadth of
+the earth,--in the depths of the seas.--The gods bow before thy
+Majesty,--magnifying the souls which form them,--rejoicing at meeting
+those who have begotten them,--they say to thee: 'Go in peace,--father
+of the fathers of all the gods,--who suspended the heaven, levelled the
+earth;--creator of beings, maker of things,--sovereign king, chief of
+the gods,--we adore thy souls, because thou hast made us,--we lavish
+offerings upon thee, because thou hast given us birth,--we shower
+benedictions upon thee, because thou dwellest among us.'" We have here
+the same ideas as those which predominate in the hymns addressed to
+Atonu,* and in the prayers directed to Phtah, the Nile, Shu, and the
+Sun-god of Heliopolis at the same period.
+
+     * Breasted points out the decisive influence exercised by
+     the solar hymns of Amenothes IV. on the development of the
+     solar ideas contained in the hymns to Amon put forth or re-
+     edited in the XXIIIrd dynasty.
+
+The idea of a single god, lord and maker of all things, continued to
+prevail more and more throughout Egypt--not, indeed, among the lower
+classes who persisted in the worship of their genii and their animals,
+but among the royal family, the priests, the nobles, and people of
+culture. The latter believed that the Sun-god had at length absorbed
+all the various beings who had been manifested in the feudal divinities:
+these, in fact, had surrendered their original characteristics in order
+to become forms of the Sun, Amon as well as the others--and the new
+belief displayed itself in magnifying the solar deity, but the solar
+deity united with the Theban Amon, that is, Amon-Ra. The omnipotence of
+this one god did not, however, exclude a belief in the existence of his
+compeers; the theologians thought all the while that the beings to whom
+ancient generations had accorded a complete independence in respect of
+their rivals were nothing more than emanations from one supreme being.
+If local pride forced them to apply to this single deity the designation
+customarily used in their city--Phtah at Memphis, Anhuri-Shu at Thinis,
+Khnumu in the neighbourhood of the first cataract--they were quite
+willing to allow, at the same time, that these appellations were but
+various masks for one face. Phtah, Hapi, Khnumu, Ra,--all the gods, in
+fact,--were blended with each other, and formed but one deity--a unique
+existence, multiple in his names, and mighty according to the importance
+of the city in which he was worshipped. Hence Amon, lord of the capital
+and patron of the dynasty, having more partisans, enjoyed more respect,
+and, in a word, felt himself possessed of more claims to be the sole god
+of Egypt than his brethren, who could not claim so many worshippers. He
+did not at the outset arrogate to himself the same empire over the dead
+as he exercised over the living; he had delegated his functions in this
+respect to a goddess, Maritsakro, for whom the poorer inhabitants of the
+left bank entertained a persistent devotion. She was a kind of Isis or
+hospitable Hathor, whose subjects in the other world adapted themselves
+to the nebulous and dreary existence provided for their disembodied
+"doubles." The Osirian and solar doctrines were afterwards blended
+together in this local mythology, and from the XIth dynasty onwards the
+Theban nobility had adopted, along with the ceremonies in use in the
+Memphite period, the Heliopolitan beliefs concerning the wanderings
+of the soul in the west, its embarkation on the solar ship, and its
+resting-places in the fields of Ialu. The rock-tombs of the XVIIIth
+dynasty demonstrate that the Thebans had then no different concept of
+their life beyond the world from that entertained by the inhabitants
+of the most ancient cities: they ascribed to that existence the same
+inconsistent medley of contradictory ideas, from which each one might
+select what pleased him best--either repose in a well-provisioned tomb,
+or a dwelling close to Osiris in the middle of a calm and agreeable
+paradise, or voyages with Ra around the world.*
+
+     * The Pyramid texts are found for the most part in the tombs
+     of Nofiru and Harhotpu; the texts of the Book of the Dead
+     are met with on the Theban coffins of the same period.
+
+[Illustration: 060.jpg DECORATED WRAPPINGS OF A MUMMY]
+
+The fusion of Ra and Amon, and the predominance of the solar idea which
+arose from it, forced the theologians to examine more closely these
+inconsistent notions, and to eliminate from them anything which might be
+out of harmony with the new views. The devout servant of Amon, desirous
+of keeping in constant touch with his god both here and in the other
+would, could not imagine a happier future for his soul than in its going
+forth in the fulness of light by day, and taking refuge by night on
+the very bark which carried the object of his worship through the thick
+darkness of, Hades. To this end he endeavoured to collect the formulae
+which would enable him to attain to this supreme happiness, and also
+inform him concerning the hidden mysteries of that obscure half of the
+world in which the sun dwelt between daylight and daylight, teaching him
+also how to make friends and supporters of the benevolent genii, and how
+to avoid or defeat the monsters whom he would encounter. The best
+known of the books relating to these mysteries contained a geographical
+description of the future world as it was described by the Theban
+priests towards the end of the Ramesside period; it was, in fact, an
+itinerary in which was depicted each separate region of the underworld,
+with its gates, buildings, and inhabitants.*
+
+     * The monumental text of this book is found sculptured on a
+     certain number of the tombs of the Theban kings. It was
+     first translated into English by Birch, then into French by
+     Deveria, and by Maspero.
+
+The account of it given by the Egyptian theologians did not exhibit much
+inventive genius. They had started with the theory that the sun, after
+setting exactly west of Thebes, rose again due east of the city, and
+they therefore placed in the dark hemisphere all the regions of the
+universe which lay to the north of those two points of the compass. The
+first stage of the sun's journey, after disappearing below the horizon,
+coincided with the period of twilight; the orb travelled along the open
+sky, diminishing the brightness of his fires as he climbed northward,
+and did not actually enter the underworld till he reached Abydos,
+close to the spot where, at the "Mouth of the Cleft," the souls of the
+faithful awaited him. As soon as he had received them into his boat,
+he plunged into the tunnel which there pierces the mountains, and the
+cities through which he first passed between Abydos and the Fayum were
+known as the Osirian fiefs. He continued his journey through them for
+the space of two hours, receiving the homage of the inhabitants, and
+putting such of the shades on shore as were predestined by their special
+devotion for the Osiris of Abydos and his associates, Horus and Anubis,
+to establish themselves in this territory. Beyond Heracleopolis, he
+entered the domains of the Memphite gods, the "land of Sokaris," and
+this probably was the most perilous moment of his journey.
+
+[Illustration: 062.jpg ONE OF THE MYSTERIOUS BOOKS OF AMON]
+
+The feudatories of Phtah were gathered together in grottoes, connected
+by a labyrinth of narrow passages through which even the most fully
+initiated were scarcely able to find their way; the luminous boat,
+instead of venturing within these catacombs, passed above them by
+mysterious tracks. The crew were unable to catch a glimpse of the
+sovereign through whose realm they journeyed, and they in like manner
+were invisible to him; he could only hear the voices of the divine
+sailors, and he answered them from the depth of the darkness. Two hours
+were spent in this obscure passage, after which navigation became easier
+as the vessel entered the nomes subject to the Osirises of the Delta:
+four consecutive hours of sailing brought the bark from the province in
+which the four principal bodies of the god slept to that in which
+his four souls kept watch, and, as it passed, it illuminated the eight
+circles reserved for men and kings who worshipped the god of Mendes.
+From the tenth hour onwards it directed its course due south, and passed
+through the Augarit, the place of fire and abysmal waters to which the
+Heliopolitans consigned the souls of the impious; then finally quitting
+the tunnel, it soared up in the east with the first blush of dawn. Each
+of the ordinary dead was landed at that particular hour of the twelve,
+which belonged to the god of his choice or of his native town. Left to
+dwell there they suffered no absolute torment, but languished in the
+darkness in a kind of painful torpor, from which condition the approach
+of the bark alone was able to rouse them. They hailed its daily coming
+with acclamations, and felt new life during the hour in which its rays
+fell on them, breaking out into lamentations as the bark passed away and
+the light disappeared with it. The souls who were devotees of the sun
+escaped this melancholy existence; they escorted the god, reduced though
+he was to a mummied corpse, on his nightly cruise, and were piloted by
+him safe and sound to meet the first streaks of the new day. As the
+boat issued from the mountain in the morning between the two trees which
+flanked the gate of the east, these souls had their choice of several
+ways of spending the day on which they were about to enter. They might
+join their risen god in his course through the hours of light, and
+assist him in combating Apophis and his accomplices, plunging again at
+night into Hades without having even for a moment quitted his side.
+
+[Illustration: 066.jpg THE ENTRANCE TO A ROYAL TOMB]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph, by Beato, of the
+     tomb of Ramses IV.
+
+[Illustration: 066b.jpg ONE OF THE HOURS OF THE NIGHT]
+
+They might, on the other hand, leave him and once more enter the world
+of the living, settling themselves where they would, but always by
+preference in the tombs where their bodies awaited them, and where they
+could enjoy the wealth which had been accumulated there: they might walk
+within their garden, and sit beneath the trees they had planted; they
+could enjoy the open air beside the pond they had dug, and breathe the
+gentle north breeze on its banks after the midday heat, until the time
+when the returning evening obliged them to repair once more to Abydos,
+and re-embark with the god in order to pass the anxious vigils of the
+night under his protection. Thus from the earliest period of Egyptian
+history the life beyond the tomb was an eclectic one, made up of a
+series of earthly enjoyments combined together.
+
+The Pharaohs had enrolled themselves instinctively among the most ardent
+votaries of this complex doctrine. Their relationship to the sun made
+its adoption a duty, and its profession was originally, perhaps, one of
+the privileges of their position. Ra invited them on board because they
+were his children, subsequently extending this favour to those whom
+they should deem worthy to be associated with them, and thus become
+companions of the ancient deceased kings of Upper and Lower Egypt.*
+
+     * This is apparently what we gather from the picture
+     inserted in chapter xvii. of the "Book of the Dead," where
+     we see the kings of Upper and Lower Egypt guiding the divine
+     bark and the deceased with them.
+
+The idea which the Egyptians thus formed of the other world, and of the
+life of the initiated within it, reacted gradually on their concept of
+the tomb and of its befitting decoration. They began to consider the
+entrances to the pyramid, and its internal passages and chambers, as a
+conventional representation of the gates, passages, and halls of Hades
+itself; when the pyramid passed out of fashion, and they had replaced
+it by a tomb cut in the rock in one or other of the branches of the Bab
+el-Moluk valley, the plan of construction which they chose was an exact
+copy of that employed by the Memphites and earlier Thebans, and they
+hollowed out for themselves in the mountain-side a burying-place on the
+same lines as those formerly employed within the pyramidal structure.
+The relative positions of the tunnelled tombs along the valley were not
+determined by any order of rank or of succession to the throne; each
+Pharaoh after Ramses I. set to work on that part of the rock where the
+character of the stone favoured his purpose, and displayed so little
+respect for his predecessors, that the workmen, after having tunnelled
+a gallery, were often obliged to abandon it altogether, or to change the
+direction of their excavations so as to avoid piercing a neighbouring
+tomb. The architect's design was usually a mere project which could be
+modified at will, and, which he did not feel bound to carry out with
+fidelity; the actual measurements of the tomb of Ramses IV. are almost
+everywhere at variance with the numbers and arrangement of the working
+drawing of it which has been preserved to us in a papyrus. The general
+disposition of the royal tombs, however, is far from being complicated;
+we have at the entrance the rectangular door, usually surmounted by the
+sun, represented by a yellow disk, before which the sovereign kneels
+with his hands raised in the posture of adoration; this gave access to
+a passage sloping gently downwards, and broken here and there by a level
+landing and steps, leading to a first chamber of varying amplitude, at
+the further end of which a second passage opened which descended to one
+or more apartments, the last of which, contained the coffin. The oldest
+rock-tombs present some noteworthy exceptions to this plan, particularly
+those of Seti I. and Ramses III.; but from the time of Ramses IV., there
+is no difference to be remarked in them except in the degree of finish
+of the wall-paintings or in the length of the passages. The shortest of
+the latter extends some fifty-two feet into the rock, while the longest
+never exceeds three hundred and ninety feet. The same artifices
+which had been used by the pyramid-builders to defeat the designs of
+robbers--false mummy-pits, painted and sculptured walls built across
+passages, stairs concealed under a movable stone in the corner of a
+chamber--were also employed by the Theban engineers. The decoration of
+the walls was suggested, as in earlier times, by the needs of the royal
+soul, with this difference--that the Thebans set themselves to render
+visible to his eyes by paintings that which the Memphites had been
+content to present to his intelligence in writing, so that the Pharaoh
+could now see what his ancestors had been able merely to read on the
+walls of their tombs. Where the inscribed texts in the burial-chamber
+of Unas state that Unas, incarnate in the Sun, and thus representing
+Osiris, sails over the waters on high or glides into the Elysian fields,
+the sculptured or painted scenes in the interior of the Theban catacombs
+display to the eye Ramses occupying the place of the god in the solar
+bark and in the fields of laid. Where the walls of Unas bear only the
+prayers recited over the mummy for the opening of his mouth, for the
+restoration of the use of his limbs, for his clothing, perfuming, and
+nourishment, we see depicted on those of Seti I. or Ramses IV. the
+mummies of these kings and the statues of their doubles in the hands
+of the priests, who are portrayed in the performance of these various
+offices. The starry ceilings of the pyramids reproduce the aspect of the
+sky, but without giving the names of the stars: on the ceilings of some
+of the Ramesside rock-tombs, on the other hand, the constellations are
+represented, each with its proper figure, while astronomical tables give
+the position of the heavenly bodies at intervals of fifteen days, so
+that the soul could tell at a glance into what region of the firmament
+the course of the bark would bring him each night. In the earlier
+Ramesside tombs, under Seti I. and Ramses II., the execution of these
+subjects shows evidence of a care and skill which are quite marvellous,
+and both figures and hieroglyphics betray the hand of accomplished
+artists. But in the tomb of Ramses III. the work has already begun to
+show signs of inferiority, and the majority of the scenes are coloured
+in a very summary fashion; a raw yellow predominates, and the tones of
+the reds and blues remind us of a child's first efforts at painting.
+This decline is even more marked under the succeeding Ramessides; the
+drawing has deteriorated, the tints have become more and more crude,
+and the latest paintings seem but a lamentable caricature of the earlier
+ones.
+
+The courtiers and all those connected with the worship of
+Amon-Ra--priests, prophets, singers, and functionaries connected with
+the necropolis--shared the same belief with regard to the future world
+as their sovereign, and they carried their faith in the sun's power
+to the point of identifying themselves with him after death, and of
+substituting the name of Ra for that of Osiris; they either did not
+venture, however, to go further than this, or were unable to introduce
+into their tombs all that we find in the Bab el-Moluk. They confined
+themselves to writing briefly on their own coffins, or confiding to
+the mummies of their fellow-believers, in addition to the "Book of the
+Dead," a copy of the "Book of knowing what there is in Hades," or of
+some other mystic writing which was in harmony with their creed. Hastily
+prepared copies of these were sold by unscrupulous scribes, often badly
+written and almost always incomplete, in which were hurriedly set
+down haphazard the episodes of the course of the sun with explanatory
+illustrations. The representations of the gods in them are but little
+better than caricatures, the text is full of faults and scarcely
+decipherable, and it is at times difficult to recognize the
+correspondence of the scenes and prayers with those in the royal tombs.
+Although Amon had become the supreme god, at least for this class of
+the initiated, he was by no means the sole deity worshipped by the
+Egyptians: the other divinities previously associated with him still
+held their own beside him, or were further defined and invested with
+a more decided personality. The goddess regarded as his partner was at
+first represented as childless, in spite of the name of Maut or Mut--the
+mother--by which she was invoked, and Amon was supposed to have adopted
+Montu, the god of Hermonthis, in order to complete his triad. Montu,
+however, formerly the sovereign of the Theban plain, and lord over Amon
+himself, was of too exalted a rank to play the inferior part of a divine
+son.
+
+[Illustration: 074.jpg KHONSU* AND TEMPLE OF KHONSU**.]
+
+     * Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a bronze statuette in the
+     Gizeh Museum.
+
+     ** Drawn by Thuillier: A is the pylon, B the court, C the
+     hypostyle hall, E the passage isolating the sanctuary, D the
+     sanctuary, F the opisthodomos with its usual chambers.
+
+The priests were, therefore, obliged to fall back upon a personage
+of lesser importance, named Khonsu, who up to that period had been
+relegated to an obscure position in the celestial hierarchy. How they
+came to identify him with the moon, and subsequently with Osiris and
+Thot, is as yet unexplained,* but the assimilation had taken place
+before the XIXth dynasty drew to its close. Khonsu, thus honoured, soon
+became a favourite deity with both the people and the upper classes,
+at first merely supplementing Montu, but finally supplanting him in the
+third place of the Triad. From the time of Sesostris onwards, Theban
+dogma acknowledged him alone side by side with Amon-Ra and Mut the
+divine mother.
+
+     * It is possible that this assimilation originated in the
+     fact that Khonsu is derived from the verb "khonsu," to
+     navigate: Khonsu would thus have been he who crossed the
+     heavens in his bark--that is, the moon-god.
+
+[Illustration: 075.jpg THE TEMPLE OF KHONSU AT KARNAK]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Beato.
+
+It was now incumbent on the Pharaoh to erect to this newly made
+favourite a temple whose size and magnificence should be worthy of the
+rank to which his votaries had exalted him. To this end, Ramses III.
+chose a suitable site to the south of the hypostyle hall of Karnak,
+close to a corner of the enclosing wall, and there laid the foundations
+of a temple which his successors took nearly a century to finish.*
+
+     * The proof that the temple was founded by Ramses III. is
+     furnished by the inscriptions of the sanctuary and the
+     surrounding chambers.
+
+Its proportions are by no means perfect, the sculpture is wanting in
+refinement, the painting is coarse, and the masonry was so faulty, that
+it was found necessary in several places to cover it with a coat of
+stucco before the bas-reliefs could be carved on the walls; yet, in
+spite of all this, its general arrangement is so fine, that it may
+well be regarded, in preference to other more graceful or magnificent
+buildings, as the typical temple of the Theban period. It is divided
+into two parts, separated from each other by a solid wall. In the centre
+of the smaller of these is placed the Holy of Holies, which opens
+at both ends into a passage ten feet in width, isolating it from the
+surrounding buildings. To the right and left of the sanctuary are dark
+chambers, and behind it is a hall supported by four columns, into which
+open seven small apartments. This formed the dwelling-place of the god
+and his compeers. The sanctuary communicates, by means of two doors
+placed in the southern wall, with a hypostyle hall of greater width
+than depth, divided by its pillars into a nave and two aisles. The
+four columns of the nave are twenty-three feet in height, and have
+bell-shaped capitals, while those of the aisles, two on either side, are
+eighteen feet high, and are crowned with lotiform capitals.
+
+[Illustration: 077.jpg THE COURT OF THE TEMPLE OF KHONSU]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Beato.
+
+The roof of the nave was thus five feet higher than those of the aisles,
+and in the clear storey thus formed, stone gratings, similar to those
+in the temple of Amon, admitted light to the building. The courtyard,
+surrounded by a fine colonnade of two rows of columns, was square, and
+was entered by four side posterns in addition to the open gateway at the
+end placed between two quadrangular towers.
+
+[Illustration: 078.jpg THE COLONNADE BUILT BY THUTMOSIS III]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Insinger and
+     Daniel Heron.
+
+This pylon measures 104 feet in length, and is 32 feet 6 inches wide,
+by 58 feet high. It contains no internal chambers, but merely a narrow
+staircase which leads to the top of the doorway, and thence to the
+summit of the towers. Four long angular grooves run up the facade of the
+towers to a height of about twenty feet from the ground, and are in
+the same line with a similar number of square holes which pierce the
+thickness of the building higher up. In these grooves were placed
+Venetian masts, made of poles spliced together and held in their place
+by means of hooks and wooden stays which projected from the four holes;
+these masts were to carry at their tops pennons of various colours.
+Such was the temple of Khonsu, and the majority of the great Theban
+buildings--at Luxor, Qurneh, and Bamesseum, or Medinet-Uabu--were
+constructed on similar lines. Even in their half-ruined condition there
+is something oppressive and uncanny in their appearance. The gods
+loved to shroud themselves in mystery, and, therefore, the plan of
+the building was so arranged as to render the transition almost
+imperceptible from the blinding sunlight outside to the darkness of
+their retreat within. In the courtyard, we are still surrounded by vast
+spaces to which air and light have free access. The hypostyle hall,
+however, is pervaded by an appropriate twilight, the sanctuary is veiled
+in still deeper darkness, while in the chambers beyond reigns an almost
+perpetual night. The effect produced by this gradation of obscurity
+was intensified by constructional artifices. The different parts of the
+building are not all on the same ground-level, the pavement rising as
+the sanctuary is approached, and the rise is concealed by a few steps
+placed at intervals. The difference of level in the temple of Khonsu is
+not more than five feet three inches, but it is combined with a still
+more considerable lowering of the height of the roof. From the pylon
+to the wall at the further end the height decreases as we go on; the
+peristyle is more lofty than the hypostyle hall, this again is higher
+than the sanctuary and the hall of columns, and the chamber beyond it
+drops still further in altitude.*
+
+     * This is "the law of progressive diminution of heights" of
+     Perrot-Chipiez.
+
+Karnak is an exception to this rule; this temple had in the course of
+centuries undergone so many restorations and additions, that it formed a
+collection of buildings rather than a single edifice. It might have
+been regarded, as early as the close of the Theban empire, as a kind of
+museum, in which every century and every period of art, from the XIIth
+dynasty downwards, had left its distinctive mark.*
+
+     * A on the plan denotes the XIIth dynasty temple; B is the
+     great hypostyle hall of Seti I. and Ramses II.; C the temple
+     of Ramses III.
+
+[Illustration: 081.jpg THE TEMPLE OF AMON AT KARNAK]
+
+All the resources of architecture had been brought into requisition
+during this period to vary, at the will of each sovereign, the
+arrangement and the general effect of the component parts. Columns with
+sixteen sides stand in the vicinity of square pillars, and lotiform
+capitals alternate with those of the bell-shape; attempts were even made
+to introduce new types altogether. The architect who built at the back
+of the sanctuary what is now known as the colonnade of Thutmosis
+III., attempted to invert the bell-shaped capital; the bell was turned
+downwards, and the neck attached to the plinth, while the mouth rested
+on the top of the shaft. This awkward arrangement did not meet with
+favour, for we find it nowhere repeated; other artists, however, with
+better taste, sought at this time to apply the flowers symbolical of
+Upper and Lower Egypt to the decorations of the shafts. In front of the
+sanctuary of Karnak two pillars are still standing which have on them
+in relief representations respectively of the fullblown lotus and the
+papyrus. A building composed of so many incongruous elements required
+frequent restoration--a wall which had been undermined by water needed
+strengthening, a pylon displaying cracks claimed attention, some
+unsafe colonnade, or a colossus which had been injured by the fall of
+a cornice, required shoring up--so that no sooner had the corvee for
+repairs completed their work in one part, than they had to begin again
+elsewhere.
+
+[Illustration: 082.jpg THE TWO STELE-PILLARS AT KARNAK]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Beato.
+
+The revenues of Amon must, indeed, have been enormous to have borne the
+continual drain occasioned by restoration, and the resources of the god
+would soon have been exhausted had not foreign wars continued to furnish
+him during several centuries with all or more than he needed.
+
+The gods had suffered severely in the troublous times which had followed
+the reign of Seti II., and it required all the generosity of Ramses III.
+to compensate them for the losses they had sustained during the anarchy
+under Arisu. The spoil taken from the Libyans, from the Peoples of the
+Sea, and from the Hittites had flowed into the sacred treasuries, while
+the able administration of the sovereign had done the rest, so that on
+the accession of Ramses IV. the temples were in a more prosperous state
+than ever.* They held as their own property 169 towns, nine of which
+were in Syria and Ethiopia; they possessed 113,433 slaves of both sexes,
+493,386 head of cattle, 1,071,780 arurse of land, 514 vineyards and
+orchards, 88 barks and sea-going vessels, 336 kilograms of gold both in
+ingots and wrought, 2,993,964 grammes of silver, besides quantities of
+copper and precious stones, and hundreds of storehouses in which they
+kept corn, oil, wine, honey, and preserved meats--the produce of their
+domains. Two examples will suffice to show the extent of this latter
+item: the live geese reached the number of 680,714, and the salt or
+smoked fish that of 494,800.** Amon claimed the giant share of this
+enormous total, and three-fourths of it or more were reserved for his
+use, namely---86,486 slaves, 421,362 head of cattle, 898,168 _arurse_
+of cornland, 433 vineyards and orchards, and 56 Egyptian towns. The nine
+foreign towns all belonged to him, and one of them contained the temple
+in which he was worshipped by the Syrians whenever they came to pay
+their tribute to the king's representatives: it was but just that his
+patrimony should surpass that of his compeers, since the conquering
+Pharaohs owed their success to him, who, without the co-operation of the
+other feudal deities, had lavished victories upon them.
+
+     * The donations of Ramses III., or rather the total of the
+     donations made to the gods by the predecessors of that
+     Pharaoh, and confirmed and augmented by him, are enumerated
+     at length in the _Great Harris Papyrus_.
+
+     ** An abridgement of these donations occupies seven large
+     plates in the _Great Harris Papyrus_.
+
+His domain was at least five times more considerable than that of Ra of
+Heliopolis, and ten times greater than that of the Memphite Phtah, and
+yet of old, in the earlier times of history, Ra and Phtah were reckoned
+the wealthiest of the Egyptian gods. It is easy to understand the
+influence which a god thus endowed with the goods of this world
+exercised over men in an age when the national wars had the same
+consequences for the immortals as for their worshippers, and when the
+defeat of a people was regarded as a proof of the inferiority of
+its patron gods. The most victorious divinity became necessarily the
+wealthiest, before whom all other deities bowed, and whom they, as well
+as their subjects, were obliged to serve.
+
+So powerful a god as Amon had but few obstacles to surmount before
+becoming the national deity; indeed, he was practically the foremost of
+the gods during the Ramesside period, and was generally acknowledged
+as Egypt's representative by all foreign nations.* His priests shared in
+the prestige he enjoyed, and their influence in state affairs increased
+proportionately with his power.
+
+     * From the XVIIIth dynasty, at least, the first prophet of
+     Amon had taken the precedence of the high priests of
+     Heliopolis and Memphis, as is proved by the position he
+     occupies in the Egyptian hierarchy in the _Hood Papyrus_.
+
+The chief of their hierarchy, however, did not bear the high titles
+which in ancient times distinguished those of Memphis and Heliopolis; he
+was content with the humble appellation of first prophet of Amon. He
+had for several generations been nominated by the sovereign, but he was
+generally chosen from the families attached hereditarily or otherwise
+to the temple of Karnak, and must previously have passed through every
+grade of the priestly hierarchy. Those who aspired to this honour had to
+graduate as "divine fathers;" this was the first step in the initiation,
+and one at which many were content to remain, but the more ambitious or
+favoured advanced by successive stages to the dignity of third, and then
+of second, prophet before attaining to the highest rank.*
+
+     * What we know on this subject has been brought to light
+     mainly by the inscriptions on the statue of Baukuni-Khonsu
+     at Munich, published and commented on by Deveria, and by
+     Lauth. The cursus honorum of Rama shows us that he was first
+     third, then second prophet of Amon, before being raised to
+     the pontificate in the reign of Minephtah.
+
+The Pharaohs of the XIXth dynasty jealously supervised the promotions
+made in the Theban temples, and saw that none was elected except him who
+was devoted to their interests--such as, for example, Baukuni-khonsu
+and Unnofri under Ramses II. Baukuni-khonsu distinguished himself by his
+administrative qualities; if he did not actually make the plans for the
+hypostyle hall at Karnak, he appears at least to have superintended
+its execution and decoration. He finished the great pylon, erected the
+obelisks and gateways, built the _bari_ or vessel of the god, and found
+a further field for his activity on the opposite bank of the Nile, where
+he helped to complete both the chapel at Qurneh and also the Ramesseum.
+Ramses II. had always been able to make his authority felt by the high
+priests who succeeded Baukuni-khonsu, but the Pharaohs who followed him
+did not hold the reins with such a strong hand. As early as the reigns
+of Minephtah and Seti II. the first prophets, Rai and Rama, claimed the
+right of building at Karnak for their own purposes, and inscribed on the
+walls long inscriptions in which their own panegyrics took precedence
+of that of the sovereign; they even aspired to a religious hegemony, and
+declared themselves to be the "chief of all the prophets of the gods
+of the South and North." We do not know what became of them during the
+usurpation of Arisu, but Nakhtu-ramses, son of Miribastit, who filled
+the office during the reign of Ramses III., revived these ambitious
+projects as soon as the state of Egypt appeared to favour them. The
+king, however pious he might be, was not inclined to yield up any of his
+authority, even though it were to the earthly delegate of the divinity
+whom he reverenced before all others; the sons of the Pharaoh were,
+however, more accommodating, and Nakhtu-ramses played his part so well
+that he succeeded in obtaining from them the reversion of the high
+priesthood for his son Amenothes. The priestly office, from having been
+elective, was by this stroke suddenly made hereditary in the family.
+The kings preserved, it is true, the privilege of confirming the new
+appointment, and the nominee was not considered properly qualified until
+he had received his investiture from the sovereign.*
+
+     * This is proved by the Maunier stele, now in the Louvre; it
+     is there related how the high priest Manakh-pirri received
+     his investiture from the Tanite king.
+
+Practically the Pharaohs lost the power of choosing one among the sons
+of the deceased pontiff; they were forced to enthrone the eldest of his
+survivors, and legalise his accession by their approbation, even when
+they would have preferred another. It was thus that a dynasty of vassal
+High Priests came to be established at Thebes side by side with the
+royal dynasty of the Pharaohs.
+
+The new priestly dynasty was not long in making its power felt in
+Thebes. Nakhtu-ramses and Amenothes lived to a great age--from the reign
+of Ramses III. to that of Ramses X., at the least; they witnessed the
+accession of nine successive Pharaohs, and the unusual length of their
+pontificates no doubt increased the already extraordinary prestige which
+they enjoyed throughout the length and breadth of Egypt. It seemed as if
+the god delighted to prolong the lives of his representatives beyond the
+ordinary limits, while shortening those of the temporal sovereigns. When
+the reigns of the Pharaohs began once more to reach their normal length,
+the authority of Amenothes had become so firmly established that no
+human power could withstand it, and the later Ramessides were merely a
+set of puppet kings who were ruled by him and his successors. Not only
+was there a cessation of foreign expeditions, but the Delta, Memphis,
+and Ethiopia were alike neglected, and the only activity displayed
+by these Pharaohs, as far as we can gather from their monuments, was
+confined to the service of Amon and Khonsu at Thebes. The lack of energy
+and independence in these sovereigns may not, however, be altogether
+attributable to their feebleness of character; it is possible that they
+would gladly have entered on a career of conquest had they possessed
+the means. It is always a perilous matter to allow the resources of
+a country to fall into the hands of a priesthood, and to place its
+military forces at the same time in the hands of the chief religious
+authority. The warrior Pharaohs had always had at their disposal the
+spoils obtained from foreign nations to make up the deficit which their
+constant gifts to the temples were making in the treasury. The sons
+of Ramses III., on the other hand, had suspended all military efforts,
+without, however, lessening their lavish gifts to the gods, and they
+must, in the absence of the spoils of war, have drawn to a considerable
+extent upon the ordinary resources of the country; their successors
+therefore found the treasury impoverished, and they would have been
+entirely at a loss for money had they attempted to renew the campaigns
+or continue the architectural work of their forefathers. The priests of
+Amon had not as yet suffered materially from this diminution of revenue,
+for they possessed property throughout the length and breadth of Egypt,
+but they were obliged to restrict their expenditure, and employ the sums
+formerly used for the enlarging of the temples on the maintenance
+of their own body. Meanwhile public works had been almost everywhere
+suspended; administrative discipline became relaxed, and disturbances,
+with which the police were unable to cope, were increasing in all the
+important towns. Nothing is more indicative of the state to which Egypt
+was reduced, under the combined influence of the priesthood and the
+Ramessides, than the thefts and pillaging of which the Theban necropolis
+was then the daily scene. The robbers no longer confined themselves
+to plundering the tombs of private persons; they attacked the royal
+burying-places, and their depredations were carried on for years before
+they were discovered. In the reign of Ramses IX., an inquiry, set on
+foot by Amenothes, revealed the fact that the tomb of Sovkumsauf I. and
+his wife, Queen Nubk-has, had been rifled, that those of Amenothes I.
+and of Antuf IV. had been entered by tunnelling, and that some dozen
+other royal tombs in the cemetery of Drah abu'l Neggah were threatened.*
+
+     * The principal part of this inquiry constitutes the _Abbott
+     Papyrus_, acquired and published by the British Museum,
+     first examined and made the subject of study by Birch,
+     translated simultaneously into French by Maspero and by
+     Chabas, into German by Lauth and by Erman. Other papyri
+     relate to the same or similar occurrences, such as the Salt
+     and Amherst Papyri published by Chabas, and also the
+     Liverpool Papyri, of which we possess merely scattered
+     notices in the writings of Goodwin, and particularly in
+     those of Spiegelberg.
+
+The severe means taken to suppress the evil were not, however,
+successful; the pillagings soon began afresh, and the reigns of the last
+three Ramessides between the robbers and the authorities, were marked by
+a struggle in which the latter did not always come off triumphant.
+
+[Illustration: 089.jpg RAMSES IX.]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from Lepsius.
+
+A system of repeated inspections secured the valley of Biban el-Moluk
+from marauders,* but elsewhere the measures of defence employed were
+unavailing, and the necropolis was given over to pillage, although both
+Amenothes and Hrihor had used every effort to protect it.
+
+     * Graffiti which are evidences of these inspections have
+     been drawn on the walls of several royal tombs by the
+     inspectors. Others have been found on several of the coffins
+     discovered at Deir el-Bahari, e.g. on those of Seti I. and
+     Ramses II.; the most ancient belong to the pontificate of
+     Hrihor, others belong to the XXIst dynasty.
+
+Hrihor appears to have succeeded immediately after Amenothes, and
+his accession to the pontificate gave his family a still more exalted
+position in the country. As his wife Nozmit was of royal blood, he
+assumed titles and functions to which his father and grandfather
+had made no claim. He became the "Royal Son" of Ethiopia and
+commander-in-chief of the national and foreign troops; he engraved his
+name upon the monuments he decorated, side by side with that of Ramses
+XII.; in short, he possessed all the characteristics of a Pharaoh except
+the crown and the royal protocol. A century scarcely had elapsed since
+the abdication of Ramses III., and now Thebes and the whole of Egypt
+owned two masters: one the embodiment of the ancient line, but a mere
+nominal king; the other the representative of Amon, and the actual ruler
+of the country.
+
+What then happened when the last Ramses who bore the kingly title was
+gathered to his fathers? The royal lists record the accession after his
+death of a new dynasty of Tanitic origin, whose founder was Nsbindidi
+or Smendes; but, on the other hand, we gather from the Theban monuments
+that the crown was seized by Hrihor, who reigned over the southern
+provinces contemporaneously with Smendes. Hrihor boldly assumed as
+prenomen his title of "First Prophet of Amon," and his authority was
+acknowledged by Ethiopia, over which he was viceroy, as well as by the
+nomes forming the temporal domain of the high priests. The latter had
+acquired gradually, either by marriage or inheritance, fresh territory
+for the god, in the lands of the princes of Nekhabit, Kop-tos, Akhmim,
+and Abydos, besides the domains of some half-dozen feudal houses
+who, from force of circumstances, had become sacerdotal families; the
+extinction of the direct line of Ramessides now secured the High
+Priests the possession of Thebes itself, and of all the lands within the
+southern provinces which were the appanage of the crown.
+
+[Illustration: 091.jpg HRIHOR]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from Champollion.
+
+They thus, in one way or another, became the exclusive masters of the
+southern half of the Nile valley, from Elephantine to Siut; beyond Siut
+also they had managed to acquire suzerainty over the town of Khobit, and
+the territory belonging to it formed an isolated border province in the
+midst of the independent baronies.*
+
+     * The extent of the principality of Thebes under the high
+     priests has been determined by means of the sacerdotal
+     titles of the Theban princesses.
+
+The representative of the dynasty reigning at Tanis held the remainder
+of Egypt from Shit to the Mediterranean--the half belonging to the
+Memphite Phtah and the Helio-politan Ra, as opposed to that assigned to
+Anion. The origin of this Tanite sovereign is uncertain, but it would
+appear that he was of more exalted rank than his rival in the south. The
+official chronicling of events was marked by the years of his reign, and
+the chief acts of the government were carried out in his name even in
+the Thebaid.* Repeated inundations had caused the ruin of part of the
+temple of Karnak, and it was by the order and under the auspices of this
+prince that all the resources of the country were employed to accomplish
+the much-needed restoration.**
+
+     * I have pointed out that the years of the reign mentioned
+     in the inscriptions of the high priests and the kings of the
+     sacerdotal line must be attributed to their suzerains, the
+     kings of Tanis. Hrihor alone seems to have been an
+     exception, since to him are attributed the dates inscribed
+     in the name of the King Siamon: M. Daressy, however, will
+     not admit this, and asserts that this Siamon was a Tanite
+     sovereign who must not be identified with Hrihor, and must
+     be placed at least two or three generations later than the
+     last of the Ramessides.
+
+     * The real name Nsbindidi and the first monument of the
+     Manethonian Smendes were discovered in the quarries of
+     Dababieh, opposite Gebelen.
+
+
+It would have been impossible for him to have exercised any authority
+over so rich and powerful a personage as Hrihor had he not possessed
+rights to the crown, before which even the high priests of Amon were
+obliged to bow, and hence it has been supposed that he was a descendant
+of Ramses II. The descendants of this sovereign were doubtless divided
+into at least two branches, one of which had just become extinct,
+leaving no nearer heir than Hrihor, while another, of which there were
+many ramifications, had settled in the Delta. The majority of these
+descendants had become mingled with the general population, and had sunk
+to the condition of private individuals; they had, however, carefully
+preserved the tradition of their origin, and added proudly to their name
+the qualification of royal son of Ramses. They were degenerate scions
+of the Ramessides, and had neither the features nor the energy of their
+ancestor. One of them, Zodphta-haufonkhi, whose mummy was found at Deir
+el-Bahari, appears to have been tall and vigorous, but the head lacks
+the haughty refinement which characterizes those of Seti I. and Ramses
+II., and the features are heavy and coarse, having a vulgar, commonplace
+expression.
+
+[Illustration: 093.jpg ZODPHTAHAUFONKHI, ROYAL SON OF RAMSES]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from the photograph by Insinger.
+
+It seems probable that one branch of the family, endowed with greater
+capability than the rest, was settled at Tanis, where Sesostris had,
+as we have seen, resided for many years; Smendes was the first of this
+branch to ascend the throne. The remembrance of his remote ancestor,
+Ramses IL, which was still treasured up in the city he had completely
+rebuilt, as well as in the Delta into which he had infused new life, was
+doubtless of no small service in securing the crown for his descendant,
+when, the line of the Theban kings having come to an end, the Tanites
+put in their claim to the succession. We are unable to discover if
+war broke out between the two competitors, or if they arrived at an
+agreement without a struggle; but, at all events, we may assume that,
+having divided Egypt between them, neither of them felt himself strong
+enough to overcome his rival, and contented himself with the possession
+of half the empire, since he could not possess it in its entirety. We
+may fairly believe that Smendes had the greater right to the throne,
+and, above all, the more efficient army of the two, since, had it been
+otherwise, Hrihor would never have consented to yield him the priority.
+
+The unity of Egypt was, to outward appearances, preserved, through the
+nominal possession by Smendes of the suzerainty; but, as a matter of
+fact, it had ceased to exist, and the fiction of the two kingdoms
+had become a reality for the first time within the range of history.
+Henceforward there were two Egypts, governed by different constitutions
+and from widely remote centres. Theban Egypt was, before all things,
+a community recognizing a theocratic government, in which the kingly
+office was merged in that of the high priest. Separated from Asia by the
+length of the Delta, it turned its attention, like the Pharaohs of the
+VIth and XIIth dynasties, to Ethiopia, and owing to its distance from
+the Mediterranean, and from the new civilization developed on its
+shores, it became more and more isolated, till at length it was reduced
+to a purely African state. Northern Egypt, on the contrary, maintained
+contact with European and Asiatic nations; it took an interest in their
+future, it borrowed from them to a certain extent whatever struck it as
+being useful or beautiful, and when the occasion presented itself, it
+acted in concert with Mediterranean powers. There was an almost constant
+struggle between these two divisions of the empire, at times
+breaking out into an open rupture, to end as often in a temporary
+re-establishment of unity. At one time Ethiopia would succeed in
+annexing Egypt, and again Egypt would seize some part of Ethiopia; but
+the settlement of affairs was never final, and the conflicting elements,
+brought with difficulty into harmony, relapsed into their usual
+condition at the end of a few years. A kingdom thus divided against
+itself could never succeed in maintaining its authority over those
+provinces which, even in the heyday of its power, had proved impatient
+of its yoke.
+
+Asia was associated henceforward in the minds of the Egyptians with
+painful memories of thwarted ambitions, rather than as offering a field
+for present conquest. They were pursued by the memories of their former
+triumphs, and the very monuments of their cities recalled what they
+were anxious to forget. Wherever they looked within their towns they
+encountered the representation of some Asiatic scene; they read the
+names of the cities of Syria on the walls of their temples; they saw
+depicted on them its princes and its armies, whose defeat was recorded
+by the inscriptions as well as the tribute which they had been forced
+to pay. The sense of their own weakness prevented the Egyptians from
+passing from useless regrets to action; when, however, one or other of
+the Pharaohs felt sufficiently secure on the throne to carry his troops
+far afield, he was always attracted to Syria, and crossed her frontiers,
+often, alas! merely to encounter defeat.
+
+[Illustration: 095.jpg Tailpiece]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II--THE RISE OF THE ASSYRIAN EMPIRE
+
+
+_PHOENICIA AND THE NORTHERN NATIONS AFTER THE DEATH OP RAMSES III.--THE
+FIRST ASSYRIAN EMPIRE: TIGLATH-PILESUR I.--THE ARAMAEANS AND THE KHATI._
+
+_The continuance of Egyptian influence over Syrian civilization after
+the death of Ramses III.--Egyptian myths in Phoenicia: Osiris and Isis
+at Byblos--Horus, Thot, and the origin of the Egyptian alphabet--The
+tombs at Arvad and the Kabr-Hiram; Egyptian designs in Phoenician glass
+and goldsmiths'work--Commerce with Egypt, the withdrawal of Phoenician
+colonies in the AEgean Sea and the Achaeans in Cyprus; maritime
+expeditions in the Western Mediterranean._
+
+_Northern Syria: the decadence of the Hittites and the steady growth
+of the Aramaean tribes--The decline of the Babylonian empire under the
+Cossaean kings, and its relations with Egypt: Assuruballit, Bammdn-nirdri
+I. and the first Assyrian conquests--Assyria, its climate, provinces,
+and cities: the god Assur and his Ishtar--The wars against
+Chaldaea: Shalmaneser I., Tulculi-ninip I., and the taking of
+Babylon--Belchadrezzar and the last of the Cosssaeans._
+
+_The dynasty of Pashe: Nebuchadrezzar I., his disputes with Elam, his
+defeat by Assurrishishi--The legend of the first Assyrian empire, Ninos
+and Semiramis--The Assyrians and their political constitution: the
+limmu, the king and his divine character, his hunting and his wars--The
+Assyrian army: the infantry and chariotry, the crossing of rivers, mode
+of marching in the plains and in the mountain districts--Camps, battles,
+sieges; cruelty shown to the vanquished, the destruction of towns and
+the removal of the inhabitants, the ephemeral character of the Assyrian
+conquests._
+
+_Tiglath pileser I.: Ms campaign against the Mushhu, his conquest of
+Kurhhi and of the regions of the Zab--The petty Asiatic kingdoms
+and their civilization: art and writing in the old Hittite
+states--Tiglath-pileser I. in Nairi and in Syria: his triumphal stele
+at Sebbeneh-Su--His buildings, his hunts, his conquest of
+Babylon--Merodach-nadin-akhi and the close of the Pashe
+dynasty--Assur-belkala and Samsi-ramman III.: the decline of
+Assyria--Syria without a foreign rider: the incapacity of the Khdti to
+give unity to the country._
+
+
+[Illustration: 099.jpg Page Image]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II--THE RISE OF THE ASSYRIAN EMPIRE
+
+
+_Phoenicia and the northern nations after the death of Ramses III.--The
+first Assyrian empire: Tiglath-pileser I.--The Aramoans and the Khati._
+
+
+The cessation of Egyptian authority over countries in which it had so
+long prevailed did not at once do away with the deep impression which
+it had made upon their constitution and customs. While the nobles
+and citizens of Thebes were adopting the imported worship of Baal and
+Astarte, and were introducing into the spoken and written language words
+borrowed from Semitic speech, the Syrians, on the other hand, were
+not unreceptive of the influence of their conquerors. They had applied
+themselves zealously to the study of Egyptian arts, industry and
+religion, and had borrowed from these as much, at least, as they had
+lent to the dwellers on the Nile. The ancient Babylonian foundation
+of their civilization was not, indeed, seriously modified, but it was
+covered over, so to speak, with an African veneer which varied in depth
+according to the locality.*
+
+     * Most of the views put forth in this part of the chapter
+     are based on posterior and not contemporary data. The most
+     ancient monuments which give evidence of it show it in such
+     a complete state that we may fairly ascribe it to some
+     centuries earlier; that is, to the time when Egypt still
+     ruled in Syria, the period of the XIXth and even the XVIIIth
+     dynasty.
+
+Phoenicia especially assumed and retained this foreign exterior. Its
+merchants, accustomed to establish themselves for lengthened periods in
+the principal trade-centres on the Nile, had become imbued therein
+with something of the religious ideas and customs of the land, and
+on returning to their own country had imported these with them and
+propagated them in their neighbourhood. They were not content with other
+household utensils, furniture, and jewellery than those to which they
+had been accustomed on the Nile, and even the Phonician gods seemed to
+be subject to this appropriating mania, for they came to be recognised
+in the indigenous deities of the Said and the Delta. There was, at
+the outset, no trait in the character of Baalat by which she could be
+assimilated to Isis or Hathor: she was fierce, warlike, and licentious,
+and wept for her lover, while the Egyptian goddesses were accustomed
+to shed tears for their husbands only. It was this element of a common
+grief, however, which served to associate the Phonician and Egyptian
+goddesses, and to produce at length a strange blending of their persons
+and the legends concerning them; the lady of Byblos ended in becoming an
+Isis or a Hathor,* and in playing the part assigned to the latter in the
+Osirian drama.
+
+* The assimilation must have been ancient, since the Egyptians of the
+Theban dynasties already accepted Baalat as the Hathor of Byblos.
+
+[Illustration: 101.jpg THE TREE GROWING ON THE TOMB OF OSIRIS]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from Prisse d'Avennes
+
+This may have been occasioned by her city having maintained closer
+relationships than the southern towns with Buto and Mendes, or by her
+priests having come to recognise a fundamental agreement between their
+theology and that of Egypt. In any case, it was at Byblos that the most
+marked and numerous, as well as the most ancient, examples of borrowing
+from the religions of the Nile were to be found. The theologians of
+Byblos imagined that the coffin of Osiris, after it had been thrown into
+the sea by Typhon, had been thrown up on the land somewhere near their
+city at the foot of a tamarisk, and that this tree, in its rapid growth,
+had gradually enfolded within its trunk the body and its case. King
+Malkander cut it down in order to use it as a support for the roof of
+his palace: a marvellous perfume rising from it filled the apartments,
+and it was not long before the prodigy was bruited abroad. Isis, who was
+travelling through the world in quest of her husband, heard of it, and
+at once realised its meaning: clad in rags and weeping, she sat down
+by the well whither the women of Byblos were accustomed to come every
+morning and evening to draw water, and, being interrogated by them,
+refused to reply; but when the maids of Queen Astarte* approached
+in their turn, they were received by the goddess in the most amiable
+manner--Isis deigning even to plait their hair, and to communicate to
+them the odour of myrrh with which she herself was impregnated.
+
+     * Astarte is the name taken by the queen in the Phoenician
+     version: the Egyptian counterpart of the same narrative
+     substituted for it Nemanous or Saosis; that is to say, the
+     two principal forms of Hathor--the Hermopolitan Nahmauit and
+     the Heliopolitan lusasit. It would appear from the presence
+     of these names that there must have been in Egypt two
+     versions at least of the Phoenician adventures of Isis--the
+     one of Hermopolitan and the other of Heliopolitan origin.
+
+Their mistress came to see the stranger who had thus treated her
+servants, took her into her service, and confided to her the care of her
+lately born son. Isis became attached to the child, adopted it for her
+own, after the Egyptian manner, by inserting her finger in its mouth;
+and having passed it through the fire during the night in order to
+consume away slowly anything of a perishable nature in its body,
+metamorphosed herself into a swallow, and flew around the miraculous
+pillar uttering plaintive cries. Astarte came upon her once while she
+was bathing the child in the flame, and broke by her shrieks of
+fright the charm of immortality. Isis was only able to reassure her by
+revealing her name and the object of her presence there. She opened the
+mysterious tree-trunk, anointed it with essences, and wrapping it in
+precious cloths, transmitted it to the priests of Byblos, who deposited
+it respectfully in their temple: she put the coffin which it contained
+on board ship, and brought it, after many adventures, into Egypt.
+Another tradition asserts, however, that Osiris never found his way back
+to his country: he was buried at Byblos, this tradition maintained, and
+it was in his honour that the festivals attributed by the vulgar to the
+young Adonis were really celebrated. A marvellous fact seemed to support
+this view. Every year a head of papyrus, thrown into the sea at some
+unknown point of the Delta, was carried for six days along the Syrian
+coast, buffeted by wind and waves, and on the seventh was thrown up at
+Byblos, where the priests received it and exhibited it solemnly to the
+people.* The details of these different stories are not in every case
+very ancient, but the first fact in them carries us back to the time
+when Byblos had accepted the sovereignty of the Theban dynasties,
+and was maintaining daily commercial and political relations with the
+inhabitants of the Nile valley.**
+
+     * In the later Roman period it was letters announcing the
+     resurrection of Adonis-Osiris that the Alexandrian women
+     cast into the sea, and these were carried by the current as
+     far as Byblos. See on this subject the commentaries of Cyril
+     of Alexandra and Procopius of Gaza on chap, xviii. of
+     Isaiah.
+
+     ** It is worthy of note that Philo gives to the divinity
+     with the Egyptian name Taautos the part in the ancient
+     history of Phoenicia of having edited the mystic writings
+     put in order by Sanchoniathon at a very early epoch.
+
+The city proclaimed Horus to be a great god.* El-Kronos allied himself
+with Osiris as well as with Adonis; Isis and Baalat became blended
+together at their first encounter, and the respective peoples made
+an exchange of their deities with the same light-heartedness as they
+displayed in trafficking with the products of their soil or their
+industry.
+
+     * This is confirmed by one of the names inscribed on the Tel
+     el-Amarna tablets as being that of a governor of Byblos
+     under Amenothes IV. This name was read Rabimur, Anrabimur,
+     or Ilrabimur, and finally Ilurabihur: the meaning of it is,
+     "Muru is the great god," or "Horus is the great god." Muru is
+     the name which we find in an appellation of a Hittite king,
+     Maurusaru, "Mauru is king." On an Aramoan cylinder in the
+     British Museum, representing a god in Assyrian dress
+     fighting with two griffins, there is the inscription
+     "Horkhu," Harmakhis.
+
+[Illustration: 104.jpg THE PHOENICIAN HORUS]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from an intaglio engraved in
+     Cesnola. The Phoenician figures of Horus and Thot which I
+     have reproduced were pointed out to me by my friend
+     Clermont-Ganneau.
+
+After Osiris, the Ibis Thot was the most important among the deities
+who had emigrated to Asia. He was too closely connected with the Osirian
+cycle to be forgotten by the Phoenicians after they had adopted his
+companions. We are ignorant of the particular divinity with whom he was
+identified, or would be the more readily associated from some similarity
+in the pronunciation of his name: we know only that he still preserved
+in his new country all the power of his voice and all the subtilty of
+his mind. He occupied there also the position of scribe and enchanter,
+as he had done at Thebes, Memphis, Thinis, and before the chief of each
+Heliopolitan Ennead. He became the usual adviser of El-Kronos at Byblos,
+as he had been of Osiris and Horus; he composed charms for him,
+and formulae which increased the warlike zeal of his partisans; he
+prescribed the form and insignia of the god and of his attendant
+deities, and came finally to be considered as the inventor of letters.*
+
+     * The part of counsellor which Thot played in connexion with
+     the god of Byblos was described at some length in the
+     writings attributed to Sankhoniathon.
+
+[Illustration: 105.jpg THE PHOENICIAN THOT]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, after an intaglio engraved in M. de
+     Vogue.
+
+The epoch, indeed, in which he became a naturalised Phoenician coincides
+approximately with a fundamental revolution in the art of writing--that
+in which a simple and rapid stenography was substituted for the
+complicated and tedious systems with which the empires of the ancient
+world had been content from their origin. Tyre, Sidon, Byblos, Arvad,
+had employed up to this period the most intricate of these systems. Like
+most of the civilized nations of Western Asia, they had conducted their
+diplomatic and commercial correspondence in the cuneiform character
+impressed upon clay tablets. Their kings had had recourse to a
+Babylonian model for communicating to the Amenothes Pharaohs the
+expression of their wishes or their loyalty; we now behold them, after
+an interval of four hundred years and more*--during which we have no
+examples of their monuments--possessed of a short and commodious script,
+without the encumbrance of ideograms, determinatives, polyphony and
+syllabic sounds, such as had fettered the Egyptian and Chaldaean
+scribes, in spite of their cleverness in dealing with them. Phonetic
+articulations were ultimately resolved into twenty-two sounds, to each
+of which a special sign was attached, which collectively took the place
+of the hundreds or thousands of signs formerly required.
+
+     * The inscription on the bronze cup dedicated to the Baal of
+     the Lebanon, goes back probably to the time of Hiram I., say
+     the Xth century before our era; the reasons advanced by
+     Winckler for dating it in the time of Hiram II. have not
+     been fully accepted up to the present. By placing the
+     introduction of the alphabet somewhere between Amenothes IV.
+     in the XVth and Hiram I. in the Xth century before our era,
+     and by taking the middle date between them, say the
+     accession of the XXIs'dynasty towards the year 1100 B.C. for
+     its invention or adoption, we cannot go far wrong one way or
+     the other.
+
+[Illustration: 106.jpg ONE OF THE MOST ANCIENT PHOENICIAN INSCRIPTIONS]
+
+     Drawn by Paucher-Gudin, from a heliogravure. This is the cup
+     of the Baal of the Lebanon.
+
+This was an alphabet, the first in point of time, but so ingenious and
+so pliable that the majority of ancient and modern nations have found
+it able to supply all their needs--Greeks and Europeans of the western
+Mediterranean on the one hand, and Semites of all kinds, Persians and
+Hindus on the other.
+
+[Illustration: 107.jpg Table of Alphabets]
+
+It must have originated between the end of the XVIIIth and the beginning
+of the XXIst dynasties, and the existence of Pharaonic rule in Phoenicia
+during this period has led more than one modern scholar to assume that
+it developed under Egyptian influence.*
+
+     * The hypothesis of an Egyptian origin, suggested casually
+     by Champollion, has been ably dealt with by E. de Rouge. E.
+     de Rouge derives the alphabet from the Hieratic, and his
+     identifications have been accepted by Lauth, by Brugsch, by
+     P. Lenormant, and by Isaac Taylor. Halevy would take it from
+     the Egyptian hieroglyphics directly without the intervention
+     of the Hieratic. The Egyptian origin, strongly contested of
+     late, has been accepted by the majority of scholars.
+
+Some affirm that it is traceable directly to the hieroglyphs, while
+others seek for some intermediary in the shape of a cursive script,
+and find this in the Hieratic writing, which contains, they maintain,
+prototypes of all the Phoenician letters. Tables have been drawn up,
+showing at a glance the resemblances and differences which appear
+respectively to justify or condemn their hypothesis. Perhaps the
+analogies would be more evident and more numerous if we were in
+possession of inscriptions going back nearer to the date of origin. As
+it is, the divergencies are sufficiently striking to lead some scholars
+to seek the prototype of the alphabet elsewhere--either in Babylon, in
+Asia Minor, or even in Crete, among those barbarous hieroglyphs which
+are attributed to the primitive inhabitants of the island. It is no easy
+matter to get at the truth amid these conflicting theories. Two points
+only are indisputable; first, the almost unanimous agreement among
+writers of classical times in ascribing the first alphabet to the
+Phoenicians; and second, the Phonician origin of the Greek, and
+afterwards of the Latin alphabet which we employ to-day.
+
+To return to the religion of the Phoenicians: the foreign deities were
+not content with obtaining a high place in the estimation of priests
+and people; they acquired such authority over the native gods that
+they persuaded them to metamorphose themselves almost completely into
+Egyptian divinities.
+
+[Illustration: 109.jpg RASHUF ON HIS LION]
+
+     Drawn by Paucher-Gudin, from a photograph reproduced in
+     Clermont-Ganneau.
+
+One finds among the majority of them the emblems commonly used in the
+Pharaonic temples, sceptres with heads of animals, head-dress like the
+Pschent, the _crux ansata_, the solar disk, and the winged scarab. The
+lady of Byblos placed the cow's horns upon her head from the moment
+she became identified with Hathor.* The Baal of the neighbouring
+Arvad--probably a form of Bashuf--was still represented as standing
+upright on his lion in order to traverse the high places: but while, in
+the monument which has preserved the figure of the god, both lion and
+mountain are given according to Chaldaean tradition, he himself, as the
+illustration shows, is dressed after the manner of Egypt, in the striped
+and plaited loin-cloth, wears a large necklace on his neck and bracelets
+on his arms, and bears upon his head the white mitre with its double
+plume and the Egyptian uraaus.**
+
+     * She is represented as Hathor on the stele of Iehav-melek,
+     King of Byblos, during the Persian period.
+
+     ** This monument, which belonged to the Peretie collection,
+     was found near Amrith, at the place called Nahr-Abrek. The
+     dress and bearing are so like those of the Rashuf
+     represented on Egyptian monuments, that I have no hesitation
+     in regarding this as a representation of that god.
+
+He brandishes in one hand the weapon of the victor, and is on the point
+of despatching with it a lion, which he has seized by the tail with
+the other, after the model of the Pharaonic hunters, Amenothes I. and
+Thutmosis III. The lunar disk floating above his head lends to him,
+it is true, a Phonician character, but the winged sun of Heliopolis
+hovering above the disk leaves no doubt as to his Egyptian antecedents.*
+
+     * The Phonician symbol represents the crescent moon holding
+     the darkened portion in its arms, like the symbol reserved
+     in Egypt for the lunar gods.
+
+[Illustration: 110.jpg A PHOENICIAN GOD IN HIS EGYPTIAN SHRINE]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from Renan.
+
+The worship, too, offered to these metamorphosed gods was as much
+changed as the deities themselves; the altars assumed something of the
+Egyptian form, and the tabernacles were turned into shrines, which were
+decorated at the top with a concave groove, or with a frieze made up of
+repetitions of the uraeus. Egyptian fashions had influenced the better
+classes so far as to change even their mode of dealing with the dead, of
+which we find in not a few places clear evidence. Travellers arriving in
+Egypt at that period must have been as much astonished as the tourist of
+to-day by the monuments which the Egyptians erected for their dead.
+
+[Illustration: 111.jpg AMENOTHES I. SEIZING A LION]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin. This monument was in the Louvre
+     Museum. Analogous figures of gods or kings holding a lion by
+     the tail are found on various monuments of the Theban
+     dynasties.
+
+The pyramids which met their gaze, as soon as they had reached the apex
+of the Delta, must have far surpassed their ideas of them, no matter how
+frequently they may have been told about them, and they must have been
+at a loss to know why such a number of stones should have been brought
+together to cover a single corpse. At the foot of these colossal
+monuments, lying like a pack of hounds asleep around their master, the
+mastabas of the early dynasties were ranged, half buried under the sand,
+but still visible, and still visited on certain days by the descendants
+of their inhabitants, or by priests charged with the duty of keeping
+them up. Chapels of more recent generations extended as a sort of screen
+before the ancient tombs, affording examples of the two archaic types
+combined--the mastaba more or less curtailed in its proportions, and the
+pyramid with a more or less acute point. The majority of these monuments
+are no longer in existence, and only one of them has come down to us
+intact--that which Amenothes III. erected in the Serapeum at Memphis in
+honour of an Apis which had died in his reign.
+
+[Illustration: 112.jpg A PHOENICIAN MASTABA AT ARVAD]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from the restoration by Thobois, as
+     given in Renan. The cuttings made in the lower stonework
+     appear to be traces of unfinished steps. The pyramid at the
+     top is no longer in existence, but its remains are scattered
+     about the foot of the monument, and furnished M. Thobois
+     with the means of reconstructing with exactness the original
+     form.
+
+Phoenicians visiting the Nile valley must have carried back with them
+to their native country a remembrance of this kind of burying-place, and
+have suggested it to their architects as a model. One of the cemeteries
+at Arvad contains a splendid specimen of this imported design.*
+
+     * Pietschmann thinks that the monument is not older than the
+     Greek epoch, and it must be admitted that the cornice is not
+     such as we usually meet with in Egypt in Theban times;
+     nevertheless, the very marked resemblance to the Theban
+     mastaba shows that it must have been directly connected with
+     the Egyptian type which prevailed from the XVIIIth to the
+     XXth dynasties.
+
+[Illustration: 113.jpg TWO OF THE TOMBS AT ARVAD]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a water-colour by Thobois,
+     reproduced in Renan.
+
+It is a square tower some thirty-six feet high; the six lower courses
+consist of blocks, each some sixteen and a half feet long, joined to each
+other without mortar. The two lowest courses project so as to form a
+kind of pedestal for the building. The cornice at the top consists of
+a deep moulding, surmounted by a broad flat band, above which rises the
+pyramid, which attains a height of nearly thirty feet. It is impossible
+to deny that it is constructed on a foreign model; it is not a slavish
+imitation, however, but rather an adaptation upon a rational plan to
+the conditions of its new home. Its foundations rest on nothing but a
+mixture of soil and sand impregnated with water, and if vaults had been
+constructed beneath this, as in Egypt, the body placed there would soon
+have corrupted away, owing to the infiltration of moisture. The dead
+bodies were, therefore, placed within the structure above ground, in
+chambers corresponding to the Egyptian chapel, which were superimposed
+the one upon the other. The first storey would furnish space for three
+bodies, and the second would contain twelve, for which as many niches
+were provided. In the same cemetery we find examples of tombs which the
+architect has constructed, not after an Egyptian, but a Chaldaean model.
+A round tower is here substituted for the square structure and a
+cupola for the pyramid, while the cornice is represented by crenellated
+markings. The only Egyptian feature about it is the four lions, which
+seem to support the whole edifice upon their backs.*
+
+     * The fellahin in the neighbourhood call these two monuments
+     the Meghazil or "distaffs."
+
+Arvad was, among Phoenician cities, the nearest neighbour to the
+kingdoms on the Euphrates, and was thus the first to experience either
+the brunt of an attack or the propagation of fashions and ideas from
+these countries. In the more southerly region, in the country about
+Tyre, there are fewer indications of Babylonian influence, and such
+examples of burying-places for the ruling classes as the Kabr-Hiram
+and other similar tombs correspond with the mixed mastaba of the Theban
+period. We have the same rectangular base, but the chapel and its
+crowning pyramid are represented by the sarcophagus itself with its
+rigid cover. The work is of an unfinished character, and carelessly
+wrought, but there is a charming simplicity about its lines and a
+harmony in its proportions which betray an Egyptian influence.
+
+[Illustration: 115.jpg THE KABR-HIRAM NEAR TYRE]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from a sketch by Thobois, reproduced by
+     Renan.
+
+The spirit of imitation which we find in the religion and architecture
+of Phoenicia is no less displayed in the minor arts, such as
+goldsmiths'work, sculpture in ivory, engraving on gems, and
+glass-making. The forms, designs, and colours are all rather those of
+Egypt than of Chaldaea. The many-hued glass objects, turned out by the
+manufacturers of the Said in millions, furnished at one time valuable
+cargoes for the Phoenicians; they learned at length to cast and
+colour copies of these at home, and imitated their Egyptian models so
+successfully that classical antiquity was often deceived by them.*
+
+     * Glass manufacture was carried to such a degree of
+     perfection among the Phoenicians, that many ancient authors
+     attributed to them the invention of glass.
+
+Their engravers, while still continuing to employ cones and cylinders
+of Babylonian form, borrowed the scarab type also, and made use of it
+on the bezils of rings, the pendants of necklaces, and on a kind of
+bracelet used partly for ornament and partly as a protective amulet.
+The influence of the Egyptian model did not extend, however, amongst the
+masses, and we find, therefore, no evidence of it in the case of common
+objects, such as those of coarse sand or glazed earthenware. Egyptian
+scarab forms were thus confined to the rich, and the material upon which
+they are found is generally some costly gem, such as cut and polished
+agate, onyx, haematite, and lapis-lazuli. The goldsmiths did not
+slavishly copy the golden and silver bowls which were imported from the
+Delta; they took their inspiration from the principles displayed in
+the ornamentation of these objects, but they treated the subjects
+after their own manner, grouping them afresh and blending them with
+new designs. The intrinsic value of the metal upon which these artistic
+conceptions had been impressed led to their destruction, and among the
+examples which have come down to us I know of no object which can be
+traced to the period of the Egyptian conquest. It was Theban art for
+the most part which furnished the Phoenicians with their designs. These
+included the lotus, the papyrus, the cow standing in a thicket and
+suckling her calf, the sacred bark, and the king threatening with his
+uplifted arm the crowd of conquered foes who lie prostrate before him.
+
+[Illustration: 117.jpg EGYPTIAN TREATMENT OF THE COW ON A PHOENICIAN
+BOWL]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, after Grifi.
+
+The king's double often accompanied him on some of the original objects,
+impassive and armed with the banner bearing the name of Horus. The
+Phoenician artist modified this figure, which in its original form
+did not satisfy his ideas of human nature, by transforming it into
+a protective genius, who looks with approval on the exploits of his
+_protege_, and gathers together the corpses of those he has slain. Once
+these designs had become current among the goldsmiths, they continued to
+be supplied for a long period, without much modification, to the markets
+of the Eastern and Western worlds. Indeed, it was natural that they
+should have taken a stereotyped form, when we consider that the
+Phoenicians who employed them held continuous commercial relations
+with the country whence they had come--a country of which, too, they
+recognised the supremacy. Egypt in the Ramesside period was, as we
+have seen, distinguished for the highest development of every branch of
+industry; it had also a population which imported and exported more raw
+material and more manufactured products than any other.
+
+[Illustration: 118.jpg THE KING AND HIS DOUBLE ON A PHOENICIAN BOWL]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a sketch by Longperier.
+
+The small nation which acted as a commercial intermediary between Egypt
+and the rest of the world had in this traffic a steady source of profit,
+and even in providing Egypt with a single article--for example, bronze,
+or the tin necessary for its preparation--could realise enormous
+profits. The people of Tyre and Sidon had been very careful not to
+alienate the good will of such rich customers, and as long as the
+representatives of the Pharaoh held sway in Syria, they had shown
+themselves, if not thoroughly trustworthy vassals, at least less
+turbulent than their neighbours of Arvad and Qodshu. Even when the
+feebleness and impotence of the successors of Ramses III. relieved them
+from the obligation of further tribute, they displayed towards their old
+masters such deference that they obtained as great freedom of trade with
+the ports of the Delta as they had enjoyed in the past. They maintained
+with these ports the same relations as in the days of their dependence,
+and their ships sailed up the river as far as Memphis, and even higher,
+while the Egyptian galleys continued to coast the littoral of Syria.
+An official report addressed to Hrihor by one of the ministers of the
+Theban Amon, indicates at one and the same time the manner in which
+these voyages were accomplished, and the dangers to which their crews
+were exposed. Hrihor, who was still high priest, was in need of foreign
+timber to complete some work he had in hand, probably the repair of the
+sacred barks, and commanded the official above mentioned to proceed
+by sea to Byblos, to King Zikarbal,* in order to purchase cedars of
+Lebanon.
+
+     * This is the name which classical tradition ascribed to the
+     first husband of Dido, the founder of Carthage--Sicharbas,
+     Sichaeus, Acerbas.
+
+The messenger started from Tanis, coasted along Kharu, and put into
+the harbour of Dor, which then belonged to the Zakkala: while he was
+revictualling his ship, one of the sailors ran away with the cash-box.
+The local ruler, Badilu, expressed at first his sympathy at this
+misfortune, and gave his help to capture the robber; then unaccountably
+changing his mind he threw the messenger into prison, who had
+accordingly to send to Egypt to procure fresh funds for his liberation
+and the accomplishment of his mission. Having arrived at Byblos, nothing
+occurred there worthy of record. The wood having at length been cut and
+put on board, the ship set sail homewards. Driven by contrary winds,
+the vessel was thrown upon the coast of Alasia, where the crew were
+graciously received by the Queen Khatiba. We have evidence everywhere,
+it may be stated, as to the friendly disposition displayed, either with
+or without the promptings of interest, towards the representative of the
+Theban pontiff. Had he been ill-used, the Phoenicians living on Egyptian
+territory would have been made to suffer for it.
+
+Navigators had to take additional precautions, owing to the presence
+of AEgean or Asiatic pirates on the routes followed by the mercantile
+marine, which rendered their voyages dangerous and sometimes interrupted
+them altogether. The Syrian coast-line was exposed to these marauders
+quite as much as the African had been during the sixty or eighty years
+which followed the death of Ramses II.; the seamen of the north--Achaeans
+and Tyrseni, Lycians and Shardanians--had pillaged it on many occasions,
+and in the invasion which followed these attacks it experienced as
+little mercy as Naharaim, the Khati, and the region of the Amorites. The
+fleets which carried the Philistines, the Zakkala, and their allies had
+devastated the whole coast before they encountered the Egyptian ships of
+Ramses III. near Magadil, to the south of Carmel. Arvad as well as Zahi
+had succumbed to the violence of their attack, and if the cities of
+Byblos, Berytus, Sidon, and Tyre had escaped, their suburbs had been
+subjected to the ravages of the foe.*
+
+     * See, for this invasion, vol. v. pp. 305-311, of the
+     present work.
+
+Peace followed the double victory of the Egyptians, and commerce on
+the Mediterranean resumed once more its wonted ways, but only in those
+regions where the authority of the Pharaoh and the fear of his vengeance
+were effective influences. Beyond this sphere there were continual
+warfare, piracy, migrations of barbaric hordes, and disturbances of all
+kinds, among which, if a stranger ventured, it was at the almost certain
+risk of losing his life or liberty. The area of undisturbed seas became
+more and more contracted in proportion as the memory of past defeats
+faded away. Cyprus was not comprised within it, and the AEgeans, who were
+restrained by the fear of Egypt from venturing into any region under
+her survey, perpetually flocked thither in numerous bodies. The Achaeans,
+too, took up their abode on this island at an early date--about the time
+when some of their bands were infesting Libya, and offering their help
+to the enemies of the Pharaoh. They began their encroachments on the
+northern side of the island--the least rich, it is true, but the nearest
+to Cilicia, and the easiest to hold against the attacks of their rivals.
+The disaster of Piriu had no doubt dashed their hopes of finding a
+settlement in Egypt: they never returned thither any more, and the
+current of emigration which had momentarily inclined towards the south,
+now set steadily towards the east, where the large island of Cyprus
+offered an unprotected and more profitable field of adventure. We know
+not how far they penetrated into its forests and its interior. The
+natives began, at length, under their influence, to despise the customs
+and mode of existence with which they had been previously contented:
+they acquired a taste for pottery rudely decorated after the Mycenean
+manner, for jewellery, and for the bronze swords which they had seen in
+the hands of the invaders. The Phoenicians, in order to maintain their
+ground against the intruders, had to strengthen their ancient posts
+or found others--such as Carpasia, Gerynia, and Lapathos on the
+Achaean coast itself, Tamassos near the copper-mines, and a new town,
+Qart-hadashat, which is perhaps only the ancient Citium under a new
+name.* They thus added to their earlier possessions on the island
+regions on its northern side, while the rest either fell gradually into
+the hands of Hellenic adventurers, or continued in the possession of
+the native populations. Cyprus served henceforward as an advance-post
+against the attacks of Western nations, and the Phoenicians must have
+been thankful for the good fortune which had made them see the wisdom
+of fortifying it. But what became of their possessions lying outside
+Cyprus? They retained several of them on the southern coasts of Asia
+Minor, and Rhodes remained faithful to them, as well as Thasos, enabling
+them to overlook the two extremities of the Archipelago;** but, owing to
+the movements of the People of the Sea and the political development of
+the Mycenean states, they had to give up the stations and harbours of
+refuge which they held in the other islands or on the continent.
+
+     * It is mentioned in the inscription of Baal of Lebanon, and
+     in the Assyrian inscriptions of the VII"'century B.C.
+
+     * This would appear to be the case, as far as Rhodes is
+     concerned, from the traditions which ascribed the final
+     expulsion of the Phoenicians to a Doric invasion from Argos.
+     The somewhat legendary accounts of the state of affairs
+     after the Hellenic conquest are in the fragments of Ergias
+     and Polyzelos.
+
+They still continued, however, to pay visits to these
+localities--sometimes in the guise of merchants and at others as
+raiders, according to their ancient custom. They went from port to port
+as of old, exposing their wares in the market-places, pillaging the
+farms and villages, carrying into captivity the women and children whom
+they could entice on board, or whom they might find defenceless on the
+strand; but they attempted all this with more risk than formerly, and
+with less success. The inhabitants of the coast were possessed of
+fully manned ships, similar in form to those of the Philistines or
+the Zakkala, which, at the first sight of the Phoenicians, set out in
+pursuit of them, or, following the example set by their foe, lay in
+wait for them behind some headland, and retaliated upon them for their
+cruelty. Piracy in the Archipelago was practised as a matter of course,
+and there was no islander who did not give himself up to it when
+the opportunity offered, to return to his honest occupations after a
+successful venture. Some kings seem to have risen up here and there who
+found this state of affairs intolerable, and endeavoured to remedy it
+by every means within their power: they followed on the heels of the
+corsairs and adventurers, whatever might be their country; they followed
+them up to their harbours of refuge, and became an effective police
+force in all parts of the sea where they were able to carry their flag.
+The memory of such exploits was preserved in the tradition of the Cretan
+empire which Minos had constituted, and which extended its protection
+over a portion of continental Greece.
+
+If the Phoenicians had had to deal only with the piratical expeditions
+of the peoples of the coast or with the jealous watchfulness of the
+rulers of the sea, they might have endured the evil, but they had now
+to put up, in addition, with rivalry in the artistic and industrial
+products of which they had long had the monopoly. The spread of art
+had at length led to the establishment of local centres of production
+everywhere, which bade fair to vie with those of Phoenicia. On the
+continent and in the Cyclades there were produced statuettes, intaglios,
+jewels, vases, weapons, and textile fabrics which rivalled those of the
+East, and were probably much cheaper. The merchants of Tyre and Sidon
+could still find a market, however, for manufactures requiring great
+technical skill or displaying superior taste--such as gold or silver
+bowls, engraved or decorated with figures in outline--but they had to
+face a serious falling off in their sales of ordinary goods. To extend
+their commerce they had to seek new and less critical markets, where the
+bales of their wares, of which the AEgean population was becoming weary,
+would lose none of their attractions. We do not know at what date they
+ventured to sail into the mysterious region of the Hesperides, nor by
+what route they first reached it. It is possible that they passed from
+Crete to Cythera, and from this to the Ionian Islands and to the point
+of Calabria, on the other side of the straits of Otranto, whence they
+were able to make their way gradually to Sicily.*
+
+     * Ed. Meyer thinks that the extension of Phoenician commerce
+     to the Western Mediterranean goes back to the XVIIIth
+     dynasty, or, at the latest, the XVth century before our era.
+     Without laying undue stress on this view, I am inclined to
+     ascribe with him, until we get further knowledge, the
+     colonisation of the West to the period immediately following
+     the movements of the People of the Sea and the diminution of
+     Phoenician trade in the Grecian Archipelago. Exploring
+     voyages had been made before this, but the founding of
+     colonies was not earlier than this epoch.
+
+Did the fame of their discovery, we may ask, spread so rapidly in the
+East as to excite there the cupidity and envy of their rivals? However
+this may have been, the People of the Sea, after repeated checks
+in Africa and Syria, and feeling more than ever the pressure of the
+northern tribes encroaching on them, set out towards the west, following
+the route pursued by the Phoenicians. The traditions current among
+them and collected afterwards by the Greek historians give an account,
+mingled with many fabulous details, of the causes which led to their
+migrations and of the vicissitudes which they experienced in the course
+of them. Daedalus having taken flight from Crete to Sicily, Minos, who
+had followed in his steps, took possession of the greater part of the
+island with his Eteocretes. Iolaos was the leader of Pelasgic bands,
+whom he conducted first into Libya and finally to Sardinia. It came also
+to pass that in the days of Atys, son of Manes, a famine broke out and
+raged throughout Lydia: the king, unable to provide food for his people,
+had them numbered, and decided by lot which of the two halves of the
+population should expatriate themselves under the leadership of his son
+Tyrsenos. Those-who were thus fated to leave their country assembled at
+Smyrna, constructed ships there, and having embarked on board of them
+what was necessary, set sail in quest of a new home. After a long
+and devious voyage, they at length disembarked in the country of the
+Umbrians, where they built cities, and became a prosperous people under
+the name of Tyrseni, being thus called after their leader Tyrsenos.*
+
+     * Herodotus, whence all the information of other classical
+     writers is directly or indirectly taken. Most modern
+     historians reject this tradition. I see no reason for my own
+     part why they should do so, at least in the present state of
+     our knowledge. The Etrurians of the historical period were
+     the result of a fusion of several different elements, and
+     there is nothing against the view that the Tursha--one of
+     these elements--should have come from Asia Minor, as
+     Herodotus says. Properly understood, the tradition seems
+     well founded, and the details may have been added
+     afterwards, either by the Lydians themselves, or by the
+     Greek historians who collected the Lydian traditions.
+
+The remaining portions of the nations who had taken part in the attack
+on Egypt--of which several tribes had been planted by Ramses III. in
+the Shephelah, from Gaza to Carmel--proceeded in a series of successive
+detachments from Asia Minor and the AEgean Sea to the coasts of Italy
+and of the large islands; the Tursha into that region which was known
+afterwards as Etruria, the Shardana into Sardinia, the Zakkala into
+Sicily, and along with the latter some Pulasati, whose memory is still
+preserved on the northern slope of Etna. Fate thus brought the Phonician
+emigrants once more into close contact with their traditional enemies,
+and the hostility which they experienced in their new settlements from
+the latter was among the influences which determined their further
+migration from Italy proper, and from the region occupied by the
+Ligurians between the Arno and the Ebro. They had already probably
+reached Sardinia and Corsica, but the majority of their ships had sailed
+to the southward, and having touched at Malta, Gozo, and the small
+islands between Sicily and the Syrtes, had followed the coast-line of
+Africa, until at length they reached the straits of Gribraltar and the
+southern shores of Spain. No traces remain of their explorations, or of
+their early establishments in the western Mediterranean, as the towns
+which they are thought--with good reason in most instances--to have
+founded there belong to a much later date. Every permanent settlement,
+however, is preceded by a period of exploration and research, which may
+last for only a few years or be prolonged to as many centuries. I am
+within the mark, I think, in assuming that Phonician adventurers,
+or possibly even the regular trading ships of Tyre and Sidon, had
+established relations with the semi-barbarous chiefs of Botica as early
+as the XIIth century before our era, that is, at the time when the power
+of Thebes was fading away under the weak rule of the pontiffs of Amon
+and the Tanite Pharaohs.
+
+The Phoenicians were too much absorbed in their commercial pursuits
+to aspire to the inheritance which Egypt was letting slip through her
+fingers. Their numbers were not more than sufficient to supply men
+for their ships, and they were often obliged to have recourse to their
+allies or to mercenary tribes--the Leleges or Carians--in order to
+provide crews for their vessels or garrisons for their trading posts;
+it was impossible, therefore, for them to think of raising armies fit to
+conquer or keep in check the rulers on the Orontes or in Naharaim. They
+left this to the races of the interior--the Amorites and Hittites--and
+to their restless ambition. The Hittite power, however, had never
+recovered from the terrible blow inflicted on it at the time of the
+Asianic invasion.
+
+[Illustration: 128.jpg AZAZ--ONE OF THIS TUMULI ON THE ANCIENT HITTITE
+PLAIN]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph by M. Barthelemy.
+
+The confederacy of feudal chiefs, which had been brought momentarily
+together by Sapalulu and his successors, was shattered by the violence
+of the shock, and the elements of which it was composed were engaged
+henceforward in struggles with each other. At this time the entire plain
+between the Amanus and the Euphrates was covered with rich cities, of
+which the sites are represented to-day by only a few wretched villages
+or by heaps of ruins. Arabian and Byzantine remains sometimes crown the
+summit of the latter, but as soon as we reach the lower strata we find
+in more or less abundance the ruins of buildings of the Greek or Persian
+period, and beneath these those belonging to a still earlier time. The
+history of Syria lies buried in such sites, and is waiting only for a
+patient and wealthy explorer to bring it to light.* The Khati proper
+were settled to the south of the Taurus in the basin of the Sajur,
+but they were divided into several petty states, of which that which
+possessed Carchemish was the most important, and exercised a practical
+hegemony over the others. Its chiefs alone had the right to call
+themselves kings of the Khati. The Patinu, who were their immediate
+neighbours on the west, stretched right up to the Mediterranean above
+the plains of Naharairn and beyond the Orontes; they had absorbed, it
+would seem, the provinces of the ancient Alasia. Aramaeans occupied
+the region to the south of the Patinu between the two Lebanon ranges,
+embracing the districts of Hamath and Qobah.**
+
+     * The results of the excavations at Zinjirli are evidence of
+     what historical material we may hope to find in these
+     tumuli. See the account of the earlier results in P. von
+     Luschan, _Ausgrabungen in Sendschirli_, 1893.
+
+     ** The Aramaeans are mentioned by Tiglath-pileser I. as
+     situated between the Balikh, the Euphrates, and the Sajur.
+
+The valleys of the Amanus and the southern slopes of the Taurus included
+within them some half-dozen badly defined principalities--Samalla on the
+Kara-Su,* Gurgum** around Marqasi, the Qui*** and Khilakku**** in
+the classical Cilicia, and the Kasku^ and Kummukh^^ in a bend of the
+Euphrates to the north and north-east of the Khati.
+
+     * The country of Samalla, in Egyptian Samalua, extended
+     around the Tell of Zinjirli, at the foot of the Amanus, in
+     the valley of Marash of the Arab historians.
+
+     ** The name has been read Gamgumu, Gaugum, and connected by
+     Tom-kins with the Egyptian Augama, which he reads Gagama, in
+     the lists of Thutmosis III. The Aramaean inscription on the
+     statue of King Panammu shows that it must be read Gurgumu,
+     and Sachau has identified this new name with that of Jurjum,
+     which was the name by which the province of the Amanus,
+     lying between Baias and the lake of Antioch, was known in
+     the Byzantine period; the ancient Gurgum stretches further
+     towards the north, around the town of Marqasi, which Tomkins
+     and Sachau have identified with Marash.
+
+     *** The site of the country of Qui was determined by
+     Schrader; it was that part of the Cilician plain which
+     stretches from the Amanus to the mountains of the Ketis, and
+     takes in the great town of Tarsus. F. Lenor-mant has pointed
+     out that this country is mentioned twice in the Scriptures
+     (1 _Kings_ x, 28 and 2 _Chron_. i. 16), in the time of
+     Solomon. The designation of the country, transformed into
+     the appellation of an eponymous god, is found in the name
+     Qauisaru, "Qaui is king."
+
+     **** Khilakku, the name of which is possibly the same as the
+     Egyptian Khalakka, is the Cilicia Trachsea of classical
+     geographers.
+
+     ^ The country of Kashku, which has been connected with
+     Kashkisha, which takes the place of Karkisha in an Egyptian
+     text, was still a dependency of the Hittites in the time of
+     Tiglath-pileser. It was in the neighbourhood of the Urumu,
+     whose capital seems to have been Urum, the Ourima of
+     Ptolemy, near the bend of the Euphrates between Sumeisat and
+     Birejik; it extended into the Commagene of classical times,
+     on the borders of Melitene and the Tubal.
+
+     ^^ Kummukh lay on both sides of the Euphrates and of the
+     Upper Tigris; it became gradually restricted, until at
+     length it was conterminous with the Commagene of classical
+     geographers.
+
+The ancient Mitanni to the east of Carchemish, which was so active in
+the time of the later Amenothes, had now ceased to exist, and there
+was but a vague remembrance of its farmer prowess. It had foundered
+probably in the great cataclysm which engulfed the Hittite empire,
+although its name appears inscribed once more among those of the vassals
+of Egypt on the triumphal lists of Ramses III. Its chief tribes had
+probably migrated towards the regions which were afterwards described by
+the Greek geographers as the home of the Matieni on the Halys and in the
+neighbourhood of Lake Urmiah. Aramaean kingdoms, of which the greatest
+was that of Bit-Adini,* had succeeded them, and bordered the Euphrates
+on each side as far as the Chalus and Balikh respectively; the ancient
+Harran belonged also to them, and their frontier stretched as far as
+Hamath, and to that of the Patinu on the Orontes.
+
+     * The province of Bit-Adini was specially that part of the
+     country which lay between the Euphrates and the Balikh, but
+     it extended also to other Syrian provinces between the
+     Euphrates and the Aprie.
+
+It was, as we have seen, a complete breaking up of the old
+nationalities, and we have evidence also of a similar disintegration in
+the countries to the north of the Taurus, in the direction of the Black
+Sea. Of the mighty Khati with whom Thutmosis III. had come into contact,
+there was no apparent trace: either the tribes of which they were
+composed had migrated towards the south, or those who had never left
+their native mountains had entered into new combinations and lost even
+the remembrance of their name. The Milidu, Tabal (Tubal), and Mushku
+(Meshech) stretched behind each other from east to west on the confines
+of the Tokhma-Su, and still further away other cities of less importance
+contended for the possession of the Upper Saros and the middle region of
+the Halys. These peoples, at once poor and warlike, had been attracted,
+like the Hittites of some centuries previous, by the riches accumulated
+in the strongholds of Syria. Eevolutions must have been frequent in
+these regions, but our knowledge of them is more a matter of conjecture
+than of actual evidence. Towards the year 1170 B.C. the Mushku swooped
+down on Kummukh, and made themselves its masters; then pursuing their
+good fortune, they took from the Assyrians the two provinces, Alzi and
+Purukuzzi, which lay not far from the sources of the Tigris and the
+Balikh.*
+
+     * The _Annals of Tiglath-pileser I_. place their invasion
+     fifty years before the beginning of his reign. Ed. Meyer saw
+     a connexion between this and the invasion of the People of
+     the Sea, which took place under Ramses III. I think that the
+     invasion of the Mushku was a purely local affair, and had
+     nothing in common with the general catastrophe occasioned by
+     the movement of the Asiatic armies.
+
+A little later the Kashku, together with some Aramaeans, broke into
+Shubarti, then subject to Assyria, and took possession of a part of it.
+The majority of these invasions had, however, no permanent result: they
+never issued in the establishment of an empire like that of the Khati,
+capable by its homogeneity of offering a serious resistance to the march
+of a conqueror from the south. To sum up the condition of affairs: if
+a redistribution of races had brought about a change in Northern Syria,
+their want of cohesion was no less marked than in the time of the
+Egyptian wars; the first enemy to make an attack upon the frontier of
+one or other of these tribes was sure of victory, and, if he persevered
+in his efforts, could make himself master of as much territory as he
+might choose. The Pharaohs had succeeded in welding together their
+African possessions, and their part in the drama of conquest had
+been played long ago; but the cities of the Tigris and the Lower
+Euphrates--Nineveh and Babylon-were ready to enter the lists as soon as
+they felt themselves strong enough to revive their ancient traditions of
+foreign conquest.
+
+The successors of Agumkakrime were not more fortunate than he had been
+in attempting to raise Babylon once more to the foremost rank; their
+want of power, their discord, the insubordination and sedition that
+existed among their Cossaean troops, and the almost periodic returns of
+the Theban generals to the banks of the Euphrates, sometimes even to
+those of the Balikh and the Khabur, all seemed to conspire to aggravate
+the helpless state into which Babylon had sunk since the close of the
+dynasty of Uruazagga. Elam was pressing upon her eastern, and Assyria
+on her northern frontier, and their kings not only harassed her with
+persistent malignity, but, by virtue of their alliances by marriage with
+her sovereigns, took advantage of every occasion to interfere both
+in domestic and state affairs; they would espouse the cause of some
+pretender during a revolt, they would assume the guardianship of such
+of their relatives as were left widows or minors, and, when the occasion
+presented itself, they took possession of the throne of Bel, or bestowed
+it on one of their creatures. Assyria particularly seemed to regard
+Babylon with a deadly hatred. The capitals of the two countries were not
+more than some one hundred and eighty-five miles apart, the intervening
+district being a flat and monotonous alluvial plain, unbroken by any
+feature which could serve as a natural frontier. The line of demarcation
+usually followed one of the many canals in the narrow strip of land
+between the Euphrates and the Tigris; it then crossed the latter, and
+was formed by one of the rivers draining the Iranian table-land,--either
+the Upper Zab, the Radanu, the Turnat, or some of their ramifications in
+the spurs of the mountain ranges. Each of the two states strove by every
+means in its power to stretch its boundary to the farthest limits,
+and to keep it there at all hazards. This narrow area was the scene of
+continual war, either between the armies of the two states or those of
+partisans, suspended from time to time by an elaborate treaty which was
+supposed to settle all difficulties, but, as a matter of fact, satisfied
+no one, and left both parties discontented with their lot and jealous of
+each other. The concessions made were never of sufficient importance
+to enable the conqueror to crush his rival and regain for himself the
+ancient domain of Khammurabi; his losses, on the other hand, were
+often considerable enough to paralyse his forces, and prevent him from
+extending his border in any other direction. When the Egyptians seized
+on Naharaim, Assyria and Babylon each adopted at the outset a different
+attitude towards the conquerors. Assyria, which never laid any permanent
+claims to the seaboard provinces of the Mediterranean, was not disposed
+to resent their occupation by Egypt, and desired only to make sure of
+their support or their neutrality. The sovereign then ruling Assyria,
+but of whose name we have no record, hastened to congratulate Thutmosis
+III. on his victory at Megiddo, and sent him presents of precious vases,
+slaves, lapis-lazuli, chariots and horses, all of which the Egyptian
+conqueror regarded as so much tribute. Babylon, on the other hand, did
+not take action so promptly as Assyria; it was only towards the latter
+years of Thutmosis that its king, Karaindash, being hard pressed by the
+Assyrian Assurbelnishishu, at length decided to make a treaty with the
+intruder.*
+
+     * We have no direct testimony in support of this hypothesis,
+     but several important considerations give it probability. As
+     no tribute from Babylon is mentioned in the _Annals of
+     Thutmosis III_., we must place the beginning of the
+     relations between Egypt and Chaldaea at a later date. On the
+     other hand, Burnaburiash II., in a letter written to
+     Amenothes III., cites Karaindash as the first of _his
+     fathers,_ who had established friendly relations with _the
+     fathers_ of the Pharaoh, a fact which obliges us to place
+     the interchange of presents before the time of Amenothes
+     III.: as the reigns of Amenothes II. and of Thutmosis IV.
+     were both short, it is probable that these relations began
+     in the latter years of Thutmosis III.
+
+The remoteness of Egypt from the Babylonian frontier no doubt relieved
+Karaindash from any apprehension of an actual invasion by the Pharaohs;
+but there was the possibility of their subsidising some nearer enemy,
+and also of forbidding Babylonish caravans to enter Egyptian provinces,
+and thus crippling Chaldaean commerce. Friendly relations, when once
+established, soon necessitated a constant interchange of embassies and
+letters between the Nile and the Euphrates. As a matter of fact, the
+Babylonian king could never reconcile himself to the idea that Syria had
+passed out of his hands. While pretending to warn the Pharaoh of Syrian
+plots against him,* the Babylonians were employing at the same time
+secret agents, to go from city to city and stir up discontent at
+Egyptian rule, praising the while the great Cosssean king and his
+armies, and inciting to revolt by promises of help never meant to be
+fulfilled. Assyria, whose very existence would have been endangered by
+the re-establishment of a Babylonian empire, never missed an opportunity
+of denouncing these intrigues at head-quarters: they warned the royal
+messengers and governors of them, and were constantly contrasting the
+frankness and honesty of their own dealings with the duplicity of their
+rival.
+
+     * This was done by Kurigalzu I., according to a letter
+     addressed by his son Burnaburiash to Amenothes IV.
+
+This state of affairs lasted for more than half a century, during which
+time both courts strove to ingratiate themselves in the favour of the
+Pharaoh, each intriguing for the exclusion of the other, by exchanging
+presents with him, by congratulations on his accession, by imploring
+gifts of wrought or unwrought gold, and by offering him the most
+beautiful women of their family for his harem. The son of Karaindash,
+whose name still remains to be discovered, bestowed one of his daughters
+on the young Amenothes III.: Kallimasin, the sovereign who succeeded
+him, also sent successively two princesses to the same Pharaoh. But
+the underlying bitterness and hatred would break through the veneer of
+polite formula and protestations when the petitioner received, as the
+result of his advances, objects of inconsiderable value such as a lord
+might distribute to his vassals,'or when he was refused a princess of
+solar blood, or even an Egyptian bride of some feudal house; at such
+times, however, an ironical or haughty epistle from Thebes would recall
+him to a sense of his own inferiority.
+
+As a fact, the lot of the Cossaean sovereigns does not appear to have
+been a happy one, in spite of the variety and pomposity of the titles
+which they continued to assume. They enjoyed but short lives, and we
+know that at least three or four of them--Kallimasin, Burnaburiash I.,
+and Kurigalzu I. ascended the throne in succession during the forty
+years that Amenothes III. ruled over Egypt and Syria.*
+
+     * The copy we possess of the Royal Canon of Babylon is
+     mutilated at this point, and the original documents are not
+     sufficiently complete to fill the gap. About two or three
+     names are missing after that of Agumkakrime, and the reigns
+     must have been very short, if indeed, as I think, Agumka-
+     krimi and Karaindash were both contemporaries of the earlier
+     Pharaohs bearing the name of Thutmosis. The order of the
+     names which have come down to us is not indisputably
+     established. The following order appears to me to be the
+     most probable at present:--
+
+     Karaindash. Kallimasin. Burnaburiash I. Kurigalzu I.
+     Burnaburiash II. Karakhardash. Kadashmankiiarbe I.
+     Nazibugas II.. Kurigalzu II. Nazimaruttasii. Kadashmanturgu.
+
+     This is, with a slight exception, the classification adopted
+     by Winckler, and that of Hilprecht differs from it only in
+     the intercalation of Kudurturgu and Shagaraktiburiash
+     between Burnaburiash II. and Karakhardash.
+
+Perhaps the rapidity of this succession may have arisen from some
+internal revolution or from family disturbances. The Chaldaeans of the
+old stock reluctantly rendered obedience to these Cosssean kings,
+and, if we may judge from the name, one at least of these ephemeral
+sovereigns, Kallimasin, appears to have been a Semite, who owed his
+position among the Cossoan princes to some fortunate chance. A few
+rare inscriptions stamped on bricks, one or two letters or documents of
+private interest, and some minor objects from widely distant spots, have
+enabled us to ascertain the sites upon which these sovereigns erected
+buildings; Karaindash restored the temple of Nana at Uruk, Burnaburiash
+and Kurigalzu added to that of Shamash at Larsam, and Kurigalzu took in
+hand that of Sin at Uru. We also possess a record of some of their acts
+in the fragments of a document, which a Mnevite scribe of the time of
+Assurbanipal had compiled, or rather jumbled together,* from certain
+Babylonian chronicles dealing with the wars against Assyria and Elam,
+with public treaties, marriages, and family quarrels. We learn from
+this, for example, that Burnaburiash I. renewed with Buzurassur the
+conventions drawn up between Karaindash and Assurbelnishishu. These
+friendly relations were maintained, apparently, under Kurigalzu I.
+and Assur-nadin-akhi, the son of Buzurassur;** if Kurigalzu built or
+restored the fortress, long called after him Dur-Kurigalzu,*** at one
+of the fords of the Narmalka, it was probably as a precautionary measure
+rather than because of any immediate danger. The relations between
+the two powers became somewhat strained when Burnaburiash II.
+and Assuruballit had respectively succeeded to Kurigalzu and
+Assur-nadin-akhi; **** this did not, however, lead to hostilities, and
+the subsequent betrothal of Karakhardash, son of Burnaburiash II., to
+Mubauitatserua, daughter of Assuruballit, tended to restore matters to
+their former condition.
+
+     * This is what is generally called the "Synchronous
+     History," the principal remains of which were discovered and
+     published by H. Rawlinson. It is a very unskilful
+     complication, in which Winckler has discovered several
+     blunders.
+
+     ** Assur-nadin-akhi I. is mentioned in a Tel el-Amarna
+     tablet as being the father of Assuruballit.
+
+     *** This is the present Akerkuf, as is proved by the
+     discovery of bricks bearing the name of Kurigalzu; but
+     perhaps what I have attributed to Kurigalzu I. must be
+     referred to the second king of that name.
+
+     **** We infer this from the way in which Burnaburiash speaks
+     of the Assyrians in the correspondence with Amenothes IV.
+
+The good will between the two countries became still more pronounced
+when Kadashmankharbe succeeded his father Karakhardash. The Cossaean
+soldiery had taken umbrage at his successor and had revolted,
+assassinated Kadashmankharbe, and proclaimed king in his stead a man
+of obscure origin named Nazibugash. Assuruballit, without a moment's
+hesitation, took the side of his new relatives; he crossed the frontier,
+killed Nazibugash, and restored the throne to his sister's child,
+Kurigalzu II., the younger. The young king, who was still a minor at
+his accession, appears to have met with no serious difficulties; at any
+rate, none were raised by his Assyrian cousins, Belnirari I. and his
+successor Budilu.*
+
+     * The _Synchronous History_ erroneously places the events of
+     the reign of Ramman-nirari in that of Belnirari. The order
+     of succession of Buzurassur, Assuruballit, Belnirari, and
+     Budilu, has been established by the bricks of Kalah-Shergat.
+
+Towards the close of his reign, however, revolts broke out, and it was
+only by sustained efforts that he was able to restore order in Babylon,
+Sippara, and the Country of the Sea. While the king was in the midst of
+these difficulties, the Elamites took advantage of his troubles to
+steal from him a portion of his territory, and their king, Khurbatila,
+challenged him to meet his army near Dur-Dungi. Kurigalzu accepted the
+challenge, gained a decisive victory, took his adversary prisoner, and
+released him only on receiving as ransom a province beyond the Tigris;
+he even entered Susa, and, from among other trophies of past wars,
+resumed possession of an agate tablet belonging to Dungi, which the
+veteran Kudurnakhunta had stolen from the temple of Nipur nearly
+a thousand years previously. This victory was followed by the
+congratulations of most of his neighbours, with the exception of
+Bamman-nirari II., who had succeeded Budilu in Assyria, and probably
+felt some jealousy or uneasiness at the news. He attacked the Cossaeans,
+and overthrew them at Sugagi, on the banks of the Salsallat; their
+losses were considerable, and Kurigalzu could only obtain peace by the
+cession to Assyria of a strip of territory the entire length of the
+north-west frontier, from the confines of the Shubari country, near
+the sources of the Khabur, to the suburbs of Babylon itself. Nearly the
+whole of Mesopotamia thus changed hands at one stroke, but Babylon had
+still more serious losses to suffer. Nazimaruttash, who attempted to
+wipe out the disaster sustained by his father Kurigalzu, experienced two
+crushing defeats, one at Kar-Ishtar and the other near Akarsallu, and
+the treaty which he subsequently signed was even more humiliating for
+his country than the preceding one. All that part of the Babylonian
+domain which lay nearest to Nineveh was ceded to the Assyrians, from
+Pilaski on the right bank of the Tigris to the province of Lulume in
+the Zagros mountains. It would appear that the Cossaean tribes who had
+remained in their native country, took advantage of these troublous
+times to sever all connection with their fellow-countrymen established
+in the cities of the plain; for we find them henceforward carrying on a
+petty warfare for their own profit, and leading an entirely independent
+life. The descendants of Gandish, deprived of territories in the north,
+repulsed in the east, and threatened in the south by the nations of
+the Persian Gulf, never recovered their former ascendency, and their
+authority slowly declined during the century which followed these
+events. Their downfall brought about the decadence of the cities over
+which they had held sway; and the supremacy which Babylon had exercised
+for a thousand years over the countries of the Euphrates passed into the
+hands of the Assyrian kings.
+
+Assyria itself was but a poor and insignificant country when compared
+with her rival. It occupied, on each side of the middle course of the
+Tigris, the territory lying between the 35th and 37th parallels of
+latitude.*
+
+     * These are approximately the limits of the first Assyrian
+     empire, as given by the monuments; from the Persian epoch
+     onwards, the name was applied to the whole course of the
+     Tigris as far as the mountain district. The ancient
+     orthography of the name is Aushar.
+
+It was bounded on the east by the hills and mountain ranges running
+parallel to the Zagros Chain--Gebel Guar, Gebel Gara, Zerguizavan-dagh,
+and Baravan-dagh, with their rounded monotonous limestone ridges, scored
+by watercourses and destitute of any kind of trees. On the north it
+was hemmed in by the spurs of the Masios, and bounded on the east by an
+undefined line running from Mount Masios to the slopes of Singar,
+and from these again to the Chaldaean plain; to the south the frontier
+followed the configuration of the table-land and the curve of the low
+cliffs, which in prehistoric times had marked the limits of the Persian
+Gulf; from here the boundary was formed on the left side of the Tigris
+by one of its tributaries, either the Lower Zab or the Badanu. The
+territory thus enclosed formed a compact and healthy district: it was
+free from extremes of temperature arising from height or latitude, and
+the relative character and fertility of its soil depended on the absence
+or presence of rivers. The eastern part of Assyria was well watered by
+the streams and torrents which drained the Iranian plateau and the lower
+mountain chains which ran parallel to it. The beds of these rivers are
+channelled so deeply in the alluvial soil, that it is necessary to stand
+on the very edge of their banks to catch a sight of their silent and
+rapid waters; and it is only in the spring or early summer, when they
+are swollen by the rains and melting snow, that they spread over the
+adjacent country. As soon as the inundation is over, a vegetation of the
+intensest green springs up, and in a few days the fields and meadows are
+covered with a luxuriant and fragrant carpet of verdure. This brilliant
+growth is, however, short-lived, for the heat of the sun dries it up as
+quickly as it appears, and even the corn itself is in danger of being
+burnt up before reaching maturity. To obviate such a disaster, the
+Assyrians had constructed a network of canals and ditches, traces of
+which are in many places still visible, while a host of _shadufs_
+placed along their banks facilitated irrigation in the dry seasons. The
+provinces supplied with water in this manner enjoyed a fertility which
+passed into a proverb, and was well known among the ancients; they
+yielded crops of cereals which rivalled those of Babylonia, and included
+among their produce wheat, barley, millet, and sesame. But few olive
+trees were cultivated, and the dates were of inferior quality; indeed,
+in the Greek period, these fruits were only used for fattening pigs and
+domestic animals. The orchards contained the pistachio, the apple, the
+pomegranate, the apricot, the vine, the almond, and the fig, and, in
+addition to the essences common to both Syria and Egypt, the country
+produced cedrats of a delicious scent which were supposed to be an
+antidote to all kinds of poisons. Assyria was not well wooded, except in
+the higher valleys, where willows and poplars bordered the rivers, and
+sycamores, beeches, limes, and plane trees abounded, besides several
+varieties of pines and oaks, including a dwarf species of the latter,
+from whose branches manna was obtained.
+
+[Illustration: 143.jpg THE 1ST ASSYRIAN EMPIRE--MAP]
+
+This is a saccharine substance, which is deposited in small lumps, and
+is found in greater abundance during wet years and especially on foggy
+days. When fresh, it has an agreeable taste and is pleasant to eat;
+but as it will not keep in its natural state, the women prepare it for
+exportation by dissolving it in boiling water, and evaporating it to a
+sweetish paste, which has more or less purgative, qualities. The aspect
+of the country changes after crossing the Tigris westward. The slopes of
+Mount Masios are everywhere furrowed with streams, which feed the Khabur
+and its principal affluent, the Kharmis;* woods become more frequent,
+and the valleys green and shady.
+
+     * The Kharmis is the Mygdonios of Greek geographers, the
+     Hirmas of the Arabs; the latter name may be derived from
+     Kharmis, or it may be that it merely presents a fortuitous
+     resemblance to it.
+
+The plains extending southwards, however, contain, like those of the
+Euphrates, beds of gypsum in the sub-soil, which render the water
+running through them brackish, and prevent the growth of vegetation.
+The effects of volcanic action are evident on the surface of these
+great steppes; blocks of basalt pierce through the soil, and near the
+embouchure of the Kharmis, a cone, composed of a mass of lava, cinders,
+and scorial, known as the Tell-Kokab, rises abruptly to a height of
+325 feet. The mountain chain of Singar, which here reaches its western
+termination, is composed of a long ridge of soft white limestone, and
+seems to have been suddenly thrown up in one of the last geological
+upheavals which affected this part of the country: in some places it
+resembles a perpendicular wall, while in others it recedes in natural
+terraces which present the appearance of a gigantic flight of steps. The
+summit is often wooded, and the spurs covered with vineyards and fields,
+which flourish vigorously in the vicinity of streams; when these fail,
+however, the table-land resumes its desolate aspect, and stretches
+in bare and sandy undulations to the horizon, broken only where it
+is crossed by the Thartar, the sole river in this region which is not
+liable to be dried up, and whose banks may be traced by the scanty line
+of vegetation which it nourishes.
+
+[Illustration: 145.jpg THE VOLCANIC CONE OF KOKAB]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from the cut in Layard.
+
+In a country thus unequally favoured by nature, the towns are
+necessarily distributed in a seemingly arbitrary fashion. Most of them
+are situated on the left bank of the Tigris, where the fertile nature
+of the soil enables it to support a dense population. They were all
+flourishing centres of population, and were in close proximity to each
+other, at all events during the centuries of Assyrian hegemony.*
+
+     * We find, for example, in the inscription of Bavian, a long
+     enumeration of towns and villages situated almost within the
+     suburbs of Nineveh, on the banks of the Khoser.
+
+Three of them soon eclipsed their rivals in political and religious
+importance; these were Kalakh and Nina on the Tigris, and Arbailu,
+lying beyond the Upper Zab, in the broken plain which is a continuation
+eastwards of the first spurs of the Zagros.* On the right bank, however,
+we find merely some dozen cities and towns, scattered about in places
+where there was a supply of water sufficient to enable the inhabitants
+to cultivate the soil; as, for example, Assur on the banks of the Tigris
+itself, Singara near the sources of the Thartar, and Nazibina near those
+of the Kharmis, at the foot of the Masios. These cities were not all
+under the rule of one sovereign when Thutmosis III. appeared in Syria,
+for the Egyptian monuments mention, besides the kingdom of Assyria, that
+of Singara** and Araphka in the upper basin of the Zab.***
+
+     * The name of Arbeles is written in a form which appears to
+     signify "the town of the four gods."
+
+     ** This kingdom of Singara is mentioned in the Egyptian
+     lists of Thutmosis III. Schrader was doubtful as to its
+     existence, but one of its kings is mentioned in a letter
+     from the King of Alasia to Amenothes IV.; according to
+     Niebuhr, the state of which Singara was the capital must
+     have been identical, at all events at one period, with the
+     Mitanni of the Egyptian texts.
+
+     *** The Arapakha of the Egyptian monuments has been
+     identified with the Arrapakhitis of the Greeks.
+
+Assyria, however, had already asserted her supremacy over this corner of
+Asia, and the remaining princes, even if they were not mere vicegerents
+depending on her king, were not strong enough in wealth and extent
+of territory to hold their own against her, since she was undisputed
+mistress of Assur, Arbeles, Kalakh, and Nineveh, the most important
+cities of the plain. Assur covered a considerable area, and the
+rectangular outline formed by the remains of its walls is still
+discernible on the surface of the soil. Within the circuit of the
+city rose a mound, which the ancient builders had transformed, by
+the addition of masses of brickwork, into a nearly square platform,
+surmounted by the usual palace, temple, and ziggurat; it was enclosed
+within a wall of squared stone, the battlements of which remain to the
+present day.* The whole pile was known as the "Ekharsagkurkurra," or the
+"House of the terrestrial mountain," the sanctuary in whose decoration
+all the ancient sovereigns had vied with one another, including
+Samsiramman I. and Irishum, who were merely vicegerents dependent upon
+Babylon. It was dedicated to Anshar, that duplicate of Anu who had
+led the armies of heaven in the struggle with Tiamat; the name Anshar,
+softened into Aushar, and subsequently into Ashshur, was first applied
+to the town and then to the whole country.**
+
+     * Ainsworth states the circumference of the principal mound
+     of Kalah-Shergat to be 4685 yards, which would make it one
+     of the most extensive ruins in the whole country.
+
+     ** Another name of the town in later times was Palbeki, "the
+     town of the old empire," "the ancient capital," or Shauru.
+     Many Assyriologists believe that the name Ashur, anciently
+     written Aushar, signified "the plain at the edge of the
+     water"; and that it must have been applied to the town
+     before being applied to the country and the god. Others, on
+     the contrary, think, with more reason, that it was the god
+     who gave his name to the town and the country; they make a
+     point of the very ancient play of words, which in Assyria
+     itself attributed the meaning "good god" to the word Ashur.
+     Jensen was the first to state that Ashur was the god Anshar
+     of the account of the creation.
+
+The god himself was a deity of light, usually represented under the form
+of an armed man, wearing the tiara and having the lower half of his body
+concealed by a feathered disk. He was supposed to hover continually
+over the world, hurling fiery darts at the enemies of his people, and
+protecting his kingly worshippers under the shadow of his wings. Their
+wars were his wars, and he was with them in the thick of the attack,
+placing himself in the front rank with the soldiery,* so that when he
+gained the victory, the bulk of the spoil--precious metals, gleanings
+of the battle-field, slaves and productive lands--fell to his share. The
+gods of the vanquished enemy, moreover, were, like their princes, forced
+to render him homage. In the person of the king he took their statues
+prisoners, and shut them up in his sanctuary; sometimes he would engrave
+his name upon their figures and send them back to their respective
+temples, where the sight of them would remind their worshippers of his
+own omnipotence.** The goddess associated with him as his wife had given
+her name, Nina, to Nineveh,*** and was, as the companion of the Chaldaean
+Bel, styled the divine lady Belit; she was, in fact, a chaste and
+warlike Ishtar, who led the armies into battle with a boldness
+characteristic of her father.****
+
+     * In one of the pictures, for instance, representing the
+     assault of a town, we see a small figure of the god, hurling
+     darts against the enemy. The inscriptions also state that
+     the peoples "are alarmed and quit their cities _before the
+     arms of Assur, the powerful one_."
+
+     ** As, for instance, the statues of the gods taken from the
+     Arabs in the time of Esarhaddon. Tiglath-pileser I. had
+     carried away twenty-five statues of gods taken from the
+     peoples of Kurkhi and Kummukh, and had placed them in the
+     temples of Beltis, Ishtar, Anu, and Ramman; he mentions
+     other foreign divinities who had been similarly treated.
+
+     *** The ideogram of the name of the goddess Nina serves to
+     write the name of the town Nineveh. The name itself has been
+     interpreted by Schrader as "station, habitation," in the
+     Semitic languages, and by Fr. Delitzsch "repose of the god,"
+     an interpretation which Delitzsch himself repudiated later
+     on. It is probable that the town, which, like Assur, was a
+     Chaldaean colony, derived its name from the goddess to whom
+     it was dedicated, and whose temple existed there as early as
+     the time of the vicegerent Samsiramman.
+
+     **** Belit is called by Tiglath-pileser I. "the great spouse
+     beloved of Assur," but Belit, "the lady," is here merely an
+     epithet used for Ishtar: the Assyrian Ishtar, Ishtar of
+     Assur, Ishtar of Nineveh, or rather--especially from the
+     time of the Sargonids--Ishtar of Arbeles, is almost always a
+     fierce and warlike Ishtar, the "lady of combat, who directs
+     battles," "whose heart incites her to the combat and the
+     struggle." Sayce thinks that the union of Ishtar and Assur
+     is of a more recent date.
+
+[Illustration: 149.jpg ISHTAR AS A WARRIOR BRINGING PRISONERS TO A
+CONQUERING KING]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from squeezes brought back by M. do
+     Morgan.
+
+These two divinities formed an abstract and solitary pair, around whom
+neither story nor myth appears to have gathered, and who never became
+the centre of any complex belief. Assur seems to have had no parentage
+assigned to him, no statue erected to him, and he was not associated
+with the crowd of other divinities; on the contrary, he was called their
+lord, their "peerless king," and, as a proof of his supreme sovereignty
+over them, his name was inscribed at the head of their lists, before
+those of the triads constituted by the Chaldaean priests--even before
+those of Anu, Bel, and Ba. The city of Assur, which had been the first
+to tender him allegiance for many years, took precedence of all the
+rest, in spite of the drawbacks with which it had to contend. Placed at
+the very edge of the Mesopotamian desert, it was exposed to the dry and
+burning winds which swept over the plains, so that by the end of the
+spring the heat rendered it almost intolerable as a residence. The
+Tigris, moreover, ran behind it, thus leaving it exposed to the attacks
+of the Babylonian armies, unprotected as it was by any natural fosse
+or rampart. The nature of the frontier was such as to afford it no
+safeguard; indeed, it had, on the contrary, to protect its frontier.
+Nineveh, on the other hand, was entrenched behind the Tigris and the
+Zab, and was thus secure from any sudden attack. Northerly and easterly
+winds prevailed during the summer, and the coolness of the night
+rendered the heat during the day more bearable. It became the custom for
+the kings and vicegerents to pass the most trying months of the year at
+Nineveh, taking up their abode close to the temple of Nina, the Assyrian
+Ishtar, but they did not venture to make it their habitual residence,
+and consequently Assur remained the official capital and chief sanctuary
+of the empire. Here its rulers concentrated their treasures, their
+archives, their administrative offices, and the chief staff of the army;
+from this town they set out on their expeditions against the Cossaeans of
+Babylon or the mountaineers of the districts beyond the Tigris, and it
+was in this temple that they dedicated to the god the tenth of the spoil
+on their return from a successful campaign.*
+
+* The majority of scholars now admit that the town of Nina, mentioned by
+Gudea and the vicegerents of Telloh, was a quarter of, or neighbouring
+borough of, Lagash, and had nothing in common with Nineveh, in spite of
+Hommel's assumption to the contrary.
+
+The struggle with Chaldaea, indeed, occupied the greater part of their
+energies, though it did not absorb all their resources, and often left
+them times of respite, of which they availed themselves to extend their
+domain to the north and east. We cannot yet tell which of the Assyrian
+sovereigns added the nearest provinces of the Upper Tigris to his
+realm; but when the names of these districts appear-in history, they
+are already in a state of submission and vassalage, and their principal
+towns are governed by Assyrian officers in the same manner as those of
+Singara and Nisibe. Assuruballit, the conqueror of the Cossaeans, had
+succeeded in establishing his authority over the turbulent hordes of
+Shubari which occupied the neighbourhood of the Masios, between the
+Khabur and the Balikh, and extended perhaps as far as the Euphrates; at
+any rate, he was considered by posterity as the actual founder of the
+Assyrian empire in these districts.* Belnirari had directed his efforts
+in another direction, and had conquered the petty kingdoms established
+on the slopes of the Iranian table-land, around the sources of the two
+Zabs, and those of the Badanu and the Turnat.**
+
+     * It is called, in an inscription of his great-grandson,
+     Ramman-nirari L, the powerful king "who reduced to servitude
+     the forces of the vast country of Shubari, and who enlarged
+     the territory and limits "of Assur.
+
+     ** The inscription of Ramman-nirari I. styles him the prince
+     "who crushes the army of the Cossaeans, he whose hand
+     unnerves the enemy, and who enlarges the territory and its
+     limits." The Cossaeans mentioned in this passage are usually
+     taken to be the Cossaean kings of Babylon, and not the
+     mountain tribes.
+
+Like Susiana, this part of the country was divided up into parallel
+valleys, separated from each other by broken ridges of limestone, and
+watered by the tributaries of the Tigris or their affluents.
+
+[Illustration: 152.jpg A VILLAGE IN THE MOUNTAIN DISTRICTS OF THE OLD
+ASSAEAN KINGDOM]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from a drawing by Pere Durand.
+
+It was thickly strewn with walled towns and villages; the latter,
+perched upon the precipitous mountain summits, and surrounded by deep
+ravines, owed their security solely to their position, and, indeed,
+needed no fortification. The country abounded in woods and pastures,
+interspersed with cornlands; access to it was gained by one or two
+passes on the eastern side, which thus permitted caravans or armies to
+reach the districts lying between the Erythraean and Caspian Seas.
+The tribes who inhabited it had been brought early under Chaldaean
+civilization, and had adopted the cuneiform script; such of their
+monuments as are still extant resemble the bas-reliefs and inscriptions
+of Assyria.* It is not always easy to determine the precise locality
+occupied by these various peoples; the Guti were situated near the upper
+courses of the Turnat and the Badanu, in the vicinity of the Kashshu;**
+the Lulume had settled in the neighbourhood of the Batir, to the north
+of the defiles of Zohab;*** the Namar separated the Lulume from Elam,
+and were situated half in the plain and half in the mountain, while the
+Arapkha occupied, both banks of the Great Zab.
+
+     * Pinches has published an inscription of a king of Khani,
+     named Tukultimir, son of Ilushaba, written in
+     Chaldeo-Assyrian, and found in the temple of Shamash at
+     Sippara, where the personage himself had dedicated it.
+     Winckler gives another inscription of a king of the Guti,
+     which is also in Semitic and in cuneiform character.
+
+     ** The name is written sometimes Quti, at others Guti, which
+     induced Pognon to believe that they were two different
+     peoples: the territory occupied by this nation must have
+     been originally to the east of the Lesser Zab, in the upper
+     basins of the Adhem and the Diyaleh. Oppert proposes to
+     recognise in these Guti "the ancestors of the Goths, who,
+     fifteen hundred years ago, pushed forward to the Russia of
+     the present day: we find," (he adds), "in this passage and in
+     others, some of which go back to the third millennium before
+     the Christian era, the earliest mention of the Germanic
+     races."
+
+     *** The people of Lulumo-Lullubi have been pointed out as
+     living to the east of the Lesser Zab by Schrader; their
+     exact position, together with that of Mount Padir-Batir in
+     whose neighbourhood they were, has been determined by Pere
+     Scheil.
+
+Budilu carried his arms against these tribes, and obtained successes
+over the Turuki and the Nigimkhi, the princes of the Guti and the Shuti,
+as well as over the Akhlami and the Iauri.*
+
+     * The Shutu or Shuti, who are always found in connection
+     with the Guti, appear to have been the inhabitants of the
+     lower mountain slopes which separate the basin of the Tigris
+     with the regions of Elam, to the south of Turnat. The
+     Akhlame were neighbours of the Shuti and the Guti; they were
+     settled partly in the Mesopotamian plain and partly in the
+     neighbourhood of Turnat. The territory of the Iauri is not
+     known; the Turuki and the Nigimkhi were probably situated
+     somewhere to the east of the Great Zab: in the same way that
+     Oppert connects the Goths with the Guti, so Hommel sees in
+     the Turuki the Turks of a very early date.
+
+The chiefs of the Lulume had long resisted the attacks of their
+neighbours, and one of them, Anu-banini, had engraved on the rocks
+overhanging the road not far from the village of Seripul, a bas-relief
+celebrating his own victories. He figures on it in full armour, wearing
+a turban on his head, and treading underfoot a fallen foe, while Ishtar
+of Arbeles leads towards him a long file of naked captives, bound
+ready for sacrifice. The resistance of the Lulume was, however, finally
+overcome by Ramman-nirari, the son of Budilu; he strengthened the
+suzerainty gained by his predecessor over the Guti, the Cossaeans, and
+the Shubarti, and he employed the spoil taken from them in beautifying
+the temple of Assur. He had occasion to spend some time in the regions
+of the Upper Tigris, warring against the Shubari, and a fine bronze
+sabre belonging to him has been found near Diarbekir, among the ruins of
+the ancient Amidi, where, no doubt, he had left it as an offering in one
+of the temples. He was succeeded by Shalmanuasharid,* better known to
+us as Shalmaneser I., one of the most powerful sovereigns of this heroic
+age of Assyrian history.
+
+[Illustration: 155.jpg THE SABRE OF RAMMAN-NIRARI]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from the sketch published in the
+     _Transactions_ of the Bibl. Arch. Soc.
+
+His reign seems to have been one continuous war against the various
+races then in a state of ferment on the frontiers of his kingdom. He
+appears in the main to have met with success, and in a few years had
+doubled the extent of his dominions.* His most formidable attacks were
+directed against the Aramaeans** of Mount Masios, whose numerous tribes
+had advanced on one side till they had crossed the Tigris, while on the
+other they had pushed beyond the river Balikh, and had probably reached
+the Euphrates.***
+
+     * Shalmanu-asharid, or Shulmanu-asharid, signifies "the god
+     Shulmanu (Shalmanu) is prince," as Pinches was the first to
+     point out.
+
+     ** Some of the details of these campaigns have been
+     preserved on the much-mutilated obelisk of Assur-nazir-pal.
+     This was a compilation taken from the Annals of Assyria to
+     celebrate the important acts of the king's ancestors. The
+     events recorded in the third column were at first attributed
+     to the reign of Tiglath-pileser I.; Fr. Delitzsch was the
+     first to recognise that they could be referred to the reign
+     of this Shalmaneser, and his opinion is now admitted by most
+     of the Assyriologists who have studied the question.
+
+     *** The identity of the Arami (written also Armaya, Arumi,
+     Arimi) with the Aramoans, admitted by the earlier Kammin-
+     nikabi Assyriologists.
+
+He captured their towns one after another, razed their fortresses, smote
+the agricultural districts with fire and sword, and then turned upon the
+various peoples who had espoused their cause--the Kirkhu, the Euri, the
+Kharrin,* and the Muzri, who inhabited the territory between the basins
+of the two great rivers;** once, indeed, he even crossed the Euphrates
+and ventured within the country of Khanigalbat, a feat which his
+ancestors had never even attempted.***
+
+     * The people of the country of Kilkhi, or Kirkhi, the
+     Kurkhi, occupied the region between the Tigris at Diarbekir
+     and the mountains overlooking the lake of Urumiah. The
+     position of the Ruri is not known, but it is certain that on
+     one side they joined the Aramaeans, and that they were in
+     the neighbourhood of Tushkhan. Kharran is the Harran of the
+     Balikh, mentioned in vol. iv. pp. 37, 38 of the present
+     work.
+
+     ** The name of Muzri frequently occurs, and in various
+     positions, among the countries mentioned by the Assyrian
+     conquerors; the frequency of its occurrence is easily
+     explained if we are to regard it as a purely Assyrian term
+     used to designate the military confines or marches of the
+     kingdom at different epochs of its history. The Muzri here
+     in question is the borderland situated in the vicinity of
+     Cilicia, probably the Sophene and the Gumathene of classical
+     geographers. Winckler appears to me to exaggerate their
+     importance when he says they were spread over the whole of
+     Northern Syria as early as the time of Shalmaneser I.
+
+     *** Khanigalbat is the name of the province in which Milid
+     was placed.
+
+He was recalled by a revolt which had broken out in the scattered cities
+of the district of Dur-Kurigalzu; he crushed the rising in spite of the
+help which Kadash-manburiash, King of Babylon, had given to the rebels,
+and was soon successful in subduing the princes of Lulume. These were
+not the raids of a day's duration, undertaken, without any regard to the
+future, merely from love of rapine or adventure. Shalmaneser desired to
+bring the regions which he annexed permanently under the authority of
+Assyria, and to this end he established military colonies in suitable
+places, most of which were kept up long after his death.*
+
+     * More than five centuries after the time of Shalmaneser I.,
+     Assurnazir-pal makes mention, in his _Annals_, of one of
+     these colonies, established in the country of Diarbekir at
+     Khabzilukha (or Khabzidipkha), near to the town of Damdamua.
+
+He seems to have directed the internal affairs of his kingdom with the
+same firmness and energy which he displayed in his military expeditions.
+It was no light matter for the sovereign to decide on a change in
+the seat of government; he ran the risk of offending, not merely his
+subjects, but the god who presided over the destinies of the State, and
+neither his throne nor his life would have been safe had he failed in
+his attempt. Shalmaneser, however, did not hesitate to make the change,
+once he was fully convinced of the drawbacks presented by Assur as
+a capital. True, he beautified the city, restored its temples, and
+permitted it to retain all its privileges and titles; but having
+done so, he migrated with his court to the town of Kalakh, where
+his descendants continued to reside for several centuries. His son
+Tukulti-ninip made himself master of Babylon, and was the first of his
+race who was able to claim the title of King of Sumir and Akkad.
+The Cossaeans were still suffering from their defeat at the hands of
+Bamman-nirari. Four of their princes had followed Nazimaruttash on the
+throne in rapid succession--Kadashmanturgu, Kadashmanburiash, who
+was attacked by Shalmaneser, a certain Isammeti whose name has been
+mutilated, and lastly, Shagaraktiburiash: Bibeiasdu, son of this latter,
+was in power at the moment when Tukulti-ninip ascended the throne. War
+broke out between the two monarchs, but dragged on without any marked
+advantage on one side or the other, till at length the conflict was
+temporarily suspended by a treaty similar to others which had been
+signed in the course of the previous two or three centuries.*
+
+     * The passage from the _Synchronous History_, republished by
+     Winckler, contains the termination of the mutilated name of
+     a Babylonian king... _ashu_, which, originally left
+     undecided by Winckler, has been restored "Bibeiashu" by
+     Hilprecht, in the light of monuments discovered at Nipur, an
+     emendation which has since then been accepted by Winckler.
+     Winckler, on his part, has restored the passage on the
+     assumption that the name of the King of Assyria engaged
+     against Bibeiashu was Tukulti-ninip; then, combining this
+     fragment with that in the _Pinches Chronicle_, which deals
+     with the taking of Babylon, he argues that Bibeiashu was the
+     king dethroned by Tukulti-ninip. An examination of the
+     dates, in so far as they are at present known to us from the
+     various documents, seems to me to render this arrangement
+     inadmissible. The _Pinches Chronicle_ practically tells us
+     that Tukulti-ninip reigned over Babylon for _seven years_,
+     when the Chaldaeans revolted, and named Rammanshumusur king.
+     Now, the Babylonian Canon gives us the following reigns for
+     this epoch: Bibeiashu _8 years_, Belnadinshumu _1 year 6
+     months_, Kadashmankharbe _1 year 6 months_, Rammannadinshumu
+     _6 years_, Rammanshumusur _30 years,_ or _9 years_ between
+     the end of the reign of Bibeiashu and the beginning of that
+     of Rammanshumusur, instead of the _7 years_ given us by the
+     _Pinches Chronicle_ for the length of the reign of Tukulti-
+     ninip at Babylon. If we reckon, as the only documents known
+     require us to do, seven years from the beginning of the
+     reign of Rammanshumusur to the date of the taking of
+     Babylon, we are forced to admit that this took place in the
+     reign of Kadashmankharbe IL, and, consequently, that the
+     passage in the _Synchronous History_, in which mention is
+     made of Bibeiashu, must be interpreted as I have done in the
+     text, by the hypothesis of a war prior to that in which
+     Babylon fell, which was followed by a treaty between this
+     prince and the King of Assyria.
+
+The peace thus concluded might have lasted longer but for an unforeseen
+catastrophe which placed Babylon almost at the mercy of her rival. The
+Blamites had never abandoned their efforts to press in every conceivable
+way their claim to the Sebbeneh-su, the supremacy, which, prior to
+Kbammurabi, had been exercised by their ancestors over the whole of
+Mesopotamia; they swooped down on Karduniash with an impetuosity like
+that of the Assyrians, and probably with the same alternations of
+success and defeat. Their king, Kidinkhutrutash, unexpectedly attacked
+Belnadinshumu, son of Bibeiashu, appeared suddenly under the walls
+of Nipur and forced the defences of Durilu and Etimgarka-lamma:
+Belnadinshumu disappeared in the struggle after a reign of eighteen
+months. Tukulti-ninip left Belna-dinshumu's successor, Kadashmankharbe
+II., no time to recover from this disaster; he attacked him in turn,
+carried Babylon by main force, and put a number of the inhabitants to
+the sword. He looted the palace and the temples, dragged the statue of
+Merodach from its sanctuary and carried it off into Assyria, together
+with the badges of supreme power; then, after appointing governors of
+his own in the various towns, he returned to Kalakh, laden with booty;
+he led captive with him several members of the royal family--among
+others, Bammanshumusur, the lawful successor of Bibeiashu.
+
+This first conquest of Chaldaea did not, however, produce any lasting
+results. The fall of Babylon did not necessarily involve the subjection
+of the whole country, and the cities of the south showed a bold front to
+the foreign intruder, and remained faithful to Kadashmankharbe; on the
+death of the latter, some months after his defeat, they hailed as king a
+certain Bammanshumnadin, who by some means or other had made his escape
+from captivity. Bammanshumnadin proved himself a better man than his
+predecessors; when Kidinkhutrutash, never dreaming, apparently, that he
+would meet with any serious resistance, came to claim his share of
+the spoil, he defeated him near Ishin, drove him out of the districts
+recently occupied by the Elamites, and so effectually retrieved his
+fortunes in this direction, that he was able to concentrate his whole
+attention on what was going on in the north. The effects of his victory
+soon became apparent: the nobles of Akkad and Karduniash declined to pay
+homage to their Assyrian governors, and, ousting them from the offices
+to which they had been appointed, restored Babylon to the independence
+which it had lost seven years previously. Tukulti-ninip paid dearly
+for his incapacity to retain his conquests: his son Assurnazirpal I.
+conspired with the principal officers, deposed him from the throne, and
+confined him in the fortified palace of Kar-Tukulti-ninip, which he
+had built not far from Kalakh, where he soon after contrived his
+assassination. About this time Rammanshumnadin disappears, and we can
+only suppose that the disasters of these last years had practically
+annihilated the Cossaean dynasty, for Rammanshu-musur, who was a prisoner
+in Assyria, was chosen as his successor. The monuments tell us nothing
+definite of the troubles which next befell the two kingdoms: we seem to
+gather, however, that Assyria became the scene of civil wars, and
+that the sons of Tukulti-ninip fought for the crown among themselves.
+Tukultiassurbel, who gained the upper hand at the end of six years, set
+Raminan-shumusur at liberty, probably with the view of purchasing
+the support of the Chaldaeans, but he did not succeed in restoring his
+country to the position it had held under Shalmaneser and Tukulti-ninip
+I. The history of Assyria presents a greater number of violent contrasts
+and extreme vicissitudes than that of any other Eastern people in the
+earliest times. No sooner had the Assyrians arrived, thanks to the
+ceaseless efforts of five or six generations, at the very summit of
+their ambition, than some incompetent, or perhaps merely unfortunate,
+king appeared on the scene, and lost in a few years all the ground
+which had been gained at the cost of such tremendous exertions: then
+the subject races would rebel, the neighbouring peoples would pluck up
+courage and reconquer the provinces which they had surrendered, till the
+dismembered empire gradually shrank back to its original dimensions. As
+the fortunes of Babylon rose, those of Nineveh suffered a corresponding
+depression: Babylon soon became so powerful that Eammanshumusur was able
+to adopt a patronising tone in his relations with Assur-nirari I. and
+Nabodainani, the descendants of Tukultiassurbel, who at one time shared
+the throne together.*
+
+     * All that we know of these two kings is contained in the
+     copy, executed in the time of Assurbanipal, of a letter
+     addressed to them by Eammanshumusur. They have been placed,
+     at one time or another, either at the beginning of Assyrian
+     history before Assurbelnishishu, or after Tigiath-pileser
+     I., about the XIth or Xth, or even the VIIIth century before
+     our era. It has since been discovered that the
+     Rammanshumusur who wrote this letter was the successor of
+     Tukulti-ninip I. in Chaldaea.
+
+This period of subjection and humiliation did not last long.
+Belkudurusur, who appears on the throne not long after Assurnirari
+and his partner, resumed military operations against the Cossaeans, but
+cautiously at first; and though he fell in the decisive engagement,
+yet Bamman-shumusur perished with him, and the two states were thus
+simultaneously left rulerless. Milishikhu succeeded Bammanshumusur,
+and Ninipahalesharra filled the place of Belkudurusur; the disastrous
+invasion of Assyria by the Chaldaeans, and their subsequent retreat, at
+length led to an armistice, which, while it afforded evidence of the
+indisputable superiority of Milishikhu, proved no less plainly the
+independence of his rival. Mero-dachabaliddina I. replaced Milishikhu,
+Zamaniashu-middin followed Merodachabaliddina: Assurdan I., son of
+Ninipahalesharra, broke the treaty, captured the towns of Zaban, Irria,
+and Akarsallu, and succeeded in retaining them. The advantage thus
+gained was but a slight one, for these provinces lying between the two
+Zabs had long been subject to Assyria, and had been wrested from her
+since the days of Tukulti-ninip: however, it broke the run of ill luck
+which seemed to have pursued her so relentlessly, and opened the way for
+more important victories. This was the last Cossaean war; at any rate,
+the last of which we find any mention in history: Bel-nadinshumu II.
+reigned three years after Zamamashu-middin, but when he died there was
+no man of his family whom the priests could invite to lay hold of the
+hand of Merodach, and his dynasty ended with him. It included thirty-six
+kings, and had lasted five hundred and seventy-six years and six
+months.*
+
+* The following is a list of some of the kings of this dynasty according
+to the canon discovered by Pinches.
+
+[Illustration: 163.jpg TABLE]
+
+It had enjoyed its moments of triumph, and at one time had almost seemed
+destined to conquer the whole of Asia; but it appears to have invariably
+failed just as it was on the point of reaching the goal, and it became
+completely exhausted by its victories at the end of every two or
+three generations. It had triumphed over Elam, and yet Elam remained a
+constant peril on its right. It had triumphed over Assyria, yet Assyria,
+after driving it back to the regions of the Upper Tigris, threatened to
+bar the road to the Mediterranean by means of its Masian colonies: were
+they once to succeed in this attempt, what hope would there be left to
+those who ruled in Babylon of ever after re-establishing the traditional
+empire of the ancient Sargon and Khammurabi? The new dynasty sprang from
+a town in Pashe, the geographical position of which is not known. It was
+of Babylonian origin, and its members placed, at the be ginning of their
+protocols, formula which were intended to indicate, in the clearest
+possible manner, the source from which they sprang: they declared
+themselves to be scions of Babylon, its vicegerents, and supreme
+masters. The names of the first two we do not know: the third,
+Nebuchadrezzar, shows himself to have been one of the most remarkable
+men of all those who flourished during this troubled era. At no time,
+perhaps, had Chaldaea been in a more abject state, or assailed by more
+active foes. The Elamite had just succeeded in wresting from her Namar,
+the region from whence the bulk of her chariot-horses were obtained, and
+this success had laid the provinces on the left bank of the Tigris open
+to their attacks. They had even crossed the river, pillaged Babylon,
+and carried away the statue of Bel and that of a goddess named Eria, the
+patroness of Khussi: "Merodach, sore angered, held himself aloof from
+the country of Akkad;" the kings could no longer "take his hands" on
+their coming to the throne, and were obliged to reign without proper
+investiture in consequence of their failure to fulfil the rite required
+by religious laws.*
+
+     * The _Donation to Shamud and Shamai_ informs us that
+     Nebuchadrezzar "took the hands of Bel" as soon as he
+     regained possession of the statue. The copy we possess of
+     the Royal Canon. Nebuchadrezzar I.'s place in the series
+     has, therefore, been the subject of much controversy.
+     Several Assyriologists were from the first inclined to place
+     him in the first or second rank, some being in favour of the
+     first, others preferring the second; Dolitzsch put him into
+     the fifth place, and Winckler, without pronouncing
+     definitely on the position to be assigned him, thought he
+     must come in about half-way down the dynasty. Hilprecht, on
+     taking up the questions, adduced reasons for supposing him
+     to have been the founder of the dynasty, and his conclusions
+     have been adopted by Oppert; they have been disputed by
+     Tiele, who wishes to put the king back to fourth or fifth in
+     order, and by Winckler, who places him fourth or fifth. It
+     is difficult, however, to accept Hilprecht's hypothesis,
+     plausible though it is, so long as Assyriologists who have
+     seen the original tablet agree in declaring that the name of
+     the first king began with the sign of _Merodach_ and not
+     with that of _Nebo_, as it ought to do, were this prince
+     really our Nebuchadrezzar.
+
+Nebuchadrezzar arose "in Babylon,--roaring like a lion, even as Bamman
+roareth,--and his chosen nobles, roared like lions with him.--To
+Merodach, lord of Babylon, rose his prayer:--'How long, for me, shall
+there be sighing and groaning?--How long, for my land, weeping and
+mourning?--How long, for my countries, cries of grief and tears? Till
+what time, O lord of Babylon, wilt thou remain in hostile regions?--Let
+thy heart be softened, and make Babylon joyful,--and let thy face be
+turned toward Eshaggil which thou lovest!'" Merodach gave ear to the
+plaint of his servant: he answered him graciously and promised his
+aid. Namar, united as it had been with Chaldaea for centuries, did not
+readily become accustomed to its new masters. The greater part of the
+land belonged to a Semitic and Cossaean feudality, the heads of which,
+while admitting their suzerain's right to exact military service from
+them, refused to acknowledge any further duty towards him. The kings of
+Susa declined to recognise their privileges: they subjected them to a
+poll-tax, levied the usual imposts on their estates, and forced them
+to maintain at their own expense the troops quartered on them for the
+purpose of guaranteeing their obedience.*
+
+     * Shamua and Shamai "fled in like manner towards Karduniash,
+     before the King of Elam;" it would seem that Rittimerodach
+     had entered into secret negotiations with Nebuchadrezzar,
+     though this is nowhere explicitly stated in the text.
+
+Several of the nobles abandoned everything rather than submit to such
+tyranny, and took refuge with Nebuchadrezzar: others entered into secret
+negotiations with him, and promised to support him if he came to their
+help with an armed force. He took them at their word, and invaded Namar
+without warning in the month of Tamuz, while the summer was at its
+height, at a season in which the Elamites never even dreamt he would
+take the field. The heat was intense, water was not to be got, and the
+army suffered terribly from thirst during its forced march of over
+a hundred miles across a parched-up country. One of the malcontents,
+Eittimerodach, lord of Bitkarziabku, joined Nebuchadrezzar with all the
+men he could assemble, and together they penetrated as far as Ulai.
+The King of Elam, taken by surprise, made no attempt to check their
+progress, but collected his vassals and awaited their attack on the
+banks of the river in front of Susa. Once "the fire of the combat had
+been lighted between the opposing forces, the face of the sun grew dark,
+the tempest broke forth, the whirlwind raged, and in this whirlwind of
+the struggle none of the characters could distinguish the face of his
+neighbour." Nebuchadrezzar, cut off from his own men, was about to
+surrender or be killed, when Eittimerodach flew to his rescue and
+brought him off safely. In the end the Chaldaeans gained the upper hand.*
+
+     * _Donation to Rittimerodach,_ col. i. 11. 12-43. The
+     description of the battle as given in this document is
+     generally taken to be merely symbolical, and I have followed
+     the current usage. But if we bear in mind that the text lays
+     emphasis on the drought and severity of the season, we are
+     tempted to agree with Pinches and Budge that its statements
+     should be taken literally. The affair may have been begun in
+     a cloud of dust, and have ended in a downpour of rain so
+     heavy as to partly blind the combatants. The king was
+     probably drawn away from his men in the confusion; it was
+     probably then that he was in danger of being made prisoner,
+     and that Rittimerodach, suddenly coming up, delivered him
+     from the foes who surrounded him.
+
+The Elamites renounced their claims to the possession of Namar, and
+restored the statues of the gods: Nebuchadrezzar "at once laid hold of
+the hands of Bel," and thus legalised his accession to the throne. Other
+expeditions against the peoples of Lulurne and against the Cossaeans
+restored his supremacy in the regions of the north-east, and a campaign
+along the banks of the Euphrates opened out the road to Syria. He
+rewarded generously those who had accompanied him on his raid against
+Elam. After issuing regulations intended to maintain the purity of the
+breed of horses for which Namar was celebrated, he reinstated in their
+possessions Shamua and his son Shamai, the descendants of one of the
+priestly families of the province, granting them in addition certain
+domains near Upi, at the mouth of the Turnat. He confirmed Rittimerodach
+in possession of all his property, and reinvested him with all the
+privileges of which the King of Elam had deprived him. From that time
+forward the domain of Bitkarziabku was free of the tithe on corn, oxen,
+and sheep; it was no longer liable to provide horses and mares for the
+exchequer, or to afford free passage to troops in time of peace; the
+royal jurisdiction ceased on the boundary of the fief, the seignorial
+jurisdiction alone extended over the inhabitants and their property.
+Chaldaean prefects ruled in Namar, at Khalman, and at the foot of the
+Zagros, and Nebuchadrezzar no longer found any to oppose him save the
+King of Assyria.
+
+The long reign of Assurdan in Assyria does not seem to have been
+distinguished by any event of importance either good or bad: it is true
+he won several towns on the south-east from the Babylonians, but then
+he lost several others on the north-west to the Mushku,* and the loss on
+the one side fully balanced the advantage gained on the other.
+
+     * Hommel has proved, by a very simple calculation, that
+     Assurdan must have been the king in whose reign the Mushku
+     made the inroad into the basin of the Upper Tigris and of
+     the Balikh, which is mentioned in the _Annals of Tiglath-
+     pileser I._ These _Annals_ are our authority for stating
+     that Assurdan was on the throne for a long period, though
+     the exact length of his reign is not known.
+
+His son Mutakkilnusku lived in Assur at peace,* but his grandson,
+Assurishishi, was a mighty king, conqueror of a score of countries, and
+the terror of all rebels: he scattered the hordes of the Akhlame and
+broke up their forces; then Ninip, the champion of the gods, permitted
+him to crush the Lulume and the G-uti in their valleys and on their
+mountains covered with forests. He made his way up to the frontiers of
+Elam,** and his encroachments on territories claimed by Babylon stirred
+up the anger of the Chaldaeans against him; Nebuchadrezzar made ready to
+dispute their ownership with him.
+
+     * _Annals of Tiglath-pileser I_. Mutakkilnusku himself has
+     only left us one inscription, in which he declares that he
+     had built a palace in the city of Assyria.
+
+     ** Smith discovered certain fragments of Annals, which he
+     attributed to Assurishishi. The longest of these tell of a
+     campaign against Elam. Lotz attributed them to Tiglath-
+     pileser I., and is supported in this by most Assyriologists
+     of the day.
+
+The earlier engagements went against the Assyrians; they were driven
+back in disorder, but the victor lost time before one of their
+strongholds, and, winter coming on before he could take it, he burnt his
+engines of war, set fire to his camp, and returned home. Next year,
+a rapid march carried him right under the walls of Assur; then
+Assurishishi came to the rescue, totally routed his opponent, captured
+forty of his chariots, and drove him flying across the frontier. The war
+died out of itself, its end being marked by no treaty: each side kept
+its traditional position and supremacy over the tribes inhabiting the
+basins of the Turnat and Eadanu. The same names reappear in line after
+line of these mutilated Annals, and the same definite enumerations of
+rebellious tribes who have been humbled or punished. These kings of
+the plain, both Ninevite and Babylonian, were continually raiding the
+country up and down for centuries without ever arriving at any decisive
+result, and a detailed account of their various campaigns would be as
+tedious reading as that of the ceaseless struggle between the Latins and
+Sabines which fills the opening pages of Roman history. Posterity soon
+grew weary of them, and, misled by the splendid position which Assyria
+attained when at the zenith of its glory, set itself to fabricate
+splendid antecedents for the majestic empire established by the latter
+dynasties. The legend ran that, at the dawn of time, a chief named
+Ninos had reduced to subjection one after the other--Babylonia, Media,
+Armenia, and all the provinces between the Indies and the Mediterranean.
+He built a capital for himself on the banks of the Tigris, in the form
+of a parallelogram, measuring a hundred and fifty stadia in length,
+ninety stadia in width; altogether, the walls were four hundred and
+eighty stadia in circumference. In addition to the Assyrians who formed
+the bulk of the population, he attracted many foreigners to Nineveh,
+so that in a few years it became the most flourishing town in the whole
+world. An inroad of the tribes of the Oxus interrupted his labours;
+Ninos repulsed the invasion, and, driving the barbarians back into
+Bactria, laid siege to it; here, in the tent of one of his captains, he
+came upon Semiramis, a woman whose past was shrouded in mystery. She
+was said to be the daughter of an ordinary mortal by a goddess, the
+Ascalonian Derketo. Exposed immediately after her birth, she was found
+and adopted by a shepherd named Simas, and later on her beauty aroused
+the passion of Oannes, governor of Syria. Ninos, amazed at the courage
+displayed by her on more than one occasion, carried her off, made her
+his favourite wife, and finally met his death at her hands. No sooner
+did she become queen, than she founded Babylon on a far more extensive
+scale than that of Nineveh. Its walls were three hundred and sixty
+stadia in length, with two hundred and fifty lofty towers, placed here
+and there on its circuit, the roadway round the top of the ramparts
+being wide enough for six chariots to drive abreast. She made a kind of
+harbour in the Euphrates, threw a bridge across it, and built quays one
+hundred and sixty stadia in length along its course; in the midst of the
+town she raised a temple to Bel. This great work was scarcely finished
+when disturbances broke out in Media; these she promptly repressed, and
+set out on a tour of inspection through the whole of her provinces,
+with a view to preventing the recurrence of similar outbreaks by her
+presence. Wherever she went she left records of her passage behind her,
+cutting her way through mountains, quarrying a pathway through the solid
+rock, making broad highways for herself, bringing rebellious tribes
+beneath her yoke, and raising tumuli to mark the tombs of such of her
+satraps as fell beneath the blows of the enemy. She built Ecbatana in
+Media, Semiramocarta on Lake Van in Armenia, and Tarsus in Cilicia;
+then, having reached the confines of Syria, she crossed the isthmus, and
+conquered Egypt and Ethiopia. The far-famed wealth of India recalled her
+from the banks of the Nile to those of the Euphrates, _en route_ for
+the remote east, but at this point her good fortune forsook her: she was
+defeated by King Stratobates, and returned to her own dominions, never
+again to leave them. She had set up triumphal stelae on the boundaries
+of the habitable globe, in the very midst of Scythia, not far from the
+Iaxartes, where, centuries afterwards, Alexander of Macedon read
+the panegyric of herself which she had caused to be engraved there.
+"Nature," she writes, "gave me the body of a woman, but my deeds have
+put me on a level with the greatest of men. I ruled over the dominion of
+Ninos, which extends eastwards to the river Hinaman, southwards to the
+countries of Incense and Myrrh, and northwards as far as the Sacaa and
+Sogdiani. Before my time no Assyrian had ever set eyes on the sea: I
+have seen four oceans to which no mariner has ever sailed, so far remote
+are they. I have made rivers to flow where I would have them, in the
+places where they were needed; thus did I render fertile the barren soil
+by watering it with my rivers. I raised up impregnable fortresses, and
+cut roadways through the solid rock with the pick. I opened a way for
+the wheels of my chariots in places to which even the feet of wild
+beasts had never penetrated. And, amidst all these labours, I yet found
+time for my pleasures and for the society of my friends." On discovering
+that her son Ninyas was plotting her assassination, she at once
+abdicated in his favour, in order to save him from committing a crime,
+and then transformed herself into a dove; this last incident betrays the
+goddess to us. Ninos and Semiramis are purely mythical, and their mighty
+deeds, like those ascribed to Ishtar and Gilgames, must be placed in the
+same category as those other fables with which the Babylonian legends
+strive to fill up the blank of the prehistoric period.*
+
+     * The legend of Ninos and Semiramis is taken from Diodorus
+     Siculus, who reproduces, often word for word, the version of
+     Ctesias.
+
+[Illustration: 172.jpg the dove-goddess]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from the sketch published in Longperier.
+
+The real facts were, as we know, far less brilliant and less extravagant
+than those supplied by popular imagination. It would be a mistake,
+however, to neglect or despise them on account of their tedious monotony
+and the insignificance of the characters who appear on the stage. It
+was by dint of fighting her neighbours again and again, without a single
+day's respite, that Rome succeeded in forging the weapons with which
+she was to conquer the world; and any one who, repelled by their tedious
+sameness, neglected to follow the history of her early struggles, would
+find great difficulty in understanding how it came about that a city
+which had taken centuries to subjugate her immediate neighbours should
+afterwards overcome all the states on the Mediterranean seaboard with
+such magnificent ease. In much the same way the ceaseless struggles of
+Assyria with the Chaldaeans, and with the mountain tribes of the
+Zagros Chain, were unconsciously preparing her for those lightning-like
+campaigns in which she afterwards overthrew all the civilized nations
+of the Bast one after another. It was only at the cost of unparalleled
+exertions that she succeeded in solidly welding together the various
+provinces within her borders, and in kneading (so to speak) the many
+and diverse elements of her vast population into one compact mass,
+containing in itself all that was needful for its support, and able to
+bear the strain of war for several years at time without giving way, and
+rich enough in men and horses to provide the material for an effective
+army without excessive impoverishment of her trade or agriculture.
+
+[Illustration: 173.jpg AN ASSYRIAN]
+
+Drawn by Boudier, from a painted bas-relief given in Layard.
+
+The race came of an old Semitic strain, somewhat crude as yet, and
+almost entirely free from that repeated admixture of foreign elements
+which had marred the purity of the Babylonian stock. The monuments show
+us a type similar in many respects to that which we find to-day on the
+slopes of Singar, or in the valleys to the east of Mossul.
+
+The figures on the monuments are tall and straight, broad-shouldered and
+wide in the hips, the arms well developed, the legs robust, with good
+substantial feet. The swell of the muscles on the naked limbs is perhaps
+exaggerated, but this very exaggeration of the modelling suggests
+the vigour of the model; it is a heavier, more rustic type than the
+Egyptian, promising greater strength and power of resistance, and in so
+far an indisputable superiority in the great game of war. The head is
+somewhat small, the forehead low and flat, the eyebrows heavy, the eye
+of a bold almond shape, with heavy lids, the nose aquiline, and full at
+the tip, with wide nostrils terminating in a hard, well-defined curve;
+the lips are thick and full, the chin bony, while the face is framed by
+the coarse dark wavy hair and beard, which fell in curly masses over the
+nape of the neck and the breast. The expression of the face is rarely
+of an amiable and smiling type, such as we find in the statues of the
+Theban period or in those of the Memphite empire, nor, as a matter of
+fact, did the Assyrian pride himself on the gentleness of his manners:
+he did not overflow with love for his fellow-man, as the Egyptian made
+a pretence of doing; on the contrary, he was stiff-necked and proud,
+without pity for others or for himself, hot-tempered and quarrelsome
+like his cousins of Chaldaea, but less turbulent and more capable of
+strict discipline. It mattered not whether he had come into the world in
+one of the wretched cabins of a fellah village, or in the palace of
+one of the great nobles; he was a born soldier, and his whole education
+tended to develop in him the first qualities of the soldier--temperance,
+patience, energy, and unquestioning obedience: he was enrolled in an
+army which was always on a war footing, commanded by the god Assur, and
+under Assur, by the king, the vicegerent and representative of the god.
+His life was shut in by the same network of legal restrictions which
+confined that of the Babylonians, and all its more important events
+had to be recorded on tablets of clay; the wording of contracts, the
+formalities of marriage or adoption, the status of bond and free, the
+rites of the dead and funeral ceremonies, had either remained identical
+with those in use during the earliest years of the cities of the Lower
+Euphrates, or differed from them only in their less important details.
+The royal and municipal governments levied the same taxes, used the
+same procedure, employed the same magistrates, and the grades of their
+hierarchy were the same, with one exception. After the king, the highest
+office was filled by a soldier, the _tartan_ who saw to the recruiting
+of the troops, and led them in time of war, or took command of the
+staff-corps whenever the sovereign himself deigned to appear on the
+scene of action.*
+
+     * We can determine the rank occupied, by the _tartanu_ at
+     court by the positions they occupy in the lists of eponymous
+     _limmu_: they invariably come next after the king--a fact
+     which was noticed many years ago.
+
+The more influential of these functionaries bore, in addition to their
+other titles, one of a special nature, which, for the space of one year,
+made its holder the most conspicuous man in the country; they became
+_limmu_, and throughout their term of office their names appeared on
+all official documents. The Chaldaeans distinguished the various years of
+each reign by a reference to some event which had taken place in
+each; the Assyrians named them after the _limmu_.* The king was the
+_ex-officio limmu_ for the year following that of his accession, then
+after him the _tartan_, then the ministers and governors of provinces
+and cities in an order which varied little from reign to reign. The
+names of the _limmu_, entered in registers and tabulated--just as,
+later on, were those of the Greek archons and Roman consuls--furnished
+the annalists with a rigid chronological system, under which the facts
+of history might be arranged with certainty.**
+
+     * According to Delitzsch, the term _limu,_ or _limmu_, meant
+     at first any given period, then later more especially the
+     year during which a magistrate filled his office; in the
+     opinion of most other Assyriologists it referred to the
+     magistrate himself as eponymous archon.
+
+     ** The first list of _limmu_ was discovered by H. Rawlinson.
+     The portions which have been preserved extend from the year
+     893 to the year 666 B.C. without a break. In the periods
+     previous and subsequent to this we have only names scattered
+     here and there which it has not been possible to classify:
+     the earliest _limmu_ known at present flourished under
+     Ramman-nirari I., and was named Mukhurilani. Three different
+     versions of the canon have como down to us. In the most
+     important one the names of the eponymous officials are
+     written one after another without titles or any mention of
+     important events; in the other two, the titles of each
+     personage, and any important occurrences which took place
+     during his year of office, are entered after the name.
+
+The king still retained the sacerdotal attributes with which Cossaean
+monarchs had been invested from the earliest times, but contact with the
+Egyptians had modified the popular conception of his personality. His
+subjects were no longer satisfied to regard him merely as a man superior
+to his fellow-men; they had come to discover something of the divine
+nature in him, and sometimes identified him--not with Assur, the master
+of all things, who occupied a position too high above the pale of
+ordinary humanity--but with one of the demi-gods of the second rank,
+Shamash, the Sun, the deity whom the Pharaohs pretended to represent in
+flesh and blood here below. His courtiers, therefore, went as far as to
+call him "Sun" when they addressed him, and he himself adopted this title
+in his inscriptions.*
+
+     * Nebuchadrezzar I. of Babylon assumes the title of _Shamash
+     mati-shu_, the "Sun of his country," and Hilprecht rightly
+     sees in this expression a trace of Egyptian influences;
+     later on, Assurnazirpal, King of Assyria similarly describes
+     himself as _Shamshu kishshat nishi_, the "Sun of all
+     mankind." Tiele is of opinion that these expressions do not
+     necessarily point to any theory of the actual incarnation of
+     the god, as was the case in Egypt, but that they may be mere
+     rhetorical figures.
+
+Formerly he had only attained this apotheosis after death, later on he
+was permitted to aspire to it during his lifetime. The Chaldaeans adopted
+the same attitude, and in both countries the royal authority shone with
+the borrowed lustre of divine omnipotence. With these exceptions life
+at court remained very much the same as it had been; at Nineveh, as at
+Babylon, we find harems filled with foreign princesses, who had either
+been carried off as hostages from the country of a defeated enemy, or
+amicably obtained from their parents. In time of war, the command of the
+troops and the dangers of the battle-field; in time of peace, a host
+of religious ceremonies and judicial or administrative duties, left but
+little leisure to the sovereign who desired to perform conscientiously
+all that was required of him. His chief amusement lay in the hunting of
+wild beasts: the majority of the princes who reigned over Assyria had a
+better right than even Amenothes III. himself to boast of the hundreds
+of lions which they had slain. They set out on these hunting expeditions
+with quite a small army of charioteers and infantry, and were often away
+several days at a time, provided urgent business did not require their
+presence in the palace. They started their quarry with the help of large
+dogs, and followed it over hill and dale till they got within bowshot:
+if it was but slightly wounded and turned on them, they gave it the
+finishing stroke with their lances without dismounting.
+
+[Illustration: 178.jpg A LION-HUNT]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from a bas-relief in the British Museum.
+
+Occasionally, however, they were obliged to follow their prey into
+places where horses could not easily penetrate; then a hand-to-hand
+conflict was inevitable. The lion would rise on its hind quarters and
+endeavour to lay its pursuer low with a stroke of its mighty paw, but
+only to fall pierced to the heart by his lance or sword.
+
+[Illustration: 179.jpg LION TRANSFIXED BY AN ARROW]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from a bas-relief in the British Museum.
+
+This kind of encounter demanded great presence of mind and steadiness of
+hand; the Assyrians were, therefore, trained to it from their youth
+up, and no hunter was permitted to engage in these terrible encounters
+without long preliminary practice. Seeing the lion as they did so
+frequently, and at such close quarters, they came to know it quite as
+well as the Egyptians, and their sculptors reproduce it with a realism
+and technical skill which have been rarely equalled in modern times.
+But while the Theban artist generally represents it in an attitude of
+repose, the Assyrians prefer to show it in violent action in all the
+various attitudes which it assumes during a struggle, either crouching
+as it prepares to spring, or fully extended in the act of leaping;
+sometimes it rears into an upright position, with arched back, gaping
+jaws, and claws protruded, ready to bite or strike its foe; at others
+it writhes under a spear-thrust, or rolls over and over in its dying
+agonies. In one instance, an arrow has pierced the skull of a male lion,
+crashing through the frontal bone a little above the left eyebrow, and
+protrudes obliquely to the right between his teeth: under the shock of
+the blow he has risen on his hind legs, with contorted spine, and beats
+the air with his fore paws, his head thrown back as though to free
+himself of the fatal shaft. Not far from him the lioness lies stretched
+out upon its back in the rigidity of death.
+
+[Illustration: 180.jpg PAINTINGS OF CHAIRS]
+
+The "rimu," or urus, was, perhaps, even a more formidable animal to
+encounter than any of the _felido_, owing to the irresistible fury of
+his attack. No one would dare, except in a case of dire necessity, to
+meet him on foot. The loose flowing robes which the king and the nobles
+never put aside--not even in such perilous pastimes as these--were ill
+fitted for the quick movements required to avoid the attack of such an
+animal, and those who were unlucky enough to quit their chariot ran a
+terrible risk of being gored or trodden underfoot in the encounter. It
+was the custom, therefore, to attack the beast by arrows, and to keep it
+at a distance. If the animal were able to come up with its pursuer, the
+latter endeavoured to seize it by the horn at the moment when it lowered
+its head, and to drive his dagger into its neck. If the blow were
+adroitly given it severed the spinal cord, and the beast fell in a heap
+as if struck by lightning. A victory over such animals was an occasion
+for rejoicing, and solemn thanks were offered to Assur and Ishtar, the
+patrons of the chase, at the usual evening sacrifice.
+
+[Illustration: 181.jpg A UBUS HUNT]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from a bas-relief in the British Museum.
+
+The slain beasts, whether lion or urus, were arranged in a row
+before the altar, while the king, accompanied by his flabella, and
+umbrella-bearers, stood alongside them, holding his bow in his left
+hand. While the singers intoned the hymn of thanksgiving to the
+accompaniment of the harp, the monarch took the bowl of sacred wine,
+touched his lips with it, and then poured a portion of the contents on
+the heads of the victims. A detailed account of each hunting exploit was
+preserved for posterity either in inscriptions or on bas-reliefs.*
+
+     * In the _Annals of Tiglath-pileser I._ the king counts the
+     number of his victims: 4 urus, 10 male elephants, 120 lions
+     slain in single combat on foot, 800 lions killed by arrows
+     let fly from his chariot. In the _Annals of Assurnazirpal,_
+     the king boasts of having slain 30 elephants, 250 urus, and
+     370 lions.
+
+The chase was in those days of great service to the rural population;
+the kings also considered it to be one of the duties attached to their
+office, and on a level with their obligation to make war on neighbouring
+nations devoted by the will of Assur to defeat and destruction.
+
+[Illustration: 182.jpg LIBATION POURED OVER THE LIONS ON THE RETURN FROM
+THE CHASE]
+
+Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Hommel.
+
+The army charged to carry out the will of the god had not yet acquired
+the homogeneity and efficiency which it afterwards attained, yet it had
+been for some time one of the most formidable in the world, and even
+the Egyptians themselves, in spite of their long experience in military
+matters, could not put into the field such a proud array of effective
+troops. We do not know how this army was recruited, but the bulk of it
+was made up of native levies, to which foreign auxiliaries were added
+in numbers varying with the times.* A permanent nucleus of troops was
+always in garrison in the capital under the "tartan," or placed in the
+principal towns at the disposal of the governors.**
+
+     * We have no bas-relief representing the armies of Tiglath-
+     pileser I. Everything in the description which follows is
+     taken from the monuments of Assurnazirpal and Shalmaneser
+     II., revised as far as possible by the inscriptions of
+     Tiglath-pileser; the armament of both infantry and chariotry
+     must have been practically the same in the two periods.
+
+     ** This is based on the account given in the Obelisk of
+     Shalmaneser, where the king, for example, after having
+     gathered his soldiers together at Kalakh [Calah], put at
+     their head Dainassur the artan, "the master of his
+     innumerable troops."
+
+[Illustration: 183.jpg TWO ASSYRIAN ARCHERS]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin.
+
+The contingents which came to be enrolled at these centres on the first
+rumour of war may have been taken from among the feudal militia, as was
+the custom in the Nile valley, or the whole population may have had to
+render personal military service, each receiving while with the colours
+a certain daily pay. The nobles and feudal lords were accustomed to call
+their own people together, and either placed themselves at their head or
+commissioned an officer to act in their behalf.*
+
+     * The assembling of foot-soldiers and chariots is often
+     described at the beginning of each campaign; the _Donation
+     of Bittimerodach_ brings before us a great feudal lord, who
+     leads his contingent to the King of Chaldaea, and anything
+     which took place among the Babylonians had its counterpart
+     among the Assyrians. Sometimes the king had need of all the
+     contingents, and then it was said he "assembled the
+     country." Auxiliaries are mentioned, for example, in the
+     _Annals of Assurnazirpal_, col. iii. 11. 58-77, where the
+     king, in his passage, rallies one after the other the troops
+     of Bit-Bakhiani, of Azalli, of Bit-Adini, of Garganish, and
+     of the Patinu.
+
+[Illustration: 184.jpg AN ASSYRIAN WAR-CHARIOT CHARGING THE FOE]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph by Mansell.
+
+These recruits were subjected to the training necessary for their
+calling by exercises similar to those of the Egyptians, but of a rougher
+sort and better adapted to the cumbrous character of their equipment.
+The blacksmith's art had made such progress among the Assyrians since
+the times of Thutmosis III. and Ramses IL, that both the character and
+the materials of the armour were entirely changed.
+
+[Illustration: 185a.jpg HARNESS OF THE HORSES]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from G. Rawlinson.
+
+[Illustration: 185b.jpg PIKEMAN]
+
+While the Egyptian of old entered into the contest almost naked, and
+without other defence than a padded cap, a light shield, and a leather
+apron, the Assyrian of the new age set out for war almost cased in
+metal. The pikemen and archers of whom the infantry of the line was
+composed wore a copper or iron helmet, conical in form, and having
+cheek-pieces covering the ears; they were clad in a sort of leathern
+shirt covered with plates or imbricated scales of metal, which protected
+the body and the upper part of the arm; a quilted and padded loin-cloth
+came over the haunches, while close-fitting trousers, and buskins laced
+up in the front, completed their attire. The pikemen were armed with a
+lance six feet long, a cutlass or short sword passed through the girdle,
+and an enormous shield, sometimes round and convex, sometimes arched at
+the top and square at the bottom. The bowmen did not encumber themselves
+with a buckler, but carried, in addition to the bow and quiver,
+a poignard or mace. The light infantry consisted of pikemen and
+archers--each of whom wore a crested helmet and a round shield of
+wicker-work--of slingers and club-bearers, as well as of men armed with
+the two-bladed battle-axe. The chariots were heavier and larger than
+those of the Egyptians. They had high, strongly made wheels with eight
+spokes, and the body of the vehicle rested directly on the axle; the
+panels were of solid wood, sometimes covered with embossed or carved
+metal, but frequently painted; they were further decorated sometimes
+with gold, silver, or ivory mountings, and with precious stones. The
+pole, which was long and heavy, ended in a boss of carved wood or
+incised metal, representing a flower, a rosette, the muzzle of a lion,
+or a horse's head. It was attached to the axle under the floor of the
+vehicle, and as it had to bear a great strain, it was not only fixed to
+this point by leather thongs such as were employed in Egypt, but also
+bound to the front of the chariot by a crossbar shaped like a spindle,
+and covered with embroidered stuff--an arrangement which prevented its
+becoming detached when driving at full speed. A pair of horses were
+harnessed to it, and a third was attached to them on the right side
+for the use of a supplementary warrior, who could take the place of his
+comrade in case of accident, or if he were wounded. The trappings were
+very simple; but sometimes there was added to these a thickly padded
+caparison, of which the various parts were fitted to the horse by tags
+so as to cover the upper part of his head, his neck, back, and breast.
+The usual complement of charioteers was two to each vehicle, as in
+Egypt, but sometimes, as among the Khati, there were three--one on the
+left to direct the horses, a warrior, and an attendant who protected the
+other two with his shield; on some occasions a fourth was added as an
+extra assistant. The equipment of the charioteers was like that of the
+infantry, and consisted of a jacket with imbricated scales of metal,
+bow and arrows, and a lance or javelin. A standard which served as a
+rallying-point for the chariots in the battle was set up on the front
+part of each vehicle, between the driver and the warrior; it bore at
+the top a disk supported on the heads of two bulls, or by two complete
+representations of these animals, and a standing figure of Assur letting
+fly his arrows. The chariotry formed, as in most countries of that time,
+the picked troops of the service, in which the princes and great lords
+were proud to be enrolled. Upon it depended for the most part the issue
+of the conflict, and the position assigned to it was in the van,
+the king or commander-in-chief reserving to himself the privilege of
+conducting the charge in person. It was already, however, in a state
+of decadence, both as regards the number of units composing it and its
+methods of manoeuvring; the infantry, on the other hand, had increased
+in numbers, and under the guidance of abler generals tended to become
+the most trustworthy force in Assyrian campaigns.*
+
+     * Tiglath-pileser is seen, for instance, setting out on a
+     campaign in a mountainous country with only thirty chariots.
+
+Notwithstanding the weight of his equipment, the Assyrian foot-soldier
+was as agile as the Egyptian, but he had to fight usually in a much more
+difficult region than that in which the Pharaoh's troops were accustomed
+to manouvre.
+
+[Illustration: 188.jpg CROSSING A RIVER IN BOATS AND ON INFLATED SKINS]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from Layard.
+
+The theatre of war was not like Syria, with its fertile and almost
+unbroken plains furrowed by streams which offered little obstruction
+to troops throughout the year, but a land of marshes, arid and rocky
+deserts, mighty rivers, capable, in one of their sudden floods, of
+arresting progress for days, and of jeopardising the success of a
+campaign;* violent and ice-cold torrents, rugged mountains whose summits
+rose into "points like daggers," and whose passes could be held against
+a host of invaders by a handful of resolute men.**
+
+     * Sennacherib was obliged to arrest his march against Elam,
+     owing to his inability to cross the torrents swollen by the
+     rain; a similar contretemps must have met Assurbanipal on
+     the banks of the Ididi.
+
+     ** The Assyrian monarchs dwell with pleasure on the
+     difficulties of the country which they have to overcome.
+
+Bands of daring skirmishers, consisting of archers, slingers, and
+pikemen, cleared the way for the mass of infantry marching in columns,
+and for the chariots, in the midst of which the king and his household
+took up their station; the baggage followed, together with the prisoners
+and their escorts.*
+
+     * Assurbanipal relates, for instance, that he put under his
+     escort a tribe which had surrendered themselves as
+     prisoners.
+
+If they came to a river where there was neither ford nor bridge, they
+were not long in effecting a passage.
+
+[Illustration: 189.jpg MAKING A BRIDGE FOR THE PASSAGE OF THE CHARIOTS]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a bas-relief on the bronze
+     gates of Balawat.
+
+Each soldier was provided with a skin, which, having inflated it by the
+strength of his lungs and closed the aperture, he embraced in his arms
+and cast himself into the stream. Partly by floating and partly by
+swimming, a whole regiment could soon reach the other side. The chariots
+could not be carried over so easily.
+
+[Illustration: 190.jpg THE KING'S CHARIOT CROSSING A BRIDGE]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from one of the bas-reliefs on the
+     bronze gates of Balawat.
+
+If the bed of the river was not very wide, and the current not too
+violent, a narrow bridge was constructed, or rather an improvised dyke
+of large stones and rude gabions filled with clay, over which was spread
+a layer of branches and earth, supplying a sufficiently broad passage
+for a single chariot, of which the horses were led across at walking
+pace.*
+
+     * Flying bridges, _titurati_, were mentioned as far back as
+     the time of Tiglath-pileser I.
+
+But when the distance between the banks was too great, and the stream
+too violent to allow of this mode of procedure, boats were requisitioned
+from the neighbourhood, on which men and chariots were embarked, while
+the horses, attended by grooms, or attached by their bridles to the
+flotilla, swam across the river.* If the troops had to pass through a
+mountainous district intersected by ravines and covered by forests, and
+thus impracticable on ordinary occasions for a large body of men, the
+advance-guard were employed in cutting a passage through the trees
+with the axe, and, if necessary, in making with the pick pathways
+or rough-hewn steps similar to those met with in the Lebanon on the
+Phoenician coast.**
+
+     * It was in this manner that Tiglath-pileser I. crossed the
+     Euphrates on his way to the attack of Carchemish.
+
+     ** Tiglath-pileser I. speaks on several occasions, and not
+     without pride, of the roads that he had made for himself
+     with bronze hatchets through the forests and over the
+     mountains.
+
+[Illustration: 191.jpg THE ASSYRIAN INFANTRY CROSSING THE MOUNTAINS]
+
+Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a bas-relief on the bronze gates of
+Balawat.
+
+The troops advanced in narrow columns, sometimes even in single file,
+along these improvised roads, always on the alert lest they should be
+taken at a disadvantage by an enemy concealed in the thickets. In case
+of attack, the foot-soldiers had each to think of himself, and endeavour
+to give as many blows as he received; but the charioteers, encumbered
+by their vehicles and the horses, found it no easy matter to extricate
+themselves from the danger. Once the chariots had entered into the
+forest region, the driver descended from his vehicle, and led the horses
+by the head, while the warrior and his assistant were not slow to follow
+his example, in order to give some relief to the animals by tugging at
+the wheels. The king alone did not dismount, more out of respect for his
+dignity than from indifference to the strain upon the animals; for, in
+spite of careful leading, he had to submit to a rough shaking from the
+inequalities of this rugged soil; sometimes he had too much of this, and
+it is related of him in his annals that he had crossed the mountains on
+foot like an ordinary mortal.*
+
+     * The same fact is found in the accounts of every
+     expedition, but more importance is attached to it as we
+     approach the end of the Ninevite empire, when the kings were
+     not so well able to endure hardship. Sennacherib mentions it
+     on several occasions, with a certain amount of self-pity for
+     the fatigue he had undergone, but with a real pride in his
+     own endurance.
+
+A halt was made every evening, either at some village, whose inhabitants
+were obliged to provide food and lodging, or, in default of this, on
+some site which they could fortify by a hastily thrown up rampart of
+earth. If they were obliged to remain in any place for a length of time,
+a regular encircling wall was constructed, not square or rectangular
+like those of the Egyptians, but round or oval.*
+
+     * The oval inclines towards a square form, with rounded
+     corners, on the bas-reliefs of the bronze gates of
+     Shalmaneser II. at Balawat.
+
+[Illustration: 193.jpg THE KING CROSSING A MOUNTAIN IN HIS CHARIOT]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph by Mansell, taken in the
+     British Museum.
+
+It was made of dried brick, and provided with towers like an ancient
+city; indeed, many of these entrenched camps survived the occasion of
+their formation, and became small fortified towns or castles, whence a
+permanent garrison could command the neighbouring country. The interior
+was divided into four equal parts by two roads, intersecting each other
+at right angles. The royal tents, with their walls of felt or brown
+linen, resembled an actual palace, which could be moved from place to
+place; they were surrounded with less pretentious buildings reserved for
+the king's household, and the stables.
+
+[Illustration: 194.jpg AN ASSYRIAN CAMP]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from Layard.
+
+The tent-poles at the angles of these habitations were plated with
+metal, and terminated at their upper extremities in figures of goats and
+other animals made of the same material. The tents of the soldiers, were
+conical in form, and each was maintained in its position by a forked
+pole placed inside. They contained the ordinary requirements of the
+peasant---bed and head-rest, table with legs like those of a gazelle,
+stools and folding-chairs; the household utensils and the provisions
+hung from the forks of the support. The monuments, which usually
+give few details of humble life, are remarkable for their complete
+reproductions of the daily scenes in the camp. We see on them, the
+soldier making his bed, grinding corn, dressing the carcase of a sheep,
+which he had just killed, or pouring out wine; the pot boiling on the
+fire is watched by the vigilant eye of a trooper or of a woman, while
+those not actively employed are grouped together in twos and threes,
+eating, drinking, and chatting. A certain number of priests and
+soothsayers accompanied the army, but they did not bring the statues of
+their gods with them, the only emblems of the divinities seen in battle
+being the two royal ensigns, one representing Assur as lord of the
+territory, borne on a single bull and bending his bow, while the other
+depicted him standing on two bulls as King of Assyria.* An altar smoked
+before the chariot on which these two standards were planted, and every
+night and morning the prince and his nobles laid offerings upon it, and
+recited prayers before it for the well-being of the army.
+
+Military tactics had not made much progress since the time of the great
+Egyptian invasions. The Assyrian generals set out in haste from Nineveh
+or Assur in the hope of surprising their enemy, and they often succeeded
+in penetrating into the very heart of his country before he had time
+to mobilise or concentrate his forces. The work of subduing him was
+performed piecemeal; they devastated his fields, robbed his orchards,
+and, marching all through the night,** they would arrive with such
+suddenness before one or other of his towns, that he would have no time
+to organise a defence. Most of their campaigns were mere forced marches
+across plains and mountains, without regular sieges or pitched battles.
+
+     * It is possible that each of these standards corresponded
+     to some dignity of the sovereign; the first belonged to him,
+     inasmuch as he was _shar kishshati,_ "king of the regions,"
+     and the other, by virtue of his office, of _shar Ashshur_,
+     "King of Assyria."
+
+     ** Assurnazirpal mentions several night marches, which
+     enabled him to reach the heart of the enemy's country.
+
+[Illustration: 196.jpg A FORTIFIED TOWN]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Mansell. The
+     inhabitants of the town who have been taken prisoners, are
+     leaving it with their cattle under the conduct of Assyrian
+     soldiers.
+
+Should the enemy, however, seek an engagement, and the men be drawn up
+in line to meet him, the action would be opened by archers and light
+troops armed with slings, who would be followed by the chariotry and
+heavy infantry for close attack; a reserve of veterans would await
+around the commanding-general the crucial moment of the engagement, when
+they would charge in a body among the combatants, and decide the victory
+by sheer strength of arm.*
+
+     * Tiglath-pileser I. mentions a pitched battle against the
+     Muskhu, who numbered 20,000 men; and another against
+     Kiliteshub, King of Kummukh, in his first campaign. In one
+     of the following campaigns he overcame the people of Saraush
+     and those of Maruttash, and also 6000 Sugi; later on he
+     defeated 23 allied kings of Nairi, and took from them 120
+     chariots and 20,000 people of Kumanu. The other wars are
+     little more than raids, during which he encountered merely
+     those who were incapable of offering him any resistance.
+
+The pursuit of the enemy was never carried to any considerable distance,
+for the men were needed to collect the spoil, despatch the wounded, and
+carry off the trophies of war. Such of the prisoners as it was deemed
+useful or politic to spare were stationed in a safe place under a guard
+of sentries. The remainder were condemned to death as they were brought
+in, and their execution took place without delay; they were made to
+kneel down, with their backs to the soldiery, their heads bowed, and
+their hands resting on a flat stone or a billet of wood, in which
+position they were despatched with clubs. The scribes, standing before
+their tent doors, registered the number of heads cut off; each soldier,
+bringing his quota and throwing it upon the heap, gave in his name and
+the number of his company, and then withdrew in the hope of receiving a
+reward proportionate to the number of his victims.*
+
+     * The details of this bringing of heads are known to us by
+     representations of a later period. The allusions contained
+     in the _Annals of Tiglath-pileser I_. show that the custom
+     was in full force under the early Assyrian conquerors.
+
+When the king happened to accompany the army, he always presided at this
+scene, and distributed largesse to those who had shown most bravery; in
+his absence he required that the heads of the enemy's chiefs should be
+sent to him, in order that they might be exposed to his subjects on the
+gates of his capital. Sieges were lengthy and arduous undertakings. In
+the case of towns situated on the plain, the site was usually chosen
+so as to be protected by canals, or an arm of a river on two or three
+sides, thus leaving one side only without a natural defence, which the
+inhabitants endeavoured to make up for by means of double or treble
+ramparts.*
+
+     * The town of Tela had three containing walls, that of
+     Shingisha had four, and that of Pitura two.
+
+[Illustration: 198.jpg THE BRINGING OF HEADS AFTER A BATTLE]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from Layard.
+
+These fortifications must have resembled those of the Syrian towns; the
+walls were broad at the base, and, to prevent scaling, rose to a height
+of some thirty or forty feet: there were towers at intervals of a
+bowshot, from which the archers could seriously disconcert parties
+making attacks against any intervening points in the curtain wall; the
+massive gates were covered with raw hides, or were plated with metal
+to resist assaults by fire and axe, while, as soon as hostilities
+commenced, the defence was further completed by wooden scaffolding.
+Places thus fortified, however, at times fell almost without an attempt
+at resistance; the inhabitants, having descended into the lowlands to
+rescue their crops from the Assyrians, would be disbanded, and, while
+endeavouring to take refuge within their ramparts, would be pursued by
+the enemy, who would gain admittance with them in the general disorder.
+If the town did not fall into their hands by some stroke of good
+fortune, they would at once attempt, by an immediate assault, to terrify
+the garrison into laying down their arms.*
+
+     * Assurnazirpal, in this fashion, took the town of Pitura in
+     two days, in spite of its strong double ramparts.
+
+The archers and slingers led the attack by advancing in couples till
+they were within the prescribed distance from the walls, one of the two
+taking careful aim, while the other sheltered his comrade behind his
+round-topped shield. The king himself would sometimes alight from his
+chariot and let fly his arrows in the front rank of the archers, while
+a handful of resolute men would rush against the gates of the town
+and attempt either to break them down or set them alight with torches.
+Another party, armed with stout helmets and quilted jerkins, which
+rendered them almost invulnerable to the shower of arrows or stones
+poured on them by the besieged, would attempt to undermine the walls by
+means of levers and pick-axes, and while thus engaged would be protected
+by mantelets fixed to the face of the walls, resembling in shape the
+shields of the archers. Often bodies of men would approach the suburbs
+of the city and endeavour to obtain access to the ramparts from the
+roofs of the houses in close proximity to the walls. If, however,
+they could gain admittance by none of these means, and time was of no
+consideration, they would resign themselves to a lengthy siege, and the
+blockade would commence by a systematic desolation of the surrounding
+country, in which the villages scattered over the plain would be burnt,
+the vines torn up, and all trees cut down.
+
+[Illustration: 200.jpg THE KING LETS FLY ARROWS AT A BESIEGED TOWN]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from Layard.
+
+The Assyrians waged war with a brutality which the Egyptians would never
+have tolerated. Unlike the Pharaohs, their kings were not content to
+imprison or put to death the principal instigators of a revolt, but
+their wrath would fall upon the entire population. As long as a town
+resisted the efforts of their besieging force, all its inhabitants
+bearing arms who fell into their hands were subjected to the most cruel
+tortures; they were cut to pieces or impaled alive on stakes, which were
+planted in the ground just in front of the lines, so that the besieged
+should enjoy a full view of the sufferings of their comrades.
+
+[Illustration: 201.jpg ASSYRIAN SAPPERS]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from Layard.
+
+Even during the course of a short siege this line of stakes would
+be prolonged till it formed a bloody pale between the two contending
+armies. This horrible spectacle had at least the effect of shaking the
+courage of the besieged, and of hastening the end of hostilities. When
+at length the town yielded to the enemy, it was often razed to the
+ground, and salt was strewn upon its ruins, while the unfortunate
+inhabitants were either massacred or transplanted _en masse_ elsewhere.
+If the bulk of the population were spared and condemned to exile, the
+wealthy and noble were shown no clemency; they were thrown from, the top
+of the city towers, their ears and noses were cut off, their hands and
+feet were amputated, or they and their children were roasted over a slow
+fire, or flayed alive, or decapitated, and their heads piled up in a
+heap.
+
+[Illustration: 202.jpg A TOWN TAKEN BY SCALING]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from one of the bas-reliefs of the
+     bronze gate at Balawat. The two soldiers who represent the
+     Assyrian army carry their shields before them; flames appear
+     above the ramparts, showing that the conquerors have burnt
+     the town.
+
+The victorious sovereigns appear to have taken a pride in the
+ingenuity with which they varied these means of torture, and dwell with
+complacency on the recital of their cruelties. "I constructed a pillar
+at the gate of the city," is the boast of one of them; "I then flayed
+the chief men, and covered the post with their skins; I suspended their
+dead bodies from this same pillar, I impaled others on the summit of the
+pillar, and I ranged others on stakes around the pillar."
+
+Two or three executions of this kind usually sufficed to demoralise the
+enemy. The remaining inhabitants assembled: terrified by the majesty of
+Assur, and as it were blinded by the brightness of his countenance, they
+sunk down at the knees of the victor and embraced his feet.*
+
+     * These are the very expressions used in the Assyrian texts:
+     "The terror of my strength overthrew them, they feared the
+     combat, and they embraced my feet;" and again: "The
+     brightness of Assur, my lord, overturned them." This latter
+     image is explained by the presence over the king of the
+     winged figure of Assur directing the battle.
+
+[Illustration: 203.jpg TORTURES INFLICTED ON PRISONERS]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from one of the bas-reliefs of the
+     bronze gates of Balawat; on the right the town is seen in
+     flames, and on the walls on either side hangs a row of
+     heads, one above another.
+
+The peace secured at the price of their freedom left them merely with
+their lives and such of their goods as could not be removed from the
+soil. The scribes thereupon surrounded the spoil seized by the soldiery
+and drew up a detailed inventory of the prisoners and their property:
+everything worth carrying away to Assyria was promptly registered, and
+despatched to the capital.
+
+[Illustration: 204.jpg A CONVOY OF PRISONERS AND CAPTIVES AFTER THE
+TAKING OF A TOWN]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher Gudin, from Layard.
+
+The contents of the royal palace led the way; it comprised the silver,
+gold, and copper of the vanquished prince, his caldrons, dishes and
+cups of brass, the women of his harem, the maidens of his household,
+his furniture and stuffs, horses and chariots, together with his men
+and women servants. The enemy's gods, like his kings, were despoiled
+of their possessions, and poor and rich suffered alike. The choicest of
+their troops were incorporated into the Assyrian regiments, and helped
+to fill the gaps which war had made in the ranks;* the peasantry and
+townsfolk were sold as slaves, or were despatched with their families to
+till the domains of the king in some Assyrian village.* Tiglath-pileser
+I. in this manner incorporated 120 chariots of the Kashki and the Urumi
+into the Assyrian chariotry.
+
+[Illustration: 205.jpg CONVOY OF PRISONERS BOUND IN VARIOUS WAYS]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a bas-relief of one of the
+     gates of Balawat.
+
+The monuments often depict the exodus of these unfortunate wretches.
+They were represented as proceeding on their way in the charge of a few
+foot-soldiers--each of the men carrying, without any sign of labour, a
+bag of provisions, while the women bear their young children on their
+shoulders or in their arms: herds of cows and flocks of goats and sheep
+follow, chariots drawn by mules bringing up the rear with the baggage.
+While the crowd of non-combatants were conducted in irregular columns
+without manacles or chains, the veteran troops and the young men capable
+of bearing arms were usually bound together, and sometimes were further
+secured by a wooden collar placed on their necks. Many perished on the
+way from want or fatigue, but such as were fortunate enough to reach
+the end of the journey were rewarded with a small portion of land and
+a dwelling, becoming henceforward identified with the indigenous
+inhabitants of the country. Assyrians were planted as colonists in the
+subjugated towns, and served to maintain there the authority of the
+conqueror. The condition of the latter resembled to a great extent that
+of the old Egyptian vassals in Phoenicia or Southern Syria. They were
+allowed to retain their national constitution, rites, and even their
+sovereigns; when, for instance, after some rebellion, one of these
+princes had been impaled or decapitated, his successor was always chosen
+from among the members of his own family, usually one of his sons, who
+was enthroned almost before his father had ceased to breathe. He was
+obliged to humiliate his own gods before Assur, to pay a yearly tribute,
+to render succour in case of necessity to the commanders of neighbouring
+garrisons, to send his troops when required to swell the royal army, to
+give his sons or brothers as hostages, and to deliver up his own sisters
+and daughters, or those of his nobles, for the harem or the domestic
+service of the conqueror. The unfortunate prince soon resigned himself
+to this state of servitude; he would collect around him and reorganise
+his scattered subjects, restore them to their cities, rebuild their
+walls, replant the wasted orchards, and sow the devastated fields. A few
+years of relative peace and tranquillity, during which he strove to
+be forgotten by his conqueror, restored prosperity to his country; the
+population increased with extraordinary rapidity, and new generations
+arose who, unconscious of the disasters suffered by their predecessors,
+had, but one aim, that of recovering their independence. We must,
+however, beware of thinking that the defeat of these tribes was as
+crushing or their desolation as terrible as the testimony of the
+inscriptions would lead us to suppose. The rulers of Nineveh were but
+too apt to relate that this or that country had been conquered and its
+people destroyed, when the Assyrian army had remained merely a week or
+a fortnight within its territory, had burnt some half-dozen fortified
+towns, and taken two or three thousand prisoners.*
+
+     * For example, Tiglath-pileser I. conquers the Kummukli in
+     the first year of his reign, burning, destroying, and
+     depopulating the towns, and massacring "the remainder of the
+     Kummukh" who had taken refuge in the mountains, after which,
+     in his second campaign, he again pillages, burns, destroys,
+     and depopulates the towns, and again massacres the remainder
+     of the inhabitants hiding in the mountains. He makes the
+     same statements with regard to most of the other countries
+     and peoples conquered by him, but we find them reappearing
+     with renewed vigour on the scene, soon after their supposed
+     destruction.
+
+If we were to accept implicitly all that is recorded of the Assyrian
+exploits in Nairi or the Taurus, we should be led to believe that for
+at least half a century the valleys of the Upper Tigris and Middle
+Euphrates were transformed into a desert; each time, however, that they
+are subsequently mentioned on the occasion of some fresh expedition,
+they appear once more covered with thriving cities and a vigorous
+population, whose generals offer an obstinate resistance to the
+invaders. We are, therefore, forced to admit that the majority of these
+expeditions must be regarded as mere raids. The population, disconcerted
+by a sudden attack, would take refuge in the woods or on the mountains,
+carrying with them their gods, whom they thus preserved from captivity,
+together with a portion of their treasures and cattle; but no sooner had
+the invader retired, than they descended once more into the plain and
+returned to their usual occupations. The Assyrian victories thus rarely
+produced the decisive results which are claimed for them; they almost
+always left the conquered people with sufficient energy and resources
+to enable them to resume the conflict after a brief interval, and the
+supremacy which the suzerain claimed as a result of his conquests was of
+the most ephemeral nature. A revolt would suffice to shake it, while a
+victory would be almost certain to destroy it, and once more reduce the
+empire to the limits of Assyria proper.
+
+Tukultiabalesharra, familiar to us under the name of Tiglath-pileser,*
+is the first of the great warrior-kings of Assyria to stand out before
+us with any definite individuality.
+
+     * Tiglath-pileser is one of the transcriptions given in the
+     LXX. for the Hebrew version of the name: it signifies, "The
+     child of Esharra is my strength." By "the child of Esharra"
+     the Assyrians, like the Chaldaeans, understood the child of
+     Ninib.
+
+We find him, in the interval between two skirmishes, engaged in hunting
+lions or in the pursuit of other wild beasts, and we see him lavishing
+offerings on the gods and enriching their temples with the spoils of
+his victories; these, however, were not the normal occupations of this
+sovereign, for peace with him was merely an interlude in a reign of
+conflict. He led all his expeditions in person, undeterred by any
+consideration of fatigue or danger, and scarcely had he returned from
+one arduous campaign, than he proceeded to sketch the plan of that for
+the following year; in short, he reigned only to wage war. His father,
+Assurishishi, had bequeathed him not only a prosperous kingdom, but a
+well-organised army, which he placed in the field without delay. During
+the fifty years since the Mushku, descending through the gorges of the
+Taurus, had invaded the Alzi and the Puru-kuzzi, Assyria had not only
+lost possession of all the countries bordering the left bank of the
+Euphrates, but the whole of Kummukh had withdrawn its allegiance from
+her, and had ceased to pay tribute. Tiglath-pileser had ascended the
+throne only a few weeks ere he quitted Assur, marched rapidly across
+Eastern Mesopotamia by the usual route, through Singar and Nisib, and
+climbing the chain of the Kashiara, near Mardin, bore down into the very
+heart of Kummukh, where twenty thousand Mushku, under the command of
+five kings, resolutely awaited him. He repulsed them in the very first
+engagement, and pursued them hotly over hill and vale, pillaging the
+fields, and encircling the towns with trophies of human heads taken
+from the prisoners who had fallen into his hands; the survivors, to the
+number of six thousand, laid down their arms, and were despatched to
+Assyria.*
+
+     * The king, starting from Assur, must have followed the
+     route through Sindjar, Nisib, Mardin, and Diarbekir--a road
+     used later by the Romans, and still in existence at the
+     present day. As he did not penetrate that year as far as the
+     provinces of Alzi and Purukuzzi, he must have halted at the
+     commencement of the mountain district, and have beaten the
+     allies in the plain of Kuru-tchai, before Diarbekir, in the
+     neighbourhood of the Tigris.
+
+The Kummukh contingents, however, had been separated in the rout from
+the Mushku, and had taken refuge beyond the Euphrates, near to the
+fortress of Shirisha, where they imagined themselves in safety behind a
+rampart of mountains and forests. Tiglath-pileser managed, by cutting
+a road for his foot-soldiers and chariots, to reach their retreat: he
+stormed the place without apparent difficulty, massacred the defenders,
+and then turning upon the inhabitants of Kurkhi,* who were on their way
+to reinforce the besieged, drove their soldiers into the Nami, whose
+waters carried the corpses down to the Tigris. One of their princes,
+Kilite-shub, son of Kaliteshub-Sarupi, had been made prisoner during
+the action. Tiglath-pileser sent him, together with his wives, children,
+treasures, and gods,** to share the captivity of the Mushku; then
+retracing his steps, he crossed over to the right bank of the Tigris,
+and attacked the stronghold of Urrakhinas which crowned the summit of
+Panari.
+
+     * The country of the Kurkhi appears to have included at this
+     period the provinces lying between the Sebbeneh-Su and the
+     mountains of Djudi, probably a portion of the Sophene, the
+     Anzanone and the Gordyenc of classical authors.
+
+     ** The vanquished must have crossed the Tigris below
+     Diarbekir and have taken refuge beyond Mayafarrikin, so that
+     Shirisha must be sought for between the Silvan-dagh and the
+     Ak-dagh, in the basin of the Batman-tchai, the present Nami.
+
+The people, terror-stricken by the fate of their neighbours, seized
+their idols and hid themselves within the thickets like a flock of
+birds. Their chief, Shaditeshub, son of Khatusaru,* ventured from out of
+his hiding-place to meet the Assyrian conqueror, and prostrated himself
+at his feet. He delivered over his sons and the males of his family
+as hostages, and yielded up all his possessions in gold and copper,
+together with a hundred and twenty slaves and cattle of all kinds;
+Tiglath-pileser thereupon permitted him to keep his principality under
+the suzerainty of Assyria, and such of his allies as followed his
+example obtained a similar concession. The king consecrated the tenth
+of the spoil thus received to the use of his god Assur and also to
+Ramman;** but before returning to his capital, he suddenly resolved to
+make an expedition into the almost impenetrable regions which separated
+him from Lake Van.
+
+     * The name of this chief's father has always been read
+     Khatukhi: it is a form of the name Khatusaru borne by the
+     Hittite king in the time of Ramses II.
+
+     ** The site of Urrakhinas--read by Winckler Urartinas--is
+     very uncertain: the town was situated in a territory which
+     could belong equally well to the Kummukh or to the Kurkhi,
+     and the mention of the crossing of the Tigris seems to
+     indicate that it was on the right bank of the river,
+     probably in the mountain group of Tur-Abdin.
+
+This district was, even more than at the present day, a confused
+labyrinth of wooded mountain ranges, through which the Eastern Tigris
+and its affluents poured their rapid waters in tortuous curves. As
+hitherto no army had succeeded in making its way through this territory
+with sufficient speed to surprise the fortified villages and scattered
+clans inhabiting the valleys and mountain slopes, Tiglath-pileser
+selected from his force a small troop of light infantry and thirty
+chariots, with which he struck into the forests; but, on reaching the
+Aruma, he was forced to abandon his chariotry and proceed with the
+foot-soldiers only. The Mildish, terrified by his sudden appearance,
+fell an easy prey to the invader; the king scattered the troops hastily
+collected to oppose him, set fire to a few fortresses, seized the
+peasantry and their flocks, and demanded hostages and the usual tribute
+as a condition of peace.*
+
+     * The Mildish of our inscription is to be identified with
+     the country of Mount Umildish, mentioned by Sargon of
+     Assyria.
+
+In his first campaign he thus reduced the upper and eastern half of
+Kummukh, namely, the part extending to the north of the Tigris, while in
+the following campaign he turned his attention to the regions bounded by
+the Euphrates and by the western spurs of the Kashiari. The Alzi and the
+Purukuzzi had been disconcerted by his victories, and had yielded him
+their allegiance almost without a struggle. To the southward, the Kashku
+and the Urumi, who had, to the number of four thousand, migrated from
+among the Khati and compelled the towns of the Shubarti to break their
+alliance with the Ninevite kings, now made no attempt at resistance;
+they laid down their arms and yielded at discretion, giving up
+their goods and their hundred and twenty war-chariots, and resigning
+themselves to the task of colonising a distant corner of Assyria. Other
+provinces, however, were not so easily dealt with; the inhabitants
+entrenched themselves within their wild valleys, from whence they had
+to be ousted by sheer force; in the end they always had to yield, and to
+undertake to pay an annual tribute. The Assyrian empire thus regained
+on this side the countries which Shalmaneser I. had lost, owing to the
+absorption of his energies and interests in the events which were taking
+place in Chaldaea.
+
+In his third campaign Tiglath-pileser succeeded in bringing about the
+pacification of the border provinces which shut in the basin of the
+Tigris to the north and east. The Kurkhi did not consider themselves
+conquered by the check they had received at the Nami; several of their
+tribes were stirring in Kharia, on the highlands above the Arzania, and
+their restlessness threatened to infect such of their neighbours as
+had already submitted themselves to the Assyrian yoke. "My master Assur
+commanded me to attack their proud summits, which no king has ever
+visited. I assembled my chariots and my foot-soldiers, and I
+passed between the Idni and the Ala, by a difficult country, across
+cloud-capped mountains whose peaks were as the point of a dagger,
+and unfavourable to the progress of my chariots; I therefore left my
+chariots in reserve, and I climbed these steep mountains. The community
+of the Kurkhi assembled its numerous troops, and in order to give me
+battle they entrenched themselves upon the Azubtagish; on the slopes of
+the mountain, an incommodious position, I came into conflict with
+them, and I vanquished them." This lesson cost them twenty-five towns,
+situated at the feet of the Aia, the Shuira, the Idni, the Shizu, the
+Silgu, and the Arzanabiu*--all twenty-five being burnt to the ground.
+
+     * The site of Kharia must be sought for probably between the
+     sources of the Tigris and the Batman-tchai.
+
+The dread of a similar fate impelled the neighbouring inhabitants of
+Adaush to beg for a truce, which was granted to them;* but the people of
+Saraush and of Ammaush, who "from all time had never known what it was
+to obey," were cut to pieces, and their survivors incorporated into the
+empire--a like fate overtaking the Isua and the Daria, who inhabited
+Khoatras.**
+
+     * According to the context, the Adaush ought to be between
+     the Kharia and the Saraush; possibly between the Batman-
+     tchai and the Bohtan-tchai, in the neighbourhood of Mildish.
+
+     ** As Tiglath-pileser was forced to cross Mount Aruma in
+     order to reach the Ammaush and the Saraush, these two
+     countries, together with Isua and Daria, cannot be far from
+     Mildish; Isua is, indeed, mentioned as near to Anzitene in
+     an inscription of Shalmaneser II., which obliges us to place
+     it somewhere near the sources of the Batman-tchai. The
+     position of Muraddash and Saradaush is indirectly pointed
+     out by the mention of the Lower Zab and the Lulume; the name
+     of Saradaush is perhaps preserved in that of Surtash, borne
+     by the valley through which runs one of the tributaries of
+     the Lower Zab.
+
+Beyond this, again, on the banks of the Lesser Zab and the confines of
+Lulumo, the principalities of Muraddash and of Saradaush refused to come
+to terms. Tiglath-pileser broke their lines within sight of Muraddash,
+and entered the town with the fugitives in the confusion which ensued;
+this took place about the fourth hour of the day. The success was so
+prompt and complete, that the king was inclined to attribute it to the
+help of Ramman, and he made an offering to the temple of this god at
+Assur of all the copper, whether wrought or in ore, which was found
+among the spoil of the vanquished. He was recalled almost immediately
+after this victory by a sedition among the Kurkhi near the sources of
+the Tigris. One of their tribes, known as the Sugi, who had not as
+yet suffered from the invaders, had concentrated round their standards
+contingents from some half-dozen cities, and the united force was, to
+the number of six thousand, drawn up on Mount Khirikha. Tiglath-pileser
+was again victorious, and took from them twenty-five statues of their
+gods, which he despatched to Assyria to be distributed among the
+sanctuaries of Belit at Assur, of Anu, Bamman, and of Ishtar. Winter
+obliged him to suspend operations. When he again resumed them at the
+beginning of his third year, both the Kummukh and the Kurkhi were so
+peaceably settled that he was able to carry his expeditions without fear
+of danger further north, into the regions of the Upper Euphrates between
+the Halys and Lake Van, a district then known as Nairi. He marched
+diagonally across the plain of Diarbekir, penetrated through dense
+forests, climbed sixteen mountain ridges one after the other by paths
+hitherto considered impracticable, and finally crossed the Euphrates by
+improvised bridges, this being, as far as we know, the first time that
+an Assyrian monarch had ventured into the very heart of those countries
+which had formerly constituted the Hittite empire.
+
+He found them occupied by rude and warlike tribes, who derived
+considerable wealth from working the mines, and possessed each their
+own special sanctuary, the ruins of which still appear above ground,
+and invite the attention of the explorer. Their fortresses must have all
+more or less resembled that city of the Pterians which flourished for so
+many ages just at the bend of the Halys;* its site is still marked by
+a mound rising to some thirty feet above the plain, resembling the
+platforms on which the Chaldaean temples were always built--a few walls
+of burnt brick, and within an enclosure, among the debris of rudely
+built houses, the ruins of some temples and palaces consisting of large
+irregular blocks of stone.
+
+     * The remains of the palace of the city of the Pterians, the
+     present Euyuk, are probably later than the reign of Tiglath-
+     pileser, and may be attributed to the Xth or IXth century
+     before our era; they, however, probably give a very fair
+     idea of what the towns of the Cappadocian region were like
+     at the time of the first Assyrian invasions.
+
+[Illustration: 216.jpg GENERAL VIEW OF THE RUINS OF EUYUK]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph.
+
+[Illustration: 217.jpg THE SPHINX ON THE RIGHT OF EUYUK]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph.
+
+Two colossal sphinxes guard the gateway of the principal edifice,
+and their presence proves with certainty how predominant was Egyptian
+influence even at this considerable distance from the banks of the Nile.
+They are not the ordinary sphinxes, with a human head surmounting the
+body of a lion couchant on its stone pedestal; but, like the Assyrian
+bulls, they are standing, and, to judge from the Hathorian locks which
+fall on each side of their countenances, they must have been intended
+to represent a protecting goddess rather than a male deity. A remarkable
+emblem is carved on the side of the upright to which their bodies are
+attached; it is none other than the double-headed eagle, the prototype
+of which is not infrequently found at Telloh in Lower Chaldaea, among
+remains dating from the time of the kings and vicegerents of Lagash.
+
+[Illustration: 218.jpg TWO BLOCKS COVERED WITH BAS-RELIEFS IN THE EUYUK
+PALACE]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph.
+
+The court or hall to which this gate gave access was decorated with
+bas-reliefs, which exhibit a glaring imitation of Babylonian art; we can
+still see on these the king, vested in his long flowing robes, praying
+before an altar, while further on is a procession of dignitaries
+following a troop of rams led by a priest to be sacrificed; another
+scene represents two individuals in the attitude of worship, wearing
+short loin-cloths, and climbing a ladder whose upper end has an
+uncertain termination, while a third person applies his hands to his
+mouth in the performance of some mysterious ceremony; beyond these are
+priests and priestesses moving in solemn file as if in the measured
+tread of some sacred dance, while in one corner we find the figure of a
+woman, probably a goddess, seated, holding in one hand a flower, perhaps
+the full-blown lotus, and in the other a cup from which she is about to
+drink. The costume of all these figures is that which Chaldaean fashion
+had imposed upon the whole of Western Asia, and consisted of the long
+heavy robe, falling from the shoulders to the feet, drawn in at the
+waist by a girdle; but it is to be noted that both sexes are shod with
+the turned-up shoes of the Hittites, and that the women wear high peaked
+caps.
+
+[Illustration: 219.jpg MYSTIC SCENE AT EUYUK]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph.
+
+The composition of the scenes is rude, the drawing incorrect, and the
+general technique reminds us rather of the low reliefs of the Memphite
+or Theban sculptors than of the high projection characteristic of the
+artists of the Lower Euphrates. These slabs of sculptured stone formed
+a facing at the base of the now crumbling brick walls, the upper
+surface of which was covered with rough plastering. Here and there a
+few inscriptions reveal the name, titles, and parentage of some once
+celebrated personage, and mention the god in whose honour he had
+achieved the work.
+
+[Illustration: 220.jpg AN ASIATIC GODDESS]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph.
+
+The characters in which these inscriptions are written are not, as a
+rule, incised in the stone, but are cut in relief upon its surface,
+and if some few of them may remind us of the Egyptian hieroglyphs, the
+majority are totally unlike them, both in form and execution. A careful
+examination of them reveals a medley of human and animal outlines,
+geometrical figures, and objects of daily use, which all doubtless
+corresponded to some letter or syllable, but to which we have as yet
+no trustworthy key. This system of writing is one of a whole group of
+Asiatic scripts, specimens of which are common in this part of the world
+from Crete to the banks of the Euphrates and Orontes. It is thought that
+the Khati must have already adopted it before their advent to power, and
+that it was they who propagated it in Northern Syria. It did not take
+the place of the cuneiform syllabary for ordinary purposes of daily life
+owing to its clumsiness and complex character, but its use was reserved
+for monumental inscriptions of a royal or religious kind, where it could
+be suitably employed as a framework to scenes or single figures.
+
+[Illustration: 221.jpg THE ASIATIC INSCRIPTION OF KOLITOLU-YAILA]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Hogarth.
+
+It, however, never presented the same graceful appearance and
+arrangement as was exhibited in the Egyptian hieroglyphs, the signs
+placed side by side being out of proportion with each other so as to
+destroy the general harmony of the lines, and it must be regarded as a
+script still in process of formation and not yet emerged from infancy.
+Every square yard of soil turned up among the ruins of the houses of
+Euyuk yields vestiges of tools, coarse pottery, terra-cotta and bronze
+statuettes of men and animals, and other objects of a not very high
+civilization. The few articles of luxury discovered, whether in
+furniture or utensils, were not indigenous products, but were imported
+for the most part from Chaldaea, Syria, Phoenicia, and perhaps from
+Egypt; some objects, indeed, came from the coast-towns of the AEgean,
+thus showing that Western influence was already in contact with the
+traditions of the East.
+
+[Illustration: 222.jpg DOUBLE SCEND OF OFFERINGS]
+
+     Drawn by Paucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Hogarth. It
+     will be remarked that both altars are in the form of a
+     female without a head, but draped in the Assyrian robe.
+
+All the various races settled between the Halys and the Orontes were
+more or less imbued with this foreign civilization, and their monuments,
+though not nearly so numerous as those of the Pharaohs and Ninevite
+kings, bear, nevertheless, an equally striking evidence of its power.
+Examples of it have been pointed out in a score of different places in
+the valleys of the Taurus and on the plains of Cappadocia, in
+bas-reliefs, steke, seals, and intaglios, several of which must be
+nearly contemporaneous with the first Assyrian conquest.
+
+[Illustration: 223.jpg THE BAS-RELIEF OF IBRIZ]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Hogarth.
+
+One instance of it appears on the rocks at Ibriz, where a king stands in
+a devout attitude before a jovial giant whose hands are full of grapes
+and wheat-ears, while in another bas-relief near Frakhtin we have a
+double scene of sacrifice. The rock-carving at Ibriz is, perhaps, of all
+the relics of a forgotten world, that which impresses the spectator most
+favourably. The concept of the scene is peculiarly naive; indeed, the
+two figures are clumsily brought together, though each of them, when
+examined separately, is remarkable for its style and execution. The king
+has a dignified bearing in spite of his large head, round eyes, and the
+unskilful way in which his arms are set on his body. The figure of the
+god is not standing firmly on both feet, but the sculptor has managed
+to invest him with an air of grandeur and an expression of vigour and
+_bonhomie,_ which reminds us of certain types of the Greek Hercules.
+
+Tiglath-pileser was probably attracted to Asia Minor as much by
+considerations of mercantile interest as by the love of conquest or
+desire for spoil. It would, indeed, have been an incomparable gain for
+him had he been able, if not to seize the mines themselves, at least
+to come into such close proximity to them that he would be able to
+monopolise their entire output, and at the same time to lay hands on the
+great commercial highway to the trade centres of the west. The eastern
+terminus of this route lay already within his domains, namely, that
+which led to Assur by way of Amid, Nisibe, Singar, and the valley of the
+Upper Tigris; he was now desirous of acquiring that portion of it
+which wound its way from the fords of the Euphrates at Malatiyeh to the
+crossing of the Halys. The changes which had just taken place in
+Kummukh and Nairi had fully aroused the numerous petty sovereigns of
+the neighbourhood. The bonds which kept them together had not been
+completely severed at the downfall of the Hittite empire, and a certain
+sense of unity still lingered among them in spite of their continual
+feuds; they constituted, in fact, a sort of loose confederation, whose
+members never failed to help one another when they were threatened by a
+common enemy. As soon as the news of an Assyrian invasion reached them,
+they at once put aside their-mutual quarrels and combined to oppose
+the invader with their united forces. Tiglath-pileser had, therefore,
+scarcely crossed the Euphrates before he was attacked on his right flank
+by twenty-three petty kings of Nairi,* while sixty other chiefs from the
+same neighbourhood bore down upon him in front. He overcame the first
+detachment of the confederates, though not without a sharp struggle; he
+carried carnage into their ranks, "as it were the whirlwind of Eamman,"
+and seized a hundred and twenty of the enemy's chariots. The sixty
+chiefs, whose domains extended as far as the "Upper Sea,"** were
+disconcerted by the news of the disaster, and of their own accord laid
+down their arms, or offered but a feeble resistance.
+
+     * The text of the Annals of the Xth year give thirty instead
+     of twenty-three; in the course of five or six years the
+     numbers have already become exaggerated.
+
+     ** The site of the "Upper Sea" has furnished material for
+     much discussion. Some believe it to be the Caspian Sea or
+     the Black Sea, others take it to be Lake Van, while some
+     think it to be the Mediterranean, and more particularly the
+     Gulf of Issus between Syria and Cilicia. At the present day
+     several scholars have returned to the theory which makes it
+     the Black Sea.
+
+Tiglath-pileser presented some of them in chains to the god Shamash; he
+extorted an oath of vassalage from them, forced them to give up their
+children as hostages, and laid a tax upon them _en masse_ of 1200
+stallions and 2000 bulls, after which he permitted them to return to
+their respective towns. He had, however, singled out from among them to
+grace his own triumph, Sini of Dayana, the only chief among them who had
+offered him an obstinate resistance; but even he was granted his liberty
+after he had been carried captive to Assur, and made to kneel before the
+gods of Assyria.*
+
+     * Dayani, which is mentioned in the Annals of Shalmaneser
+     II., has been placed on the banks of the Murad-su by
+     Schrader, and more particularly in the neighbourhood of
+     Melasgerd by Sayce; Delattre has shown that it was the last
+     and most westerly of twenty-three kingdoms conquered by
+     Tiglath-pileser I., and that it was consequently enclosed
+     between the Murad-su and the Euphrates proper.
+
+Before returning to the capital, Tiglath-pileser attacked Khanigalbat,
+and appeared before Milidia: as the town attempted no defence, he spared
+it, and contented himself with levying a small contribution upon
+its inhabitants. This expedition was rather of the nature of a
+reconnaissance than a conquest, but it helped to convince the king
+of the difficulty of establishing any permanent suzerainty over the
+country. The Asiatic peoples were quick to bow before a sudden attack;
+but no sooner had the conqueror departed, than those who had sworn him
+eternal fealty sought only how best to break their oaths. The tribes in
+immediate proximity to those provinces which had been long subject to
+the Assyrian rule, were intimidated into showing some respect for a
+power which existed so close to their own borders. But those further
+removed from the seat of government felt a certain security in
+their distance from it, and were tempted to revert to the state of
+independence they had enjoyed before the conquest; so that unless the
+sovereign, by a fresh campaign, promptly made them realise that their
+disaffection would not remain unpunished, they soon forgot their
+feudatory condition and the duties which it entailed.
+
+Three years of merciless conflict with obstinate and warlike mountain
+tribes had severely tried the Assyrian army, if it had not worn out
+the sovereign; the survivors of so many battles were in sore need of a
+well-merited repose, the gaps left by death had to be filled, and both
+infantry and chariotry needed the re-modelling of their corps. The
+fourth year of the king's reign, therefore, was employed almost entirely
+in this work of reorganisation; we find only the record of a raid of
+a few weeks against the Akhlami and other nomadic Aramaeans situated
+beyond the Mesopotamian steppes. The Assyrians spread over the district
+between the frontiers of Sukhi and the fords of Carchemish for a whole
+day, killing all who resisted, sacking the villages and laying hands
+on slaves and cattle. The fugitives escaped over the Euphrates, vainly
+hoping that they would be secure in the very heart of the Khati.
+Tiglath-pileser, however, crossed the river on rafts supported on skins,
+and gave the provinces of Mount Bishri over to fire and sword:* six
+walled towns opened their gates to him without having ventured to strike
+a blow, and he quitted the country laden with spoil before the kings of
+the surrounding cities had had time to recover from their alarm.
+
+     * The country of Bishri was situated, as the _Annals_ point
+     out, in the immediate neighbourhood of Carchemish. The name
+     is preserved in that of Tell Basher still borne by the
+     ruins, and a modern village on the banks of the Sajur. The
+     Gebel Bishri to which Hommel alludes is too far to the south
+     to correspond to the description given in the inscription of
+     Tiglath-pileser.
+
+This expedition was for Tiglath-pileser merely an interlude between
+two more serious campaigns; and with the beginning of his fifth year
+he reappeared in the provinces of the Upper Euphrates to complete his
+conquest of them. He began by attacking and devastating Musri, which lay
+close to the territory of Milid. While thus occupied he was harassed by
+bands of Kumani; he turned upon them, overcame them, and imprisoned the
+remainder of them in the fortress of Arini, at the foot of Mount Aisa,
+where he forced them to kiss his feet. His victory over them, however,
+did not disconcert their neighbours. The bulk of the Kumani, whose
+troops had scarcely suffered in the engagement, fortified themselves
+on Mount Tala, to the number of twenty thousand; the king carried the
+heights by assault, and hotly pursued the fugitives as far as the range
+of Kharusa before Musri, where the fortress of Khunusa afforded them
+a retreat behind its triple walls of brick. The king, nothing daunted,
+broke his way through them one after another, demolished the ramparts,
+razed the houses, and strewed the ruins with salt; he then constructed
+a chapel of brick as a sort of trophy, and dedicated within it what
+was known as a copper thunderbolt, being an image of the missile which
+Eamman, the god of thunder, brandished in the face of his enemies. An
+inscription engraved on the object recorded the destruction of Khunusa,
+and threatened with every divine malediction the individual, whether
+an Assyrian or a stranger, who should dare to rebuild the city. This
+victory terrified the Kumani, and their capital, Kibshuna, opened
+its gates to the royal troops at the first summons. Tiglath-pileser
+completely destroyed the town, but granted the inhabitants their lives
+on condition of their paying tribute; he chose from among them, however,
+three hundred families who had shown him the most inveterate hostility,
+and sent them as exiles into Assyria.*
+
+     * The country of the Kumani or Kammanu is really the
+     district of Comana in Cataonia, and not the Comana Pontica
+     or the Khammanene on the banks of the Halys. Delattre thinks
+     that Tiglath-pileser penetrated into this region by the
+     Jihun, and consequently seeks to identify the names of towns
+     and mountains, e.g. Mount Ilamuni with Jaur-dagh, the
+     Kharusa with Shorsh-dagh, and the Tala with the Kermes-dagh;
+     but it is difficult to believe that, if the king took this
+     route, he would not mention the town of Marqasi-Marash,
+     which lay at the very foot of the Jaur-dagh, and would have
+     stopped his passage. It is more probable that the Assyrians,
+     starting from Melitene, which they had just subdued, would
+     have followed the route which skirts the northern slope of
+     the Taurus by Albistan; the scene of the conflict in this
+     case would probably have been the mountainous district of
+     Zeitun.
+
+With this victory the first half of his reign drew to its close; in five
+years Tiglath-pileser had subjugated forty-two peoples and their princes
+within an area extending from the banks of the Lower Zab to the plains
+of the Khati, and as far as the shores of the Western Seas. He revisited
+more than once these western and northern regions in which he had
+gained his early triumphs. The reconnaissance which he had made
+around Carchemish had revealed to him the great wealth of the Syrian
+table-land, and that a second raid in that direction could be made more
+profitable than ten successful campaigns in Nairi or upon the banks
+of the Zab. He therefore marched his battalions thither, this time
+to remain for more than a few days. He made his way through the whole
+breadth of the country, pushed forward up the valley of the Orontes,
+crossed the Lebanon, and emerged above the coast of the Mediterranean in
+the vicinity of Arvad.
+
+[Illustration: 230.jpg SACRIFICE OFFERED BEFORE THE ROYAL STELE]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from one of the bas-reliefs on the
+     bronze gates of Balawat.
+
+This is the first time for many centuries that an Oriental sovereign had
+penetrated so far west; and his contemporaries must have been obliged
+to look back to the almost fabulous ages of Sargon of Agade or of
+Khammurabi, to find in the long lists of the dynasties of the Euphrates
+any record of a sovereign who had planted his standards on the shores of
+the Sea of the Setting Sun.*
+
+     *This is the name given by the Assyrians to the
+     Mediterranean.
+
+Tiglath-pileser embarked on its waters, made a cruise into the open, and
+killed a porpoise, but we have no record of any battles fought, nor do
+we know how he was received by the Phoenician towns. He pushed on, it is
+thought, as far as the Nahr el-Kelb, and the sight of the hieroglyphic
+inscriptions which Ramses had caused to be cut there three centuries
+previously aroused his emulation. Assyrian conquerors rarely quitted
+the scene of their exploits without leaving behind them some permanent
+memorial of their presence. A sculptor having hastily smoothed the
+surface of a rock, cut out on it a figure of the king, to which was
+usually added a commemorative inscription. In front of this stele was
+erected an altar, upon which sacrifices were made, and if the monument
+was placed near a stream or the seashore, the soldiers were accustomed
+to cast portions of the victims into the water in order to propitiate
+the river-deities.
+
+[Illustration: 231.jpg PORTIONS OF THE SACRIFICIAL VICTIMS THROWN INTO
+THE WATER]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from one of the bas-reliefs on the
+     bronze gates of Balawat.
+
+One of the half-effaced Assyrian stelae adjoining those of the Egyptian
+conqueror is attributed to Tiglath-pileser.*
+
+     *Boscawen thinks that we may attribute to Tiglath-pileser I.
+     the oldest of the Assyrian stelae at Nahr el-Kelb; no
+     positive information has as yet confirmed this hypothesis,
+     which is in other respects very probable.
+
+It was on his return, perhaps, from this campaign that he planted
+colonies at Pitru on the right, and at Mutkinu on the left bank of the
+Euphrates, in order to maintain a watch over Carchemish, and the more
+important fords connecting Mesopotamia with the plains of the Aprie and
+the Orontes.*
+
+     * The existence of these colonies is known only from an
+     inscription of Shalmaneser II.
+
+The news of Tiglath-pileser's expedition was not long in reaching the
+Delta, and the Egyptian monarch then reigning at Tanis was thus made
+acquainted with the fact that there had arisen in Syria a new power
+before which his own was not unlikely to give way. In former times such
+news would have led to a war between the two states, but the time
+had gone by when Egypt was prompt to take up arms at the slightest
+encroachment on her Asiatic provinces. Her influence at this time was
+owing merely to her former renown, and her authority beyond the isthmus
+was purely traditional. The Tanite Pharaoh had come to accept with
+resignation the change in the fortunes of Egypt, and he therefore
+contented himself with forwarding to the Assyrian conqueror, by one of
+the Syrian coasting vessels, a present of some rare wild beasts and
+a few crocodiles. In olden times Assyria had welcomed the arrival of
+Thutmosis III. on the Euphrates by making him presents, which the Theban
+monarch regarded in the light of tribute: the case was now reversed, the
+Egyptian Pharaoh taking the position formerly occupied by the Assyrian
+monarch. Tiglath-pileser graciously accepted this unexpected homage, but
+the turbulent condition of the northern tribes prevented his improving
+the occasion by an advance into Phoenicia and the land of Canaan. Nairi
+occupied his attention on two separate occasions at least; on the second
+of these he encamped in the neighbourhood of the source of the river
+Subnat. This stream, had for a long period issued from a deep grotto,
+where in ancient times a god was supposed to dwell. The conqueror
+was lavish in religious offerings here, and caused a bas-relief to be
+engraved on the entrance in remembrance of his victories.
+
+[Illustration 233.jpg THE STELE AT SEBENNEH-SU]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a sketch by P. Taylor, in G.
+     Rawlinson.
+
+He is here represented as standing upright, the tiara on his brow, and
+his right arm extended as if in the act of worship, while his left, the
+elbow brought up to his side, holds a club. The inscription appended
+to the figure tells, with an eloquence all the more effective from its
+brevity, how, "with the aid of Assur, Shamash, and Eamman, the
+great gods, my lords, I, Tiglath-pileser, King of Assyria, son of
+Assurishishi, King of Assyria, son of Mutakkilnusku, King of Assyria,
+conqueror from the great sea, the Mediterranean, to the great sea of
+Nairi, I went for the third time to Nairi."
+
+The gods who had so signally favoured the monarch received the greater
+part of the spoils which he had secured in his campaigns. The majority
+of the temples of Assyria, which were founded at a time when its city
+was nothing more than a provincial capital owing allegiance to Babylon,
+were either, it would appear, falling to ruins from age, or presented a
+sorry exterior, utterly out of keeping with the magnitude of its recent
+wealth. The king set to work to enlarge or restore the temples of
+Ishtar, Martu, and the ancient Bel;* he then proceeded to rebuild,
+from the foundations to the summit, that of Anu and Bamman, which the
+vicegerent Samsiramman, son of Ismidagan, had constructed seven hundred
+and one years previously. This temple was the principal sanctuary of
+the city, because it was the residence of the chief of the gods, Assur,
+under his appellation of Anu.**
+
+     * "Bel the ancient," or possibly "the ancient master,"
+     appears to have been one of the names of Anu, who is
+     naturally in this connexion the same as Assur.
+
+     ** This was the great temple of which the ruins still exist.
+
+The soil was cleared away down to the bed-rock, upon which an enormous
+substructure, consisting of fifty courses of bricks, was laid, and above
+this were erected two lofty ziggurats, whose tile-covered surfaces shone
+like the rising sun in their brightness; the completion of the whole was
+commemorated by a magnificent festival. The special chapel of Bamman
+and his treasury, dating from the time of the same Samsiramman who had
+raised the temple of Anu, were also rebuilt on a more important scale.*
+
+     * The British Museum possesses bricks bearing the name of
+     Tiglath-pileser I., brought from this temple, as is shown by
+     the inscription on their sides.
+
+These works were actively carried on notwithstanding the fact that war
+was raging on the frontier; however preoccupied he might be with warlike
+projects, Tiglath-pileser never neglected the temples, and set to work
+to collect from every side materials for their completion and adornment.
+
+[Illustration: 235.jpg TRANSPORT OF BUILDING MATERIALS BY WATER]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a bas-relief on the bronze
+     doors at Balawat.
+
+He brought, for example, from Nairi such marble and hard stone as might
+be needed for sculptural purposes, together with the beams of cedar and
+cypress required by his carpenters. The mountains of Singar and of the
+Zab furnished the royal architects with building stone for ordinary
+uses, and for those facing slabs of bluish gypsum on which the
+bas-reliefs of the king's exploits were carved; the blocks ready squared
+were brought down the affluents of the Tigris on rafts or in boats, and
+thus arrived at their destination without land transport.
+
+[Illustration: 236.jpg RARE ANIMALS BROUGHT BACK AS TROPHIES BY THE
+KING]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from the cast in the Louvre. The
+     original is in the British Museum.
+
+The kings of Assyria, like the Pharaohs, had always had a passion for
+rare trees and strange animals; as soon as they entered a country, they
+inquired what natural curiosities it contained, and they would send back
+to their own land whatever specimens of them could be procured.
+
+[Illustration: 237.jpg MONKEY BROUGHT BACK AS TRIBUTE]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from the bas-relief in Layard.
+
+The triumphal _cortege_ which accompanied the monarch on his return
+after each campaign comprised not only prisoners and spoil of a
+useful sort, but curiosities from all the conquered districts, as,
+for instance, animals of unusual form or habits, rhinoceroses and
+crocodiles,* and if some monkey of a rare species had been taken in the
+sack of a town, it also would find a place in the procession, either
+held in a leash or perched on the shoulders of its keeper.
+
+     * A crocodile sent as a present by the King of Egypt is
+     mentioned in the _Inscription of the Broken Obelisk_. The
+     animal is called _namsukha_, which is the Egyptian _msuhu_
+     with the plural article _na._
+
+The campaigns of the monarch were thus almost always of a double nature,
+comprising not merely a conflict with men, but a continual pursuit of
+wild beasts. Tiglath-pileser, "in the service of Ninib, had killed four
+great specimens of the male urus in the desert of Mitanni, near to the
+town of Araziki, opposite to the countries of the Khati;* he killed them
+with his powerful bow, his dagger of iron, his pointed lance, and he
+brought back their skins and horns to his city of Assur. He secured ten
+strong male elephants, in the territory of Harran and upon the banks of
+the Khabur, and he took four of them alive: he brought back their skins
+and their tusks, together with the living elephants, to his city of
+Assur." He killed moreover, doubtless also in the service of Ninib, a
+hundred and twenty lions, which he attacked on foot, despatching eight
+hundred more with arrows from his chariot,** all within the short space
+of five years, and we may well ask what must have been the sum total,
+if the complete record for his whole reign were extant. We possess,
+unfortunately, no annals of the later years of this monarch; we have
+reason to believe that he undertook several fresh expeditions into
+Nairi,*** and a mutilated tablet records some details of troubles with
+Elam in the Xth year of his reign.
+
+     * The town of Araziki has been identified with the Eragiza
+     (Eraziga) of Ptolemy; the Eraziga of Ptolemy was on the
+     right bank of the Euphrates, while the text of Tiglath-
+     pileser appears to place Araziki on the left bank.
+
+     ** The account of the hunts in the _Annals_ is supplemented
+     by the information furnished in the first column of the
+     "Broken Obelisk." The monument is of the time of Assur-nazir-
+     pal, but the first column contains an abstract from an
+     account of an anonymous hunt, which a comparison of numbers
+     and names leads us to attribute to Tiglath-pileser I.; some
+     Assyri-ologists, however, attribute it to Assur-nazir-pal.
+
+     * The inscription of Sebbeneh-Su was erected at the time of
+     the third expedition into Nairi, and the _Annals_ give only
+     one; the other two expeditions must, therefore, be
+     subsequent to the Vth year of his reign.
+
+We gather that he attacked a whole series of strongholds, some of
+whose names have a Cossaean ring about them, such as Madkiu, Sudrun,
+Ubrukhundu, Sakama, Shuria, Khirishtu, and Andaria. His advance in this
+direction must have considerably provoked the Chaldaeans, and, indeed,
+it was not long before actual hostilities broke out between the two
+nations. The first engagement took place in the valley of the Lower Zab,
+in the province of Arzukhina, without any decisive result, but in the
+following year fortune favoured the Assyrians, for Dur-kurigalzu, both
+Sipparas, Babylon, and Upi opened their gates to them, while Akar-sallu,
+the Akhlame, and the whole of Sukhi as far as Eapiki tendered their
+submission to Tiglath-achuch-sawh-akhl-pileser.
+
+[Illustration: 239.jpg MERODACH-NADIN-AKHI]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from the heliogravure in Pr.
+     Lenormant. The original is in the British Museum. It is one
+     of the boundary stones which were set up in a corner of a
+     field to mark its legal limit.
+
+Merodach-nadin-akhi, who was at this time reigning in Chaldaea, was
+like his ancestor Nebuchadrezzar I., a brave and warlike sovereign: he
+appears at first to have given way under the blow thus dealt him, and to
+have acknowledged the suzerainty of his rival, who thereupon assumed the
+title of Lord of the four Houses of the World, and united under a single
+empire the valleys of the Tigris and Euphrates. But this state of things
+lasted for a few years only; Merodach-nadin-akhi once more took courage,
+and, supported by the Chaldaean nobility, succeeded in expelling the
+intruders from Sumir and Akkad. The Assyrians, however, did not allow
+themselves to be driven out without a struggle, but fortune turned
+against them; they were beaten, and the conqueror inflicted on the
+Assyrian gods the humiliation to which they had so often subjected those
+of other nations. He took the statues of Eamman and Shala from Ekallati,
+carried them to Babylon, and triumphantly set them up within the temple
+of Bel. There they remained in captivity for 418 years.* Tiglath-pileser
+did not long survive this disaster, for he died about the year 1100
+B.C.,** and two of his sons succeeded him on the throne. The elder,
+Assur-belkala,*** had neither sufficient energy nor resources to resume
+the offensive, and remained a passive spectator of the revolutions which
+distracted Babylon.
+
+     * We know this fact from the inscription of Bavian, in which
+     Sennacherib boasts of having brought back these statues to
+     Assyria after they had been 418 years in the possession of
+     the enemy. I have followed the commonly received opinion,
+     which places the defeat of Tiglath-pileser after the taking
+     of Babylon; others think that it preceded the decisive
+     victory of the Assyrians. It is improbable that, if the loss
+     of the statues preceded the decisive victory, the Assyrian
+     conquerors should have left their gods prisoners in a
+     Babylonian temple, and should not have brought them back
+     immediately to Ekallati.
+
+     ** The death of Tiglath-pileser must have followed quickly
+     on the victory of Babylon; the contents of the inscription
+     of Bavian permit us to fix the taking of Ekallati by the
+     Chaldaeans about the year 1108-1106 B.C. We shall not be far
+     wrong in supposing Tiglath-pileser to have reigned six or
+     eight years after his defeat.
+
+     *** I followed the usually received classification. It is,
+     however, possible that we must reverse the order of the
+     sovereigns.
+
+Merodach-nadin-akhi had been followed by his son Merodach-shapik-zirim,*
+but this prince was soon dethroned by the people, and Bamman-abaliddin,
+a man of base extraction, seized the crown.
+
+     * The name of the Babylonian king has been variously read
+     Merodach-shapik-zirat, Merodach-shapik-kullat, Merodach-
+     shapik-zirmati and Merodach-shapik-zirim.
+
+Assur-belkala not only extended to this usurper the friendly relations
+he had kept up with the legitimate sovereign, but he asked for the hand
+of his daughter in marriage, and the rich dowry which she brought her
+husband no doubt contributed to the continuation of his pacific policy.
+He appears also to have kept possession of all the parts of Mesopotamia
+and Kammukh conquered by his father, and it is possible that he may have
+penetrated beyond the Euphrates. His brother, Samsi-ramman III.,
+does not appear to have left any more definite mark upon history than
+Assur-belkala; he decorated the temples built by his predecessors,
+but beyond this we have no certain record of his achievements. We know
+nothing of the kings who followed him, their names even having been
+lost, but about a century and a half after Tiglath-pileser, a certain
+Assurirba seems to have crossed Northern Syria, and following in the
+footsteps of his great ancestor, to have penetrated as far as the
+Mediterranean: on the rocks of Mount Amanus, facing the sea, he left
+a triumphal inscription in which he set forth the mighty deeds he
+had accomplished. This is merely a gleam out of the murky night which
+envelops his history, and the testimony of one of his descendants
+informs us that his good fortune soon forsook him: the Aramaeans wrested
+from him the fortresses of Pitru and Mutkinu, which commanded both banks
+of the Euphrates near Carchemish. Nor did the retrograde movement slaken
+after his time: Assyria slowly wasted away down to the end of the Xth
+century, and but for the simultaneous decadence of the Chaldaeans, its
+downfall would have been complete. But neither Ramman-abaliddin nor his
+successor was able to take advantage of its weakness; discord and
+want of energy soon brought about their own ruin. The dynasty of
+Pashe disappeared towards the middle of the Xth century, and a family
+belonging to the "Countries of the Sea" took its place: it had continued
+for about one hundred and thirty-two years, and had produced eleven
+kings.*
+
+     * It is no easy matter to draw up an exact list of this
+     dynasty, and Hilprecht's attempt to do so contains more than
+     one doubtful name. The following list is very imperfect and
+     doubtful, but the best that our present knowledge enables us
+     to put forward.
+
+[Illustration: 242.jpg TABLE OF KINGS]
+
+What were the causes of this depression, from which Babylon suffered at
+almost regular intervals, as though stricken with some periodic malady?
+The main reason soon becomes apparent if we consider the nature of
+the country and the material conditions of its existence. Chaldaea was
+neither extensive enough nor sufficiently populous to afford a solid
+basis for the ambition of her princes. Since nearly every man capable
+of bearing arms was enrolled in the army, the Chaktean kings had no
+difficulty in raising, at a moment's notice, a force which could be
+employed to repel an invasion, or make a sudden attack on some distant
+territory; it was in schemes which required prolonged and sustained
+effort that they felt the drawbacks of their position. In that age of
+hand-to-hand combats, the mortality in battle was very high, forced
+marches through forests and across mountains entailed a heavy loss of
+men, and three or four consecutive campaigns against a stubborn foe soon
+reduced an army to a condition of dangerous weakness. Recruits might be
+obtained to fill the earlier vacancies in the ranks, but they soon grew
+fewer and fewer if time was not given for recovery after the opening
+victories in the struggle, and the supply eventually ceased if
+operations were carried on beyond a certain period.
+
+The total duration of the dynasty was, according to the Royal Canon, 72
+years 6 months. Peiser has shown that this is a mistake, and he proposes
+to correct it to 132 years 6 months, and this is accepted by most
+Assyri-ologists.
+
+A reign which began brilliantly often came to an impotent conclusion,
+owing to the king having failed to economise his reserves; and the
+generations which followed, compelled to adopt a strictly defensive
+attitude, vegetated in a sort of anaemic condition, until the birth-rate
+had brought the proportion of males up to a figure sufficiently high to
+provide the material for a fresh army. When Nebuchadrezzar made war upon
+Assurishishi, he was still weak from the losses he had incurred during
+the campaign against Elam, and could not conduct his attack with the
+same vigour as had gained him victory on the banks of the Ulai; in
+the first year he only secured a few indecisive advantages, and in the
+second he succumbed. Merodach-nadin-akhi was suffering from the reverses
+sustained by his predecessors when Tiglath-pileser provoked him to war,
+and though he succeeded in giving a good account of an adversary who was
+himself exhausted by dearly bought successes, he left to his descendants
+a kingdom which had been drained of its last drop of blood. The same
+reason which explains the decadence of Babylon shows us the cause of
+the periodic eclipses undergone by Assyria after each outburst of her
+warlike spirit. She, too, had to pay the penalty of an ambition
+which was out of all proportion to her resources. The mighty deeds of
+Shalmaneser and Tukulti-ninip were, as a natural consequence,
+followed by a state of complete prostration under Tukultiassurbel
+and Assurnirari: the country was now forced to pay for the glories of
+Assurishishi and of Tiglath-pileser by falling into an inglorious state
+of languor and depression. Its kings, conscious that their rule must be
+necessarily precarious as long as they did not possess a larger stock of
+recruits to fall back on, set their wits to work to provide by various
+methods a more adequate reserve. While on one hand they installed native
+Assyrians in the more suitable towns of conquered countries, on the
+other they imported whole hordes of alien prisoners chosen for their
+strength and courage, and settled them down in districts by the banks of
+the Tigris and the Zab. We do not know what Eammanirani and Shalmaneser
+may have done in this way, but Tiglath-pileser undoubtedly introduced
+thousands of the Mushku, the Urumseans, the people of Kummukh and
+Nairi, and his example was followed by all those of his successors
+whose history has come down to us. One might have expected that such an
+invasion of foreigners, still smarting under the sense of defeat, might
+have brought with it an element of discontent or rebellion; far from
+it, they accepted their exile as a judgment of the gods, which the
+gods alone had a right to reverse, and did their best to mitigate the
+hardness of their lot by rendering unhesitating obedience to their
+masters. Their grandchildren, born in the midst of Assyrians, became
+Assyrians themselves, and if they did not entirely divest themselves of
+every trace of their origin, at any rate became so closely identified
+with the country of their adoption, that it was difficult to distinguish
+them from the native race. The Assyrians who were sent out to colonise
+recently acquired provinces were at times exposed to serious risks. Now
+and then, instead of absorbing the natives among whom they lived, they
+were absorbed by them, which meant a loss of so much fighting strength
+to the mother country; even under the most favourable conditions
+a considerable time must have passed before they could succeed in
+assimilating to themselves the races amongst whom they lived. At
+last, however, a day would dawn when the process of incorporation was
+accomplished, and Assyria, having increased her area and resources
+twofold, found herself ready to endure to the end the strain of
+conquest. In the interval, she suffered from a scarcity of fighting men,
+due to the losses incurred in her victories, and must have congratulated
+herself that her traditional foe was not in a position to take advantage
+of this fact.
+
+The first wave of the Assyrian invasion had barely touched Syria; it
+had swept hurriedly over the regions in the north, and then flowed
+southwards to return no more, so that the northern races were able to
+resume the wonted tenor of their lives. For centuries after this
+their condition underwent no change; there was the same repetition of
+dissension and intrigue, the same endless succession of alliances and
+battles without any signal advantage on either side. The Hittites still
+held Northern Syria: Carchemish was their capital, and more than one
+town in its vicinity preserved the tradition of their dress, their
+language, their arts, and their culture in full vigour. The Greek
+legends tell us vaguely of some sort of Cilician empire which is said
+to have brought the eastern and central provinces of Asia Minor into
+subjection about ten centuries before our era.*
+
+     * Solinus, relying on the indirect evidence of Hecatseus of
+     Miletus, tells us that Cilicia extended not only to the
+     countries afterwards known as Cataonia, Commagene, and
+     Syria, but also included Lydia, Media, Armenia, Pamphylia,
+     and Cappadocia; the conquests of the Assyrian kings must
+     have greatly reduced its area. I am of opinion that the
+     tradition preserved by  Hecatous referred both to the
+     kingdom of Sapalulu and to that of the monarchs of this
+     second epoch.
+
+Is there any serious foundation for such a belief, and must we assume
+that there existed at this time and in this part of the world a kingdom
+similar to that of Sapalulu? Assyria was recruiting its forces, Chaldaea
+was kept inactive by its helplessness, Egypt slumbered by the banks of
+its river, there was no actor of the first rank to fill the stage; now
+was the opportunity for a second-rate performer to come on the scene and
+play such a part as his abilities permitted. The Cilician conquest, if
+this be indeed the date at which it took place, had the boards to itself
+for a hundred years after the defeat of Assurirba. The time was too
+short to admit of its striking deep root in the country. Its leaders and
+men were, moreover, closely related to the Syrian Hittites; the language
+they spoke was, if not precisely the Hittite, at any rate a dialect of
+it; their customs were similar, if, perhaps, somewhat less refined, as
+is often the case with mountain races, when compared with the peoples of
+the plain. We are tempted to conclude that some of the monuments found
+south of the Taurus were their handiwork, or, at any rate, date from
+their time. For instance, the ruined palace at Sinjirli, the lower
+portions of which are ornamented with pictures similar to those
+at Pteria, representing processions of animals, some real, others
+fantastic, men armed with lances or bending the bow, and processions
+of priests or officials. Then there is the great lion at Marash, which
+stands erect, with menacing head, its snarling lips exposing the teeth;
+its body is seamed with the long lines of an inscription in the Asiatic
+character, in imitation of those with which the bulls in the Assyrian
+palaces are covered. These Cilicians gave an impulse to the civilization
+of the Khati which they sorely needed, for the Semitic races, whom they
+had kept in subjection for centuries, now pressed them hard on all the
+territory over which they had formerly reigned, and were striving to
+drive them back into the hills.
+
+[Illustration: 248.jpg LION AT MAKASH]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph of the cast shown at the
+     Paris Exhibition of 1889.
+
+The Aramaeans in particular gave them a great deal of trouble. The states
+on the banks of the Euphrates had found them awkward neighbours; was
+this the moment chosen by the Pukudu, the Eutu, the Gambulu, and a dozen
+other Aramaean tribes, for a stealthy march across the frontier of Elam,
+between Durilu and the coast? The tribes from which, soon after, the
+Kaldi nation was formed, were marauding round Eridu, Uru, and Larsa, and
+may have already begun to lay the foundations of their supremacy over
+Babylon: it is, indeed, an open question whether those princes of the
+Countries of the Sea who succeeded the Pashe dynasty did not come from
+the stock of the Kaldi Aramaeans. While they were thus consolidating on
+the south-east, the bulk of the nation continued to ascend northwards,
+and rejoined its outposts in the central region of the Euphrates, which
+extends from the Tigris to the Khabur, from the Khabur to the Balikh and
+the Aprie. They had already come into frequent conflict with most of the
+victorious Assyrian kings, from Eammanirari down to Tiglath-pileser; the
+weakness of Assyria and Chaldaea gave them their opportunity, and they
+took full advantage of it. They soon became masters of the whole of
+Mesopotamia; a part of the table-land extending from Carchemish to Mount
+Amanus fell into their hands, their activity was still greater in the
+basin of the Orontes, and their advanced guard, coming into collision
+with the Amorites near the sources of the Litany, began gradually to
+drive farther and farther southwards all that remained of the races
+which had shown so bold a front to the Egyptian troops. Here was an
+almost entirely new element, gradually eliminating from the scene of the
+struggle other elements which had grown old through centuries of war,
+and while this transformation was taking place in Northern and Central,
+a similar revolution was effecting a no less surprising metamorphosis in
+Southern Syria. There, too, newer races had gradually come to displace
+the nations over which the dynasties of Thutmosis and Ramses had once
+held sway. The Hebrews on the east, the Philistines and their allies on
+the south-west, were about to undertake the conquest of the Kharu and
+its cities. As yet their strength was inadequate, their temperament
+undecided, their system of government imperfect; but they brought with
+them the quality of youth, and energies which, rightly guided, would
+assure the nation which first found out how to take advantage of
+them, supremacy over all its rivals, and the strength necessary for
+consolidating the whole country into a single kingdom.
+
+[Illustration: 250.jpg TAILPIECE]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III--THE HEBREWS AND THE PHILISTINES--DAMASCUS
+
+
+_THE ISRAELITES IN THE LAND OF CANAAN: THE JUDGES--THE PHILISTINES AND
+THE HEBREW KINGDOM--SAUL, DAVID, SOLOMON, THE DEFECTION OF THE TEN
+TRIBES--THE XXIst EGYPTIAN DYNASTY--SHESHONQ OR SHISHAK DAMASCUS._
+
+_The Hebrews in the desert: their families, clans, and tribes--The
+Amorites and the Hebrews on the left bank of the Jordan--The conquest
+of Canaan and the native reaction against the Hebrews--The judges, Ehud,
+Deborah, Jerubbaal or Gideon and the Manassite supremacy; Abimelech,
+Jephihdh._
+
+_The Philistines, their political organisation, their army and
+fleet--Judah, Dan, and the story of Samson--Benjamin on the Philistine
+frontier--Eli and the ark of the covenant--The Philistine dominion over
+Israel; Samuel, Saul, the Benjamite monarchy--David, his retreat to the
+desert of Judah and his sojourn at Zilclag--The battle of Gilboa and the
+death of Saul--The struggle between Ish-bosheth and David--David sole
+king, and the final defeat of the Philistines--Jerusalem becomes
+the capital; the removal of the ark--Wars with the peoples of the
+East--Absalom's rebellion; the coronation of Solomon._
+
+_Solomon's government and his buildings--Phoenician colonisation in
+Spain: Hiram I. and the enlargement of Tyre--The voyages to Ophir and
+Tarshish--The palace at Jerusalem, the temple and its dedication: the
+priesthood and prophets--The death of Solomon; the schism of the ten
+tribes and the division of the Hebrew kingdom._
+
+_The XXIst Egyptian dynasty: the Theban high priests and the Tanite
+Pharaohs--The Libyan mercenaries and their predominance in the state:
+the origin of the XXIInd (Bubastite) dynasty--Sheshonq I. as king
+and his son Auputi as high priest of Amon; the hiding-place at Deir
+el-Bahari--Sheshonq's expedition against Jerusalem._
+
+_The two Hebrew "kingdoms"; the fidelity of Judah to the descendants
+of Solomon, and the repeated changes of dynasty in Israel--Asa and
+Baasha--The kingdom of Damascus and its origin--Bezon, Tabrimmon,
+Benhadad I.--Omri and the foundation of Samaria: Ahab and the Tyrian
+alliance--The successors of Hiram I. at Tyre: Ithobaal I.--The prophets,
+their struggle against Phonician idolatry, the story of Elijah--The wars
+between Israel and Damascus up to the time of the Assyrian invasion._
+
+
+[Illustration: 253.jpg PAGE IMAGE]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III--THE HEBREWS AND THE PHILISTINES--DAMASCUS
+
+
+_The Israelites in the land of Canaan: the judges--The Philistines
+and the Hebrew kingdom--Saul, David, Solomon, the defection of the ten
+tribes--the XXIst Egyptian dynasty--Sheshonq--Damascus._
+
+
+After reaching Kadesh-barnea, the Israelites in their wanderings had
+come into contact with various Bedawin tribes--Kenites, Jerahmelites,
+Edomites, and Midianites, with whom they had in turn fought or allied
+themselves, according to the exigencies of their pastoral life.
+Continual skirmishes had taught them the art of war, their numbers had
+rapidly increased, and with this increase came a consciousness of their
+own strength, so that, after a lapse of two or three generations, they
+may be said to have constituted a considerable nation. Its component
+elements were not, however, firmly welded together; they consisted of
+an indefinite number of clans, which were again subdivided into several
+families. Each of these families had its chief or "ruler," to whom it
+rendered absolute obedience, while the united chiefs formed an assembly
+of elders who administered justice when required, and settled any
+differences which arose among their respective followers. The clans in
+their turn were grouped into tribes,* according to certain affinities
+which they mutually recognised, or which may have been fostered by daily
+intercourse on a common soil, but the ties which bound them together at
+this period were of the most slender character. It needed some special
+event, such as a projected migration in search of fresh pasturage, or
+an expedition against a turbulent neighbour, or a threatened invasion
+by some stranger, to rouse the whole tribe to corporate action; at
+such times they would elect a "nasi," or ruler, the duration of whose
+functions ceased with the emergency which had called him into office.**
+
+     * The tribe was designated by two words signifying "staff" or
+     "branch."
+
+     ** The word _nasi,_ first applied to the chiefs of the
+     tribes (_Exod._ xxxiv. 31; _Lev_. iv. 22; _Numb_. ii. 3),
+     became, after the captivity, the title of the chiefs of
+     Israel, who could not be called _kings_ owing to the foreign
+     suzerainty (_Esdras_ i. 8).
+
+Both clans and tribes were designated by the name of some ancestor from
+whom they claimed to be descended, and who appears in some cases to
+have been a god for whom they had a special devotion; some writers have
+believed that this was also the origin of the names given to several of
+the tribes, such as Gad, "Good Fortune," or of the totems of the hyena
+and the dog, in Arabic and Hebrew, "Simeon" and "Caleb."* Gad, Simeon,
+and Caleb were severally the ancestors of the families who ranged
+themselves under their respective names, and the eponymous heroes of
+all the tribes were held to have been brethren, sons of one father, and
+under the protection of one God. He was known as the Jahveh with whom
+Abraham of old had made a solemn covenant; His dwelling-place was Mount
+Sinai or Mount Seir, and He revealed Himself in the storm;** His voice
+was as the thunder "which shaketh the wilderness," His breath was as "a
+consuming fire," and He was decked with light "as with a garment." When
+His anger was aroused, He withheld the dew and rain from watering the
+earth; but when His wrath was appeased, the heavens again poured their
+fruitful showers upon the fields.***
+
+     * Simeon is derived by some from a word which at times
+     denotes a hyena, at others a cross between a dog and a
+     hyena, according to Arab lexicography. With regard to Caleb,
+     Renan prefers a different interpretation; it is supposed to
+     be a shortened form of Kalbel, and "Dog of El" is a strong
+     expression to denote the devotion of a tribe to its patron
+     god.
+
+     ** Cf. the graphic description of the signs which
+     accompanied the manifestations of Jahveh in the _Song of
+     Deborah (Judges_ v. 4, 5), and also in 1 _Kings_ xix. 11-13.
+
+     *** See 1 _Kings_ xvii., xviii., where the conflict between
+     Elijah and the prophets of Baal for the obtaining of rain is
+     described.
+
+He is described as being a "jealous God," brooking no rival, and
+"visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third
+and fourth generation." We hear of His having been adored under the
+figure of a "calf,"* and of His Spirit inspiring His prophets, as well
+as of the anointed stones which were dedicated in His honour. The common
+ancestor of the nation was acknowledged to have been Jacob, who, by his
+wrestling with God, had obtained the name of Israel; the people were
+divided theoretically into as many tribes as he had sons, but the number
+twelve to which they were limited does not entirely correspond with all
+that we know up to the present time of these "children of Israel." Some
+of the tribes appear never to have had any political existence, as for
+example that of Levi,** or they were merged at an early date into some
+fellow-tribe, as in the case of Reuben with Gad;*** others, such as
+Ephraim, Manasseh, Benjamin, and Judah, apparently did not attain their
+normal development until a much later date.
+
+     * The most common of these animal forms was that of a calf
+     or bull (Exod. xxxii.; Deut. ix. 21; and in the kingly
+     period, 1 Kings xii. 28-30; 2 Kings x. 29); we are not told
+     the form of the image of Micah the Ephraimite (Judges xviii.
+     14, 17, 18, 20, 30, 31).
+
+     ** Levi appears to have suffered dispersion after the events
+     of which there are two separate accounts combined in Gen.
+     xxxiv. In conjunction with Simeon, he appears to have
+     revenged the violation of his sister Dinah by a massacre of
+     the Shechemites, and the dispersion alluded to in Jacob's
+     blessing (Gen. xlix. 5-7) is mentioned as consequent on this
+     act of barbarism.
+
+     *** In the IXth century Mesha of Moab does not mention the
+     Reubenites, and speaks of the Gadites only as inhabiting the
+     territory formerly occupied by them. Tradition attributed
+     the misfortunes of the tribe to the crime of its chief in
+     his seduction of Bilhah, his father's concubine (Gen. xlix.
+     3, 4; cf. xxxv. 22)
+
+The Jewish chroniclers attempted by various combinations to prove that
+the sacred number of tribes was the correct one. At times they included
+Levi in the list, in which case Joseph was reckoned as one;* while on
+other occasions Levi or Simeon was omitted, when for Joseph would be
+substituted his two sons Ephraim and Manasseh.** In addition to this,
+the tribes were very unequal in size: Ephraim, Gad, and Manasseh
+comprised many powerful and wealthy families; Dan, on the contrary,
+contained so few, that it was sometimes reckoned as a mere clan.
+
+     * As, for instance, in Jacob's blessing (Gen. xlix. 5-7) and
+     in the enumeration of the patriarch's sons at the time of
+     his journey to Egypt (Gen. xlvi. 9-26).
+
+     ** Numb. i. 20, et seq., where the descendants of Levi are
+     not included among the twelve, and Deut. xxxiii. 6-25, where
+     Simeon is omitted from among the tribes blessed by Moses
+     before his death.
+
+The tribal organisation had not reached its full development at the
+time of the sojourn in the desert. The tribes of Joseph and Judah, who
+subsequently played such important parts, were at that period not held
+in any particular estimation; Reuben, on the other hand, exercised a
+sort of right of priority over the rest.*
+
+     * This conclusion is drawn from the position of eldest son
+     given to him in all the genealogies enumerating the children
+     of Jacob. Stade, on the contrary, is inclined to believe
+     that this place of honour was granted to him on account of
+     the smallness of his family, to prevent any jealousy arising
+     between the more powerful tribes, such as Ephraim and Judah
+     (_Ges. des Vollces Isr._, vol. i. pp. 151, 152).
+
+The territory which they occupied soon became insufficient to support
+their numbers, and they sought to exchange it for a wider area, such as
+was offered by the neighbouring provinces of Southern Syria. Pharaoh
+at this time exercised no authority over this region, and they were,
+therefore, no longer in fear of opposition from his troops; the latter
+had been recalled to Egypt, and it is doubtful even whether he retained
+possession of the Shephelah by means of his Zakkala and Philistine
+colonies; the Hebrews, at any rate, had nothing to fear from him so long
+as they respected Gaza and Ascalon. They began by attempting to possess
+themselves of the provinces around Hebron, in the direction of the Dead
+Sea, and we read that, before entering them, they sent out spies to
+reconnoitre and report on the country.* Its population had undergone
+considerable modifications since the Israelites had quitted Goshen.
+The Amorites, who had seriously suffered from the incursions of Asiatic
+hordes, and had been constantly harassed by the attacks of the Aramaeans,
+had abandoned the positions they had formerly occupied on the banks
+of the Orontes and the Litany, and had moved southwards, driving the
+Canaanites before them; their advance was accelerated as the resistance
+opposed to their hordes became lessened under the successors of Ramses
+III., until at length all opposition was withdrawn. They had possessed
+themselves of the regions about the Lake of Genesareth, the mountain
+district to the south of Tabor, the middle valley of the Jordan, and,
+pressing towards the territory east of that river, had attacked the
+cities scattered over the undulating table-land. This district had
+not been often subjected to incursions of Egyptian troops, and yet its
+inhabitants had been more impressed by Egyptian influence than many
+others.
+
+[Illustration: 259.jpg THE AMORITE ASTARTE]
+
+     Drawn by Paucher-Gudin, from the squeezes and sketches
+     published in the _Zeitschrift ties Palcistina-Vereins_.
+
+Whereas, in the north and west, cuneiform writing was almost entirely
+used, attempts had been made here to adapt the hieroglyphs to the native
+language.
+
+The only one of their monuments which has been preserved is a rudely
+carved bas-relief in black basalt, representing a two-horned Astarte,
+before whom stands a king in adoration; the sovereign is Ramses II., and
+the inscriptions accompanying the figures contain a religious formula
+together with a name borrowed from one of the local dialects.*
+
+     *This is the "Stone of Job" discovered by Strahmacher. The
+     inscription appears to give the name of a goddess, Agana-
+     Zaphon, the second part of which recalls the name of Baal-
+     Zephon.
+
+The Amorites were everywhere victorious, but our information is confined
+to this bare fact; soon after their victory, however, we find the
+territory they had invaded divided into two kingdoms: in the north that
+of Bashan, which comprised, besides the Hauran, the plain watered by the
+Yarrnuk; and to the south that of Heshbon, containing the district lying
+around the Arnon, and the Jabbok to the east of the Dead Sea.* They seem
+to have made the same rapid progress in the country between the Jordan
+and the Mediterranean as elsewhere. They had subdued some of the small
+Canaanite states, entered into friendly relation with others, and
+penetrated gradually as far south as the borders of Sinai, while we find
+them establishing petty kings among the hill-country of Shechem around
+Hebron, on the confines of the Negeb, and the Shephelah.** When the
+Hebrew tribes ventured to push forward in a direct line northwards, they
+came into collision with the advance posts of the Amorite population,
+and suffered a severe defeat under the walls of Hormah.*** The check
+thus received, however, did not discourage them. As a direct course
+was closed to them, they turned to the right, and followed, first the
+southern and then the eastern shores of the Red Sea, till they reached
+the frontier of Gilead.****
+
+     * The extension of the Amorite power in this direction is
+     proved by the facts relating to the kingdoms of Sihon and Og
+     Gent. i. 4, ii. 24-37, iii. 1-1.7.
+
+     ** For the Amorite occupation of the Negeb and the hill-
+     country of Judah, cf. Numb. xiii. 29; Bent. i. 7, 19-46;
+     Josh. x. 5, 6, 12, xi. 3; for their presence in the
+     Shephelah, cf. Judges i. 34-36.
+
+     *** See the long account in Numb, xiii., xiv., which
+     terminates with the mention of the defeat of the Israelites
+     at Hormah; and cf. Bent. i. 19-46.
+
+     **** The itinerary given in Numb. xx. 22-29, xxxi., xxxiii.
+     37-49, and repeated in Bent, ii., brings the Israelites as
+     far as Ezion-geber, in such a manner as to avoid the
+     Midianites and the Moabites. The friendly welcome accorded
+     to them in the regions situated to the east of the Dead Sea,
+     has been accounted for either by an alliance made with Moab
+     and Ammon against their common enemy, the Amorites, or by
+     the fact that Ammon and Moab did not as yet occupy those
+     regions; the inhabitants in that case would have been
+     Edomites and Midianites, who were in continual warfare with
+     each other.
+
+There again they were confronted by the Amorites, but in lesser
+numbers, and not so securely entrenched within their fortresses as their
+fellow-countrymen in the Negeb, so that the Israelites were able to
+overthrow the kingdoms of Heshbon and Bashan.*
+
+     * War against Sihon, King of Heshbon (Numb. xxi. 21-31;
+     Beut. ii. 26-37), and against Og, King of Bashan (Numb. xxi.
+     32-35; Beut. iii. 1-13).
+
+[Illustration: 261.jpg THE VALLEY OF THE JABBOK, NEAR TO ITS CONFLUENCE
+WITH THE JORDAN]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from photograph No. 336 of the _Palestine
+     Exploration Fund._
+
+Gad received as its inheritance nearly the whole of the territory lying
+between the Jabbok and the Yarmuk, in the neighbourhood of the ancient
+native sanctuaries of Penuel, Mahanaim, and Succoth, associated with
+the memory of Jacob.* Reuben settled in the vicinity, and both tribes
+remained there isolated from the rest. From this time forward they took
+but a slight interest in the affairs of their brethren: when the latter
+demanded their succour, "Gilead abode beyond Jordan," and "by the
+watercourses of Reuben there were great resolves at heart," but without
+any consequent action.** It was not merely due to indifference on their
+part; their resources were fully taxed in defending themselves against
+the Aramaeans and Bedawins, and from the attacks of Moab and Ammon.
+Gad, continually threatened, struggled for centuries without being
+discouraged, but Reuben lost heart,*** and soon declined in power, till
+at length he became merely a name in the memory of his brethren.
+
+     * Gad did not possess the districts between the Jabbok and
+     the Arnon till the time of the early kings, and retained
+     them only till about the reign of Jehu, as we gather from
+     the inscription of Mesa.
+
+     ** These are the very expressions used by the author of the
+     _Song of Deborah_ in Judges v. 16, 17.
+
+     *** The recollection of these raids by Reuben against the
+     Beduin of the Syrian desert is traceable in 1 Citron, v. 10,
+     18-22.
+
+Two tribes having been thus provided for, the bulk of the Israelites
+sought to cross the Jordan without further delay, and establish
+themselves as best they might in the very heart of the Canaanites. The
+sacred writings speak of their taking possession of the country by
+a methodic campaign, undertaken by command of and under the visible
+protection of Jahveh* Moses had led them from Egypt to Kadesh, and from
+Kadesh to the land of Gilead; he had seen the promised land from the
+summit of Mount Nebo, but he had not entered it, and after his death,
+Joshua, son of Nun, became their leader, brought them across Jordan
+dryshod, not far from its mouth, and laid siege to Jericho.
+
+     * The history of the conquest is to be found in the _Book of
+     Joshua._
+
+The walls of the city fell of themselves at the blowing of the brazen
+trumpets,* and its capture entailed that of three neighbouring towns,
+Ai, Bethel, and Shechem. Shechem served as a rallying-place for the
+conquerors; Joshua took up his residence there, and built on the summit
+of Mount Ebal an altar of stone, on which he engraved the principal
+tenets of the divine Law.**
+
+     * Josh, i.-vi.
+
+     ** Josh, vii., viii. Mount Ebal is the present Gebel
+     Sulemiyeh.
+
+[Illustration: 263.jpg ONE OF THE MOUNDS OF AIN ES-SULTAN, THE ANCIENT
+JERICHO]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph brought back by Lortet.
+
+The sudden intrusion of a new element naturally alarmed the worshippers
+of the surrounding local deities; they at once put a truce to their
+petty discords, and united in arms against the strangers. At the
+instigation of Adoni-zedeck, King of Jerusalem, the Canaanites collected
+their forces in the south; but they were routed not far from Gibeon, and
+their chiefs killed or mutilated.* The Amorites in the north, who had
+assembled round Jabin, King of Hazor, met with no better success; they
+were defeated at the waters of Merom, Hazor was burnt, and Galilee
+delivered to fire and sword.**
+
+     * Josh. x. The same war is given rather differently in
+     Judges i. 1-9, where the king is called Adoni-bezek.
+
+     ** Josh. xi. As another Jabin appears in the history of
+     Deborah, it has
+
+[Illustration: 264.jpg THE JORDAN IN THE NEIGHBOURHOOD OF JERICHO]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph in Lortet.
+
+The country having been thus to a certain extent cleared, Joshua set
+about dividing the spoil, and assigned to each tribe his allotted
+portion of territory.* Such, in its main outlines, is the account given
+by the Hebrew chroniclers; but, if closely examined, it would appear
+that the Israelites did not act throughout with that unity of purpose
+and energy which they [the Hebrew chroniclers] were pleased to imagine.
+They did not gain possession of the land all at once, but established
+themselves in it gradually by detachments, some settling at the fords
+of Jericho,** others more to the north, and in the central valley of the
+Jordan as far up as She-chem.***
+
+     * The lot given to each tribe is described in Josh, xiii.-
+     xxi. It has been maintained by some critics that there is a
+     double role assigned to one and the same person, only that
+     some maintain that the Jabin of Josh. xi. has been
+     transferred to the time of the Judges, while others make out
+     that the Jabin of Deborah was carried back to the time of
+     the conquest.
+
+     ** Renan thinks that the principal crossing must have taken
+     place opposite Jericho, as is apparent from the account in
+     Josh, ii., iii.
+
+     *** Carl Niebuhr believes that he has discovered the exact
+     spot at the ford of Admah, near Succoth.
+
+[Illustration: 265.jpg ONE OF THE WELLS OF BEERSHEBA]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph in Lortet.
+
+The latter at once came into contact with a population having a
+higher civilization than themselves, and well equipped for a vigorous
+resistance; the walled towns which had defied the veterans of the
+Pharaohs had not much to fear from the bands of undisciplined Israelites
+wandering in their neighbourhood. Properly speaking, there were no
+pitched battles between them, but rather a succession of raids or
+skirmishes, in which several citadels would successively fall into the
+hands of the invaders. Many of these strongholds, harassed by repeated
+attacks, would prefer to come to terms with the enemy, and would cede or
+sell them some portion of their territory; others would open their gates
+freely to the strangers, and their inhabitants would ally themselves by
+intermarriage with the Hebrews. Judah and the remaining descendants of
+Simeon and Levi established themselves in the south; Levi comprised but
+a small number of families, and made no important settlements; whereas
+Judah took possession of nearly the whole of the mountain district
+separating the Shephelah from the western shores of the Dead Sea, while
+Simeon made its abode close by on the borders of the desert around the
+wells of Beersheba.*
+
+     * Wellhausen has remarked that the lot of Levi must not be
+     separated from that of Simeon, and, as the remnant of Simeon
+     allied themselves with Judah, that of Levi also must have
+     shared the patrimony of Judah.
+
+The descendants of Rachel and her handmaid received as their inheritance
+the regions situated more to the centre of the country, the house of
+Joseph taking the best domains for its branches of Ephraim and Manasseh.
+Ephraim received some of the old Canaanite sanctuaries, such as Ramah,
+Bethel, and Shiloh, and it was at the latter spot that they deposited
+the ark of the covenant. Manasseh settled to the north of Ephraim, in
+the hills and valleys of the Carmel group, and to Benjamin were assigned
+the heights which overlook the plain of Jericho. Four of the less
+important tribes, Issachar, Asher, Naphtali, and Zebulon, ventured
+as far north as the borders of Tyre and Sidon, behind the Phoenician
+littoral, but were prevented by the Canaanites and Amorites from
+spreading over the plain, and had to confine themselves to the
+mountains. All the fortresses commanding the passes of Tabor and
+Carmel, Megiddo, Taanach, Ibleam, Jezreel, Endor, and Bethshan remained
+inviolate, and formed as it were an impassable barrier-line between the
+Hebrews of Galilee and their brethren of Ephraim. The Danites were long
+before they found a resting-place; they attempted to insert themselves
+to the north of Judah, between Ajalon and Joppa, but were so harassed
+by the Amorites, that they had to content themselves with the precarious
+tenure of a few towns such as Zora, Shaalbin, and Eshdol. The foreign
+peoples of the Shephelah and the Canaanite cities almost all preserved
+their autonomy; the Israelites had no chance against them wherever they
+had sufficient space to put into the field large bodies of infantry or
+to use their iron-bound chariots. Finding it therefore impossible to
+overcome them, the tribes were forced to remain cut off from each other
+in three isolated groups of unequal extent which they were powerless
+to connect: in the centre were Joseph, Benjamin, and Dan; in the south,
+Judah, Levi, and Simeon; while Issachar, Asher, Naphtali, and Zebulon
+lay to the north.
+
+The period following the occupation of Canaan constituted the heroic age
+of the Hebrews. The sacred writings agree in showing that the ties which
+bound the twelve tribes together were speedily dissolved, while their
+fidelity and obedience to God were relaxed with the growth of the young
+generations to whom Moses or Joshua were merely names. The conquerors
+"dwelt among the Canaanites: the Hittite, and the Amorite, and the
+Perizzite, and the Hivite, and the Jebusite: and they took their
+daughters to be their wives, and gave their own daughters to their sons,
+and served their gods. And the children of Israel did that which was
+evil in the sight of the Lord their God, and served the Baalim and the
+Asheroth."*
+
+[Illustration: 268.jpg MAP OF PALESTINE IN TIME OF THE JUDGES]
+
+When they had once abandoned their ancient faith, political unity was
+not long preserved. War broke out between one tribe and another; the
+stronger allowed the weaker to be oppressed by the heathen, and were
+themselves often powerless to retain their independence. In spite of the
+thousands of men among them, all able to bear arms, they fell an easy
+prey to the first comer; the Amorites, the Ammonites, the Moabites, and
+the Philistines, all oppressed them in turn, and repaid with usury the
+ills which Joshua had inflicted on the Canaanites. "Whithersoever they
+went out, the hand of the Lord was against them for evil, as the Lord
+had spoken, and as the Lord had sworn unto them: and they were sore
+distressed. And the Lord raised up judges, which saved them out of the
+hand of those that spoiled them. And yet they hearkened not unto their
+judges, for they went a-whoring after other gods, and bowed themselves
+down unto them: they turned aside quickly out of the way wherein their
+fathers walked obeying the commandments of the Lord; but they did not
+so. And when the Lord raised them up judges, then the Lord was with the
+judge, and saved them out of the hand of their enemies all the days of
+the judge: for it repented the Lord because of their groaning by reason
+of them that oppressed them and vexed them. But it came to pass, when
+the judge was dead, that they turned back, and dealt more corruptly than
+their fathers, in following other gods to serve them, and to bow down
+unto them; they ceased not from their doings, nor from their stubborn
+way."* The history of this period lacks the unity and precision with
+which we are at first tempted to credit it.
+
+     * Judges ii. 15-19.
+
+The Israelites, when transplanted into the promised land, did not
+immediately lose the nomadic habits they had acquired in the desert.
+They retained the customs and prejudices they had inherited from their
+fathers, and for many years treated the peasantry, whose fields they
+had devastated, with the same disdain that the Bedawin of our own day,
+living in the saddle, lance in hand, shows towards the fellahin who till
+the soil and bend patiently over the plough. The clans, as of old,
+were impatient of all regular authority; each tribe tended towards an
+isolated autonomy, a state of affairs which merited reprisals from the
+natives and encouraged hatred of the intruders, and it was only when
+the Canaanite oppression became unendurable that those who suffered most
+from it united themselves to make a common effort, and rallied for
+a moment round the chief who was ready to lead them. Many of these
+liberators must have acquired an ephemeral popularity, and then have
+sunk into oblivion together with the two or three generations who had
+known them; those whose memory remained green among their kinsmen were
+known by posterity as the judges of Israel.*
+
+     * The word "judges," which has been adopted to designate
+     these rulers, is somewhat misleading, as it suggests the
+     idea of an organized civil magistracy. The word "shophet,"
+     the same that we meet with in classical times under the form
+     _suffetes_, had indeed that sense, but its primary meaning
+     denotes a man invested with an absolute authority, regular
+     or otherwise; it would be better translated _chief, prince,
+     captain_.
+
+These judges were not magistrates invested with official powers and
+approved by the whole nation, or rulers of a highly organised republic,
+chosen directly by God or by those inspired by Him. They were merely
+local chiefs, heroes to their own immediate tribe, well known in their
+particular surroundings, but often despised by those only at a short
+distance from them. Some of them have left only a name behind them, such
+as Shamgar, Ibzan, Tola, Elon, and Abdon; indeed, some scholars have
+thrown doubts on the personality of a few of them, as, for instance,
+Jair, whom they affirm to have personified a Gileadite clan, and
+Othniel, who is said to represent one of the Kenite families associated
+with the children of Israel.* Others, again, have come down to us
+through an atmosphere of popular tradition, the elements of which modern
+criticism has tried in vain to analyse. Of such unsettled and turbulent
+times we cannot expect an uninterrupted history:** some salient episodes
+alone remain, spread over a period of nearly two centuries, and from
+these we can gather some idea of the progress made by the Israelites,
+and observe their stages of transition from a cluster of semi-barbarous
+hordes to a settled nation ripe for monarchy.
+
+     * The name Tola occurs as that of one of the clans of
+     Issachar (Gen. xlvi. 13; Numb. xxvi. 23); Elon was one of
+     the clans of Zebulon (Gen. xlvi. 14; Numb. xxvi. 26)
+
+     ** Renan, however, believes that the judges "formed an
+     almost continuous line, and that there merely lacks a
+     descent from father to son to make of them an actual
+     dynasty." The chronology of the _Book of Judges_ appears to
+     cover more than four centuries, from Othniel to Samson, but
+     this computation cannot be relied on, as "forty
+     years" represents an indefinite space of time. We must
+     probably limit this early period of Hebrew history to about
+     a century and a half, from cir. 1200 to 1050 B.C.
+
+The first of these episodes deals merely with a part, and that the least
+important, of the tribes settled in Central Canaan.* The destruction of
+the Amorite kingdoms of Heshbon and Bashan had been as profitable to
+the kinsmen of the Israelites, Ammon and Moab, as it had been to the
+Israelites themselves.
+
+     * The episode of Othniel and Cushan-rishathaim, placed at
+     the beginning of the history of this period (Judges iii. 8-
+     11), is, by general consent, regarded as resting on a
+     worthless tradition.
+
+The Moabites had followed in the wake of the Hebrews through all the
+surrounding regions of the Dead Sea; they had pushed on from the banks
+of the Arnon to those of the Jabbok, and at the time of the Judges were
+no longer content with harassing merely Reuben and Gad.
+
+[Illustration: 272.jpg MOABITE WARRIOR]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from the original in the Louvre.
+
+They were a fine race of warlike, well-armed Beda-wins. Jericho had
+fallen into their hands, and their King Eglon had successfully scoured
+the entire hill-country of Ephraim,* so that those who wished to escape
+being pillaged had to safeguard themselves by the payment of an annual
+tribute.
+
+     * The text seems to infer (Judges iii. 13-15) that, after
+     having taken the Oily of Palm Trees, i.e. Jericho (Deut.
+     xxxiv. 3; 2 Ghron. xxviii. 15), Eglon had made it his
+     residence, which makes the story incomprehensible from a
+     geographical point of view. But all difficulties would
+     disappear if we agreed to admit that in ver. 15 the name of
+     the capital of Eglon has dropped out.
+
+Ehud the Left-handed concealed under his garments a keen dagger, and
+joined himself to the Benjamite deputies who were to carry their dues to
+the Moabite sovereign. The money having been paid, the deputies turned
+homewards, but when they reached the cromlech of Gilgal,* and were safe
+beyond the reach of the enemy, Ehud retraced his steps, and presenting
+himself before the palace of Eglon in the attitude of a prophet,
+announced that he had a secret errand to the king, who thereupon
+commanded silence, and ordered his servants to leave him with the divine
+messenger in his summer parlour.
+
+     * The cromlech at Gilgal was composed of twelve stones,
+     which, we are told, were erected by Joshua as a remembrance
+     of the crossing of the Jordan (Josh. iv. 19-24).
+
+"And Ehud said, I have a message from God unto thee. And he arose out of
+his seat. And Ehud put forth his left hand, and took the sword from his
+right thigh, and thrust it into his belly: and the haft also went in
+after the blade; and the fat closed upon the blade, for he drew not the
+sword out of his belly; and it came out behind." Then Ehud locked the
+doors and escaped. "Now when he was gone out, his servants came; and
+they saw, and, behold, the doors of the parlour were locked; and they
+said, Surely he covereth his feet in his summer chamber." But by the
+time they had forced an entrance, Ehud had reached Gilgal and was in
+safety. He at once assembled the clans of Benjamin, occupied the fords
+of the Jordan, massacred the bands of Moabites scattered over the plain
+of Jericho, and blocked the routes by which the invaders attempted to
+reach the hill-country of Ephraim. Almost at the same time the tribes
+in Galilee had a narrow escape from a still more formidable enemy.* They
+had for some time been under the Amorite yoke, and the sacred writings
+represent them at this juncture as oppressed either by Sisera of
+Harosheth-ha-Goyim or by a second Jabin, who was able to bring nine
+hundred chariots of iron into the field.** At length the prophetess
+Deborah of Issachar sent to Barak of Kadesh a command to assemble his
+people, together with those of Zebulon, in the name of the Lord;*** she
+herself led the contingents of Issachar, Ephraim, and Machir to meet him
+at the foot of Tabor, where the united host is stated to have comprised
+forty thousand men. Sisera,**** who commanded the Canaanite force,
+attacked the Israelite army between Taanach and Megiddo in that plain
+of Kishon which had often served as a battle-field during the Egyptian
+campaigns.
+
+     * The text tells us that, after the time of Ehud, the land
+     had rest eighty years (Judges iii. 30). This, again, is one
+     of those numbers which represent an indefinite space of
+     time.
+
+     ** It has been maintained that two versions are here blended
+     together in the text, one in which the principal part is
+     played by Sisera, the other in which it is attributed to
+     Jabin. The episode of Deborah and Barak (Judges iv., v.)
+     comprises a narrative in prose (chap, iv.), and the song
+     (chap, v.) attributed to Deborah. The prose account probably
+     is derived from the song. The differences in the two
+     accounts may be explained as having arisen partly from an
+     imperfect understanding of the poetic text, and partly from
+     one having come down from some other source.
+
+     *** Some critics suppose that the prose narrative (Judges
+     iv. 5) has confounded the prophetess Deborah, wife of
+     Lapidoth, with Deborah, nurse of Rachel, who was buried near
+     Bethel, under the "Oak of Weeping" (Gen. xxxv. 8), and
+     consequently place it between Rama and Bethel, in the hill-
+     country of Ephraim.
+
+     **** In the prose narrative (Judges iv. 2-7) Sisera is
+     stated to have been the general of Jabin: there is nothing
+     incompatible in this statement with the royal dignity
+     elsewhere attributed to Sisera. Harosheth-ha-Goyim has been
+     identified with the present village of El-Haretiyeh, on the
+     right bank of the Kishon.
+
+It would appear that heavy rains had swelled the streams, and thus
+prevented the chariots from rendering their expected service in the
+engagement; at all events, the Amorites were routed, and Sisera escaped
+with the survivors towards Hazor.
+
+[Illustration: 275.jpg TELL]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph in Lortet.
+
+The people of Meroz facilitated his retreat, but a Kenite named Jael,
+the wife of Heber, traitorously killed him with a blow from a hammer
+while he was in the act of drinking.*
+
+     * Meroz is the present Marus, between the Lake of Huleh and
+     Safed. I have followed the account given in the song (Judges
+     v. 24-27). According to the prose version (iv. 17-22), Jael
+     slew Sisera while he was asleep with a tent-pin, which she
+     drove into his temple. [The text of Judges v. 24-27 does not
+     seem to warrant the view that he was slain "in the act of
+     drinking," nor does it seem to conflict with Judges iv. 11.-
+     -Tr.]
+
+This exploit was commemorated in a song, the composition of which is
+attributed to Deborah and Barak: "For that the leaders took the lead in
+Israel, for that the people offered themselves willingly, bless ye the
+Lord. Hear, O ye kings, give ear, O ye princes; I, even I, will sing
+unto the Lord; I will sing praise to the Lord, the God of Israel."* The
+poet then dwells on the sufferings of the people, but tells how Deborah
+and Barak were raised up, and enumerates the tribes who took part in
+the conflict as well as those who turned a deaf ear to the appeal. "Then
+came down a remnant of the nobles and the people.... Out of Ephraim
+came down they whose root is in Amalek:--out of Machir came down
+governors,--and out of Zebulon they that handle the marshal's
+staff.--And the princes of Issachar were with Deborah--as was Issachar
+so was Barak,--into the valley they rushed forth at his feet.**--By the
+watercourses of Reuben--there were great resolves of heart.--Why satest
+thou among the sheepfolds,--to hear the pipings for the flocks?--At
+the watercourses of Reuben--there were great searchings of heart--Gilead
+abode beyond Jordan:--and Dan, why did he remain in ships?--Asher sat
+still at the haven of the sea--and abode by his creeks.--Zebulon was a
+people that jeoparded their lives unto the death,--and Naphtali upon the
+high places of the field.--The kings came and fought;--then fought the
+kings of Canaan.--In Taanach by the waters of Megiddo:--they took no
+gain of money.--They fought from heaven,--the stars in their courses
+fought against Sisera.--The river of Kishon swept them away,--that
+ancient river, the river Kishon.--O my soul, march on with
+strength.--Then did the horsehoofs stamp--by reason of the pransings,
+the pransings of their strong ones."
+
+     * Judges v. 2, 3 (R.V.).
+
+     ** The text of the song (Judges v. 14) contains an allusion
+     to Benjamin, which is considered by many critics to be an
+     interpolation. It gives a mistaken reading, "_Issachar_ with
+     Barak;" Issachar having been already mentioned with Deborah,
+     probably Zebulon should be inserted in the text.
+
+Sisera flies, and the poet follows him in fancy, as if he feared to see
+him escape from vengeance. He curses the people of Meroz in passing,
+"because they came not to the help of the Lord." He addresses Jael and
+blesses her, describing the manner in which the chief fell at her feet,
+and then proceeds to show how, at the very time of Sisera's death, his
+people were awaiting the messenger who should bring the news of his
+victory; "through the window she looked forth and cried--the mother
+of Sisera cried through the lattice--'Why is his chariot so long in
+coming?--Why tarry the wheels of his chariot?'--Her wise ladies answered
+her,--yea, she returned answer to herself,--'Have they not found, have
+they not divided the spoil?--A damsel, two damsels to every man;--to
+Sisera a spoil of divers colours,--a spoil of divers colours of
+embroidery on both sides, on the necks of the spoil?--So let all Thine
+enemies perish, O Lord:--but let them that love Him be as the sun when
+he goeth forth in his might.'"
+
+It was the first time, as far as we know, that several of the Israelite
+tribes combined together for common action after their sojourn in the
+desert of Kadesh-barnea, and the success which followed from their
+united efforts ought, one would think, to have encouraged them to
+maintain such a union, but it fell out otherwise; the desire for freedom
+of action and independence was too strong among them to permit of the
+continuance of the coalition.
+
+[Illustration: 278.jpg MOUNT TABOR]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by M. C. Alluaud
+     of Limoges.
+
+Manasseh, restricted in its development by the neighbouring Canaanite
+tribes, was forced to seek a more congenial neighbourhood to the east of
+the Jordan--not close to Gad, in the land of Gilead, but to the north
+of the Yarmuk and its northern affluents in the vast region extending
+to the mountains of the Hauran. The families of Machir and Jair migrated
+one after the other to the east of the Lake of Gennesaret, while that
+of Nobah proceeded as far as the brook of Kanah, and thus formed in this
+direction the extreme outpost of the children of Israel: these families
+did not form themselves into new tribes, for they were mindful of
+their affiliation to Manasseh, and continued beyond the river to
+regard themselves still as his children.* The prosperity of Ephraim and
+Manasseh, and the daring nature of their exploits, could not fail
+to draw upon them the antagonism and jealousy of the people on their
+borders. The Midianites were accustomed almost every year to pass
+through the region beyond the Jordan which the house of Joseph had
+recently colonised. Assembling in the springtime at the junction of the
+Yarmuk with the Jordan, they crossed the latter river, and, spreading
+over the plains of Mount Tabor, destroyed the growing crops, raided the
+villages, and pushed, sometimes, their skirmishing parties over hill and
+dale as far as Gaza.**
+
+     * Manasseh was said to have been established beyond the
+     Jordan at the time that Gad and Reuben were in possession of
+     the land of Gilead (Numb, xxxii. 33, 39-42, xxxiv. 14, 15;
+     Dent. iii. 13-15; Josh. xiii. 8, 29-32, xxii.). Earlier
+     traditions placed this event in the period which followed
+     the conquest of Canaan by Joshua. It is not certain that all
+     the families which constituted the half-tribe of Manasseh
+     took their origin from Manasseh: one of them, for example,
+     that of Jair, was regarded as having originated partly from
+     Judah (1 Chron. ii. 21-24).
+
+     ** Judges vi. 2-6. The inference that they dare not beat
+     wheat in the open follows from ver. 11, where it is said
+     that "Gideon was beating out wheat in his winepress to hide
+     it from the Midianites."
+
+A perpetual terror reigned wherever they were accustomed to pass*: no
+one dared beat out wheat or barley in the open air, or lead his herds to
+pasture far from his home, except under dire necessity; and even on such
+occasions the inhabitants would, on the slightest alarm, abandon their
+possessions to take refuge in caves or in strongholds on the mountains.1
+During one of these incursions two of their sheikhs encountered some
+men of noble mien in the vicinity of Tabor, and massacred them without
+compunction.** The latter were people of Ophrah,*** brethren of a
+certain Jerubbaal (Gideon) who was head of the powerful family of
+Abiezer.****
+
+     * The history of the Midianite oppression (Judges vi.-viii.)
+     seems to be from two different sources; the second (Judges
+     viii. 4-21), which is also the shortest, is considered by
+     some to represent the more ancient tradition. The double
+     name of the hero, Gideon-Jerubbaal, has led some to assign
+     its elements respectively to Gideon, judge of the western
+     portion of Manasseh, and Jerubbaal, judge of the eastern
+     Manasseh, and to the consequent fusion of the two men in
+     one.
+
+     ** This is an assumption which follows reasonably from
+     Judges viii. 18, 19.
+
+     *** The site of the Ophrah of Abiezer is not known for
+     certain, but it would seem from the narrative that it was in
+     the neighbourhood of Shechem.
+
+     **** The position of Gideon-Jerubbaal as head of the house
+     of Abiezer follows clearly from the narrative; if he is
+     represented in the first part of the account as a man of
+     humble origin (Judges vi. 15, 16), it was to exalt the power
+     of Jahveh, who was accustomed to choose His instruments from
+     amongst the lowly. The name Jerubbaal (1 Sam. xii. 11:2 Sam.
+     xi. 21, where the name is transformed into Jerubbesheth, as
+     Ishbaal and Meribbaal are into Ishbosheth and Mephibosheth
+     respectively), in which "Baal" seems to some not to
+     represent the Canaanite God, but the title Lord as applied
+     to Jahveh, was supposed to mean "Baal fights against him,"
+     and was, therefore, offensive to the orthodox. Kuenen
+     thought it meant "Lord, fight for him!" Renan read it
+     Yarebaal, from the Vulgate form Jerobaal, and translated "He
+     who fears Baal." Gideon signifies "He who overthrows" in the
+     battle.
+
+Assembling all his people at the call of the trumpet, Jerubbaal chose
+from among them three hundred of the strongest, with whom he came
+down unexpectedly upon the raiders, put them to flight in the plain of
+Jezreel, and followed them beyond the Jordan. Having crossed the river,
+"faint and yet pursuing," he approached the men of Succoth, and asked
+them for bread for himself and his three hundred followers. Their fear
+of the marauders, however, was so great that the people refused to give
+him any help, and he had no better success with the people of Penuel
+whom he encountered a little further on. He did not stop to compel them
+to accede to his wishes, but swore to inflict an exemplary punishment
+upon them on his return. The Midianites continued their retreat, in the
+mean time, "by the way of them that dwelt in tents on the east of
+Nobah and Jogbehah," but Jerubbaal came up with them near Karkar, and
+discomfited the host. He took vengeance upon the two peoples who had
+refused to give him bread, and having thus fulfilled his vow, he began
+to question his prisoners, the two chiefs: "What manner of men were they
+whom ye slew at Tabor?" "As thou art, so were they; each one resembled
+the children of a king." "And he said, They were my brethren, the sons
+of my mother: as the Lord liveth, if ye had saved them alive, I would
+not slay you. And he said unto Jether his firstborn, Up, and slay them.
+But the youth drew not his sword: for he feared, because he was yet a
+youth." True Bedawins as they were, the chiefs' pride revolted at the
+idea of their being handed over for execution to a child, and they cried
+to Jerubbaal: "Rise thou, and fall upon us: for as the man is, so is
+his strength." From this victory rose the first monarchy among the
+Israelites. The Midianites, owing to their marauding habits and the
+amount of tribute which they were accustomed to secure for escorting
+caravans, were possessed of a considerable quantity of gold, which they
+lavished on the decoration of their persons: their chiefs were clad in
+purple mantles, their warriors were loaded with necklaces, bracelets,
+rings, and ear-rings, and their camels also were not behind their
+masters in the brilliance of their caparison. The booty which Gideon
+secured was, therefore, considerable, and, as we learn from the
+narrative, excited the envy of the Ephraimites, who said: "Why hast thou
+served us thus, that thou calledst us not, when thou wentest to fight
+with Midian?"*
+
+     * Judges viii. 1-3.
+
+The spoil from the golden ear-rings alone amounted to one thousand seven
+hundred shekels, as we learn from the narrative, and this treasure in
+the hands of Jerubbaal was not left unemployed, but was made, doubtless,
+to contribute something to the prestige he had already acquired: the
+men of Israel, whom he had just saved from their foes, expressed their
+gratitude by offering the crown to him and his successors. The mode of
+life of the Hebrews had been much changed after they had taken up their
+abode in the mountains of Canaan. The tent had given place to the house,
+and, like their Canaanite neighbours, they had given themselves up
+to agricultural pursuits. This change of habits, in bringing about
+a greater abundance of the necessaries of life than they had been
+accustomed to, had begotten aspirations which threw into relief the
+inadequacy of the social organisation, and of the form of government
+with which they had previously been content. In the case of a horde
+of nomads, defeat or exile would be of little moment. Should they be
+obliged by a turn in their affairs to leave their usual haunts, a few
+days or often a few hours would suffice to enable them to collect
+their effects together, and set out without trouble, and almost
+without regret, in search of a new and more favoured home. But with
+a cultivator of the ground the case would be different: the farm,
+clearings, and homestead upon which he had spent such arduous and
+continued labour; the olive trees and vines which had supplied him
+with oil and wine--everything, in fact, upon which he depended for a
+livelihood, or which was dependent upon him, would bind him to the soil,
+and expose his property to disasters likely to be as keenly felt as
+wounds inflicted on his person. He would feel the need, therefore,
+of laws to secure to him in time of peace the quiet possession of his
+wealth, of an army to protect it in time of war, and of a ruler to
+cause, on the one hand, the laws to be respected, and to become the
+leader, on the other, of the military forces. Jerubbaal is said to have,
+in the first instance, refused the crown, but everything goes to prove
+that he afterwards virtually accepted it. He became, it is true, only
+a petty king, whose sovereignty was limited to Manasseh, a part of
+Ephraim, and a few towns, such as Succoth and Penuel, beyond the Jordan.
+The Canaanite city of Shechem also paid him homage. Like all great
+chiefs, he had also numerous wives, and he recognised as the national
+Deity the God to whom he owed his victories.
+
+Out of the spoil taken from the Midianites he formed and set up at
+Ophrah an ephod, which became, as we learn, "a snare unto him and unto
+his house," but he had also erected under a terebinth tree a stone altar
+to Jahveh-Shalom ("Jehovah is peace").* This sanctuary, with its altar
+and ephod, soon acquired great celebrity, and centuries after its
+foundation it was the object of many pilgrimages from a distance.
+
+Jerubbaal was the father by his Israelite wives of seventy children,
+and, by a Canaanite woman whom he had taken as a concubine at Shechem,
+of one son, called Abimelech.**
+
+     * The _Book of Judges_ separates the altar from the ephod,
+     placing the erection of the former at the time of the
+     vocation of Gideon (vi. 11-31) and that of the ephod after
+     the victory (viii. 24-27). The sanctuary of Ophrah was
+     possibly in existence before the time of Jerubbaal, and the
+     sanctity of the place may have determined his selection of
+     the spot for placing the altar and ephod there.
+
+     ** Judges viii. 30, 31.
+
+The succession to the throne would naturally have fallen to one of the
+seventy, but before this could be arranged, Abimelech "went to Shechem
+unto his mother's brethren, and spake with them, and with all the family
+of the house of his mother's father, saying, Speak, I pray you, in the
+ears of all the men of Shechem, Whether is better for you, that all the
+sons of Jerubbaal, which are threescore and ten persons, rule over you,
+or that one rule over you? remember also that I am your bone and your
+flesh." This advice was well received; it flattered the vanity of the
+people to think that the new king was to be one of themselves; "their
+hearts inclined to follow Abimelech; for they said, He is our brother.
+And they gave him threescore and ten pieces of silver out of the house
+of Baal-berith (the Lord of the Covenant), wherewith Abimelech hired
+vain and light fellows, which followed him.... He slew his brethren the
+sons of Jerubbaal, being threescore and ten persons, upon one stone."
+The massacre having been effected, "all the men of Shechem assembled
+themselves together, and all the house of Millo,* and made Abimelech
+king, by the oak of the pillar which was in Shechem."** He dwelt at
+Ophrah, in the residence, and near the sanctuary, of his father, and
+from thence governed the territories constituting the little kingdom
+of Manasseh, levying tribute upon the vassal villages, and exacting
+probably tolls from caravans passing through his domain.
+
+     * The word "Millo" is a generic term, meaning citadel or
+     stronghold of the city: there was a Millo in every important
+     town, Jerusalem included.
+
+     ** The "oak of the pillar" was a sacred tree overshadowing
+     probably a _cippus_: it may have been the tree mentioned in
+     Gen. xxxv. 4, under which Jacob buried the strange gods; or
+     that referred to in Josh. xxiv. 26, under which Joshua set
+     up a stone commemorative of the establishment of the law.
+     Jotham, the youngest son of Gideon, escaped the massacre. As
+     soon as he heard of the election of Abimelech, he ascended
+     Mount Gerizim, and gave out from there the fable of the
+     trees, applying it to the circumstances of the time, and
+     then fled. Some critics think that this fable--which is
+     confessedly old--was inserted in the text at a time when
+     prophetical ideas prevailed and monarchy was not yet
+     accepted.
+
+This condition of things lasted for three years, and then the
+Shechemites, who had shown themselves so pleased at the idea of having
+"one of their brethren" as sovereign, found it irksome to pay the taxes
+levied upon them by him, as if they were in no way related to him. The
+presence among them of a certain Zebul, the officer and representative
+of Abimelech, restrained them at first from breaking out into rebellion,
+but they returned soon to their ancient predatory ways, and demanded
+ransom for the travellers they might capture even when the latter were
+in possession of the king's safe conduct. This was not only an insult to
+their lord, but a serious blow to his treasury: the merchants who found
+themselves no longer protected by his guarantee employed elsewhere the
+sums which would have come into his hands. The king concealed his anger,
+however; he was not inclined to adopt premature measures, for the place
+was a strong one, and defeat would seriously weaken his prestige. The
+people of Shechem, on their part, did not risk an open rupture for fear
+of the consequences. Gaal, son of Ebed,* a soldier of fortune and of
+Israelitish blood, arrived upon the scene, attended by his followers: he
+managed to gain the confidence of the people of Shechem, who celebrated
+under his protection the feast of the Vintage.
+
+     * The name Ebed ("slave," "servant") is assumed to have been
+     substituted in the Massorotic text for the original name
+     Jobaal, because of the element Baal in the latter word,
+     which was regarded as that of the strange god, and would
+     thus have the sacrilegious meaning "Jahveh is Baal." The term
+     of contempt, Ebed, was, according to this view, thus used to
+     replace it.
+
+On this occasion their merrymaking was disturbed by the presence among
+them of the officer charged with collecting the tithes, and Gaal did not
+lose the opportunity of stimulating their ire by his ironical speeches:
+"Who is Abimelech, and who is Shechem, that we should serve him? is
+not he the son of Jerubbaal? and Zebul his officer? serve ye the men of
+Hamor the father of Shechem: but why should we serve him? And would to
+God this people were under my hand! then would I remove Abimelech. And
+he said to Abimelech, Increase thine army, and come out." Zebul promptly
+gave information of this to his master, and invited him to come by night
+and lie in ambush in the vicinity of the town, "that in the morning,
+as soon as the sun is up, thou shalt rise early, and set upon the city:
+and, behold, when he and the people that is with him come out against
+thee, thou mayest do to them as thou shalt find occasion." It turned out
+as he foresaw; the inhabitants of Shechem went out in order to take part
+in the gathering in of the vintage, while Gaal posted his men at the
+entering in of the gate of the city. As he looked towards the hills he
+thought he saw an unusual movement among the trees, and, turning round,
+said to Zebul, who was close by, "Behold, there come people down from
+the tops of the mountains. And Zebul said unto him, Thou seest the
+shadow of the mountains as if they were men." A moment after he looked
+in another direction, "and spake again and said, See, there come people
+down by the middle of the land, and one company cometh by the way of
+the terebinth of the augurs." Zebul, seeing the affair turn out so well,
+threw off the mask, and replied railingly, "Where is now thy mouth,
+wherewith thou saidst, Who is Abimelech, that we should serve him? is
+not this the people that thou hast despised? go out, I pray, now, and
+fight with him." The King of Manasseh had no difficulty in defeating
+his adversary, but arresting the pursuit at the gates of the city, he
+withdrew to the neighbouring village of Arumah.*
+
+     * This is now el-Ormeh, i.e.Kharbet el-Eurmah, to the south-
+     west of Nablus.
+
+He trusted that the inhabitants, who had taken no part in the affair,
+would believe that his wrath had been appeased by the defeat of Gaal;
+and so, in fact, it turned out: they dismissed their unfortunate
+champion, and on the morrow returned to their labours as if nothing had
+occurred.
+
+[Illustration: 288.jpg MOUNT GERIZIM, WITH A VIEW OF NABLUS]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph reproduced by the Duc de
+     Luynes.
+
+Abimelech had arranged his Abiezerites in three divisions: one of
+which made for the gates, while the other two fell upon the scattered
+labourers in the vineyards. Abimelech then fought against the city and
+took it, but the chief citizens had taken refuge in "the hold of the
+house of El-berith." "Abimelech gat him up to Mount Zalmon, he and all
+the people that were with him; and Abimelech took an axe in his hand,
+and cut down a bough from the trees, and took it up, and laid it on his
+shoulder: and he said unto the people that were with him, What ye
+have seen me do, make haste, and do as I have done. And all the people
+likewise cut down every man his bough, and followed Abimelech, and put
+them to the hold, and set the hold on fire upon them; so that all the
+men of the tower of Shechem died also, about a thousand men and women."
+
+[Illustration: 289.jpg THE TOWN OF ASCALON]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a bas-relief in the Ramesseum.
+     This is a portion of the picture representing the capture of
+     Ascalon by Ramses II.
+
+This summary vengeance did not, however, prevent other rebellions.
+Thebez imitated Shechem, and came nigh suffering the same penalty.* The
+king besieged the city and took it, and was about to burn with fire the
+tower in which all the people of the city had taken refuge, when a woman
+threw a millstone down upon his head "and brake his skull."
+
+     * Thebez, now Tubas, the north-east of Nablus.
+
+The narrative tells us that, feeling himself mortally wounded, he called
+his armour-bearer to him, and said, "Draw thy sword, and kill me, that
+men say not of me, A woman slew him." His monarchy ceased with him, and
+the ancient chronicler recognises in the catastrophe a just punishment
+for the atrocious crime he had committed in slaying his half-brothers,
+the seventy children of Jerubbaal.* His fall may be regarded also as
+the natural issue of his peculiar position: the resources upon which he
+relied were inadequate to secure to him a supremacy in Israel. Manasseh,
+now deprived of a chief, and given up to internal dissensions, became
+still further enfeebled, and an easy prey to its rivals. The divine
+writings record in several places the success attained by the central
+tribes in their conflict with their enemies. They describe how a certain
+Jephthah distinguished himself in freeing Gilead from the Ammonites.**
+
+     * Judges ix. 23, 24. "And God sent an evil spirit between
+     Abimelech and the men of Shechem; and the men of Shechem
+     dealt treacherously with Abimelech: that the violence done
+     to the threescore and ten sons of Jerubbaal might come, and
+     that their blood might be laid upon Abimelech their brother,
+     which slew them, and upon the men of Shechem, which
+     strengthened his hands to slay his brethren."
+
+     ** The story of Jephthah is contained in chaps, xi., xii. 1-
+     7, of the _Book of Judges_. The passage (xi. 12-29) is
+     regarded by some, owing to its faint echo of certain
+     portions of Numb, xx., xxi., to be an interpolation.
+     Jephthah is said to have had Gilead for his father and a
+     harlot for his mother. Various views have been put forward
+     as to the account of his victories over the Midianites, some
+     seeing in it, as well as in the origin of the four
+     days'feast in honour of Jephthah's daughter, insertions of a
+     later date.
+
+But his triumph led to the loss of his daughter, whom he sacrificed in
+order to fulfil a vow he had made to Jahveh before the battle.* These
+were, however, comparatively unimportant episodes in the general history
+of the Hebrew race. Bedawins from the East, sheikhs of the Midianites,
+Moabites, and Ammonites--all these marauding peoples of the frontier
+whose incursions are put on record--gave them continual trouble, and
+rendered their existence so miserable that they were unable to develop
+their institutions and attain the permanent freedom after which they
+aimed. But their real dangers--the risk of perishing altogether, or of
+falling back into a condition of servitude--did not arise from any of
+these quarters, but from the Philistines.
+
+     * There are two views as to the nature of the sacrifice of
+     Jephthah's daughter. Some think she was vowed to perpetual
+     virginity, while others consider that she was actually
+     sacrificed.
+
+By a decree of Pharaoh, a new country had been assigned to the remnants
+of each of the maritime peoples: the towns nearest to Egypt, lying
+between Raphia and Joppa, were given over to the Philistines, and the
+forest region and the coast to the north of the Philistines, as far as
+the Phoenician stations of Dor and Carmel,* were appropriated to the
+Zakkala. The latter was a military colony, and was chiefly distributed
+among the five fortresses which commanded the Shephelah.
+
+     * We are indebted to the _Papyrus Golenischeff_ for the
+     mention of the position of the Zakkala at the beginning of
+     the XXIst dynasty.
+
+[Illustration: 292.jpg A ZAKKALA]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a "squeeze."
+
+Gaza and Ashdod were separated from the Mediterranean by a line of
+sand-dunes, and had nothing in the nature of a sheltered port--nothing,
+in fact, but a "maiuma," or open roadstead, with a few dwellings and
+storehouses arranged along the beach on which their boats were drawn
+up. Ascalon was built on the sea, and its harbour, although well enough
+suited for the small craft of the ancients, could not have been entered
+by the most insignificant of our modern ships. The Philistines had here
+their naval arsenal, where their fleets were fitted out for scouring
+the Egyptian waters as a marine police, or for piratical expeditions
+on their own account, when the occasion served, along the coasts of
+Phoenicia. Ekron and Gath kept watch over the eastern side of the plain
+at the points where it was most exposed to the attacks of the people
+of the hills--the Canaanites in the first instance, and afterwards
+the Hebrews. These foreign warriors soon changed their mode of life in
+contact with the indigenous inhabitants; daily intercourse, followed up
+by marriages with the daughters of the land, led to the substitution of
+the language, manners, and religion of the environing race for those of
+their mother country. The Zakkala, who were not numerous, it is true,
+lost everything, even to their name, and it was all that the Philistines
+could do to preserve their own. At the end of one or two generations,
+the "colts" of Palestine could only speak the Canaanite tongue, in which
+a few words of the old Hellenic _patois_ still continued to survive.
+Their gods were henceforward those of the towns in which they resided,
+such as Marna and Dagon and Gaza,* Dagon at Ashdod,** Baalzebub at
+Ekron,*** and Derketo in Ascalon;**** and their mode of worship, with
+its mingled bloody and obscene rites, followed that of the country.
+
+     * Marna, "our lord," is mentioned alongside Baalzephon in a
+     list of strange gods worshipped at Memphis in the XIXth
+     dynasty. The worship of Dagon at Gaza is mentioned in the
+     story of Samson (Judges xvi. 21-30).
+
+     ** The temple and statue of Dagon are mentioned in the
+     account of the events following the taking of the ark in 1
+     Sam. v. 1-7. It is, perhaps, to him that 1 Chron. x. 10
+     refers, in relating how the Philistines hung up Saul's arms
+     in the house of their gods, although 1 Sam. xxxi. 10 calls
+     the place the "house of the Ashtoreth."
+
+     *** Baalzebub was the god of Ekron (2 Kings i. 2-6), and his
+     name was doubtfully translated "Lord of Flies." The
+     discovery of the name of the town Zebub on the Tell el-
+     Amarna tablets shows that it means the "Baal of Zebub."
+     Zebub was situated in the Philistine plains, not far from
+     Ekron. Halevy thinks it may have been a suburb of that town.
+
+     **** The worship of Derketo or Atergatis at Ascalon is
+     witnessed to by the classical writers.
+
+[Illustration: 294.jpg A PROCESSION OF PHILISTINE CAPTIVES AT
+MEDINET-HABU]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Insinger.
+
+Two things belonging to their past history they still retained--a clear
+remembrance of their far-off origin, and that warlike temperament which
+had enabled them to fight their way through many obstacles from the
+shores of the AEgean to the frontiers of Egypt. They could recall
+their island of Caphtor,* and their neighbours in their new home were
+accustomed to bestow upon them the designation of Cretans, of which they
+themselves were not a little proud.**
+
+     * Jer. xlvii. 4 calls them "the remnant of the isle of
+     Caphtor;" Amos (ix. 7) knew that the Lord had brought "the
+     Philistines from Caphtor;" and in Dent. ii. 23 it is related
+     how "the Caphtorim which came forth out of Caphtor destroyed
+     the Avvim, which dwelt in villages as far as Gaza, and dwelt
+     in their stead." Classical tradition falls in with the sacred
+     record, and ascribes a Cretan origin to the Philistines; it
+     is suggested, therefore, that in Gen. x. 14 the names
+     Casluhim and Caphtorim should be transposed, to bring the
+     verse into harmony with history and other parts of
+     Scripture.
+
+     ** In an episode in the life of David (1 Sam. xxx. 14),
+     there is mention of the "south of the Cherethites," which
+     some have made to mean Cretans--that is to say, the region
+     to the south of the Philistines, alongside the territory of
+     Judah, and to the "south of Caleb." Ezelc. xx. 16 also
+     mentions in juxtaposition with the Philistines the
+     Cherethites, and "the remnant of the sea-coast," as objects
+     of God's vengeance for the many evils they had inflicted on
+     Israel. By the Cherethims here, and the Cherethites in Zoph.
+     ii. 5, the Cretans are by some thought to be meant, which
+     would account for their association with the Philistines.
+
+Gaza enjoyed among them a kind of hegemony, alike on account of its
+strategic position and its favourable situation for commerce, but this
+supremacy was of very precarious character, and brought with it no
+right whatever to meddle in the internal affairs of other members of the
+confederacy. Each of the latter had a chief of its own, a Seren,* and
+the office of this chief was hereditary in one case at least--Gath, for
+instance, where there existed a larger Canaanite element than elsewhere,
+and was there identified with that of "melek,"** or king.
+
+     * The _sarne plishtim_ figure in the narrative of the last
+     Philistine campaign against Saul (1 Sam. xxix. 2-4, 7, 9).
+     Their number, five, is expressly mentioned in 1 Sam. vi. 4,
+     16-18, as well as the names of the towns over which they
+     ruled.
+
+     ** Achish was King of Gath (1 Sam. xxi. 10, 12, xxvii. 2),
+     and probably Maoch before him.
+
+The five Sarnim assembled in council to deliberate upon common
+interests, and to offer sacrifices in the name of the Pentapolis. These
+chiefs were respectively free to make alliances, or to take the field
+on their own account, but in matters of common importance they acted
+together, and took their places each at the head of his own contingent.*
+Their armies were made up of regiments of skilled archers and of
+pikemen, to whom were added a body of charioteers made up of the princes
+and the nobles of the nation. The armour for all alike was the coat
+of scale mail and the helmet of brass; their weapons consisted of the
+two-edged battle-axe, the bow, the lance, and a large and heavy sword of
+bronze or iron.**
+
+     * Achish, for example, King of Gath, makes war alone against
+     the pillaging tribes, owing to the intervention of David and
+     his men, without being called to account by the other
+     princes (1 Sam. xxvii. 2-12, xxviii. 1, 2), but as soon as
+     an affair of moment is in contemplation--such as the war
+     against Saul--they demand the dismissal of David, and Achish
+     is obliged to submit to his colleagues acting together (1
+     Sam. xxix.).
+
+     ** Philistine archers are mentioned in the battle of Gilboa
+     (1 Sam. xxxi. 3) as well as chariots (2 Sam. i. 6). The
+     horsemen mentioned in the same connexion are regarded by
+     some critics as an interpolation, because they cannot bring
+     themselves to think that the Philistines had cavalry corps
+     in the Xth century B.C. The Philistine arms are described at
+     length in the duel between David and Goliath (1 Sam. xvii. 5
+     -7, 38, 39). They are in some respects like those of the
+     Homeric heroes.
+
+Their war tactics were probably similar to those of the Egyptians, who
+were unrivalled in military operations at this period throughout the
+whole East. Under able leadership, and in positions favourable for the
+operations of their chariots, the Philistines had nothing to fear from
+the forces which any of their foes could bring up against them. As to
+their maritime history, it is certain that in the earliest period,
+at least, of their sojourn in Syria, as well as in that before their
+capture by Ramses III., they were successful in sea-fights, but the
+memory of only one of their expeditions has come down to us: a squadron
+of theirs having sailed forth from Ascalon somewhere towards the end
+of the XIIth dynasty,* succeeded in destroying the Sidonian fleet, and
+pillaging Sidon itself.
+
+     * _Justinus_, xviii. 3, Sec. 5. The memory of this has been
+     preserved, owing to the disputes about precedence which
+     raged in the Greek period between the Phoenician towns. The
+     destruction of Sidon must have allowed Tyre to develop and
+     take the first place.
+
+[Illustration: 297.jpg A PHILISTINE SHIP OF WAR]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Beato.
+
+But however vigorously they may have plied the occupation of Corsairs at
+the outset of their career, there was, it would appear, a rapid falling
+off in their maritime prowess; it was on land, and as soldiers, that
+they displayed their bravery and gained their fame. Their geographical
+position, indeed, on the direct and almost only route for caravans
+passing between Asia and Africa, must have contributed to their success.
+The number of such caravans was considerable, for although Egypt had
+ceased to be a conquering nation on account of her feebleness at home,
+she was still one of the great centres of production, and the most
+important market of the East. A very great part of her trade with
+foreign countries was carried on through the mouths of the Nile, and of
+this commerce the Phoenicians had made themselves masters; the remainder
+followed the land-routes, and passed continually through the territory
+of the Philistines. These people were in possession of the tract of land
+which lay between the Mediterranean and the beginning of the southern
+desert, forming as it were a narrow passage, into which all the roads
+leading from the Nile to the Euphrates necessarily converged. The chief
+of these routes was that which crossed Mount Carmel, near Megiddo, and
+passed up the valleys of the Litany and the Orontes. This was met
+at intervals by other secondary roads, such as that which came from
+Damascus by way of Tabor and the plain of Jezreel, or those which,
+starting out from the highland of Gilead, led through the fords of the
+Lower Jordan to Ekron and Gath respectively. The Philistines charged
+themselves, after the example and at the instigation of the Egyptians,
+with the maintenance of the great trunk road which was in their hands,
+and also with securing safe transit along it, as far as they could
+post their troops, for those who confided themselves to their care. In
+exchange for these good offices they exacted the same tolls which had
+been levied by the Canaanites before them.
+
+In their efforts to put down brigandage, they had been brought into
+contact with some of the Hebrew clans after the latter had taken
+possession of Canaan. Judah, in its home among the mountains of the
+Dead Sea, had become acquainted with the diverse races which were found
+there, and consequently there had been frequent intermarriages between
+the Hebrews and these peoples. Some critics have argued from this that
+the chronicler had this fact in his mind when he assigned a Canaanite
+wife, Shuah, to the father of the tribe himself. He relates how Judah,
+having separated from his brethren, "turned in to a certain Adullamite,
+whose name was Hiram," and that here he became acquainted with Shuah,
+by whom he had three sons. With Tamar, the widow of the eldest of the
+latter, he had accidental intercourse, and two children, Perez and
+Zerah, the ancestors of numerous families, were born of that union.*
+
+     * Gen. xxxviii., where there is a detailed account of
+     Judah's unions.
+
+Edomites, Arabs, and Midianites were associated with this semi-Canaanite
+stock--for example, Kain, Caleb, Othniel, Kenaz, Shobal, Ephah, and
+Jerahmeel, but the Kenites took the first place among them, and played
+an important part in the history of the conquest of Canaan. It is
+related how one of their subdivisions, of which Caleb was the eponymous
+hero, had driven from Hebron the three sons of Anak--Sheshai, Ahiman,
+and Talmai--and had then promised his daughter Achsah in marriage to
+him who should capture Debir; this turned out to be his youngest brother
+Othniel, who captured the city, and at the same time obtained a
+wife. Hobab, another Kenite, who is represented to have been the
+brother-in-law of Moses, occupied a position to the south of Arad, in
+Idumsean territory.* These heterogeneous elements existed alongside each
+other for a long time without intermingling; they combined, however, now
+and again to act against a common foe, for we know that the people
+of Judah aided the tribe of Simeon in the reduction of the city of
+Zephath;** but they followed an independent course for the most part,
+and their isolation prevented their obtaining, for a lengthened period,
+any extension of territory.
+
+     * The father-in-law of Moses is called Jethro in Exod. iii.
+     1, iv. 19, but Raguel in Exod. ii. 18-22. Hobab is the son
+     of Raguel, Numb. x. 29.
+
+     ** Judges i. 17, where Zephath is the better reading, and
+     not Arad, as has been suggested.
+
+They failed, as at first, in their attempts to subjugate the province of
+Arad, and in their efforts to capture the fortresses which guarded
+the caravan routes between Ashdod and the mouth of the Jordan. It
+is related, however, that they overthrew Adoni-bezek, King of the
+Jebusites, and that they had dealt with him as he was accustomed to deal
+with his prisoners. "And Adoni-bezek said, Threescore and ten kings,
+having their thumbs and their great toes cut off, gathered their meat
+under my table: as I have done, so God hath requited me." Although
+Adoni-bezek had been overthrown, Jerusalem still remained independent,
+as did also Gibeon. Beeroth, Kirjath-Jearim, Ajalon, Gezer, and
+the cities of the plain, for the Israelites could not drive out the
+inhabitants of the valley, because they had chariots of iron, with which
+the Hebrew foot-soldiers found it difficult to deal.* This independent
+and isolated group was not at first, however, a subject of anxiety
+to the masters of the coast, and there is but a bare reference to
+the exploits of a certain Shamgar, son of Anath, who "smote of the
+Philistines six hundred men with an ox-goad."**
+
+     * See Josh. ix. 3-27 for an explanation of how these people
+     were allowed afterwards to remain in a subordinate capacity
+     among the children of Israel.
+
+     ** Judges iii. 31; cf. also Judges v. 6, in which Shamgar is
+     mentioned in the song of Deborah.
+
+[Illustration: 301.jpg TELL ES-SAFIEH, THE GATH OF THE PHILISTINES]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from photograph No. 265 of the _Palestine
+     Exploration Fund._
+
+These cities had also to reckon with Ephraim, and the tribes which had
+thrown in their lot with her. Dan had cast his eyes upon the northern
+districts of the Shephelah--which were dependent upon Ekron or Gath--and
+also upon the semi-Phoenician port of Joppa; but these tribes did not
+succeed in taking possession of those districts, although they had
+harassed them from time to time by raids in which the children of Israel
+did not always come off victorious. One of their chiefs--Samson--had a
+great reputation among them for his bravery and bodily strength. But the
+details of his real prowess had been forgotten at an early period.
+The episodes which have been preserved deal with some of his exploits
+against the Philistines, and there is a certain humour in the
+chronicler's account of the weapons which he employed: "with the jawbone
+of an ass have I smitten a thousand men;" he burned up their harvest
+also by letting go three hundred foxes, with torches attached to their
+tails, among the standing corn of the Philistines. Various events in his
+career are subsequently narrated; such as his adventure in the house
+of the harlot at Gaza, when he carried off the gate of the city and
+the gate-posts "to the top of the mountain that is before Hebron." By
+Delilah's treachery he was finally delivered over to his enemies, who,
+having put out his eyes, condemned him to grind in the prison-house. On
+the occasion of a great festival in honour of Dagon, he was brought into
+the temple to amuse his captors, but while they were making merry at his
+expense, he took hold of the two pillars against which he was resting,
+and bowing "himself with all his might," overturned them, "and the house
+fell upon the lords, and upon all the people that were therein."*
+
+     * Some learned critics considered Samson to have been a sort
+     of solar deity.
+
+The tribe of Dan at length became weary of these unprofitable
+struggles, and determined to seek out another and more easily defensible
+settlement. They sent out five emissaries, therefore, to look out for
+a new home. While these were passing through the mountains they called
+upon a certain Michah in the hill-country of Ephraim and lodged there.
+Here they took counsel of a Levite whom Michah had made his priest, and,
+in answer to the question whether their journey would be prosperous, he
+told them to "Go in peace: before the Lord is the way wherein ye go."
+Their search turned out successful, for they discovered near the sources
+of the Jordan the town of Laish, whose people, like the Zidonians, dwelt
+in security, fearing no trouble. On the report of the emissaries, Dan
+decided to emigrate: the warriors set out to the number of six hundred,
+carried off by the way the ephod of Micah and the Levite who served
+before it, and succeeded in capturing Laish, to which they gave the
+name of their tribe. "They there set up for themselves the ephod: and
+Jonathan, the son of Gershom, the son of Moses, he and his sons were
+priests to the tribe of the Danites until the day of the captivity of
+the land."* The tribe of Dan displayed in this advanced post of peril
+the bravery it had shown on the frontiers of the Shephelah, and showed
+itself the most bellicose of the tribes of Israel.
+
+     * The history of this migration, which is given summarily in
+     Josh. xix. 47, is, as it now stands, a blending of two
+     accounts. The presence of a descendant of Moses as a priest
+     in this local sanctuary probably offended the religious
+     scruples of a copyist, who substituted Manasseh for Moses
+     (Judges xviii. 30), but the correction was not generally
+     accepted. [The R.V. reads "Moses" where the authorised text
+     has "Manasseh."--Tr.]
+
+It bore out well its character--"Dan is a lion's whelp that leapeth
+forth from Bashan" on the Hermon;* "a serpent in the way, an adder
+in the path, that biteth the horse's heels, so that his rider falleth
+backward."** The new position they had taken up enabled them to protect
+Galilee for centuries against the incursions of the Aramaeans.
+
+     * See the Blessing of Moses (Dent, xxxiii. 22).
+
+     ** These are the words used in the Blessing of Jacob (Gen.
+     xlix. 17).
+
+[Illustration: 304.jpg THE HILL OF SHILOH, SEEN FROM THE NORTH-EAST]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from photograph No. 100 of the _Palestine
+     Exploration Fund._
+
+Their departure, however, left the descendants of Joseph unprotected,
+with Benjamin as their only bulwark. Benjamin, like Dan, was one of
+the tribes which contained scarcely more than two or three clans, but
+compensated for the smallness of their numbers by their energy and
+tenacity of character: lying to the south of Ephraim, they had developed
+into a breed of hardy adventurers, skilled in handling the bow and
+sling, accustomed from childhood to use both hands indifferently,
+and always ready to set out on any expedition, not only against the
+Canaanites, but, if need be, against their own kinsfolk.* They had
+consequently aroused the hatred of both friend and foe, and we read that
+the remaining tribes at length decreed their destruction; a massacre
+ensued, from which six hundred Benjamites only escaped to continue the
+race.** Their territory adjoined on the south that of Jerusalem, the
+fortress of the Jebusites, and on the west the powerful confederation of
+which Gibeon was the head. It comprised some half-dozen towns--Ramah,
+Anathoth, Michmash, and Nob, and thus commanded both sides of the passes
+leading from the Shephelah into the valley of the Jordan. The Benjamites
+were in the habit of descending suddenly upon merchants who were making
+their way to or returning from Gilead, and of robbing them of their
+wares; sometimes they would make a raid upon the environs of Ekron and
+Gath, "like a wolf that ravineth:" realising the prediction of Jacob,
+"in the morning he shall devour the prey, and at even he shall divide
+the spoil."***
+
+     * Benjamin signifies, properly speaking, "the Southern."
+
+     ** Story of the Levite of Ephraim (Judges xix.-xxi.). The
+     groundwork of it contains only one historical element. The
+     story of the Levite is considered by some critics to be of a
+     later date than the rest of the text.
+
+     *** He is thus characterised in the Blessing of Jacob (Gen.
+     xlix. 27). VOL. VI.  X
+
+The Philistines never failed to make reprisals after each raid, and the
+Benjamites were no match for their heavily armed battalions; but the
+labyrinth of ravines and narrow gorges into which the Philistines had
+to penetrate to meet their enemy was a favourable region for guerilla
+warfare, in which they were no match for their opponents. Peace was
+never of long duration on this ill-defined borderland, and neither
+intercourse between one village and another, alliances, nor
+intermarriage between the two peoples had the effect of interrupting
+hostilities; even when a truce was made at one locality, the feud would
+be kept up at other points of contact. All details of this conflict have
+been lost, and we merely know that it terminated in the defeat of the
+house of Joseph, a number of whom were enslaved. The ancient sanctuary
+of Shiloh still continued to be the sacred town of the Hebrews, as it
+had been under the Canaanites, and the people of Ephraim kept there the
+ark of Jahveh-Sabaoth, "the Lord of Hosts."* It was a chest of wood,
+similar in shape to the shrine which surmounted the sacred barks of the
+Egyptian divinities, but instead of a prophesying statue, it contained
+two stones on which, according to the belief of a later age, the law had
+been engraved.** Yearly festivals were celebrated before it, and it was
+consulted as an oracle by all the Israelites. Eli, the priest to whose
+care it was at this time consigned, had earned universal respect by
+the austerity of his life and by his skill in interpreting the divine
+oracles.***
+
+     * At the very opening of the _First Book of Samuel_ (i. 3),
+     Shiloh is mentioned as being the sanctuary of _Jahveh-
+     Sabaoth_, Jahveh the Lord of hosts. The tradition preserved
+     in Josh, xviii. 1, removes the date of its establishment as
+     far back as the earliest times of the Israelite conquest.
+
+     ** The idea that the Tables of the Law were enclosed in the
+     Ark is frequently expressed in Exodus and in subsequent
+     books of the Hexateuch.
+
+     *** The history of Eli extends over chaps, i.-iv. of the
+     _First Book of Samuel_; it is incorporated with that of
+     Samuel, and treats only of the events which accompanied the
+     destruction of the sanctuary of Shiloh by the Philistines.
+
+His two sons, on the contrary, took advantage of his extreme age to
+annoy those who came up to worship, and they were even accused of
+improper behaviour towards the women who "served at the door of" the
+tabernacle. They appropriated to themselves a larger portion of the
+victims than they were entitled to, extracting from the caldron the
+meat offerings of the faithful after the sacrifice was over by means of
+flesh-hooks. Their misdeeds were such, that "men abhorred the offering
+of the Lord," and yet the reverence for the ark was so great in the
+minds of the people, that they continued to have recourse to it on every
+occasion of national danger.* The people of Ephraim and Benjamin having
+been defeated once between Eben-ezer and Aphek, bore the ark in state to
+the battle-field, that its presence might inspire them with confidence.
+The Philistines were alarmed at its advent, and exclaimed, "God is come
+into the camp. Woe unto us! Who shall deliver us out of the hand of
+these mighty gods?... Be strong, and quit yourselves like men, O ye
+Philistines, that ye be not servants unto the Hebrews, as they have been
+to you."** In response to this appeal, their troops fought so boldly
+that they once more gained a victory. "And there ran a man of Benjamin
+out of the army, and came to Shiloh the same day with his clothes rent,
+and with earth upon his head. And when he came, lo, Eli sat upon his
+seat by the wayside watching: for his heart trembled for the ark of God.
+And when the man came into the city, and told it, all the city cried
+out. And when Eli heard the noise of the crying, he said, What meaneth
+the noise of this tumult? And the man hasted, and came and told Eli. Now
+Eli was ninety and eight years old; and his eyes were set, that he could
+not see. And the man said unto Eli, I am he that came out of the army,
+and I fled to-day out of the army. And he said, How went the matter, my
+son? And he that brought the tidings answered and said, Israel is fled
+before the Philistines, and there hath been also a great slaughter among
+the people, and thy two sons also, Hophni and Phineas, are dead, and the
+ark of God is taken. And it came to pass, when he made mention of the
+ark of God, that he fell from off his seat backward by the side of
+the gate, and his neck brake, and he died: for he was an old man, and
+heavy."***
+
+     * Sam. iv. 12-18.
+
+     ** This is not mentioned in the sacred books; but certain
+     reasons for believing this destruction to have taken place
+     are given by Stade.
+
+     *** The Philistine garrison at Geba (Gibeah) is mentioned in
+     1 Sam. xiii. 3, i.
+
+The defeat of Eben-ezer completed, at least for a time, the overthrow of
+the tribes of Central Canaan. The Philistines destroyed the sanctuary
+of Shiloh, and placed a garrison at Gibeah to keep the Benjamites in
+subjection, and to command the route of the Jordan;* it would even
+appear that they pushed their advance-posts beyond Carmel in order to
+keep in touch with the independent Canaanite cities such as Megiddo,
+Taanach, and Bethshan, and to ensure a free use of the various routes
+leading in the direction of Damascus, Tyre, and Coele-Syria.**
+
+     * After the victory at Gilboa, the Philistines exposed the
+     dead bodies of Saul and his sons upon the walls of Bethshan
+     (1 Sam. xxxi. 10, 12), which they would not have been able
+     to do had the inhabitants not been allies or vassals.
+     Friendly relations with Bethshan entailed almost as a matter
+     of course some similar understanding with the cities of the
+     plain of Jezreel.
+
+     ** 1 Sam. vii. 16, 17. These verses represent, as a matter
+     of fact, all that we know of Samuel anterior to his
+     relations with Saul. This account seems to represent him as
+     exercising merely a restricted influence over the territory
+     of Benjamin and the south of Ephraim. It was not until the
+     prophetic period that, together with Eli, he was made to
+     figure as Judge of all Israel.
+
+The Philistine power continued dominant for at least half a century. The
+Hebrew chroniclers, scandalised at the prosperity of the heathen,
+did their best to abridge the time of the Philistine dominion, and
+interspersed it with Israelitish victories. Just at this time, however,
+there lived a man who was able to inspire them with fresh hope. He was
+a priest of Bamah, Samuel, the son of Elkanah, who had acquired the
+reputation of being a just and wise judge in the towns of Bethel,
+Gilgal, and Mizpah; "and he judged Israel in all those places, and his
+return was to Bamah, for there was his house... and he built there an
+altar unto the Lord." To this man the whole Israelite nation attributed
+with pride the deliverance of their race. The sacred writings relate how
+his mother, the pious Hannah, had obtained his birth from Jahveh after
+years of childlessness, and had forthwith devoted him to the service of
+God. She had sent him to Shiloh at the age of three years, and there,
+clothed in a linen tunic and in a little robe which his mother made for
+him herself, he ministered before God in the presence of Eli. One night
+it happened, when the latter was asleep in his place, "and the lamp
+of God was not yet gone out, and Samuel was laid down to sleep in the
+temple of the Lord, where the ark of God was, that the Lord called
+Samuel: and he said, Here am I. And he ran unto Eli, and said, Here
+am I; for thou calledst me. And he said, I called thee not; lie down
+again." Twice again the voice was heard, and at length Eli perceived
+that it was God who had called the child, and he bade him reply: "Speak,
+Lord; for Thy servant heareth." From thenceforward Jahveh was "with him,
+and did let none of his words fall to the ground. And all Israel from
+Dan even to Beersheba knew that Samuel was established to be a prophet
+of the Lord." Twenty years after the sad death of his master, Samuel
+felt that the moment had come to throw off the Philistine yoke; he
+exhorted the people to put away their false gods, and he assembled them
+at Mizpah to absolve them from their sins. The Philistines, suspicious
+of this concourse, which boded ill for the maintenance of their
+authority, arose against him. "And when the children of Israel heard it,
+they were afraid of the Philistines. And Samuel took a sucking lamb, and
+offered it for a whole burnt offering unto the Lord: and Samuel cried
+unto the Lord for Israel, and the Lord answered him." The Philistines,
+demoralised by the thunderstorm which ensued, were overcome on the very
+spot where they had triumphed over the sons of Eli, and fled in disorder
+to their own country. "Then Samuel took a stone, and set it between
+Mizpah and Shen, and called the name of it Eben-ezer (the Stone of
+Help), saying, Hitherto hath the Lord helped us." He next attacked the
+Tyrians and the Amorites, and won back from them all the territory they
+had conquered.* One passage, in which Samuel is not mentioned, tells
+us how heavily the Philistine yoke had weighed upon the people, and
+explains their long patience by the fact that their enemies had taken
+away all their weapons. "Now there was no smith found throughout all
+the land of Israel: for the Philistines said, Lest the Hebrews make them
+swords or spears;" and whoever needed to buy or repair the most ordinary
+agricultural implements was forced to address himself to the Philistine
+blacksmiths.** The very extremity of the evil worked its own cure. The
+fear of the Midian-ites had already been the occasion of the ephemeral
+rule of Jerubbaal and Abimelech; the Philistine tyranny forced first the
+tribes of Central and then those of Southern Canaan to unite under the
+leadership of one man. In face of so redoubtable an enemy and so grave a
+peril a greater effort was required, and the result was proportionate to
+their increased activity.
+
+     * This manner of retaliating against the Philistines for the
+     disaster they had formerly inflicted on Israel, is supposed
+     by some critics to be an addition of a later date, either
+     belonging to the time of the prophets, or to the period when
+     the Jews, without any king or settled government, rallied at
+     Mizpah. According to these scholars, 1 Sam. vii. 2-14 forms
+     part of a biography, written at a time when the foundation
+     of the Benjamite monarchy had not as yet been attributed to
+     Saul.
+
+     ** 1 Sam. xiii. 20, 21.
+
+The Manassite rule extended at most over two or three clans, but that
+of Saul and David embraced the Israelite nation.* Benjamin at that
+time reckoned among its most powerful chiefs a man of ancient and
+noble family--Saul, the son of Kish--who possessed extensive flocks and
+considerable property, and was noted for his personal beauty, for "there
+was not among the children of Israel a goodlier person than he: from
+his shoulders and upward he was higher than any of the people."** He had
+already reached mature manhood, and had several children, the eldest
+of whom, Jonathan, was well known as a skilful and brave soldier, while
+Saul's reputation was such that his kinsmen beyond Jordan had recourse
+to his aid as to a hero whose presence would secure victory. The
+Ammonites had laid siege to Jabesh-Gilead, and the town was on the point
+of surrendering; Saul came to their help, forced the enemy to raise the
+siege, and inflicted such a severe lesson upon them, that during the
+whole of his lifetime they did not again attempt hostilities. He was
+soon after proclaimed king by the Benjamites, as Jerubbaal had been
+raised to authority by the Manassites on the morrow of his victory.***
+
+     * The beginning of Saul's reign, up to his meeting with
+     David, will be found in 1 Sam. viii.-xv. We can distinguish
+     the remains of at least two ancient narratives, which the
+     writer of the Book of Samuel has put together in order to
+     form a complete and continuous account. As elsewhere in this
+     work, I have confined myself to accepting the results at
+     which criticism has arrived, without entering into detailed
+     discussions which do not come within the domain of history.
+
+     ** 1 Sam. ix. 2. In one account he is represented as quite a
+     young man, whose father is still in the prime of life (1
+     Sam. ix.), but this cannot refer to the time of the
+     Philistine war, where we find him accompanied, at the very
+     outset of his reign, by his son, who is already skilled in
+     the use of weapons.
+
+     *** 1 Sam. xi. According to the text of the Septuagint, the
+     war against the Ammonites broke out a month after Saul had
+     been secretly anointed by Samuel; his popular proclamation
+     did not take place till after the return from the campaign.
+
+We learn from the sacred writings that Samuel's influence had helped to
+bring about these events. It had been shown him by the divine voice that
+Saul was to be the chosen ruler, and he had anointed him and set him
+before the people as their appointed lord; the scene of this must have
+been either Mizpah or Gilgal.*
+
+     * One narrative appears to represent him as being only the
+     priest or local prophet of Hamah, and depicts him as
+     favourable to the establishment of the monarchy (1 Sam. ix.
+     1-27, x. 1-16); the other, however, admits that he was
+     "judge" of all Israel, and implies that he was hostile to the
+     choice of a king (1 Sam. viii. 1-22, x. 17, 27, xii. 1-25)
+
+The accession of a sovereign who possessed the allegiance of all Israel
+could not fail to arouse the vigilance of their Philistine oppressors;
+Jonathan, however, anticipated their attack and captured Gibeah. The
+five kings at once despatched an army to revenge this loss; the main
+body occupied Michmash, almost opposite to the stronghold taken from
+them, while three bands of soldiers were dispersed over the country,
+ravaging as they went, with orders to attack Saul in the rear. The
+latter had only six hundred men, with whom he scarcely dared to face
+so large a force; besides which, he was separated from the enemy by the
+Wady Suweinit, here narrowed almost into a gorge between two precipitous
+rocks, and through which no body of troops could penetrate without
+running the risk of exposing themselves in single file to the enemy.
+Jonathan, however, resolved to attempt a surprise in broad daylight,
+accompanied only by his armour-bearer. "There was a rocky crag on the
+one side, and a rooky crag on the other side: and the name of the one
+was Bozez (the Shining), and the name of the other Seneh (the Acacia).
+The one crag rose up on the north in front of Michmash, and the other on
+the south in front of Geba (Gribeah)." The two descended the side of the
+gorge, on the top of which they were encamped, and prepared openly to
+climb the opposite side. The Philistine sentries imagined they were
+deserters, and said as they approached: "Behold, the Hebrews come forth
+out of the holes where they had hid themselves. And the men of the
+garrison answered Jonathan and his armour-bearer, and said, Come up
+to us, and we will show you a thing. And Jonathan said unto his
+armour-bearer, Come up after me: for the Lord hath delivered them into
+the hand of Israel. And Jonathan climbed up upon his hands and upon his
+feet, and his armour-bearer after him: and they fell before Jonathan;
+and his armour-bearer slew them after him. And that first slaughter that
+Jonathan and his armour-bearer made, was about twenty men, within as
+it were half a furrow's length in an acre of land." From Gribeah, where
+Saul's troops were in ignorance of what was passing, the Benjamite
+sentinels could distinguish a tumult. Saul guessed that a surprise had
+taken place, and marched upon the enemy.
+
+[Illustration: 314.jpg THE WADY SUWEINIT]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from photograph No. 402 of the _Palestine
+     Exploration Fund_.
+
+The Philistines were ousted from their position, and pursued hotly
+beyond Bethel as far as Ajalon.* This constituted the actual birthday of
+the Israelite monarchy.
+
+     * The account of these events, separated by the parts
+     relating to the biography of Samuel (1 Sam. xiii. 76-15a,
+     thought by some to be of a later date), and of the breaking
+     by Jonathan of the fast enjoined by Saul (1 Sam. xiv. 23-
+     45), covers 1 Sam. xiii. 3-7a, 156-23, xiv. 1-22, 46. The
+     details appear to be strictly historical; the number of the
+     Philistines, however, seems to be exaggerated; "30,000
+     chariots, and 6000 horsemen, and people as the sand which is
+     on the sea-shore in multitude "(1 Sam. xiii. 5).
+
+Gilead, the whole house of Joseph--Ephraim and Manasseh--and Benjamin
+formed its nucleus, and were Saul's strongest supporters. We do not know
+how far his influence extended northwards; it probably stopped short at
+the neighbourhood of Mount Tabor, and the Galileans either refused to
+submit to his authority, or acknowledged it merely in theory. In the
+south the clans of Judah and Simeon were not long in rallying round
+him, and their neighbours the Kenites, with Caleb and Jerahmeel, soon
+followed their example. These southerners, however, appear to have been
+somewhat half-hearted in their allegiance to the Benjamite king: it was
+not enough to have gained their adhesion--a stronger tie was needed to
+attach them to the rest of the nation. Saul endeavoured to get rid of
+the line of Canaanite cities which isolated them from Ephraim, but
+he failed in the effort, we know not from what cause, and his attempt
+produced no other result than to arouse against him the hatred of the
+Gibeonite inhabitants.* He did his best to watch over the security of
+his new subjects, and protected them against the Amalekites, who were
+constantly harassing them.
+
+     * The fact is made known to us by an accidental mention of
+     it in 2 Sam. xxi. 1-11. The motive which induced Saul to
+     take arms against the Gibeonites is immediately apparent
+     when we realise the position occupied by Gideon between
+     Judah and the tribes of Central Canaan.
+
+Their king, Agag, happening to fall into his hands, he killed him, and
+destroyed several of their nomad bands, thus inspiring the remainder
+with a salutary terror.* Subsequent tradition credited him with
+victories gained over all the enemies of Israel--over Moab, Edom, and
+even the Aramaeans of Zobah--it endowed him even with the projects
+and conquests of David. At any rate, the constant incursions of the
+Philistines could not have left him much time for fighting in the
+north and east of his domains. Their defeat at Gibeah was by no means
+a decisive one, and they quickly recovered from the blow; the conflict
+with them lasted to the end of Saul's lifetime, and during the whole of
+this period he never lost an opportunity of increasing his army.**
+
+The monarchy was as yet in a very rudimentary state, without either
+the pomp or accessories usually associated with royalty in the ancient
+kingdoms of the East. Saul, as King of Israel, led much the same sort of
+life as when he was merely a Benjamite chief. He preferred to reside at
+Gibeah, in the house of his forefathers, with no further resources than
+those yielded by the domain inherited from his ancestors, together with
+the spoil taken in battle.***
+
+     * The part taken by Samuel in the narrative of Saul's war
+     against the Amalekites (1 Sam. xv.) is thought by some
+     critics to have been introduced with a view of exalting the
+     prophet's office at the expense of the king and the
+     monarchy. They regard 1 Sam. xiv. 48 as being the sole
+     historic ground of the narrative.
+
+     ** 1 Sam. xiv. 47. We may admit his successful skirmishes
+     with Moab, but some writers maintain that the defeat of the
+     Edomites and Aramaeans is a mere anticipation, and consider
+     that the passage is only a reflection of 2 Sam. viii. 8, and
+     reproduces the list of the wars of David, with the exception
+     of the expedition against Damascus.
+
+     *** Gibeah is nowhere expressly mentioned as being the
+     capital of Saul, but the name Gibeah of Saul which it bore
+     shows that it must have been the royal residence; the names
+     of the towns mentioned in the account of Saul's pursuit of
+     David--Naioth, Eamah, and Nob--are all near to Gibeah. It
+     was also at Gibeah that the Gibeonites slew seven of the
+     sons and grandsons of Saul (2 Sam. xxi. 6-9), no doubt to
+     bring ignominy on the family of the first king in the very
+     place in which they had governed.
+
+All that he had, in addition to his former surroundings, were a
+priesthood attached to the court, and a small army entirely at his own
+disposal. Ahijah, a descendant of Eli, sacrificed for the king when the
+latter did not himself officiate; he fulfilled the office of chaplain
+to him in time of war, and was the mouthpiece of the divine oracles
+when these were consulted as to the propitious moment for attacking the
+enemy.
+
+[Illustration: 319.jpg A PHOENICIAN SOLDIER]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from the bronze original in the
+     Louvre.
+
+The army consisted of a nucleus of Benjamites, recruited from the
+king's clan, with the addition of any adventurers, whether Israelites or
+strangers, who were attracted to enlist under a popular military chief.*
+It comprised archers, slingers, and bands of heavily armed infantry,
+after the fashion of the Phoenician, bearing pikes. We can gam some
+idea of their appearance and equipment from the bronze statuettes of an
+almost contemporary period, which show us the Phoenician foot-soldiers
+or the barbarian mercenaries in the pay of the Phoenician cities: they
+wear the horizontally striped loin-cloth of the Syrians, leaving the
+arms and legs entirely bare, and the head is protected by a pointed or
+conical helmet.
+
+     * Ahijah (1 Sam. xiv. 3), son of Ahitub, great-grandson of
+     Eli, appears to be the same as Ahimelech, son of Ahitub, who
+     subsequently helped David (1 Sam. xxi. 1-10), and was
+     massacred by order of Saul (1 Sam. xxii. 9-19). The scribe
+     must have been shocked by the name Melech--that of the god
+     Milik [Moloch]--and must have substituted Jah or Jahveh.
+
+Saul possessed none of the iron-bound chariots which always accompanied
+the Qanaanite infantry; these heavy vehicles would have been entirely
+out of place in the mountain districts, which were the usual field of
+operations for the Israelite force.* We are unable to ascertain whether
+the king's soldiers received any regular pay, but we know that the spoil
+was divided between the prince and his men, each according to his
+rank and in proportion to the valour he had displayed.** In cases of
+necessity, the whole of the tribes were assembled, and a selection was
+made of all those capable of bearing arms. This militia, composed mainly
+of a pastoral peasantry in the prime of life, capable of heroic efforts,
+was nevertheless ill-disciplined, liable to sudden panics, and prone to
+become disbanded on the slightest reverse.***
+
+     * With regard to the use of the bow among Saul's soldiers,
+     cf. 1 Sam. xx. 18-42, where we find the curious scene of the
+     meeting of David and Jonathan, when the latter came out of
+     Gibeah on the pretext of practising with bow and arrows. The
+     accoutrement of the Hebrews is given in the passage where
+     Saul lends his armour to David before meeting with Goliath
+     (1 Sam. xvii. 38, 39).
+
+     ** Cf. the quarrel which took place between the soldiers of
+     David about the spoil taken from the Amalekites, and the
+     manner in which the strife was decided by David (1 Sam. xxx.
+     21-25)
+
+     *** Saul, for instance, assembles the people and makes a
+     selection to attack the Philistines (1 Sam. xiii. 2, 4, 7)
+     against the Ammonites (1 Sam. xi. 7, 8) and against the
+     Amalekites (1 Sam. xv. 4).
+
+Saul had the supreme command of the whole; the members of his own family
+served as lieutenants under him, including his son Jonathan, to whom
+he owed some of his most brilliant victories, together with his cousin
+Abner, the _sar-zaba_, who led the royal guard.* Among the men of
+distinguished valour who had taken service under Saul, he soon singled
+out David, son of Jesse, a native of Bethlehem of Judah.** David was
+the first Judaean hero, the typical king who served as a model to all
+subsequent monarchs. His elevation, like that of Saul, is traced to
+Samuel. The old prophet had repaired to Bethlehem ostensibly to offer a
+sacrifice, and after examining all the children of Jesse, he chose the
+youngest, and "anointed him in the midst of his brethren: and the spirit
+of the Lord came mightily upon David."***
+
+     * 1 Sam. xiv. 50, 51. There is no record of the part played
+     by Abner during Saul's lifetime: he begins to figure in the
+     narrative after the battle at Gilboa under the double reign
+     of Ish-bosheth and David.
+
+     ** The name of David is a shortened form of Davdo, Dodo,
+     "the favourite of Him," i.e. God.
+
+     *** The intervention of the prophet occupies 1 Sam. xvi. 1-
+     13. Some critics have imagined that this passage was
+     interpolated at a later date, and reflects the events which
+     are narrated in chap. x. They say it was to show that Saul
+     was not alone in enjoying consecration by the prophet, and
+     hence all doubt would be set at rest as to whether David was
+     actually that "neighbour of thine, that is better than
+     thou," mentioned in 1 Sam. xv. 28.
+
+His introduction at the court of Saul is variously accounted for.
+According to one narrative, Saul, being possessed by an evil spirit,
+fell at times into a profound melancholy, from which he could be aroused
+only by the playing of a harp. On learning that David was skilled in
+this instrument, he begged Jesse to send him his son, and the lad soon
+won the king's affection. As often as the illness came upon him, David
+took his harp, and "Saul was refreshed, and the evil spirit departed
+from him."* Another account relates that he entered on his soldierly
+career by killing with his sling Goliath of Gath,** who had challenged
+the bravest Israelites to combat; though elsewhere the death of Goliath
+is attributed to Elhanan of Bethlehem,*** one of the "mighty men of
+valour," who specially distinguished himself in the wars against the
+Philistines. David had, however, no need to take to himself the brave
+deeds of others; at Ephes-dammim, in company with Eleazar, the son of
+Dodai, and Shammah, the son of Agu, he had posted himself in a field
+of lentils, and the three warriors had kept the Philistines at bay till
+their discomfited Israelite comrades had had time to rally.****
+
+     * 1 Sam. xvi. 14-23. This narrative is directly connected
+     with 1 Sam. xiv. 52, where we are told that when "Saul saw
+     any strong man, or any valiant man, he took him unto him."
+
+     ** 1 Sam. xvii., xviii. 1-5. According to some writers, this
+     second version, the best known of the two, is a development
+     at a later period of the tradition preserved in 2 Sam. xxi.
+     19, where the victory of Elhanan over Goliath is recorded.
+
+     *** 2 Sam. xxi. 19, where the duel of Goliath and Elhanan is
+     placed in the reign of David, during the combat at Gob. Some
+     critics think that the writer of Chronicles, recognising the
+     difficulty presented by this passage, changed the epithet
+     Bethlehemite, which qualified the name of Elhanan, into
+     Lahmi, the name of Goliath's brother (1 Citron, xx. 5). Say
+     ce thought to get over the difficulty by supposing that
+     Elhanan was David's first name; but Elhanan is the son of
+     Jair, and not the son of Jesse.
+
+     **** The combat of Paz-Dammim or Ephes-Dammim is mentioned
+     in 1 Sam. xvii. 1; the exploit of David and his two
+     comrades, 2 Sam: xxiii. 9-12 (cf. 1 Chron. xi, 12-14, which
+     slightly varies from 2 Sam. xxiii. 9-12).
+
+Saul entrusted him with several difficult undertakings, in all of which
+he acquitted himself with honour. On his return from one of them, the
+women of the villages came out to meet him, singing and dancing to the
+sound of timbrels, the refrain of their song being: "Saul hath slain his
+thousands, and David his ten thousands." The king concealed the jealousy
+which this simple expression of joy excited within him, but it found
+vent at the next outbreak of his illness, and he attempted to kill David
+with a spear, though soon after he endeavoured to make amends for his
+action by giving him his second daughter Michal in marriage.* This did
+not prevent the king from again attempting David's life, either in
+a real or simulated fit of madness; but not being successful, he
+despatched a body of men to waylay him. According to one account it was
+Michal who helped her husband to escape,** while another attributes the
+saving of his life to Jonathan. This prince had already brought about
+one reconciliation between his father and David, and had spared no pains
+to reinstall him in the royal favour, but his efforts merely aroused
+the king's suspicion against himself. Saul imagined that a conspiracy
+existed for the purpose of dethroning him, and of replacing him by his
+son; Jonathan, knowing that his life also was threatened, at length
+renounced the attempt, and David and his followers withdrew from court.
+
+     * The account of the first disagreement between Saul and
+     David, and with regard to the marriage of David with Michal,
+     is given in 1 Sam. xviii. 6-16, 20-29, and presents every
+     appearance of authenticity. Verses 17-19, mentioning a
+     project of union between David and Saul's eldest daughter,
+     Merab, has at some time been interpolated; it is not given
+     in the LXX., either because it was not in the Hebrew version
+     they had before them, or because they suppressed it owing to
+     the motive appearing to them insufficient.
+
+     ** 1 Sam. xix. 11-17. Many critics regard this passage as an
+     interpolation.
+
+[Illustration: 324.jpg AID-EL-RA, THE SITE OF THE ANCIENT ADULLAM]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from photograph No. 430 of the _Palestine
+     Exploration Fund._
+
+He was hospitably received by a descendant of Eli,* Ahimelech the
+priest, at Nob, and wandered about in the neighbourhood of Adullam,
+hiding himself in the wooded valleys of Khereth, in the heart of Judah.
+He retained the sympathies of many of the Benjamites, more than one
+of whom doubted whether it would not be to their advantage to transfer
+their allegiance from their aged king to this more youthful hero.
+
+     * 1 Sam. xxi. 8, 9 adds that he took as a weapon the sword
+     of Goliath which was laid up in the sanctuary at Nob.
+
+Saul got news of their defection, and one day when he was sitting, spear
+in hand, under the tamarisk at Gibeah, he indignantly upbraided his
+servants, and pointed out to them the folly of their plans. "Hear, now,
+ye Benjamites; will the son of Jesse give every one of you fields and
+vineyards? will he make you all captains of thousands and captains of
+hundreds?" Ahimelech was selected as the victim of the king's anger:
+denounced by Doeg, Saul's steward, he was put to death, and all his
+family, with the exception of Abiathar, one of his sons, perished with
+him.* As soon as it became known that David held the hill-country,
+a crowd of adventurous spirits flocked to place themselves under his
+leadership, anticipating, no doubt, that spoil would not be lacking with
+so brave a chief, and he soon found himself at the head of a small
+army, with Abiathar as priest, and the ephod, rescued from Nob, in his
+possession.**
+
+     * 1 Sam. xix.-xxii., where, according to some critics, two
+     contradictory versions have been blended together at a late
+     period. The most probable version is given in 1 Sam, xix. 8-
+     10 [11-18a], xxi. 1-7 [8-10], xxii., and is that which I
+     have followed by preference; the other version, according to
+     these writers, attributes too important a role to Jonathan,
+     and relates at length the efforts he made to reconcile his
+     father and his friend (1 Sam. xviii. 30, xix. 1-7, xx.). It
+     is thought, from the confusion apparent in this part of the
+     narrative, that a record of the real motives which provoked
+     a rupture between the king and his son-in-law has not been
+     preserved.
+
+     ** 1 Sam. xxii. 20-23, xxiii. 6. For the use of the ephod by
+     Abiathar for oracular purposes, cf. 1 Sam. xxiii. 9-12, xxx.
+     7, 8; the inquiry in 1 Sam. xxiii. 2-4 probably belongs to
+     the same series, although neither Abiathar nor the ephod is
+     mentioned.
+
+The country was favourable for their operations; it was a perfect
+labyrinth of deep ravines, communicating with each other by narrow
+passes or by paths winding along the edges of precipices. Isolated
+rocks, accessible only by rugged ascents, defied assault, while
+extensive caves offered a safe hiding-place to those who were familiar
+with their windings. One day the little band descended to the rescue of
+Keilah, which they succeeded in wresting from the Philistines, but no
+sooner did they learn that Saul was on his way to meet them than they
+took refuge in the south of Judah, in the neighbourhood of Ziph and
+Maon, between the mountains and the Dead Sea.*
+
+     * 1 Sam. xxiii. 1-13; an episode acknowledged to be
+     historical by nearly-all modern critics.
+
+[Illustration: 326.jpg THE DESERT OF JUDAH]
+
+     Drawn by Boudior, from photograph No. 197 of the _Palestine
+     Exploration Fund._ The heights visible in the distance are
+     the mountains of Moab, beyond the Dead Sea.
+
+Saul already irritated by his rival's successes, was still more galled
+by being always on the point of capturing him, and yet always seeing him
+slip from his grasp. On one afternoon, when the king had retired into a
+cave for his siesta, he found himself at the mercy of his adversary; the
+latter, however, respected the sleep of his royal master, and contented
+himself with cutting a piece off his mantle.* On another occasion David,
+in company with Abishai and Ahimelech the Hittite, took a lance and
+a pitcher of water from the king's bedside.** The inhabitants of the
+country were not all equally loyal to David's cause; those of Ziph,
+whose meagre resources were taxed to support his followers, plotted to
+deliver him up to the king,*** while Nabal of Maon roughly refused
+him food. Abigail atoned for her husband's churlishness by a speedy
+submission; she collected a supply of provisions, and brought it herself
+to the wanderers. David was as much disarmed by her tact as by her
+beauty, and when she was left a widow he married her. This union insured
+the support of the Calebite clan, the most powerful in that part of
+the country, and policy as well as gratitude no doubt suggested the
+alliance.
+
+     * 1 Sam, xxiv. Thought by some writers to be of much later
+     date.
+
+     ** 1 Sam. xxvi. 4-25.
+
+Skirmishes were not as frequent between the king's troops and the
+outlaws as we might at first be inclined to believe, but if at times
+there was a truce to hostilities, they never actually ceased, and
+the position became intolerable. Encamped between his kinsman and the
+Philistines, David found himself unable to resist either party except by
+making friends with the other. An incursion of the Philistines near Maon
+saved David from the king, but when Saul had repulsed it, David had no
+choice but to throw himself into the arms of Achish, King of Gath,
+of whom he craved permission to settle as his vassal at Ziklag, on
+condition of David's defending the frontier against the Bedawin.*
+
+
+* 1 Sam. xxvii. The earlier part of this chapter (vers. 1-6) is strictly
+historical. Some critics take vers. 8-12 to be of later date, and
+pretend that they were inserted to show the cleverness of David, and to
+deride the credulity of the King of Gath.
+
+Saul did not deem it advisable to try and dislodge him from this
+retreat. Peace having been re-established in Judah, the king turned
+northward and occupied the heights which bound the plain of Jezreel to
+the east; it is possible that he contemplated pushing further afield,
+and rallying round him those northern tribes who had hitherto never
+acknowledged his authority. He may, on the other hand, have desired
+merely to lay hands on the Syrian highways, and divert to his own
+profit the resources brought by the caravans which plied along them.
+The Philistines, who had been nearly ruined by the loss of the right to
+demand toll of these merchants, assembled the contingents of their five
+principalities, among them being the Hebrews of David, who formed
+the personal guard of Achish. The four other princes objected to the
+presence of these strangers in their midst, and forced Achish to dismiss
+them. David returned to Ziklag, to find ruin and desolation everywhere.
+The Amalekites had taken advantage of the departure of the Hebrews to
+revenge themselves once for all for David's former raids on them, and
+they had burnt the town, carrying off the women and flocks. David at
+once set out on their track, overtook them just beyond the torrent of
+Besor, and rescued from them, not only his own belongings, but all the
+booty they had collected by the way in the southern provinces of Caleb,
+in Judah, and in the Cherethite plain.
+
+He distributed part of this spoil among those cities of Judah which
+had shown hospitality to himself and his men, for instance, to Jattir,
+Aroer, Eshtemoa, Hormah, and Hebron.* While he thus kept up friendly
+relations with those who might otherwise have been tempted to forget
+him, Saul was making his last supreme effort against the Philistines,
+but only ito meet with failure. He had been successful in repulsing them
+as long as he kept to the mountain districts, where the courage of his
+troops made up for their lack of numbers and the inferiority of their
+arms; but he was imprudent enough to take up a position on the hillsides
+of Gilboa, whose gentle slopes offered no hindrances to the operations
+of the heavy Philistine battalions. They attacked the Israelites from
+the Shunem side, and swept all before them. Jonathan perished in the
+conflict, together with his two brothers, Malchi-shua and Abinadab;
+Saul, who was wounded by an arrow, begged his armour-bearer to take his
+life, but, on his persistently refusing, the king killed himself with
+his own sword. The victorious Philistines cut off his head and those of
+his sons, and placed their armour in the temple of Ashtoreth,**
+while their bodies, thus despoiled, were hung up outside the walls of
+Bethshan, whose Canaanite inhabitants had made common cause with the
+Philistines against Israel.
+
+     * 1 Sam. xxviii. 1, 2, xxix., xxx. The torrent of Besor is
+     the present Wady Esh-Sheriah, which runs to the south of
+     Gaza.
+
+     ** The text of 1 Sam. xxxi. 10 says, in a vague manner, "in
+     the house of the Ashtaroth" (in the plural), which is
+     corrected, somewhat arbitrarily, in 1 Chron. x. 10 iato "in
+     the house of Dagon" (B.V.); it is possible that it was the
+     temple at Gaza, Gaza being the chief of the Philistine
+     towns.
+
+The people of Jabesh-Gilead, who had never forgotten how Saul had saved
+them from the Ammonites, hearing the news, marched all night, rescued
+the mutilated remains, and brought them back to their own town, where
+they burned them, and buried the charred bones under a tamarisk, fasting
+meanwhile seven days as a sign of mourning.*
+
+     * 1 Sam. xxxi. It would seem that there were two narratives
+     describing this war: in one, the Philistines encamped at
+     Shunem, and Saul occupied Mount Gilboa (1 Sam. xxviii. 4);
+     in the other, the Philistines encamped at Aphek, and the
+     Israelites "by the fountain which is in Jezreel" (1 Sam.
+     xxix. 1). The first of these accounts is connected with the
+     episode of the witch of Endor, the second with the sending
+     away of David by Achish. The final catastrophe is in both
+     narratives placed on Mount Gilboa and Stade has endeavoured
+     to reconcile the two accounts by admitting that the battle
+     was fought between Aphek and "the fountain," but that the
+     final scene took place on the slopes of Gilboa. There are
+     even two versions of the battle, one in 1 Sam. xxxi. and the
+     other in 2 Sam. i. 6-10, where Saul does not kill himself,
+     but begs an Amalekite to slay him; many critics reject the
+     second version.
+
+[Illustration: 330.jpg THE HILL OF BETHSHAN, SEEN FROM THE EAST]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from photograph No. 79 of the _Palestine
+     Exploration Fund._
+
+David afterwards disinterred these relics, and laid them in the
+burying-place of the family of Kish at Zela, in Benjamin. The tragic end
+of their king made a profound impression on the people. We read that,
+before entering on his last battle, Saul was given over to gloomy
+forebodings: he had sought counsel of Jahveh, but God "answered him not,
+neither by dreams, nor by Urim, nor by prophets." The aged Samuel had
+passed away at Ramah, and had apparently never seen the king after
+the flight of David;* Saul now bethought himself of the prophet in his
+despair, and sought to recall him from the tomb to obtain his counsel.
+
+     * 1 Sam. xxv. 1, repeated 1 Sam. xxviii. 3, with a mention
+     of the measures taken by Saul against the wizards and
+     fortune-tellers.
+
+The king had banished from the land all wizards and fortune-tellers, but
+his servants brought him word that at Endor there still remained a woman
+who could call up the dead. Saul disguised himself, and, accompanied by
+two of his retainers, went to find her; he succeeded in overcoming her
+fear of punishment, and persuaded her to make the evocation. "Whom
+shall I bring up unto thee?"--"Bring up Samuel."--And when the woman saw
+Samuel, she cried with a loud voice, saying, "Why hast thou deceived me,
+for thou art Saul?" And the king said unto her, "Be not afraid, for what
+sawest thou?"--"I saw gods ascending out of the earth."--"What form is
+he of?"--"An old man cometh up, and he is covered with a mantle." Saul
+immediately recognised Samuel, and prostrated himself with his face to
+the ground before him. The prophet, as inflexible after death as in
+his lifetime, had no words of comfort for the God-forsaken man who had
+troubled his repose. "The Lord hath rent the kingdom out of thine hand,
+and given it to thy neighbour, even to David, because thou obeyedst not
+the voice of the Lord,... and tomorrow shalt thou and thy sons be with
+me. The Lord also shall deliver the host of Israel into the hands of the
+Philistines."*
+
+     * 1 Sam. xxviii. 5-25. There is no reason why this scene
+     should not be historical; it was natural that Saul, like
+     many an ancient general in similar circumstances, should
+     seek to know the future by means of the occult sciences then
+     in vogue. Some critics think that certain details of the
+     evocation--as, for instance, the words attributed to Samuel
+     --are of a later date.
+
+We learn, also, how David, at Ziklag, on hearing the news of the
+disaster, had broken into weeping, and had composed a lament, full
+of beauty, known as the "Song of the Bow," which the people of Judah
+committed to memory in their childhood. "Thy glory, O Israel, is slain
+upon thy high places! How are the mighty fallen! Tell it not in Gath,
+publish it not in the streets of Ashkelon; lest the daughters of the
+Philistines rejoice, lest the daughters of the uncircumcised triumph!
+Ye mountains of Gilboa, let there be no dew nor rain upon you, neither
+fields of offerings: for there the shield of the mighty was vilely cast
+away, the shield of Saul, not anointed with oil! From the blood of the
+slain, from the fat of the mighty, the bow of Jonathan turned not back,
+the sword of Saul returned not empty. Saul and Jonathan were lovely and
+pleasant in their lives, and in death they were not divided."*
+
+     * 2 Sam. i. 17-27 (R.V.). This elegy is described as a
+     quotation from Jasher, the "Book of the Upright." Many modern
+     writers attribute its authorship to David himself; others
+     reject this view; all agree in regarding it as extremely
+     ancient. The title, "Song of the Bow," is based on the
+     possibly corrupt text of ver. 18.
+
+The Philistines occupied in force the plain of Jezreel and the pass
+which leads from it into the lowlands of Bethshan: the Israelites
+abandoned the villages which they had occupied in these districts, and
+the gap between the Hebrews of the north and those of the centre grew
+wider. The remnants of Saul's army sought shelter on the eastern bank
+of the Jordan, but found no leader to reorganise them. The reverse
+sustained by the Israelitish champion seemed, moreover, to prove the
+futility of trying to make a stand against the invader, and even the
+useless-ness of the monarchy itself: why, they might have asked, burthen
+ourselves with a master, and patiently bear with his exactions, if, when
+put to the test, he fails to discharge the duties for the performance
+of which he was chosen? And yet the advantages of a stable form of
+government had been so manifest during the reign of Saul, that it never
+for a moment occurred to his former subjects to revert to patriarchal
+institutions: the question which troubled them was not whether they were
+to have a king, but rather who was to fill the post. Saul had left a
+considerable number of descendants behind him.* From these, Abner, the
+ablest of his captains, chose Ishbaal, and set him on the throne to
+reign under his guidance.**
+
+     * We know that he had three sons by his wife Ahinoam--
+     Jonathan, Ishbaal, and Malchi-shua; and two daughters, Merab
+     and Michal (1 Sam. xiv. 49, 50, where "Ishvi" should be read
+     "Ishbaal"). Jonathan left at least one son, Meribbaal (1
+     Chron. viii. 34, ix. 40, called Mephibosheth in 2 Sam. xxi.
+     7), and Merab had five sons by Adriel (2 Sam. xxi. 8). One
+     of Saul's concubines, Rizpah, daughter of Aiah, had borne
+     him two sons, Armoni and Meribbaal (2 Sam. xxi. 8, where the
+     name Meribbaal is changed into Mephibosheth); Abinadab, who
+     fell with him in the fight at Mount Gilboa (1 Sam. xxxi. 2),
+     whose mother's name is not mentioned, was another son.
+
+     ** Ishbaal was still a child when his father died: had he
+     been old enough to bear arms, he would have taken a part in
+     the battle of Gilboa with his brothers.. The expressions
+     used in the account of his elevation to the throne prove
+     that he was a minor (2 Sam. ii. 8, 9); the statement that he
+     was forty years old when he began to reign would seem,
+     therefore, to be an error (ii. 10).
+
+Gibeah was too close to the frontier to be a safe residence for a
+sovereign whose position was still insecure; Abner therefore installed
+Ishbaal at Mahanaim, in the heart of the country of Gilead. The house
+of Jacob, including the tribe of Benjamin, acknowledged him as king, but
+Judah held aloof. It had adopted the same policy at the beginning of
+the previous reign, yet its earlier isolation had not prevented it from
+afterwards throwing in its lot with the rest of the nation. But at that
+time no leader had come forward from its own ranks who was worthy to be
+reckoned among the mighty men of Israel; now, on the contrary, it had on
+its frontier a bold and resolute leader of its own race. David lost no
+time in stepping into the place of those whose loss he had bewailed.
+Their sudden removal, while it left him without a peer among his own
+people, exposed him to the suspicion and underground machinations of his
+foreign protectors; he therefore quitted them and withdrew to Hebron,
+where his fellow-countrymen hastened to proclaim him king.* From that
+time onwards the tendency of the Hebrew race was to drift apart into two
+distinct bodies; one of them, the house of Joseph, which called itself
+by the name of Israel, took up its position in the north, on the banks
+of the Jordan; the other, which is described as the house of Judah, in
+the south, between the Dead Sea and the Shephelah. Abner endeavoured to
+suppress the rival kingdom in its infancy: he brought Ishbaal to Gibeah
+and proposed to Joab, who was in command of David's army, that the
+conflict should be decided by the somewhat novel expedient of pitting
+twelve of the house of Judah against an equal number of the house of
+Benjamin. The champions of Judah are said to have won the day, but the
+opposing forces did not abide by the result, and the struggle still
+continued.**
+
+     * 2 Sam. ii. 1--11. Very probably Abner recognised the
+     Philistine suzerainty as David had done, for the sake of
+     peace; at any rate, we find no mention in Holy Writ of a war
+     between Ishbaal and the Philistines.
+
+     ** 2 Sam. ii. 12-32, iii. 1.
+
+An intrigue in the harem furnished a solution of the difficulty. Saul
+had raised one of his wives of the second rank, named Eizpah, to the
+post of favourite. Abner became enamoured of her and took her. This was
+an insult to the royal house, and amounted to an act of open usurpation:
+the wives of a sovereign could not legally belong to any but his
+successor, and for any one to treat them as Abner had treated Rizpah,
+was equivalent to his declaring himself the equal, and in a sense the
+rival, of his master. Ishbaal keenly resented his minister's conduct,
+and openly insulted him. Abner made terms with David, won the northern
+tribes, including that of Benjamin, over to his side, and when what
+seemed a propitious moment had arrived, made his way to Hebron with
+an escort of twenty men. He was favourably received, and all kinds of
+promises were made him; but when he was about to depart again in
+order to complete the negotiations with the disaffected elders, Joab,
+returning from an expedition, led him aside into a gateway and slew him.
+David gave him solemn burial, and composed a lament on the occasion, of
+which four verses have come down to us: having thus paid tribute to
+the virtues of the deceased general, he lost no time in taking further
+precautions to secure his power. The unfortunate king Ishbaal, deserted
+by every one, was assassinated by two of his officers as he slept in the
+heat of the day, and his head was carried to Hebron: David again poured
+forth lamentations, and ordered the traitors to be killed. There was now
+no obstacle between him and the throne: the elders of the people met him
+at Hebron, poured oil upon his head, and anointed him king over all
+the provinces which had obeyed the rule of Saul in Gilead--Ephraim and
+Benjamin as well as Judah.*
+
+     * 2 Sam. v. 1-3; in 1 Ghron. xi. 1-3, xii. 23-40, we find
+     further details beyond those given in the Book of Samuel; it
+     seems probable, however, that the northern tribes may not
+     have recognised David's sovereignty at this time.
+
+As long as Ishbaal lived, and his dissensions with Judah assured their
+supremacy, the Philistines were content to suspend hostilities: the news
+of his death, and of the union effected between Israel and Judah, soon
+roused them from this state of quiescence. As prince of the house of
+Caleb and vassal of the lord of Grath, David had not been an object of
+any serious apprehension to them; but in his new character, as master
+of the dominions of Saul, David became at once a dangerous rival, whom
+they must overthrow without delay, unless they were willing to risk
+being ere long overthrown by him. They therefore made an attack on
+Bethlehem with the choicest of their forces, and entrenched themselves
+there, with the Canaanite city of Jebus as their base, so as to separate
+Judah entirely from Benjamin, and cut off the little army quartered
+round Hebron from the reinforcements which the central tribes would
+otherwise have sent to its aid.* This move was carried out so quickly
+that David found himself practically isolated from the rest of his
+kingdom, and had no course left open but to shut himself up in Adullam,
+with his ordinary guard and the Judsean levies.**
+
+     * The history of this war is given in 2 Sam. v. 17-25, where
+     the text shows signs of having been much condensed. It is
+     preceded by the account of the capture of Jerusalem, which
+     some critics would like to transfer to chap, vi., following
+     ver. 1 which leads up to it. The events which followed are
+     self-explanatory, if we assume, as I have done in the text,
+     that the Philistines wished to detach Judah from Israel: at
+     first (2 Sam. v. 17-21) David endeavours to release himself
+     and effect a juncture with Israel, as is proved by the
+     relative positions assigned to the two opposing armies, the
+     Philistines at Bethlehem, David in the cave of Adullam;
+     afterwards (2 Sam. v. 22-25) David has shaken himself free,
+     has rejoined Israel, and is carrying on the struggle between
+     Gibeah and Gezer. The incidents recounted in 2 Sam. xxi. 15-
+     22, xxiii. 13-19, seem to refer almost exclusively to the
+     earlier part of the war, at the time when the Hebrews were
+     hemmed in in the neighbourhood of Adullam.
+
+     ** The passage in 2 Sam. v. 17 simply states that David
+     "went down to the hold," and gives no further details. This
+     expression, following as it does the account of the taking
+     of Jerusalem, would seem to refer to this town itself, and
+     Renan has thus interpreted it. It really refers to Adullam,
+     as is shown by the passage in 2 Sam. xxiii. 13-17. 1 2 Sam.
+     xxi. 15-17.
+
+The whole district round about is intersected by a network of winding
+streams, and abounds in rocky gorges, where a few determined men could
+successfully hold their ground against the onset of a much more numerous
+body of troops. The caves afford, as we know, almost impregnable
+refuges: David had often hidden himself in them in the days when he fled
+before Saul, and now his soldiers profited by the knowledge he possessed
+of them to elude the attacks of the Philistines. He began a sort of
+guerilla warfare, in the conduct of which he seems to have been without
+a rival, and harassed in endless skirmishes his more heavily equipped
+adversaries. He did not spare himself, and freely risked his own life;
+but he was of small stature and not very powerful, so that his spirit
+often outran his strength. On one occasion, when he had advanced too far
+into the fray and was weary with striking, he ran great peril of being
+killed by a gigantic Philistine: with difficulty Abishai succeeded in
+rescuing him unharmed from the dangerous position into which he had
+ventured, and for the future he was not allowed to run such risks on the
+field of battle. On another occasion, when lying in the cave of Adullam,
+he began to feel a longing for the cool waters of Bethlehem, and asked
+who would go down and fetch him a draught from the well by the gates
+of the town. Three of his mighty men, Joshebbasshebeth, Eleazar, and
+Shammah, broke through the host of the Philistines and succeeded in
+bringing it; but he refused to drink the few drops they had brought,
+and poured them out as a libation to Jehovah, saying, "Shall I drink the
+blood of men that went in jeopardy of their lives?"* Duels between
+the bravest and stoutest champions of the two hosts were of frequent
+occurrence. It was in an encounter of this kind that Elhanan the
+Bethlehemite [or David] slew the giant Goliath at Gob. At length David
+succeeded in breaking his way through the enemies' lines in the valley of
+Kephaim, thus forcing open the road to the north. Here he probably fell
+in with the Israelitish contingent, and, thus reinforced, was at last
+in a position to give battle in the open: he was again successful,
+and, routing his foes, pursued them from Gibeon to Gezer.** None of his
+victories, however, was of a sufficiently decisive character to bring
+the struggle to an end: it dragged on year after year, and when at last
+it did terminate, there was no question on either side of submission or
+of tribute:*** the Hebrews completely regained their independence, but
+the Philistines do not seem to have lost any portion of their domain,
+and apparently retained possession of all that they had previously held.
+
+     * 2 Sam. xxiii. 13-17; cf. 1 Ghron. xi. 15-19. Popular
+     tradition furnishes many incidents of a similar type; cf.
+     Alexander in the desert of Gedrosia, Godfrey de Bouillon in
+     Asia Minor, etc.
+
+     ** The Hebrew text gives "from Geba [or Gibeah] to Gezer"
+     (2 Sam. v. 25); the Septuagint, "from Gibeon to Gezer." This
+     latter reading [which is that of 1 Chron. xiv. 16.--Tr.] is
+     more in accordance with the geographical facts, and I have
+     therefore adopted it. Jahveh had shown by a continual
+     rustling in the leaves of the mulberry trees that He was on
+     David's side.
+
+     *** In 2 Sam. viii. 1 we are told that David humiliated the
+     Philistines, and took "the bridle of the mother city" out of
+     their hands, or, in other words, destroyed the supremacy
+     which they had exercised over Israel; he probably did no
+     more than this, and failed to secure any part of their
+     territory. The passage in 1 Chron. xviii. 1, which
+     attributes to him the conquest of Gath and its dependencies,
+     is probably an amplification of the somewhat obscure wording
+     employed in 2 Sam. viii. 1.
+
+But though they suffered no loss of territory, their position was in
+reality much inferior to what it was before. Their control of the plain
+of Jezreel was lost to them for ever, and with it the revenue which they
+had levied from passing caravans: the Hebrews transferred to themselves
+this right of their former masters, and were so much the richer at their
+expense. To the five cities this was a more damaging blow than twenty
+reverses would have been to Benjamin or Judah. The military spirit had
+not died out among the Philistines, and they were still capable of any
+action which did not require sustained effort; but lack of resources
+prevented them from entering on a campaign of any length, and any chance
+they may at one time have had of exercising a dominant influence in the
+affairs of Southern Syria had passed away. Under the restraining hand
+of Egypt they returned to the rank of a second-rate power, just strong
+enough to inspire its neighbours with respect, but too weak to extend
+its territory by annexing that of others. Though they might still, at
+times, give David trouble by contesting at intervals the possession of
+some outlying citadel, or by making an occasional raid on one of
+the districts which lay close to the frontier, they were no longer a
+permanent menace to the continued existence of his kingdom.
+
+But was Judah strong enough to take their place, and set up in Southern
+Syria a sovereign state, around which the whole fighting material of the
+country might range itself with confidence? The incidents of the last
+war had clearly shown the disadvantages of its isolated position in
+regard to the bulk of the nation. The gap between Ekron and the Jordan,
+which separated it from Ephraim and Manasseh, had, at all costs, to be
+filled up, if a repetition of the manouvre which so nearly cost David
+his throne at Adullam were to be avoided. It is true that the Gibeonites
+and their allies acknowledged the sovereignty of Ephraim, and formed
+a sort of connecting link between the tribes, but it was impossible to
+rely on their fidelity so long as they were exposed to the attacks of
+the Jebusites in their rear: as soon therefore as David found he had
+nothing more to fear from the Philistines, he turned his attention
+to Jerusalem.* This city stood on a dry and sterile limestone spur,
+separated on three sides from the surrounding hills by two valleys of
+unequal length. That of the Kedron, on the east, begins as a simple
+depression, but gradually becomes deeper and narrower as it extends
+towards the south. About a mile and a half from its commencement it is
+nothing more than a deep gorge, shut in by precipitous rocks, which for
+some days after the winter rains is turned into the bed of a torrent.**
+
+     * The name Jerusalem occurs under the form Ursalimmu, or
+     Urusalim, in the Tel el-Amarna tablets. Sion was the name of
+     the citadel preserved by the Israelites after the capture of
+     the place, and applied by them to the part of the city which
+     contained the royal palace, and subsequently to the town
+     itself.
+
+     ** The Kedron is called a nalial (2 Sam. xv. 23; 1 Kings ii.
+     37; Jer. xxxi. 40), i.e. a torrent which runs dry during the
+     summer; in winter it was termed a brook. Excavations show
+     that the fall diminishes at the foot of the ancient walls,
+     and that the bottom of the valley has risen nearly twelve
+     yards.
+
+During the remainder of the year a number of springs, which well up at
+the bottom of the valley, furnish an unfailing supply of water to the
+inhabitants of Gibon,* Siloam,** and Eogel.*** The valley widens out
+again near En-Kogel, and affords a channel to the Wady of the Children
+of Hinnom, which bounds the plateau on the west. The intermediate space
+has for a long time been nothing more than an undulating plain, at
+present covered by the houses of modern Jerusalem. In ancient times it
+was traversed by a depression in the ground, since filled up, which
+ran almost parallel with the Kedron, and joined it near the Pool of
+Siloam.**** The ancient city of the Jebusites stood on the summit of the
+headland which rises between these two valleys, the town of Jebus itself
+being at the extremity, while the Millo lay farther to the north on the
+hill of Sion, behind a ravine which ran down at right angles into the
+valley of the Hedron.
+
+     * Now, possibly, the "Fountain of the Virgin," but its
+     identity is not certain.
+
+     ** These are the springs which feed the group of reservoirs
+     now known as the Pool of Siloam. The name "Siloam" occurs
+     only in Neh. iii. 15, but is undoubtedly more ancient.
+
+     *** En-Rogel, the "Traveller's Well," is now called the
+     "Well of Job."
+
+     **** This valley, which is not mentioned by name in the Old
+     Testament, was called, in the time of Josephus, the
+     Tyropoon, or Cheesemakers'Quarter. Its true position, which
+     had been only suspected up to the middle of the present
+     century, was determined with certainty by means of the
+     excavations carried out by the English and Germans. The
+     bottom of the valley was found at a depth of from forty to
+     sixty feet below the present surface.
+
+An unfortified suburb had gradually grown up on the lower ground to the
+west, and was connected by a stairway cut in the rock* with the upper
+city. This latter was surrounded by ramparts with turrets, like those
+of the Canaanitish citadels which we constantly find depicted on the
+Egyptian monuments. Its natural advantages and efficient garrison had so
+far enabled it to repel all the attacks of its enemies.
+
+     * This is the Ophel of the Hebrew text.
+
+When David appeared with his troops, the inhabitants ridiculed his
+presumption, and were good enough to warn him of the hopelessness of his
+enterprise: a garrison composed of the halt and the blind, without an
+able-bodied man amongst them, would, they declared, be able successfully
+to resist him. The king, stung by their mockery, made a promise to his
+"mighty men" that the first of them to scale the walls should be made
+chief and captain of his host. We often find that impregnable cities
+owe their downfall to negligence on the part of their defenders: these
+concentrate their whole attention on the few vulnerable points, and give
+but scanty care to those which are regarded as inaccessible.* Jerusalem
+proved to be no exception to this rule; Joab carried it by a sudden
+assault, and received as his reward the best part of the territory which
+he had won by his valour.**
+
+     * Cf. the capture of Sardis by Cyrus (Herodotus) and by
+     Antiochus III. (Polybius), as also the taking of the Capitol
+     by the Gauls.
+
+     ** The account of the capture of Jerusalem is given in 2
+     Sam. v. 6-9, where the text is possibly corrupt, with
+     interpolated glosses, especially in ver. 8; David's reply to
+     the mockery of the Jebusites is difficult to understand. 1
+     Citron, xi. 4-8 gives a more correct text, but one less
+     complete in so far as the portions parallel with 2 Sam. v.
+     6-9 are concerned; the details in regard to Joab are
+     undoubtedly historical, but we do not find them in the Book
+     of Samuel.
+
+In attacking Jerusalem, David's first idea was probably to rid himself
+of one of the more troublesome obstacles which served to separate
+one-half of his people from the other; but once he had set foot in the
+place, he was not slow to perceive its advantages, and determined to
+make it his residence. Hebron had sufficed so long as his power extended
+over Caleb and Judah only. Situated as it was in the heart of the
+mountains, and in the wealthiest part of the province in which it stood,
+it seemed the natural centre to which the Kenites and men of Judah must
+gravitate, and the point at which they might most readily be moulded
+into a nation; it was, however, too far to the south to offer a
+convenient rallying-point for a ruler who wished to bring the Hebrew
+communities scattered about on both banks of the Jordan under the sway
+of a common sceptre. Jerusalem, on the other hand, was close to the
+crossing point of the roads which lead from the Sinaitic desert into
+Syria, and from the Shephelah to the land of Gilead; it commanded
+nearly the whole domain of Israel and the ring of hostile races by which
+it was encircled. From this lofty eyrie, David, with Judah behind him,
+could either swoop down upon Moab, whose mountains shut him out from a
+view of the Dead Sea, or make a sudden descent on the seaboard, by way
+of Bethhoron, at the least sign of disturbance among the Philistines,
+or could push straight on across Mount Ephraim into Galilee. Issachar,
+Naphtali, Asher, Dan, and Zebulun were, perhaps, a little too far from
+the seat of government; but they were secondary tribes, incapable of
+any independent action, who obeyed without repugnance, but also without
+enthusiasm, the soldier-king able to protect them from external foes.
+The future master of Israel would be he who maintained his hold on the
+posterity of Judah and of Joseph, and David could not hope to find a
+more suitable place than Jerusalem from which to watch over the two
+ruling houses at one and the same time.
+
+The lower part of the town he gave up to the original inhabitants,* the
+upper he filled with Benjamites and men of Judah;** he built or restored
+a royal palace on Mount Sion, in which he lived surrounded by his
+warriors and his family.*** One thing only was lacking--a temple for his
+God. Jerubbaal had had a sanctuary at Ophrah, and Saul had secured the
+services of Ahijah the prophet of Shiloh: David was no longer satisfied
+with the ephod which had been the channel of many wise counsels during
+his years of adversity and his struggles against the Philistines. He
+longed for some still more sacred object with which to identify the
+fortunes of his people, and by which he might raise the newly gained
+prestige of his capital. It so happened that the ark of the Lord,
+the ancient safeguard of Ephraim, had been lying since the battle
+of Eben-ezer not far away, without a fixed abode or regular
+worshippers.****
+
+     * Judges i. 21; cf. Zech. xi. 7, where Ekron in its
+     decadence is likened to the Jebusite vassal of Judah.
+
+     ** Jerusalem is sometimes assigned to Benjamin (Judges i.
+     21), sometimes to Judah (Josh. xv. 63). Judah alone is
+     right.
+
+     *** 2 Sam. v. 9, and the parallel passage in 1 Chron. xi. 7,
+     8.
+
+     **** The account of the events which followed the battle of
+     Eben-ezer up to its arrival in the house of Abinadab, is
+     taken from the history of the ark, referred to on pp. 306,
+     307, supra. It is given in 1 Sam. v., vi., vii. 1, where it
+     forms an exceedingly characteristic whole, composed, it may
+     be, of two separate versions thrown into one; the passage in
+     1 Sam. vi. 15, where the Levites receive the ark, is
+     supposed by some to be interpolated.
+
+The reason why it had not brought victory on that occasion, was that
+God's anger had been stirred at the misdeeds committed in His name by
+the sons of Eli, and desired to punish His people; true, it had been
+preserved from profanation, and the miracles which took place in its
+neighbourhood proved that it was still the seat of a supernatural power.
+
+[Illustration: 340.jpg MOUSE OF METAL]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a sketch published by Schick
+     and Oldfield Thomas.
+
+At first the Philistines had, according to their custom, shut it up in
+the temple of Dagon at Ashdod. On the morrow when the priests entered
+the sanctuary, they found the statue of their god prostrate in front of
+it, his fish-like body overthrown, and his head and hands scattered on
+the floor;* at the same time a plague of malignant tumours broke out
+among the people, and thousands of mice overran their houses. The
+inhabitants of Ashdod made haste to transfer it on to Ekron: it thus
+went the round of the five cities, its arrival being in each case
+accompanied by the same disasters. The soothsayers, being consulted
+at the end of seven months, ordered that solemn sacrifices should
+be offered up, and the ark restored to its rightful worshippers,
+accompanied by expiatory offerings of five golden mice and five golden
+tumours, one for each of the five repentant cities.**
+
+     * The statue here referred to is evidently similar to those
+     of the Chaldaean gods and genii, in which Dagon is
+     represented as a man with his back and head enveloped in a
+     fish as in a cloak.
+
+     ** In the Oustinoff collection at Jaffa, there is a roughly
+     shaped image of a mouse, cut out of a piece of white metal,
+     and perhaps obtained from the ruins of Gaza; it would seem
+     to be an ex-voto of the same kind as that referred to in the
+     Hebrew text, but it is of doubtful authenticity.
+
+The ark was placed on a new cart, and two milch cows with their calves
+drew it, lowing all the way, without guidance from any man, to the field
+of a certain Joshua at Bethshemesh. The inhabitants welcomed it with
+great joy, but their curiosity overcame their reverence, and they looked
+within the shrine. Jehovah, being angered thereat, smote seventy men of
+them, and the warriors made haste to bring the ark to Kirjath-jearim,
+where it remained for a long time, in the house of Abinadab on the
+hill, under charge of his son Eleazar.* Kirjath-jearim is only about two
+leagues from Jerusalem. David himself went thither, and setting "the ark
+of God upon a new cart," brought it away.* Two attendants, called Uzzah
+and Ahio, drove the new cart, "and David and all Israel played before
+God with all their might: even with songs, and with harps, and with
+psalteries, and with timbrels, and with cymbals, and with trumpets."
+An accident leading to serious consequences brought the procession to
+a standstill; the oxen stumbled, and their sacred burden threatened to
+fall: Uzzah, putting forth his hand to hold the ark, was smitten by the
+Lord, "and there he died before the Lord." David was disturbed at this,
+feeling some insecurity in dealing with a Deity who had thus seemed to
+punish one of His worshippers for a well-meant and respectful act.**
+
+     * The text of 1 Sam. vi. 21, vii. 1, gives the reading
+     Kirjath-jearim, whereas the text of 2 Sam. vi. 2 has Baale-
+     Judah, which should be corrected to Baal-Judah. Baal-Judah,
+     or, in its abbreviated form, Baala, is another name for
+     Kirjath-jearim (Josh. xv. 9-11; cf. 1 Ghron. xiii. 6).
+     Similarly, we find the name Kirjath-Baal (Josh. xv. 60).
+     Kirjath-jearim is now Kharbet-el-Enab.
+
+     ** The transport of the ark from Kirjath-jearim to Jerusalem
+     is related in 2 Sam. vi. and in 1 Ghron. xiii., xv., xvi.
+
+He "was afraid of the Lord that day," and "would not remove the ark" to
+Jerusalem, but left it for three months in the house of a Philistine,
+Obed-Edom of Gath; but finding that its host, instead of experiencing
+any evil, was blessed by the Lord, he carried out his original
+intention, and brought the ark to Jerusalem. "David, girded with a linen
+ephod, danced with all his might before the Lord," and "all the house of
+Israel brought up the ark of the Lord with shouting, and with the sound
+of the trumpet." When the ark had been placed in the tent that David had
+prepared for it, he offered up burnt offerings and peace offerings, and
+at the end of the festival there were dealt out to the people gifts of
+bread, cakes, and wine (or flesh). There is inserted in the narrative*
+an account of the conduct of Michal his wife, who looking out of the
+window and seeing the king dancing and playing, despised him in
+her heart, and when David returned to his house, congratulated him
+ironically--"How glorious was the King of Israel to-day, who uncovered
+himself in the eyes of the handmaids of his servants!"
+
+     * Renan would consider this to have been inserted in the
+     time of Hezekiah. It appeared to him to answer "to the
+     antipathy of Hamutal and the ladies of the court to the
+     worship of Jahveh, and to that form of human respect which
+     restrained the people of the world from giving themselves up
+     to it."
+
+David said in reply that he would rather be held in honour by the
+handmaids of whom she had spoken than avoid the acts which covered him
+with ridicule in her eyes; and the chronicler adds that "Michal the
+daughter of Saul had no child unto the day of her death."*
+
+     * [David's reply shows (2 Sam. vi. 21, 22) that it was in
+     gratitude to Jehovah who had exalted him that he thus
+     humbled himself.--Tr.]
+
+The tent and the ark were assigned at this time to the care of two
+priests--Zadok, son of Ahitub, and Abiathar, son of Ahimelech, who was
+a descendant of Eli, and had never quitted David throughout his
+adventurous career.* It is probable, too, that the ephod had not
+disappeared, and that it had its place in the sanctuary; but it may have
+gradually fallen into neglect, and may have ceased to be the vehicle
+of oracular responses as in earlier years. The king was accustomed on
+important occasions to take part in the sacred ceremonies, after the
+example of contemporary monarchs, and he had beside him at this time a
+priest of standing to guide him in the religious rites, and to fulfil
+for him duties similar to those which the chief reader rendered to
+Pharaoh. The only one of these priests of David whose name has come down
+to us was Ira the Jethrite, who accompanied his master in his
+campaigns, and would seem to have been a soldier also, and one of "the
+thirty." These priestly officials seem, however, to have played but a
+subordinate part, as history is almost silent about their acts.** While
+David owed everything to the sword and trusted in it, he recognised at
+the same time that he had obtained his crown from Jahveh; just as the
+sovereigns of Thebes and Nineveh saw in Amon and Assur the source of
+their own royal authority.
+
+     * 2 Sam. viii. 17, xx. 25; cf. 1 Sam. xxi. 1, xxii. 20; 1
+     Chron. xv. 11.
+
+     ** 2 Sam. xx. 26, where he is called the Jairite, and not
+     the Ithrite, owing to an easily understood confusion of the
+     Hebrew letters. He figures in the list of the _Gibborim_,
+     "mighty men," 2 Sam. xxiii. 38.
+
+He consulted the Lord directly when he wished for counsel, and accepted
+the issue as a test whether his interpretation of the Divine will was
+correct or erroneous. When once he had realised, at the time of the
+capture of Jerusalem, that God had chosen him to be the champion of
+Israel, he spared no labour to accomplish the task which the Divine
+favour had assigned to him. He attacked one after the other the peoples
+who had encroached upon his domain, Moab being the first to feel the
+force of his arm. He extended his possessions at the expense of Gilead,
+and the fertile provinces opposite Jericho fell to his sword. These
+territories were in dangerous proximity to Jerusalem, and David
+doubtless realised the peril of their independence. The struggle for
+their possession must have continued for some time, but the details are
+not given, and we have only the record of a few incidental exploits: we
+know, for instance, that the captain of David's guard, Benaiah, slew two
+Moabite notables in a battle.* Moabite captives were treated with all
+the severity sanctioned by the laws of war. They were laid on the ground
+in a line, and two-thirds of the length of the row being measured off,
+all within it were pitilessly massacred, the rest having their lives
+spared. Moab acknowledged its defeat, and agreed to pay tribute: it had
+suffered so much that it required several generations to recover.**
+
+     * 2 Sam. xxiii. 20-23: cf. 1 Chron. xi. 22-25. "Ariel," who
+     is made the father of the two slain by Benaiah, may possibly
+     be the term in 11. 12, 17, 18 of the Inscription of Mesha
+     (Moabite Stone); but its meaning is obscure, and has
+     hitherto baffled all attempts to explain it.
+
+     ** 2 Sam. viii. 2.
+
+Gilead had become detached from David's domain on the south, while
+the Ammonites were pressing it on the east, and the Ararnaeans making
+encroachments upon its pasture-lands on the north. Nahash, King of the
+Ammonites, being dead, David, who had received help from him in his
+struggle with Saul, sent messengers to offer congratulations to his son
+Hanun on his accession. Hanun, supposing the messengers to be spies
+sent to examine the defences of the city, "shaved off one-half of
+their beards, and cut off their garments in the middle, even to
+their buttocks, and sent them away." This was the signal for war. The
+Ammonites, foreseeing that David would endeavour to take a terrible
+vengeance for this insult to his people, came to an understanding with
+their neighbours. The overthrow of the Amorite chiefs had favoured the
+expansion of the Aramaeans towards the south. They had invaded all that
+region hitherto unconquered by Israel in the valley of the Litany to
+the east of Jordan, and some half-dozen of their petty states had
+appropriated among them the greater part of the territories which were
+described in the sacred record as having belonged previously to Jabin
+of Hazor and the kings of Bashan. The strongest of these
+principalities--that which occupied the position of Qodshu in the
+Bekaa, and had Zoba as its capital--was at this time under the rule of
+Hadadezer, son of Behob. This warrior had conquered Damascus, Maacah,
+and Geshur, was threatening the Canaanite town of Hamath, and was
+preparing to set out to the Euphrates when the Ammonites sought his help
+and protection. He came immediately to their succour. Joab, who was in
+command of David's army, left a portion of his troops at Babbath under
+his brother Abishai, and with the rest set out against the Syrians.
+He overthrew them, and returned immediately afterwards. The Ammonites,
+hearing of his victory, disbanded their army; but Joab had suffered such
+serious losses, that he judged it wise to defer his attack upon them
+until Zoba should be captured. David then took the field himself,
+crossed the Jordan with all his reserves, attacked the Syrians at
+Helam, put them to flight, killing Shobach, their general, and captured
+Damascus. Hadadezer [Hadarezer] "made peace with Israel," and Tou or
+Toi, the King of Hamath, whom this victory had delivered, sent presents
+to David. This was the work of a single campaign. The next year Joab
+invested Kabbath, and when it was about to surrender he called the king
+to his camp, and conceded to him the honour of receiving the submission
+of the city in person. The Ammonites were treated with as much severity
+as their kinsmen of Moab. David "put them under saws and harrows
+of iron, and under axes of iron, and made them pass through the
+brick-kiln."*
+
+     * The war with the Aramaeans, described in 2 Sam. viii. 3-
+     12, is similar to the account of the conflict with the
+     Ammonites in 2 Sam. x.-xii., but with more details. Both
+     documents are reproduced in 1 Chron. xviii. 3-11, and xix.,
+     xx. 1-3.
+
+[Illustration: 353.jpg THE HEBREW KINGDOM]
+
+This success brought others in its train. The Idumaeans had taken
+advantage of the employment of the Israelite army against the Aramaeans
+to make raids into Judah. Joab and Abishai, despatched in haste to check
+them, met them in the Valley of Salt to the south of the Dead Sea, and
+gave them battle: their king perished in the fight, and his son Hadad
+with some of his followers took flight into Egypt. Joab put to the sword
+all the able-bodied combatants, and established garrisons at Petra,
+Elath, and Eziongeber* on the Red Sea. David dedicated the spoils to the
+Lord, "who gave victory to David wherever he went."
+
+     Neither Elath nor Eziongeber are here mentioned, but 1 Kings
+     ix. 25-28 and 2 Chron. viii. 17, 18 prove that these places
+     had been occupied by David. For all that concerns Hadad, see
+     1 Kings xi. 15-20.
+
+Southern Syria had found its master: were the Hebrews going to pursue
+their success, and undertake in the central and northern regions a
+work of conquest which had baffled the efforts of all their
+predecessors--Canaanites, Amorites, and Hittites? The Assyrians, thrown
+back on the Tigris, were at this time leading a sort of vegetative
+existence in obscurity; and, as for Egypt, it would seem to have
+forgotten that it ever had possessions in Asia. There was, therefore,
+nothing to be feared from foreign intervention should the Hebrew be
+inclined to weld into a single state the nations lying between the
+Euphrates and the Red Sea.
+
+[Illustration: 354.jpg THE SITE OF RABBATH-AMON, SEEN FROM THE WEST]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from photograph No. 377 of the _Palestine
+     Exploration Fund._
+
+Unfortunately, the Israelites had not the necessary characteristics of
+a conquering people. Their history from the time of their entry into
+Canaan showed, it is true, that they were by no means incapable of
+enthusiasm and solidarity: a leader with the needful energy and good
+fortune to inspire them with confidence could rouse them from their
+self-satisfied indolence, and band them together for a great effort.
+But such concentration of purpose was ephemeral in its nature, and
+disappeared with the chief who had brought it about. In his absence,
+or when the danger he had pointed out was no longer imminent, they fell
+back instinctively into their usual state of apathy and disorganisation.
+Their nomadic temperament, which two centuries of a sedentary existence
+had not seriously modified, disposed them to give way to tribal
+quarrels, to keep up hereditary vendettas, to break out into sudden
+tumults, or to make pillaging expeditions into their neighbours'
+territories. Long wars, requiring the maintenance of a permanent army,
+the continual levying of troops and taxes, and a prolonged effort to
+keep what they had acquired, were repugnant to them. The kingdom
+which David had founded owed its permanence to the strong will of its
+originator, and its increase or even its maintenance depended upon the
+absence of any internal disturbance or court intrigue, to counteract
+which might make too serious a drain upon his energy. David had survived
+his last victory sufficiently long to witness around him the evolution
+of plots, and the multiplication of the usual miseries which sadden, in
+the East, the last years of a long reign. It was a matter of custom as
+well as policy that an exaltation in the position of a ruler should be
+accompanied by a proportional increase in the number of his retinue
+and his wives. David was no exception to this custom: to the two wives,
+Abigail and Ahinoam, which he had while he was in exile at Ziklag, he
+now added Maacah the Aramaean, daughter of the King of Geshur, Haggith,
+Abital, Bglah, and several others.* During the siege of Babbath-Ammon he
+also committed adultery with Bathsheba, the wife of Uriah the Hittite,
+and, placing her husband in the forefront of the battle, brought about
+his death. Rebuked by the prophet Nathan for this crime, he expressed
+his penitence, but he continued at the same time to keep Bathsheba, by
+whom he had several children.** There was considerable rivalry among
+the progeny of these different unions, as the right of succession would
+appear not to have been definitely settled. Of the family of Saul,
+moreover, there were still several members in existence--the son which
+he had by Eizpah, the children of his daughter Merab, Merib-baal, the
+lame offspring of Jonathan,*** and Shimei****--all of whom had partisans
+among the tribes, and whose pretensions might be pressed unexpectedly at
+a critical moment.
+
+     * Ahinoam is mentioned in the following passages: 1 Sam.
+     xxv. 43, xxvii. 3, xxx. 5; 2 Sam. ii. 2, iii. 2; cf. also 1
+     Chron. iii. 1; Maacah in 2 Sam. iii. 3; 1 Chron. iii. 2;
+     Haggith in 2 Sam. iii. 4; 1 Kings i. 5, 11, ii. 13; 1 Chron.
+     iii. 2; Abital in 2 Sam. iii. 4; 1 Chron. iii. 3; Eglah in 2
+     Sam. iii. 5; 1 Chron. iii. 3. For the concubines, see 2 Sam.
+     v. 13, xv. 15, xvi. 21, 22; 1 Chron. iii. 9, xiv. 3.
+
+     ** 2 Sam. xi., xii. 7-25.
+
+     *** 2 Sam. ix., xvi. 1-4, xix. 25-30, where the name is
+     changed into Mephibosheth; the original name is given in 1
+     Chron. viii. 34.
+
+     **** Sam. xvi. 5-14, xix. 16-23; 1 Kings ii. 8, 9, 36-46.
+
+The eldest son of Ahinoam, Amnon, whose priority in age seemed likely
+to secure for him the crown, had fallen in love with one of his
+half-sisters named Tamar, the daughter of Maacah, and, instead of
+demanding her in marriage, procured her attendance on him by a feigned
+illness, and forced her to accede to his desires. His love was thereupon
+converted immediately into hate, and, instead of marrying her, he had
+her expelled from his house by his servants. With rent garments and
+ashes on her head, she fled to her full-brother Absalom. David was
+very wroth, but he loved his firstborn, and could not permit himself to
+punish him. Absalom kept his anger to himself, but when two years had
+elapsed he invited Amnon to a banquet, killed him, and fled to his
+grandfather Talmai, King of Geshur.*
+
+     * It is to be noted that Tamar asked Amnon to marry her, and
+     that the sole reproach directed against the king's eldest
+     son was that, after forcing her, he was unwilling to make
+     her his wife. Unions of brother and sister were probably as
+     legitimate among the Hebrews at this time as among the
+     Egyptians.
+
+His anger was now turned against the king for not having taken up the
+cause of his sister, and he began to meditate his dethronement. Having
+been recalled to Jerusalem at the instigation of Joab, "Absalom
+prepared him chariots and horses, and fifty men to run before him,"
+thus affecting the outward forms of royalty. Judah, dissatisfied at
+the favour shown by David to the other tribes, soon came to recognise
+Absalom as their chief, and some of the most intimate counsellors of the
+aged king began secretly to take his part. When Absalom deemed things
+safe for action, he betook himself to Hebron, under the pretence of a
+vow which he had made daring his sojourn at Geshur. All Judah rallied
+around him, and the excitement at Jerusalem was so great that David
+judged it prudent to retire, with his Philistine and Cherethite guards,
+to the other side of the Jordan. Absalom, in the mean while, took up his
+abode in Jerusalem, where, having received the tacit adherence of the
+family of Saul and of a number of the notables, he made himself king. To
+show that the rupture between him and David was complete, he had tents
+erected on the top of the house, and there, in view of the people, took
+possession of his father's harem. Success would have been assured to
+him if he had promptly sent troops after the fugitives, but while he was
+spending his time in inactivity and feasting, David collected together
+those who were faithful to him, and put them under the command of
+Joab and Abishai. The king's veterans were more than a match for
+the undisciplined rabble which opposed them, and in the action which
+followed at Mahanaim Absalom was defeated: in his flight through
+the forest of Ephraim he was caught in a tree, and before he could
+disentangle himself was pierced through the heart by Joab.
+
+David, we read, wished his people to have mercy on his son, and he wept
+bitterly. He spared on this occasion the family of Saul, pardoned the
+tribe of Judah, and went back triumphantly into Jerusalem, which a few
+days before had taken part in his humiliation. The tribes of the house
+of Joseph had taken no side in the quarrel. They were ignorant alike of
+the motives which set the tribe of Judah against their own hero, and of
+their reasons for the zeal with which they again established him on the
+throne. They sent delegates to inquire about this, who reproached Judah
+for acting without their cognisance: "We have ten parts in the king, and
+we have also more right in David than ye: why then did ye despise us,
+that our advice should not be first had in bringing back our king?"
+Judah answered with yet fiercer words; then Sheba, a chief of the
+Benjamites, losing patience, blew a trumpet, and went off crying: "We
+have no portion in David, neither have we inheritance in the son of
+Jesse: every man to his tents, O Israel." If these words had produced
+an echo among the central and northern tribes, a schism would have been
+inevitable: some approved of them, while others took no action, and
+since Judah showed no disposition to put its military forces into
+movement, the king had once again to trust to Joab and the Philistine
+guards to repress the sedition. Their appearance on the scene
+disconcerted the rebels, and Sheba retreated to the northern frontier
+without offering battle. Perhaps he reckoned on the support of the
+Aramaeans. He took shelter in the small stronghold of Abel of Bethmaacah,
+where he defended himself for some time; but just when the place was on
+the point of yielding, the inhabitants cut off Sheba's head, and threw
+it to Joab from the wall. His death brought the crisis to an end,
+and peace reigned in Israel. Intrigues, however, began again more
+persistently than ever over the inheritance which the two slain princes
+had failed to obtain. The eldest son of the king was now Adonijah, son
+of Haggith, but Bathsheba exercised an undisputed sway over her husband,
+and had prepared him to recognise in Solomon her son the heir to the
+throne. She had secured, too, as his adherents several persons of
+influence, including Zadok, the prophet Nathan, and Benaiah, the captain
+of the foreign guard.
+
+Adonijah had on his side Abiathar the priest, Joab, and the people of
+Jerusalem, who had been captivated by his beauty and his regal display.
+In the midst of these rivalries the king was daily becoming weaker: he
+was now very old, and although he was covered with wrappings he could
+not maintain his animal heat. A young girl was sought out for him to
+give him the needful warmth. Abishag, a Shunammite, was secured for the
+purpose, but her beauty inspired Adonijah with such a violent passion
+that he decided to bring matters to a crisis. He invited his brethren,
+with the exception of Solomon, to a banquet in the gardens which
+belonged to him in the south of Jerusalem, near the well of Eogel. All
+his partisans were present, and, inspired by the good cheer, began to
+cry, "God save King Adonijah!" When Nathan informed Bathsheba of what
+was going on, she went in unto the king, who was being attended on by
+Abishag, complained to him of the weakness he was showing in regard to
+his eldest son, and besought him to designate his heir officially. He
+collected together the soldiers, and charged them to take the young
+man Solomon with royal pomp from the hill of Sion to the source of the
+Gibon: Nathan anointed his forehead with the sacred oil, and in the
+sight of all the people brought him to the palace, mounted on his
+father's mule. The blare of the coronation trumpets resounded in the
+ears of the conspirators, quickly followed by the tidings that Solomon
+had been hailed king over the whole of Israel: they fled on all sides,
+Adonijah taking refuge at the horns of the altar. David did not long
+survive this event: shortly before his death he advised Solomon to
+rid himself of all those who had opposed his accession to the throne.
+Solomon did not hesitate to follow this counsel, and the beginning of
+his reign was marked by a series of bloodthirsty executions. Adonijah
+was the first to suffer. He had been unwise enough to ask the hand of
+Abishag in marriage: this request was regarded as indicative of a hidden
+intention to rebel, and furnished an excuse for his assassination.
+Abiathar, at whose instigation Adonijah had acted, owed his escape
+from a similar fate to his priestly character and past services: he was
+banished to his estate at Anathoth, and Zadok became high priest in his
+stead. Joab, on learning the fate of his accomplice, felt that he was
+a lost man, and vainly sought sanctuary near the ark of the Lord; but
+Benaiah slew him there, and soon after, Shimei, the last survivor of the
+race of Saul, was put to death on some transparent pretext. This was the
+last act of the tragedy: henceforward Solomon, freed from all those who
+bore him malice, was able to devote his whole attention to the cares of
+government.*
+
+     * 1 Kings i., ii. This is the close of the history of David,
+     and follows on from 2 Sam. xxiv. It would seem that Adonijah
+     was heir-apparent (1 Kings i. 5, 6), and that Solomon's
+     accession was brought about by an intrigue, which owed its
+     success to the old king's weakness (1 Kings i. 12, 13, 17,
+     18, 30, 31).
+
+The change of rulers had led, as usual, to insurrections among the
+tributary races: Damascus had revolted before the death of David, and
+had not been recovered. Hadad returned from Egypt, and having gained
+adherents in certain parts of Edom, resisted all attempts made to
+dislodge him.*
+
+     * It seems clear from the context that the revolt of
+     Damascus took place during David's lifetime. It cannot, in
+     any case, have occurred at a later date than the beginning
+     of the reign of Solomon, for we are told that Rezon, after
+     capturing the town, "was an adversary of Israel all the days
+     of Solomon" (1 Kings xi. 23-25). Hadad returned from Egypt
+     when "he had heard that David slept with his fathers, and
+     that Joab the captain of the host was dead" (1 Kings xi. 21,
+     22, 25).
+
+As a soldier, Solomon was neither skilful nor fortunate: he even failed
+to retain what his father had won for him. Though he continued to
+increase his army, it was more with a view to consolidating his power
+over the Bne-Israel than for any aggressive action outside his borders.
+On the other hand, he showed himself an excellent administrator, and
+did his best, by various measures of general utility, to draw closer the
+ties which bound the tribes to him and to each other. He repaired the
+citadels with such means as he had at his disposal. He rebuilt the
+fortifications of Megiddo, thus securing the control of the network of
+roads which traversed Southern Syria. He remodelled the fortifications
+of Tamar, the two Bethhorons, Baalath, Hazor, and of many other
+towns which defended his frontiers. Some of them he garrisoned with
+foot-soldiers, others with horsemen and chariots. By thus distributing
+his military forces over the whole country, he achieved a twofold
+object;* he provided, on the one hand, additional security from foreign
+invasion, and on the other diminished the risk of internal revolt.
+
+     * 1 Kings ix. 15, 17-19; cf. 2 Chron. viii. 4-6. The
+     parallel passage in 2 Chron. viii. 4, and the marginal
+     variant in the _Book of Kings_, give the reading Tadmor
+     Palmyra for Tamar, thus giving rise to the legends which
+     state that Solomon's frontier extended to the Euphrates. The
+     Tamar here referred to is that mentioned in Ezeh. xlvii. 19,
+     xlviii. 28, as the southern boundary of Judah; it is perhaps
+     identical with the modern Kharbet-Kurnub.
+
+The remnants of the old aboriginal clans, which had hitherto managed to
+preserve their independence, mainly owing to the dissensions among the
+Israelites, were at last absorbed into the tribes in whose territory
+they had settled. A few still held out, and only gave way after long
+and stubborn resistance: before he could triumph over Gezer, Solomon was
+forced to humble himself before the Egyptian Pharaoh. He paid homage to
+him, asked the hand of his daughter in marriage, and having obtained it,
+persuaded him to come to his assistance: the Egyptian engineers placed
+their skill at the service of the besiegers and soon brought the
+recalcitrant city to reason, handing it over to Solomon in payment for
+his submission.* The Canaanites were obliged to submit to the poll-tax
+and the _corvee_: the men of the league of Gibeon were made hewers
+of wood and drawers of water for the house of the Lord.** The Hebrews
+themselves bore their share in the expenses of the State, and though
+less heavily taxed than the Canaanites, were, nevertheless, compelled to
+contribute considerable sums; Judah alone was exempt, probably because,
+being the private domain of the sovereign, its revenues were already
+included in the royal exchequer.***
+
+     * 1 Kings ix. 16. The Pharaoh in question was probably one
+     of the Psiukhannit, the Psusennos II. of Manetho.
+
+     ** 1 Kings ix. 20, 21. The annexation of the Gibeonites and
+     their allies is placed at the time of the conquest in Josh.
+     ix. 3-27; it should be rather fixed at the date of the loss
+     of independence of the league, probably in the time of
+     Solomon.
+
+     *** Stade thinks that Judah was not exempt, and that the
+     original document must have given thirteen districts.
+
+In order to facilitate the collection of the taxes, Solomon divided the
+kingdom into twelve districts, each of which was placed in charge of
+a collector; these regions did not coincide with the existing tribal
+boundaries, but the extent of each was determined by the wealth of the
+lands contained within it. While one district included the whole of
+Mount Ephraim, another was limited to the stronghold of Mahanaim and its
+suburbs. Mahanaim was at one time the capital of Israel, and had played
+an important part in the life of David: it held the key to the regions
+beyond Jordan, and its ruler was a person of such influence that it was
+not considered prudent to leave him too well provided with funds. By
+thus obliterating the old tribal boundaries, Solomon doubtless hoped
+to destroy, or at any rate greatly weaken, that clannish spirit which
+showed itself with such alarming violence at the time of the revolt of
+Sheba, and to weld into a single homogeneous mass the various Hebrew and
+Canaanitish elements of which the people of Israel were composed.*
+
+     * 1 Kings iv. 7-19, where a list of the districts is given;
+     the fact that two of Solomon's sons-in-law appear in it,
+     show that the document from which it is taken gave the staff
+     of collectors in office at the close of his reign.
+
+Each of these provinces was obliged, during one month in each year,
+to provide for the wants of "the king and his household," or, in other
+words, the requirements of the central government. A large part of these
+contributions went to supply the king's table; the daily consumption at
+the court was--thirty measures of fine flour, sixty measures of meal,
+ten fat oxen, twenty oxen out of the pastures, a hundred sheep, besides
+all kinds of game and fatted fowl: nor need we be surprised at these
+figures, for in a country where, and at a time when money was unknown,
+the king was obliged to supply food to all his dependents, the greater
+part of their emoluments consisting of these payments in kind. The
+tax-collectors had also to provide fodder for the horses reserved
+for military purposes: there were forty thousand of these, and twelve
+thousand charioteers, and barley and straw had to be forthcoming either
+in Jerusalem itself or in one or other of the garrison towns amongst
+which they were distributed.* The levying of tolls on caravans passing
+through the country completed the king's fiscal operations which were
+based on the systems prevailing in neighbouring States, especially that
+of Egypt.**
+
+     * 1 Kings iv. 26-28; the complementary passages in 1 Kings
+     x. 26 and 2 Chron. i. 14 give the number of chariots as 1400
+     and of charioteers at 12,000. The numbers do not seem
+     excessive for a kingdom which embraced the whole south of
+     Palestine, when we reflect that, at the battle of Qodshu,
+     Northern Syria was able to put between 2500 and 3000
+     chariots into the field against Ramses II. The Hebrew
+     chariots probably carried at least three men, like those of
+     the Hittites and Assyrians.
+
+     ** 1 Kings x. 15, where mention is made of the amount which
+     the chapmen brought, and the traffic of the merchants
+     contains an allusion to these tolls.
+
+Solomon, like other Oriental sovereigns, reserved to himself the
+monopoly of certain imported articles, such as yarn, chariots, and
+horses. Egyptian yarn, perhaps the finest produced in ancient times, was
+in great request among the dyers and embroiderers of Asia. Chariots,
+at once strong and light, were important articles of commerce at a time
+when their use in warfare was universal. As for horses, the cities of
+the Delta and Middle Egypt possessed a celebrated strain of stallions,
+from which the Syrian princes were accustomed to obtain their
+war-steeds.* Solomon decreed that for the future he was to be the sole
+intermediary between the Asiatics and the foreign countries supplying
+their requirements. His agents went down at regular intervals to the
+banks of the Nile to lay in stock; the horses and chariots, by the
+time they reached Jerusalem, cost him at the rate of six hundred silver
+shekels for each chariot, and one hundred and fifty shekels for each
+horse, but he sold them again at a profit to the Aramaean and Hittite
+princes. In return he purchased from them Cilician stallions, probably
+to sell again to the Egyptians, whose relaxing climate necessitated a
+frequent introduction of new blood into their stables.** By these and
+other methods of which we know nothing the yearly revenue of the kingdom
+was largely increased: and though it only reached a total which may seem
+insignificant in comparison with the enormous quantities of the precious
+metals which passed through the hands of the Pharaohs of that time, yet
+it must have seemed boundless wealth in the eyes of the shepherds and
+husbandmen who formed the bulk of the Hebrew nation.
+
+     * The terms in which the text, 1 Kings x. 27-29 (cf. 2
+     Citron, i. 16, 17), speaks of the trade in horses, show that
+     the traffic was already in existence when Solomon decided to
+     embark in it.
+
+     ** 1 Kings x. 27-29; 2 Chron. i. 16, 17. Kue, the name of
+     Lower Cilicia, was discovered in the Hebrew text by Pr.
+     Lenormant. Winckler, with mistaken reliance on the authority
+     of Erman, has denied that Egypt produced stud-horses at this
+     time, and wishes to identify the Mizraim of the Hebrew text
+     with Musri, a place near Mount Taurus, mentioned in the
+     Assyrian texts.
+
+In thus developing his resources and turning them to good account,
+Solomon derived great assistance from the Phoenicians of Tyre and Sidon,
+a race whose services were always at the disposal of the masters of
+Southern Syria. The continued success of the Hellenic colonists on the
+eastern shores of the Mediterranean had compelled the Phoenicians to
+seek with redoubled boldness and activity in the Western Mediterranean
+some sort of compensation for the injury which their trade had thus
+suffered. They increased and consolidated their dealings with Sicily,
+Africa, and Spain, and established themselves throughout the whole of
+that misty region which extended beyond the straits of Gibraltar on the
+European side, from the mouth of the Guadalete to that of the Guadiana.
+This was the famous Tarshish--the Oriental El Dorado. Here they had
+founded a number of new towns, the most flourishing of which, Gadir,*
+rose not far from the mouths of the Betis, on a small islet separated
+from the mainland by a narrow arm of the sea. In this city they
+constructed a temple to Melkarth, arsenals, warehouses, and shipbuilding
+yards: it was the Tyre of the west, and its merchant-vessels sailed to
+the south and to the north to trade with the savage races of the African
+and European seaboard. On the coast of Morocco they built Lixos, a town
+almost as large as Gadir, and beyond Lixos, thirty days' sail southwards,
+a whole host of depots, reckoned later on at three hundred.
+
+     * I do not propose to discuss here the question of the
+     identity of the country of Tartessos with the Tarshish or
+     Tarsis mentioned in the Bible (1 Kings x. 22).
+
+By exploiting the materials to be obtained from these lands, such as
+gold, silver, tin, lead, and copper, Tyre and Sidon were soon able to
+make good the losses they had suffered from Greek privateersmen and
+marauding Philistines. Towards the close of the reign of Saul over
+Israel, a certain king Abibaal had arisen in Tyre, and was succeeded by
+his son Hiram, at the very moment when David was engaged in bringing
+the whole of Israel into subjection. Hiram, guided by instinct or by
+tradition, at once adopted a policy towards the rising dynasty which his
+ancestors had always found successful in similar cases. He made friendly
+overtures to the Hebrews, and constituted himself their broker and
+general provider: when David was in want of wood for the house he was
+building at Jerusalem, Hiram let him have the necessary quantity, and
+hired out to him workmen and artists at a reasonable wage, to help him
+in turning his materials to good account.*
+
+     * 2 Sam. v. 11; cf. the reference to the same incident in
+     1 Kings v 1-3.
+
+The accession of Solomon was a piece of good luck for him. The new king,
+born in the purple, did not share the simple and somewhat rustic tastes
+of his father. He wanted palaces and gardens and a temple, which might
+rival, even if only in a small way, the palaces and temples of Egypt and
+Chaldaea, of which he had heard such glowing accounts: Hiram undertook
+to procure these things for him at a moderate cost, and it was doubtless
+his influence which led to those voyages to the countries which produced
+precious metals, perfumes, rare animals, costly woods, and all those
+foreign knicknacks with which Eastern monarchs of all ages loved to
+surround themselves. The Phoenician sailors were well acquainted with
+the bearings of Puanit, most of them having heard of this country when
+in Egypt, a few perhaps having gone thither under the direction and by
+the orders of Pharaoh: and Hiram took advantage of the access which the
+Hebrews had gained to the shores of the Red Sea by the annexation of
+Edom, to establish relations with these outlying districts without
+having to pass the Egyptian customs. He lent to Solomon shipwrights and
+sailors, who helped him to fit out a fleet at Ezion-geber, and undertook
+a voyage of discovery in company with a number of Hebrews, who were no
+doubt despatched in the same capacity as the royal messengers sent
+with the galleys of Hatshopsitu. It was a venture similar to those so
+frequently undertaken by the Egyptian admirals in the palmy days of the
+Theban navy, and of which we find so many curious pictures among the
+bas-reliefs at Deir el-Bahari. On their return, after a three years'
+absence, they reported that they had sailed to a country named Ophir,
+and produced in support of their statement a freight well calculated to
+convince the most sceptical, consisting as it did of four hundred and
+twenty talents of gold. The success of this first venture encouraged
+Solomon to persevere in such expeditions: he sent his fleet on several
+voyages to Ophir, and procured from thence a rich harvest of gold and
+silver, wood and ivory, apes and peacocks.*
+
+
+* 1 Kings ix. 26-28, x. 11, 12; cf. 2 Citron, viii. 17, 18, ix. 10, 11,
+21. A whole library might be stocked with the various treatises which
+have appeared on the situation of the country of Ophir: Arabia, Persia,
+India, Java, and America have all been suggested. The mention of almug
+wood and of peacocks, which may be of Indian origin, for a long time
+inclined the scale in favour of India, but the discoveries of Mauch and
+Bent on the Zimbabaye have drawn attention to the basin of the Zambesi
+and the ruins found there. Dr. Peters, one of the best-known German
+explorers, is inclined to agree with Mauch and Bent, in their theory
+as to the position of the Ophir of the Bible. I am rather inclined to
+identify it with the Egyptian Puanit, on the Somali or Yemen seaboard.
+
+Was the profit from these distant cruises so very considerable after
+all? After they had ceased, memory may have thrown a fanciful glamour
+over them, and magnified the treasures they had yielded to fabulous
+proportions: we are told that Solomon would have no drinking vessels or
+other utensils save those of pure gold, and that in his days "silver was
+as stone," so common had it become.*
+
+     * 1 Kings x. 21, 27. In Chronicles the statement in the
+     _Book of Kings_ is repeated in a still more emphatic manner,
+     since it is there stated that gold itself was "in Jerusalem
+     as stones" (2 Chron. i. 15).
+
+[Illustration: 370.jpg MAP OF TYRE SUBSEQUENT TO HIRAM]
+
+Doubtless Hiram took good care to obtain his fall share of the gains.
+The Phoenician king began to find Tyre too restricted for him, the
+various islets over which it was scattered affording too small a space
+to support the multitudes which flocked thither. He therefore filled up
+the channels which separated them; by means of embankments and fortified
+quays he managed to reclaim from the sea a certain amount of land on the
+south; after which he constructed two harbours--one on the north, called
+the Sidonian; the other on the south, named the Egyptian. He was perhaps
+also the originator of the long causeway, the lower courses of which
+still serve as a breakwater, by which he transformed the projecting
+headland between the island and the mainland into a well-sheltered
+harbour. Finally, he set to work on a task like that which he had
+already helped Solomon to accomplish: he built for himself a palace
+of cedar-wood, and restored and beautified the temples of the gods,
+including the ancient sanctuary of Melkarth, and that of Astarte. In his
+reign the greatness of Phoenicia reached its zenith, just as that of the
+Hebrews culminated under David.
+
+[Illustration: 371.jpg THE BREAKWATER OF THE EGYPTIAN HARBOUR AT TYRE]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph published by the Duc de
+     Luynes.
+
+The most celebrated of Solomon's works were to be seen at Jerusalem. As
+David left it, the city was somewhat insignificant. The water from its
+fountains had been amply sufficient for the wants of the little
+Jebusite town; it was wholly inadequate to meet the requirements of
+the growing-population of the capital of Judah. Solomon made better
+provision for its distribution than there had been in the past, and then
+tapped a new source of supply some distance away, in the direction of
+Bethlehem; it is even said that he made the reservoirs for its storage
+which still bear his name.*
+
+     * A somewhat ancient tradition attributes these works to
+     Solomon; no single fact confirms it, but the balance of
+     probability seems to indicate that he must have taken steps
+     to provide a water-supply for the new city. The channels and
+     reservoirs, of which traces are found at the present day,
+     probably occupy the same positions as those which preceded
+     them.
+
+[Illustration: 372.jpg one of Solomon's reservoirs near Jerusalem]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph by M. C. Alluaud of
+     Limoges.
+
+Meanwhile, Hiram had drawn up for him plans for a fortified residence,
+on a scale commensurate with the thriving fortunes of his dynasty. The
+main body was constructed of stone from the Judaean quarries, cut by
+masons from Byblos, but it was inlaid with cedar to such an extent that
+one wing was called "the house of the forest-of-Lebanon." It contained
+everything that was required for the comfort of an Eastern potentate--a
+harem, with separate apartments for the favourites (one of which was
+probably decorated in the Egyptian manner for the benefit of Pharaoh's
+daughter);* then there were reception-halls, to which the great men
+of the kingdom were admitted; storehouses, and an arsenal. The king's
+bodyguard possessed five hundred shields "of beaten gold," which were
+handed over by each detachment, when the guard was relieved, to the
+one which took its place. But this gorgeous edifice would not have been
+complete if the temple of Jahveh had not arisen side by side with the
+abode of the temporal ruler of the nation. No monarch in those days
+could regard his position as unassailable until he had a sanctuary and a
+priesthood attached to his religion, either in his own palace or not far
+away from it. David had scarcely entered Jerusalem before he fixed upon
+the threshing-floor of Araunah the Jebusite as a site for the temple,
+and built an altar there to the Lord during a plague which threatened to
+decimate his people; but as he did not carry the project any farther,**
+Solomon set himself to complete the task which his father had merely
+sketched out.
+
+     * 1 Kings vii. 8, ix. 24; 2 Ghron. viii. 11.
+
+     ** 2 Sam xxiv. 18-25, The threshing-floor of Araunah the
+     Jebusite is mentioned elsewhere as the site on which Solomon
+     built his temple (2 Ghron. iii. 1).
+
+The site was irregular in shape, and the surface did not
+naturally lend itself to the purpose for which it was destined. His
+engineers, however, put this right by constructing enormous piers for
+the foundations, which they built up from the slopes of the mountain
+or from the bottom of the valley as circumstances required: the space
+between this artificial casing and the solid rock was filled up, and
+the whole mass formed a nearly square platform, from which the temple
+buildings were to rise. Hiram undertook to supply materials for the
+work. Solomon had written to him that he should command "that they
+hew me cedar trees out of Lebanon; and my servants shall be with thy
+servants; and I will give thee hire for thy servants according to all
+that thou shalt say: for thou knowest that there is not among us
+any that can skill to hew timber like unto the Zidonians." Hiram was
+delighted to carry out the wishes of his royal friend with regard to the
+cedar and cypress woods.
+
+[Illustration: 374.jpg SOME OF THE STONE COURSE OF SOLOMON'S TEMPLE AT
+JERUSALEM]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph.
+
+"My servants," he answered, "shall bring them down from Lebanon unto the
+sea: and I will make them into rafts to go by sea unto the place that
+thou shalt appoint me, and will cause them to be broken up there, and
+thou shalt receive them; and thou shalt accomplish my desire, in giving
+food for my household." The payment agreed on, which was in kind,
+consisted of twenty thousand _kor_ of wheat, and twenty _kor_ of pure
+oil per annum, for which Hiram was to send to Jerusalem not only the
+timber, but architects, masons, and Gebalite carpenters (i.e. from
+Byblos), smelters, sculptors, and overseers.* Solomon undertook to
+supply the necessary labour, and for this purpose made a levy of men
+from all the tribes. The number of these labourers was reckoned at
+thirty thousand, and they were relieved regularly every three months;
+seventy thousand were occupied in the transport of the materials, while
+eighty thousand cut the stones from the quarry.**
+
+     * 1 Kings v. 7--11 * cf. 2 Chron. ii. 3--16, where the
+     writer adds 20,000 _kor_ of barley, 20,000 "baths" of wine,
+     and the same quantity of oil.
+
+     ** 1 Kings v. 13-18; of. 2 Chron. ii. 1, 2, 17, 18.
+
+It is possible that the numbers may have been somewhat exaggerated in
+popular estimation, since the greatest Egyptian monuments never required
+such formidable levies of workmen for their construction; we must
+remember, however, that such an undertaking demanded a considerable
+effort, as the Hebrews were quite unaccustomed to that kind of labour.
+The front of the temple faced eastward; it was twenty cubits wide, sixty
+long, and thirty high. The walls were of enormous squared stones, and
+the ceilings and frames of the doors of carved cedar, plated with gold;
+it was entered by a porch, between two columns of wrought bronze, which
+were called Jachin and Boaz.*
+
+* 1 Kings vii. 15-22; cf. 2 Chron. iv. 11-13. The names were probably
+engraved each upon its respective column, and taken together formed an
+inscription which could be interpreted in various ways. The most simple
+interpretation is to recognise in them a kind of talismanic formula to
+ensure the strength of the building, affirming "that it exists by the
+strength" of God.
+
+The interior contained only two chambers; the _hekal,_ or holy place,
+where were kept the altar of incense, the seven-branched candlestick,
+and the table of shewbread; and the Holy of Holies--_debir_--where the
+ark of God rested beneath the wings of two cherubim of gilded wood.
+Against the outer wall of the temple, and rising to half its height,
+were rows of small apartments, three stories high, in which were kept
+the treasures and vessels of the sanctuary. While the high priest was
+allowed to enter the Holy of Holies only once a year, the holy place was
+accessible at all times to the priests engaged in the services, and it
+was there that the daily ceremonies of the temple-worship took place;
+there stood also the altar of incense and the table of shewbread. The
+altar of sacrifice stood on the platform in front of the entrance; it
+was a cube of masonry with a parapet, and was approached by stone steps;
+it resembled, probably, in general outline the monumental altars which
+stood in the forecourts of the Egyptian temples and palaces. There stood
+by it, as was also customary in Chaldaea, a "molten sea," and some ten
+smaller lavers, in which the Levites washed the portions of the victims
+to be offered, together with the basins, knives, flesh-hooks, spoons,
+shovels, and other utensils required for the bloody sacrifice. A low
+wall surmounted by a balustrade of cedar-wood separated this sacred
+enclosure from a court to which the people were permitted to have
+free access. Both palace and temple were probably designed in that
+pseudo-Egyptian style which the Phoenicians were known to affect. The
+few Hebrew edifices of which remains have come down to us, reveal
+a method of construction and decoration common in Egypt; we have an
+example of this in the uprights of the doors at Lachish, which terminate
+in an Egyptian gorge like that employed in the naos of the Phonician
+temples.
+
+[Illustration: 377.jpg AN UPRIGHT OF A DOOR AT LACHISH]
+
+     Drawn by Paucher-Gudin, from the drawing by Petrie.
+
+The completion of the whole plan occupied thirteen years; at length both
+palace and temple were finished in the XVIIth year of the king's
+reign. Solomon, however, did not wait for the completion of the work
+to dedicate the sanctuary to God. As soon as the inner court was ready,
+which was in his XIth year, he proceeded to transfer the ark to its new
+resting-place; it was raised upon a cubical base, and the long staves by
+which it had been carried were left in their rings, as was usual in the
+case of the sacred barks of the Egyptian deities.* The God of Israel
+thus took up His abode in the place in which He was henceforth to
+be honoured. The sacrifices on the occasion of the dedication were
+innumerable, and continued for fourteen days, in the presence of the
+representatives of all Israel. The ornate ceremonial and worship which
+had long been lavished on the deities of rival nations were now, for
+the first time, offered to the God of Israel. The devout Hebrews who
+had come together from far and near returned to their respective tribes
+filled with admiration,** and their limited knowledge of art doubtless
+led them to consider their temple as unique in the world; in fact, it
+presented nothing remarkable either in proportion, arrangement, or in
+the variety and richness of its ornamentation and furniture. Compared
+with the magnificent monuments of Egypt and Chaldaea, the work of Solomon
+was what the Hebrew kingdom appears to us among the empires of the
+ancient world--a little temple suited to a little people.
+
+     * 1 Kings viii. 6-8, and 2 Ghron. v. 7-9.
+
+     ** 1 Kings vi. 37, 38 states that the foundations were laid
+     in the IVth year of Solomon's reign, in the month of Ziv,
+     and that the temple was completed in the month of Bui in the
+     XIth year; the work occupied seven years. 1 Kings vii. 1
+     adds that the construction of the palace lasted thirteen
+     years; it went on for six years after the completion of the
+     temple. The account of the dedication (1 Kings viii.)
+     contains a long prayer by Solomon, part of which (vers. 14-
+     66) is thought by certain critics to be of later date. They
+     contend that the original words of Solomon are confined to
+     vers. 12 and 13.
+
+The priests to whose care it was entrusted did not differ much from
+those whom David had gathered about him at the outset of the monarchy.
+They in no way formed an hereditary caste confined to the limits of
+a rigid hierarchy; they admitted into their number--at least up to a
+certain point--men of varied extraction, who were either drawn by their
+own inclinations to the service of the altar, or had been dedicated to
+it by their parents from childhood. He indeed was truly a priest "who
+said of his father and mother, 'I have not seen him;' neither did he
+acknowledge his brethren, nor knew he his own children." He was content,
+after renouncing these, to observe the law of God and keep His covenant,
+and to teach Jacob His judgments and Israel His law; he put incense
+before the Lord, and whole burnt offerings upon His altar.*
+
+     * Those are the expressions used in the Blessing of Moses
+     (Deut. xxxiii. 8-12); though this text is by some writers
+     placed as late as the VIIIth century B.C., yet the state of
+     things there represented would apply also to an earlier
+     date. The Hebrew priest, in short, had the same duties as a
+     large proportion of the priesthood in Chaldae and Egypt.
+
+As in Egypt, the correct offering of the Jewish sacrifices was beset
+with considerable difficulties, and the risk of marring their efficacy
+by the slightest inadvertence necessitated the employment of men who
+were thoroughly instructed in the divinely appointed practices and
+formulae. The victims had to be certified as perfect, while the offerers
+themselves had to be ceremonially pure; and, indeed, those only who had
+been specially trained were able to master the difficulties connected
+with the minutiae of legal purity. The means by which the future was
+made known necessitated the intervention of skilful interpreters of the
+Divine will. We know that in Egypt the statues of the gods were supposed
+to answer the questions put to them by movements of the head or arms,
+sometimes even by the living voice; but the Hebrews do not appear to
+have been influenced by any such recollections in the use of their
+sacred oracles. We are ignorant, however, of the manner in which the
+ephod was consulted, and we know merely that the art of interrogating
+the Divine will by it demanded a long noviciate.* The benefits derived
+by those initiated into these mysteries were such as to cause them to
+desire the privileges to be perpetuated to their children. Gathered
+round the ancient sanctuaries were certain families who, from father
+to son, were devoted to the performance of the sacred rites, as, for
+instance, that of Eli at Shiloh, and that of Jonathan-ben-Gershom at
+Dan, near the sources of the Jordan; but in addition to these, the text
+mentions functionaries analogous to those found among the Canaanites,
+diviners, seers--_roe_--who had means of discovering that which was
+hidden from the vulgar, even to the finding of lost objects, but
+whose powers sometimes rose to a higher level when they were suddenly
+possessed by the prophetic spirit and enabled to reveal coming events.
+Besides these, again, were the prophets--_nabi_**--who lived either
+alone or in communities, and attained, by means of a strict training, to
+a vision of the future.
+
+     * An example of the consulting of the ephod will be found in
+     1 Sam. xxx. 7, 8, where David desires to know if he shall
+     pursue the Amalekites.
+
+     ** 1 Sam. ix. 9 is a gloss which identifies the _seer_ of
+     former times with the prophet of the times of the monarchy.
+
+Their prophetic utterances were accompanied by music and singing, and
+the exaltation of spirit which followed their exercises would at
+times spread to the bystanders,--as is the case in the "zikr" of the
+Mahomedans of to-day.*
+
+     * 1 Sam. x. 5-13, where we see Saul seized with the
+     prophetic spirit on meeting with a band of prophets
+     descending from the high place; cf. 2 Sam. vi. 13-16, 20-23,
+     for David dancing before the ark.
+
+The early kings, Saul and David, used to have recourse to individuals
+belonging to all these three classes, but the prophets, owing to the
+intermittent character of their inspiration and their ministry, could
+not fill a regular office attached to the court. One of this class was
+raised up by God from time to time to warn or guide His servants, and
+then sank again into obscurity; the priests, on the contrary, were
+always at hand, and their duties brought them into contact with the
+sovereign all the year round. The god who was worshipped in the capital
+of the country and his priesthood promptly acquired a predominant
+position in all Oriental monarchies, and most of the other temples,
+together with the sacerdotal bodies attached to them, usually fell into
+disrepute, leaving them supreme. If Amon of Thebes became almost the
+sole god, and his priests the possessors of all Egypt, it was because
+the accession of the XVIIIth dynasty had made his pontiffs the almoners
+of the Pharaoh. Something of the same sort took place in Israel; the
+priesthood at Jerusalem attached to the temple built by the sovereign,
+being constantly about his person, soon surpassed their brethren in
+other parts of the country both in influence and possessions. Under
+David's reign their head had been Abiathar, son of Ahimelech, a
+descendant of Eli, but on Solomon's accession the primacy had been
+transferred to the line of Zadok. In this alliance of the throne and
+the altar, it was natural at first that the throne should reap the
+advantage. The king appears to have continued to be a sort of high
+priest, and to have officiated at certain times and occasions.* The
+priests kept the temple in order, and watched over the cleanliness of
+its chambers and its vessels; they interrogated the Divine will for the
+king according to the prescribed ceremonies, and offered sacrifices on
+behalf of the monarch and his subjects; in short, they were at first
+little more than chaplains to the king and his family.
+
+     * Solomon officiated and preached at the consecration of the
+     temple (1 Kings viii.). The actual words appear to be of a
+     later date; but even if that be the case, it proves that, at
+     the time they were written, the king still possessed his
+     full sacerdotal powers.
+
+Solomon's allegiance to the God of Israel did not lead him to proscribe
+the worship of other gods; he allowed his foreign wives the exercise of
+their various religions, and he raised an altar to Chemosh on the Mount
+of Olives for one of them who was a Moabite. The political supremacy and
+material advantages which all these establishments acquired for Judah
+could not fail to rouse the jealousy of the other tribes. Ephraim
+particularly looked on with ill-concealed anger at the prospect of the
+hegemony becoming established in the hands of a tribe which could be
+barely said to have existed before the time of David, and was to a
+considerable extent of barbarous origin. Taxes, homage, the keeping up
+and recruiting of garrisons, were all equally odious to this, as well
+as to the other clans descended from Joseph; meanwhile their burdens did
+not decrease. A new fortress had to be built at Jerusalem by order of
+the aged king. One of the overseers appointed for this work--Jeroboam,
+the son of Nebat--appears to have stirred up the popular discontent,
+and to have hatched a revolutionary plot. Solomon, hearing of the
+conspiracy, attempted to suppress it; Jeroboam was forewarned, and fled
+to Egypt, where Pharaoh Sheshonq received him with honour, and gave him
+his wife's sister in marriage.* The peace of the nation had not been
+ostensibly troubled, but the very fact that a pretender should have
+risen up in opposition to the legitimate king augured ill for the future
+of the dynasty. In reality, the edifice which David had raised with
+such difficulty tottered on its foundations before the death of his
+successor; the foreign vassals were either in a restless state or ready
+to throw off their allegiance; money was scarce, and twenty Galilaean
+towns had been perforce ceded to Hiram to pay the debts due to him for
+the building of the temple;** murmurings were heard among the people,
+who desired an easier life.
+
+     * 1 Kings xi. 23-40, where the LXX. is fuller than the A. V.
+
+     ** 1 Kings ix. 10-13; cf. 2 Cliron. viii. 1, 2, where the
+     fact seems to have been reversed, and Hiram is made the
+     donor of the twenty towns.
+
+In a future age, when priestly and prophetic influences had gained the
+ascendant, amid the perils which assailed Jerusalem, and the miseries of
+the exile, the Israelites, contrasting their humiliation with the glory
+of the past, forgot the reproaches which their forefathers had addressed
+to the house of David, and surrounded its memory with a halo of romance.
+David again became the hero, and Solomon the saint and sage of his race;
+the latter "spake three thousand proverbs; and his songs were a thousand
+and five. And he spake of trees, from the cedar that is in Lebanon even
+unto the hyssop that springeth out of the wall: he spake also of beasts,
+and of fowl, and of creeping things, and of fishes." We are told that
+God favoured him with a special predilection, and appeared to him on
+three separate occasions: once immediately after the death of David,
+to encourage him by the promise of a prosperous reign, and the gift
+of wisdom in governing; again after the dedication of the temple, to
+confirm him in his pious intentions; and lastly to upbraid him for his
+idolatry, and to predict the downfall of his house. Solomon is supposed
+to have had continuous dealings with all the sovereigns of the Oriental
+world,* and a Queen of Sheba is recorded as having come to bring him
+gifts from the furthest corner of Arabia.
+
+     * 1 Kings iv. 34; on this passage are founded all the
+     legends dealing with the contests of wit and wisdom in which
+     Solomon was supposed to have entered with the kings of
+     neighbouring countries; traces of these are found in Dius,
+     in Menander, and in Eupolemus.
+
+His contemporaries, however, seem to have regarded him as a tyrant who
+oppressed them with taxes, and whose death was unregretted.*
+
+     * I am inclined to place the date of Solomon's death between
+     935 and 930 B.C.
+
+[Illustration: 384.jpg King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba]
+
+His son Rehoboam experienced no opposition in Jerusalem and Judah on
+succeeding to the throne of his father; when, however, he repaired to
+Shechem to receive the oath of allegiance from the northern and central
+tribes, he found them unwilling to tender it except under certain
+conditions; they would consent to obey him only on the promise of his
+delivering them from the forced labour which had been imposed upon them
+by his predecessors. Jeroboam, who had returned from his Egyptian exile
+on the news of Solomon's death, undertook to represent their grievances
+to the new king. "Thy father made our yoke grievous: now therefore make
+thou the grievous service of thy father, and his heavy yoke which he put
+upon us, lighter, and we will serve thee." Rehoboam demanded three
+days for the consideration of his reply; he took counsel with the old
+advisers of the late king, who exhorted him to comply with the petition,
+but the young men who were his habitual companions urged him, on the
+contrary, to meet the remonstrances of his subjects with threats of
+still harsher exactions. Their advice was taken, and when Jeroboam again
+presented himself, Rehoboam greeted him with raillery and threats. "My
+little finger is thicker than my father's loins. And now whereas my
+father did lade you with a heavy yoke, I will add to your yoke:
+my father chastised you with whips, but I will chastise you with
+scorpions." This unwise answer did not produce the intimidating effect
+which was desired; the cry of revolt, which had already been raised in
+the earlier days of the monarchy, was once more heard. "What portion
+have we in David? neither have we inheritance in the son of Jesse:
+to your tents, O Israel: now see to thine own house, David." Rehoboam
+attempted to carry his threats into execution, and sent the collectors
+of taxes among the rebels to enforce payment; but one of them was stoned
+almost before his eyes, and the king himself had barely time to regain
+his chariot and flee to Jerusalem to escape an outburst of popular
+fury. The northern and central tribes immediately offered the crown to
+Jeroboam, and the partisans of the son of Solomon were reduced to those
+of his own tribe; Judah, Caleb, the few remaining Simeonites, and some
+of the towns of Dan and Benjamin, which were too near to Jerusalem to
+escape the influence of a great city, were all who threw in their lot
+with him.*
+
+     * 1 Kings xii. 1--24; cf. 2 Chron. x., xi. 1-4. The text of
+     1 Kings xii. 20 expressly says, "there was none that
+     followed the house of David but the tribe of Judah only;"
+     whereas the following verse, which some think to have been
+     added by another hand, adds that Rehoboam assembled 180,000
+     men "which were warriors" from "the house of Judah and the
+     tribe of Benjamin."
+
+Thus was accomplished the downfall of the House of David, and with it
+the Hebrew kingdom which it had been at such pains to build up. When we
+consider the character of the two kings who formed its sole dynasty, we
+cannot refrain from thinking that it deserved a better fate. David
+and Solomon exhibited that curious mixture of virtues and vices which
+distinguished most of the great Semite princes. The former, a soldier
+of fortune and an adventurous hero, represents the regular type of the
+founder of a dynasty; crafty, cruel, ungrateful, and dissolute, but
+at the same time brave, prudent, cautious, generous, and capable of
+enthusiasm, clemency, and repentance; at once so lovable and so gentle
+that he was able to inspire those about him with the firmest friendship
+and the most absolute devotion. The latter was a religious though
+sensual monarch, fond of display--the type of sovereign who usually
+succeeds to the head of the family and enjoys the wealth which his
+predecessor had acquired, displaying before all men the results of an
+accomplished work, and often thereby endangering its stability. The real
+reason of their failure to establish a durable monarchy was the fact
+that neither of them understood the temperament of the people they were
+called upon to govern. The few representations we possess of the Hebrews
+of this period depict them as closely resembling the nations which
+inhabited Southern Syria at the time of the Egyptian occupation. They
+belong to the type with which the monuments have made us familiar; they
+are distinguished by an aquiline nose, projecting cheek-bones, and curly
+hair and beard. They were vigorous, hardy, and inured to fatigue, but
+though they lacked those qualities of discipline and obedience which are
+the characteristics of true warrior races, David had not hesitated to
+employ them in war; they were neither sailors, builders, nor given to
+commerce and industries, and yet Solomon built fleets, raised palaces
+and a temple, and undertook maritime expeditions, and financial
+circumstances seemed for the moment to be favourable.
+
+[Illustration: 387.jpg A JEWISH CAPTIVE]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Petrie.
+
+The onward progress of Assyria towards the Mediterranean had been
+arrested by the Hittites, Egypt was in a condition of lethargy, the
+Aramaean populations were fretting away their energies in internal
+dissensions; David, having encountered no serious opposition after his
+victory over the Philistines, had extended his conquests and increased
+the area of his kingdom, and the interested assistance which Tyre
+afterwards gave to Solomon enabled the latter to realise his dreams of
+luxury and royal magnificence. But the kingdom which had been created
+by David and Solomom rested solely on their individual efforts, and its
+continuance could be ensured only by bequeathing it to descendants who
+had sufficient energy and prudence to consolidate its weaker elements,
+and build up the tottering materials which were constantly threatening
+to fall asunder. As soon as the government had passed into the hands
+of the weakling Rehoboam, who had at the outset departed from his
+predecessors' policy, the component parts of the kingdom, which had
+for a few years been, held together, now became disintegrated without
+a shock, and as if by mutual consent. The old order of things which
+existed in the time of the Judges had passed away with the death of
+Saul. The advantages which ensued from a monarchical regime were too
+apparent to permit of its being set aside, and the tribes who had been
+bound together by nearly half a century of obedience to a common master
+now resolved themselves, according to their geographical positions, into
+two masses of unequal numbers and extent--Judah in the south, together
+with the few clans who remained loyal to the kingly house, and Israel in
+the north and the regions beyond Jordan, occupying three-fourths of the
+territory which had belonged to David and Solomon.
+
+Israel, in spite of its extent and population, did not enjoy the
+predominant position which we might have expected at the beginning of
+its independent existence. It had no political unity, no capital
+in which to concentrate its resources, no temple, and no army; it
+represented the material out of which a state could be formed rather
+than one already constituted. It was subdivided into three groups,
+formerly independent of, and almost strangers to each other, and between
+whom neither David nor Solomon had been able to establish any bond which
+would enable them to forget their former isolation. The centre group was
+composed of the House of Joseph--Ephraim, Benjamin, and Manasseh--and
+comprised the old fortresses of Perea, Mahanaim, Penuel, Succoth,
+and Eamoth, ranged in a line running parallel with the Jordan. In the
+eastern group were the semi-nomad tribes of Reuben and Gad, who still
+persisted in the pastoral habits of their ancestors, and remained
+indifferent to the various revolutions which had agitated their race
+for several generations. Finally, in the northern group lay the smaller
+tribes of Asher, Naphtali, Issachar, Zebulon, and Dan, hemmed in between
+the Phoenicians and the Aramaeans of Zoba and Damascus. Each group had
+its own traditions, its own interests often opposed to those of its
+neighbours, and its own peculiar mode of life, which it had no intention
+of renouncing for any one else's benefit. The difficulty of keeping
+these groups together became at once apparent. Shechem had been the
+first to revolt against Rehoboam; it was a large and populous town,
+situated almost in the centre of the newly formed state, and the seat of
+an ancient oracle, both of which advantages seemed to single it out as
+the future capital. But its very importance, and the memories of its
+former greatness under Jeruhhaal and Abimelech, were against it. Built
+in the western territory belonging to Manasseh, the eastern and northern
+clans would at once object to its being chosen, on the ground that it
+would humiliate them before the House of Joseph, in the same manner as
+the selection of Jerusalem had tended to make them subservient to Judah.
+Jeroboam would have endangered his cause by fixing on it as his capital,
+and he therefore soon quitted it to establish himself at Tirzah. It is
+true that the latter town was also situated in the mountains of Ephraim,
+but it was so obscure and insignificant a place that it disarmed all
+jealousy; the new king therefore took up his residence in it, since he
+was forced to fix on some royal abode, but it never became for him what
+Jerusalem was to his rival, a capital at once religious and military. He
+had his own sanctuary and priests at Tirzah, as was but natural, but
+had he attempted to found a temple which would have attracted the whole
+population to a common worship, he would have excited jealousies which
+would have been fatal to his authority. On the other hand, Solomon's
+temple had in its short period of existence not yet acquired such a
+prestige as to prevent Jeroboam's drawing his people away from it:
+which he determined to do from a fear that contact with Jerusalem would
+endanger the allegiance of his subjects to his person and family. Such
+concourses of worshippers, assembling at periodic intervals from all
+parts of the country, soon degenerated into a kind of fair, in which
+commercial as well as religious motives had their part.
+
+[Illustration: 391.jpg THE MOUND AND PLAIN OF BETHEL.]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from the photograph published by the Duc
+     de Luynes.
+
+These gatherings formed a source of revenue to the prince in
+whose capital they were held, and financial as well as political
+considerations required that periodical assemblies should be established
+in Israel similar to those which attracted Judah to Jerusalem. Jeroboam
+adopted a plan which while safeguarding the interests of his treasury,
+prevented his becoming unpopular with his own subjects; as he was
+unable to have a temple for himself alone, he chose two out of the most
+venerated ancient sanctuaries, that of Dan for the northern tribes, and
+that of Bethel, on the Judaean frontier, for the tribes of the east and
+centre. He made two calves of gold, one for each place, and said to the
+people, "It is too much for you to go up to Jerusalem; behold thy gods,
+O Israel, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt." He granted
+the sanctuaries certain appanages, and established a priesthood
+answering to that which officiated in the rival kingdom: "whosoever
+would he consecrated him, that there might be priests of the high
+places."* While Jeroboam thus endeavoured to strengthen himself on the
+throne by adapting the monarchy to the temperament of the tribes over
+which he ruled, Rehoboam took measures to regain his lost ground and
+restore the unity which he himself had destroyed. He recruited the army
+which had been somewhat neglected in the latter years of his father,
+restored the walls of the cities which had remained faithful to him, and
+fortified the places which constituted his frontier defences against the
+Israelites.** His ambition was not as foolish as we might be tempted to
+imagine. He had soldiers, charioteers, generals, skilled in the art of
+war, well-filled storehouses, the remnant of the wealth of Solomon, and,
+as a last resource, the gold of the temple at Jerusalem. He ruled over
+the same extent of territory as that possessed by David after the death
+of Saul, but the means at his disposal were incontestably greater than
+those of his grandfather, and it is possible that he might in the
+end have overcome Jeroboam, as David overcame Ishbosheth, had not the
+intervention of Egypt disconcerted his plans, and, by exhausting his
+material forces, struck a death-blow to all his hopes.
+
+     * 1 Kings xii. 25-32; chaps, xii. 33, xiii., xiv. 1-18
+     contain, side by side with the narrative of facts, such as
+     the death of Jeroboam's son, comments on the religious
+     conduct of the sovereign, which some regard as being of
+     later date.
+
+     ** 1 Kings xii. 21-24; cf. 2 Ghron. xi. 1-17, where the list
+     of strongholds, wanting in the Boole of Kings, is given from
+     an ancient source. The writer affirms, in harmony with the
+     ideas of his time, "that the Levites left their suburbs and
+     their possession, and came to Judah and Jerusalem; for
+     Jeroboam and his sons cast them off, that they should not
+     execute the Priest's office unto the Lord."
+
+The century and a half which had elapsed since the death of the last of
+the Ramessides had, as far as we can ascertain, been troubled by civil
+wars and revolutions.*
+
+* I have mentioned above the uncertainty which still shrouds the XXth
+dynasty. The following is the order in which I propose that its kings
+should be placed:--
+
+[Illustration: 393.jpg TABLE OF KINGS]
+
+The imperious Egypt of the Theban dynasties had passed away, but a new
+Egypt had arisen, not without storm and struggle, in its place. As long
+as the campaigns of the Pharaohs had been confined to the Nile valley
+and the Oases, Thebes had been the natural centre of the kingdom; placed
+almost exactly between the Mediterranean and the southern frontier, it
+had been both the national arsenal and the treasure-house to which all
+foreign wealth had found its way from the Persian Gulf to the Sahara,
+and from the coasts of Asia Minor to the equatorial swamps. The cities
+of the Delta, lying on the frontier of those peoples with whom Egypt
+now held but little intercourse, possessed neither the authority nor the
+resources of Thebes; even Memphis, to which the prestige of her ancient
+dynasties still clung, occupied but a secondary place beside her rival.
+The invasion of the shepherds, by making the Thebaid the refuge and
+last bulwark of the Egyptian nation, increased its importance: in the
+critical times of the struggle, Thebes was not merely the foremost city
+in the country, it represented the country itself, and the heart of
+Egypt may be said to have throbbed within its walls. The victories of
+Ahmosis, the expeditions of Thutmosis I. and Thutmosis III., enlarged
+her horizon; her Pharaohs crossed the isthmus of Suez, they conquered
+Syria, subdued the valleys of the Euphrates and the Balikh, and by so
+doing increased her wealth and her splendour. Her streets witnessed
+during two centuries processions of barbarian prisoners laden with the
+spoils of conquest. But with the advent of the XIXth and XXth dynasties
+came anxious times; the peoples of Syria and Libya, long kept in
+servitude, at length rebelled, and the long distance between Karnak and
+Gaza soon began to be irksome to princes who had to be constantly on
+the alert on the Canaanite frontier, and who found it impossible to have
+their head-quarters six hundred miles from the scene of hostilities.
+Hence it came about that Ramses II., Minephtah, and Ramses III. all
+took up their abode in the Delta during the greater part of their active
+life; they restored its ancient towns and founded new ones, which
+soon acquired considerable wealth by foreign commerce. The centre
+of government of the empire, which, after the dissolution of the old
+Memphite state, had been removed southwards to Thebes on account of the
+conquest of Ethiopia and the encroachment of Theban civilization upon
+Nubia and the Sudan, now gradually returned northwards, and passing over
+Heracleo-polis, which had exercised a transitory supremacy, at length
+established itself in the Delta. Tanis, Bubastis, Sais, Mondes, and
+Sebennytos all disputed the honour of forming the royal residence, and
+all in turn during the course of ages enjoyed the privilege without ever
+rising to the rank of Thebes, or producing any sovereigns to be compared
+with those of her triumphant dynasties. Tanis was, as we have seen, the
+first of these to rule the whole of the Nile valley. Its prosperity had
+continued to increase from the time that Ramses II. began to rebuild it;
+the remaining inhabitants of Avaris, mingled with the natives of pure
+race and the prisoners of war settled there, had furnished it with an
+active and industrious population, which had considerably increased
+during the peaceful reigns of the XXth dynasty. The surrounding country,
+drained and cultivated by unremitting efforts, became one of the most
+fruitful parts of the Delta; there was a large exportation of fish
+and corn, to which were soon added the various products of its
+manufactories, such as linen and woollen stuffs, ornaments, and objects
+in glass and in precious metals.*
+
+     * The immense number of designs taken from aquatic plants,
+     as, for instance, the papyrus and the lotus, single or in
+     groups, as well as from fish and aquatic birds, which we
+     observe on objects of Phoenician goldsmiths' work, leads me
+     to believe that the Tyrian and Sidonian artists borrowed
+     most of their models from the Delta, and doubtless from
+     Tanis, the most flourishing town of the Delta during the
+     centuries following the downfall of Thebes.
+
+These were embarked on Egyptian or Phoenician galleys, and were
+exchanged in the ports of the Mediterranean for Syrian, Asiatic, or
+AEgean commodities, which were then transmitted by the Egyptian merchants
+to the countries of the East and to Northern Africa.* The port of Tanis
+was one of the most secure and convenient which existed at that period.
+It was at sufficient distance from the coast to be safe from the sudden
+attacks of pirates,** and yet near enough to permit of its being reached
+from the open by merchantmen in a few hours of easy navigation; the arms
+of the Nile, and the canals which here flowed into the sea, were broad
+and deep, and, so long as they were kept well dredged, would allow the
+heaviest-laden vessel of large draught to make its way up them with
+ease.
+
+     * It was from Tanis that the Egyptian vessel set out
+     carrying the messengers of Hrihor to Byblos.
+
+     ** We may judge of the security afforded by such a position
+     by the account in Homer which Ulysses gives to Eumaios of
+     his pretended voyage to Egypt; the Greeks having
+     disembarked, and being scattered over the country, were
+     attacked by the Egyptians before they could capture a town
+     or carry their booty to the ships.
+
+The site of the town was not less advantageous for overland traffic.
+Tanis was the first important station encountered by caravans after
+crossing the frontier at Zalu, and it offered them a safe and convenient
+emporium for the disposal of their goods in exchange for the riches of
+Egypt and the Delta. The combination of so many advantageous features
+on one site tended to the rapid development of both civic and individual
+wealth; in less than three centuries after its rebuilding by Ramses II.,
+Tanis had risen to a position which enabled its sovereigns to claim even
+the obedience of Thebes itself.
+
+We know very little of the history of this Tanite dynasty; the monuments
+have not revealed the names of all its kings, and much difficulty is
+experienced in establishing the sequence of those already brought to
+light.*
+
+
+* The classification of the Tanite line has been complicated in the
+minds of most Egyptologists by the tendency to ignore the existence
+of the sacerdotal dynasty of high priests, to confuse with the Tanite
+Pharaohs those of the high priests who bore the crown, and to identify
+in the lists of Manetho (more or less corrected) the names they are
+in search of. A fresh examination of the subject has led me to adopt
+provisionally the following order for the series of Tanite kings:--
+
+[Illustration: 397.jpg TABLE OF KINGS]
+
+Their actual domain barely extended as far as Siut, but their suzerainty
+was acknowledged by the Said as well as by all or part of Ethiopia, and
+the Tanite Pharaohs maintained their authority with such vigour, that
+they had it in their power on several occasions to expel the high
+priests of Amon, and to restore, at least for a time, the unity of the
+empire. To accomplish this, it would have been sufficient for them to
+have assumed the priestly dignity at Thebes, and this was what no doubt
+took place at times when a vacancy in the high priesthood occurred;
+but it was merely in an interim, and the Tanite sovereigns always
+relinquished the office, after a brief lapse of time, in favour of some
+member of the family of Hrihor whose right of primogeniture entitled him
+to succeed to it.* It indeed seemed as if custom and religious etiquette
+had made the two offices of the pontificate and the royal dignity
+incompatible for one individual to hold simultaneously. The priestly
+duties had become marvellously complicated during the Theban hegemony,
+and the minute observances which they entailed absorbed the whole life
+of those who dedicated themselves to their performance.**
+
+     * This is only true if the personage who entitles himself
+     once within a cartouche, "the Master of the two lands, First
+     Prophet of Amon, Psiukhan-nit," is really the Tanite king,
+     and not the high priest Psiukhannit.
+
+     ** The first book of Diodorus contains a picture of the life
+     of the kings of Egypt, which, in common with much
+     information contained in the work, is taken from a lost book
+     of Hecataeus. The historical romance written by the latter
+     appears to have been composed from information taken from
+     Theban sources. The comparison of it with the inscribed
+     monuments and the ritual of the cultus of Amon proves that
+     the ideal description given in this work of the life of the
+     kings, merely reproduces the chief characteristics of the
+     lives of the Theban and Ethiopian high priests; hence the
+     greater part of the minute observances which we remark
+     therein apply to the latter only, and not to the Pharaohs
+     properly so called.
+
+They had daily to fulfil a multitude of rites, distributed over the
+various hours in such a manner that it seemed impossible to find leisure
+for any fresh occupation without encroaching on the time allotted to
+absolute bodily needs. The high priest rose each morning at an appointed
+hour; he had certain times for taking food, for recreation, for giving
+audience, for dispensing justice, for attending to worldly affairs, and
+for relaxation with his wives and children; at night he kept watch, or
+rose at intervals to prepare for the various ceremonies which could only
+be celebrated at sunrise. He was responsible for the superintendence of
+the priests of Amon in the numberless festivals held in honour of the
+gods, from which he could not absent himself except for some legitimate
+reason. From all this it will be seen how impossible it was for a lay
+king, like the sovereign ruling at Tanis, to submit to such restraints
+beyond a certain point; his patience would soon have become exhausted,
+want of practice would have led him to make slips or omissions,
+rendering the rites null and void; and the temporal affairs of his
+kingdom--internal administration, justice, finance, commerce, and
+war--made such demands upon his time, that he was obliged as soon as
+possible to find a substitute to fulfil his religious duties. The force
+of circumstances therefore maintained the line of Theban high priests
+side by side with their sovereigns, the Tanite kings. They were, it is
+true, dangerous rivals, both on account of the wealth of their fief and
+of the immense prestige which they enjoyed in Egypt, Ethiopia, and in
+all the nomes devoted to the worship of Amon. They were allied to the
+elder branch of the ramessides, and had thus inherited such near rights
+to the crown that Smendes had not hesitated to concede to Hrihor the
+cartouches, the preamble, and insignia of the Pharaoh, including the
+pschent and the iron helmet inlaid with gold. This concession, however,
+had been made as a personal favour, and extended only to the lifetime of
+Hrihor, without holding good, as a matter of course, for his successors;
+his son Pionkhi had to confine himself to the priestly titles,* and his
+grandson Painotmu enjoyed the kingly privileges only during part of his
+life, doubtless in consequence of his marriage with a certain Makeri,
+probably daughter of Psiukhannit L, the Tanite king. Makeri apparently
+died soon after, and the discovery of her coffin in the hiding-place at
+Deir el-Bahari reveals the fact of her death in giving birth to a little
+daughter who did not survive her, and who rests in the same
+coffin beside the mummy of her mother. None of the successors
+of Painotmu--Masahirti, Manakhpirri, Painotmu II., Psiukhannit,
+Nsbindidi--enjoyed a similar distinction, and if one of them happened to
+surround his name with a cartouche, it was done surreptitiously, without
+the authority of the sovereign.**
+
+     * The only monument of this prince as yet known gives him
+     merely the usual titles of the high priest, and the
+     inscriptions of his son Painotmu I. style him "First Prophet
+     of Amon." His name should probably be read Paionukhi or
+     Pionukhi, rather than Pionkhi or Piankhi. It is not unlikely
+     that some of the papyri published by Spiegelberg date from
+     his pontificate.
+
+     ** Manakhpirri often places his name in a square cartouche
+     which tends at times to become an oval, but this is the case
+     only on some pieces of stuff rolled round a mummy and on
+     some bricks concealed in the walls of el-Hibeh, Thebes, and
+     Gebelein. If the "Psiukhannit, High Priest of Amon," who
+     once (to our knowledge) enclosed his name in a cartouche, is
+     really a high priest, and not a king, his case would be
+     analogous to that of Manakhpirri.
+
+Painotmu II. contented himself with drawing attention to his
+connection with the reigning house, and styled himself "Royal Son of
+Psiukhannit-Miamon," on account of his ancestress Makeri having been the
+daughter of the Pharaoh Psiukhannit.*
+
+     * The example of the "royal sons of Ramses" explains the
+     variant which makes "Painotmu, son of Manakhpirri," into
+     "Painotmu, royal son of Psiukhannit-Miamon."
+
+The relationship of which he boasted was a distant one, but many of his
+contemporaries who claimed to be of the line of Sesostris, and called
+themselves "royal sons of Ramses," traced their descent from a far more
+remote ancestor.
+
+[Illustration: 401.jpg THE MUMMIES OF QUEEN MAKERI AND HER CHILD]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Emil Brugsch-
+     Bey.
+
+The death of one high priest, or the appointment of his successor, was
+often the occasion of disturbances; the jealousies between his children
+by the same or by different wives were as bitter as those which existed
+in the palace of the Pharaohs, and the suzerain himself was obliged
+at times to interfere in order to restore peace. It was owing to an
+intervention of this kind that Manakhpirri was called on to replace his
+brother Masahirti. A section of the Theban population had revolted,
+but the rising had been put down by the Tanite Siamon, and its leaders
+banished to the Oasis; Manakhpirri had thereupon been summoned to court
+and officially invested with the pontificate in the XXVth year of the
+king's reign. But on his return to Karnak, the new high priest desired
+to heal old feuds, and at once recalled the exiles.* Troubles and
+disorders appeared to beset the Thebans, and, like the last of the
+Ramessides, they were engaged in a perpetual struggle against robbers.**
+
+     * This appears in the _Maunier Stele_ preserved for some
+     time in the "Maison Francaise" at Luxor, and now removed to
+     the Louvre.
+
+     ** The series of high priests side by side with the
+     sovereigns of the XXIst dynasty may be provisionally
+     arranged as follows:--
+
+[Illustration: 402.jpg TABLE]
+
+
+The town, deprived of its former influx of foreign spoil, became more
+and more impoverished, and its population gradually dwindled. The
+necropolis suffered increasingly from pillagers, and the burying-places
+of the kings were felt to be in such danger, that the authorities,
+despairing of being able to protect them, withdrew the mummies from
+their resting-places. The bodies of Seti I., Ramses II., and Ramses III.
+were once more carried down the valley, and, after various removals,
+were at length huddled together for safety in the tomb of Amenothes I.
+at Drah-abu'l-Neggah.
+
+The Tanite Pharaohs seemed to have lacked neither courage nor good will.
+The few monuments which they have left show that to some extent they
+carried on the works begun by their predecessors. An unusually high
+inundation had injured the temple at Karnak, the foundations had been
+denuded by the water, and serious damage would have been done, had not
+the work of reparation been immediately undertaken. Nsbindidi reopened
+the sandstone quarries between Erment and Grebelein, from which Seti I.
+had obtained the building materials for the temple, and drew from thence
+what was required for the repair of the edifice. Two of the descendants
+of Nsbindidi, Psiukhannit I. and Amenemopit, remodelled the little
+temple built by Kheops in honour of his daughter Honit-sonu, at the
+south-east angle of his pyramid. Both Siamonmiamon and Psiukhannit I.
+have left traces of their work at Memphis, and the latter inserted his
+cartouches on two of the obelisks raised by Ramses at Heliopolis. But
+these were only minor undertakings, and it is at Tanis that we must seek
+the most characteristic examples of their activity. Here it was that
+Psiukhannit rebuilt the brick ramparts which defended the city, and
+decorated several of the halls of the great temple. The pylons of this
+sanctuary had been merely begun by Sesostris: Siamon completed them,
+and added the sphinxes; and the metal plaques and small objects which he
+concealed under the base of one of the latter have been brought to light
+in the course of excavations. The appropriation of the monuments of
+other kings, which we have remarked under former dynasties, was also
+practised by the Tanites. Siamon placed his inscriptions over those of
+the Kamessides, and Psiukhannit engraved his name on the sphinxes and
+statues of Ame-nemhait III. as unscrupulously as Apophis and the Hyksos
+had done before him. The Tanite sovereigns, however, were not at a loss
+for artists, and they had revived, after the lapse of centuries, the
+traditions of the local school which had flourished during the XIIth
+dynasty.
+
+[Illustration: 404.jpg THE TWO NILES OF TANIS]
+
+     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Emil Brugsch-
+     Bey.
+
+One of the groups, executed by order of Psiukhannit, has escaped
+destruction, and is now in the Gizeh Museum. It represents two figures
+of the Nile, marching gravely shoulder to shoulder, and carrying in
+front of them tables of offerings, ornamented with fish and
+garnished with flowers. The stone in which they are executed is of an
+extraordinary hardness, but the sculptor has, notwithstanding, succeeded
+in carving and polishing it with a skill which does credit to his
+proficiency in his craft. The general effect of the figures is a
+little heavy, but the detail is excellent, and the correctness of pose,
+precision in modelling, and harmony of proportion are beyond criticism.
+The heads present a certain element of strangeness. The artist evidently
+took as his model, as far as type and style of head-dress are concerned,
+the monuments of Amenemhait III. which he saw around him; indeed, he
+probably copied one of them feature for feature. He has reproduced the
+severity of expression, the firm mouth, the projecting cheek-bones, the
+long hair and fan-shaped beard of his model, but he has not been able
+to imitate the broad and powerful treatment of the older artists; his
+method of execution has a certain hardness and conventionality which we
+never see to the same extent in the statues of the XIIth dynasty. The
+work is, however, an extremely interesting one, and we are tempted to
+wish that many more such monuments had been saved from the ruins of the
+city.*
+
+
+     * Mariette attributes this group to the Hyksos; I have
+     already expressed the opinion that it dates from the XXIst
+     dynasty.
+
+The Pharaoh who dedicated it was a great builder, and, like most of
+his predecessors with similar tastes, somewhat of a conqueror. The
+sovereigns of the XXIst dynasty, though they never undertook any distant
+campaigns, did not neglect to keep up a kind of suzerainty over the
+Philistine Shephelah to which they still laid claim. The expedition
+which one of them, probably Psiukhannit II., led against Gezer, the
+alliance with the Hebrews and the marriage of a royal princess with
+Solomon, must all have been regarded at the court of Tanis as a partial
+revival of the former Egyptian rule in Syria. The kings were, however,
+obliged to rest content with small results, for though their battalions
+were sufficiently numerous and well disciplined to overcome the
+Canaanite chiefs, or even the Israelite kingdom, it is to be doubted
+whether they were strong enough to attack the troops of the Aramaean or
+Hittite princes, who had a highly organised military system, modelled
+on that of Assyria. Egyptian arms and tactics had not made much progress
+since the great campaigns of the Theban conquerors; the military
+authorities still complacently trusted to their chariots and their light
+troops of archers at a period when the whole success of a campaign was
+decided by heavily armed infantry, and when cavalry had already begun
+to change the issue of battles. The decadence of the military spirit
+in Egypt had been particularly marked in all classes under the later
+Ramessides, and the native militia, without exception, was reduced to a
+mere rabble--courageous, it is true, and able to sell their lives dearly
+when occasion demanded, rather than give way before the enemy, but
+entirely lacking that enthusiasm and resolution which sweep all
+obstacles before them. The chariotry had not degenerated in the same
+way, thanks to the care with which the Pharaoh and his vassals kept up
+the breeding of suitable horses in the training stables of the principal
+towns. Egypt provided Solomon with draught-horses, and with strong yet
+light chariots, which he sold with advantage to the sovereigns of the
+Orontes and the Euphrates. But it was the mercenaries who constituted
+the most active and effective section of the Pharaonic armies. These
+troops formed the backbone on which all the other elements--chariots,
+spearmen, and native archers--were dependent. Their spirited attack
+carried the other troops with them, and by a tremendous onslaught on the
+enemy at a decisive moment gave the commanding general some chance of
+success against the better-equipped and better-organised battalions that
+he would be sure to meet with on the plains of Asia. The Tanite kings
+enrolled these mercenaries in large numbers: they entrusted them with
+the garrisoning of the principal towns, and confirmed the privileges
+which their chiefs had received from the Ramessides, but the results of
+such a policy were not long in manifesting themselves, and this state
+of affairs had been barely a century in existence before Egypt became a
+prey to the barbarians.
+
+It would perhaps be more correct to say that it had fallen a prey to the
+Libyans only. The Asiatics and Europeans whom the Theban Pharaohs had
+called in to fight for them had become merged in the bulk of the nation,
+or had died out for lack of renewal. Semites abounded, it is true, in
+the eastern nomes of the Delta, but their presence had no effect on
+the military strength of the country. Some had settled in the towns
+and villages, and were engaged in commerce or industry; these included
+Phoenician, Canaanite, Edomite, and even Hebrew merchants and artisans,
+who had been forced to flee from their own countries owing to political
+disturbances.*
+
+     * Jeroboam (1 Kings xi. 40, xii. 2, 3) and Hadad (1 Kings
+     xi. 17-22) took refuge in this way at the court of Pharaoh.
+
+A certain proportion were descendants of the Hidjsos, who had been
+reinforced from time to time by settlements of prisoners captured in
+battle; they had taken refuge in the marshes as in the times of Abmosis,
+and there lived in a kind of semi-civilized independence, refusing to
+pay taxes, boasting of having kept themselves from any alliances with
+the inhabitants of the Nile valley, while their kinsmen of the older
+stock betrayed the knowledge of their origin by such disparaging
+nicknames as Pa-shmuri, "the stranger," or Pi-atnu, "the Asiatic." The
+Shardana, who had constituted the body-guard of Ramses II., and whose
+commanders had, under Ramses III., ranked with the great officers of the
+crown, had all but disappeared. It had been found difficult to recruit
+them since the dislodgment of the People of the Sea from the Delta and
+the Syrian littoral, and their settlement in Italy and the fabulous
+islands of the Mediterranean; the adventurers from Crete and the AEgean
+coasts now preferred to serve under the Philistines, where they found
+those who were akin to their own race, and from thence they passed on to
+the Hebrews, where, under David and Solomon, they were gladly hired as
+mercenaries.*
+
+     * Carians or Cretans (Chercthites) formed part of David's
+     body-guard (2 Sam viii. 18, xv. 18, xx. 23); one again meets
+     with these Carian or Cretan troops in Judah in the reign of
+     Athaliah (2 Kings xi. 4, 19).
+
+The Libyans had replaced the Shardana in all the offices they had filled
+and in all the garrison towns they had occupied. The kingdom of Maraiu
+and Kapur had not survived the defeats which it had suffered from
+Minephtah and Ramses III., but the Mashauasha who had founded it still
+kept an active hegemony over their former subjects; hence it was that
+the Egyptians became accustomed to look on all the Libyan tribes as
+branches of the dominant race, and confounded all the immigrants from
+Libya under the common name of Mashauasha.* Egypt was thus slowly
+flooded by Libyans; it was a gradual invasion, which succeeded by
+pacific means where brute force had failed. A Berber population
+gradually took possession of the country, occupying the eastern
+provinces of the Delta, filling its towns--Sais, Damanhur, and
+Marea--making its way into the Fayum, the suburbs of Heracleopolis, and
+penetrating as far south as Abydos; at the latter place they were not
+found in such great numbers, but still considerable enough to leave
+distinct traces.** The high priests of Amon seem to have been the
+only personages who neglected to employ this ubiquitous race; but they
+preferred to use the Nubian tribe of the Mazaiu,*** who probably from
+the XIIth dynasty onwards had constituted the police force of Thebes.
+
+     * Ramses III. still distinguished between the Qahaka, the
+     Tihonu, and the Mashauasha; the monuments of the XXIInd
+     dynasty only recognise the Mashaiiasha, whose name they
+     curtail to Ma.
+
+     ** The presence in those regions of persons bearing Asiatic
+     names has been remarked, without drawing thence any proof
+     for the existence of Asiatic colonies in those regions. The
+     presence of Libyans at Abydos seems to be proved by the
+     discovery in that town of the little monument reproduced on
+     the next page, and of many objects in the same style, many
+     of which are in the Louvre or the British Museum.
+
+     *** I have not discovered among the personal attendants of
+     the descendants of Hrihor any functionary bearing the title
+     of _Chief of the Mashaiuasha _; even those who bore it later
+     on, under the XXIInd dynasty, were always officers from
+     the north of Egypt. It seems almost certain that Thebes
+     always avoided having Libyan troops, and never received a
+     Mashauasha settlement.
+
+These Libyan immigrants had adopted the arts of Egypt and the externals
+of her civilization; they sculptured rude figures on the rocks and
+engraved scenes on their stone vessels, in which they are represented
+fully armed,* and taking part in some skirmish or attack, or even a
+chase in the desert. The hunters are divided into two groups, each of
+which is preceded by a different ensign--that of the West for the right
+wing of the troop, and that of the East for the left wing. They carry
+the spear the boomerang, the club, the double-curved bow, and the
+dart; a fox's skin depends from their belts over their thighs, and an
+ostrich's feather waves above their curly hair.
+
+     * I attribute to the Libyans, whether mercenaries or tribes
+     hovering on the Egyptian frontier, the figures cut
+     everywhere on the rocks, which no one up till now has
+     reproduced or studied. To them I attribute also the tombs
+     which Mr. Petrie has so successfully explored, and in which
+     he finds the remains of a New Race which seems to have
+     conquered Egypt after the VIth dynasty: they appear to be of
+     different periods, but all belong to the Berber horsemen of
+     the desert and the outskirts of the Nile valley.
+
+[Illustration: 410.jpg A TROOP OF LIBYANS HUNTING]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from the original in the Louvre.
+
+They never abandoned this special head-dress and manner of arming
+themselves, and they can always be recognised on the monuments by the
+plumes surmounting their forehead.*
+
+     * This design is generally thought to represent a piece of
+     cloth folded in two, and laid flat on the head; examination
+     of the monuments proves that it is the ostrich plume fixed
+     at the back of the head, and laid flat on the hair or wig.
+
+Their settlement on the banks of the Nile and intermarriage with the
+Egyptians had no deteriorating effect on them, as had been the case
+with the Shardana, and they preserved nearly all their national
+characteristics. If here and there some of them became assimilated with
+the natives, there was always a constant influx of new comers, full
+of energy and vigour, who kept the race from becoming enfeebled. The
+attractions of high pay and the prospect of a free-and-easy life drew
+them to the service of the feudal lords. The Pharaoh entrusted their
+chiefs with confidential offices about his person, and placed the
+royal princes at their head. The position at length attained by these
+Mashauasha was analogous to that of the Oossasans at Babylon, and,
+indeed, was merely the usual sequel of permitting a foreign militia
+to surround an Oriental monarch; they became the masters of their
+sovereigns. Some of their generals went so far as to attempt to use the
+soldiery to overturn the native dynasty, and place themselves upon the
+throne; others sought to make and unmake kings to suit their own taste.
+The earlier Tanite sovereigns had hoped to strengthen their authority
+by trusting entirely to the fidelity and gratitude of their guard; the
+later kings became mere puppets in the hands of mercenaries. At length
+a Libyan family arose who, while leaving the externals of power in
+the hands of the native sovereigns, reserved to themselves the actual
+administration, and reduced the kings to the condition of luxurious
+dependence enjoyed by the elder branch of the Ramessides under the rule
+of the high priests of Amon.
+
+There was at Bubastis, towards the middle or end of the XXth dynasty,
+a Tihonu named Buiuwa-buiuwa. He was undoubtedly a soldier of fortune,
+without either office or rank, but his descendants prospered and rose to
+important positions among the Mashadasha chiefs: the fourth among these,
+Sheshonq by name, married Mihtinuoskhit, a princess of the royal line.
+His son, Namaroti, managed to combine with his function of chief of
+the Mashauasha several religious offices, and his grandson, also called
+Sheshonq, had a still more brilliant career. We learn from the monuments
+of the latter that, even before he had ascended the throne, he was
+recognised as king and prince of princes, and had conferred on him the
+command of all the Libyan troops. Officially he was the chief person in
+the state after the sovereign, and had the privilege of holding personal
+intercourse with the gods, Amonra included--a right which belonged
+exclusively to the Pharaoh and the Theban high priest. The honours which
+he bestowed upon his dead ancestors were of a remarkable character, and
+included the institution of a liturgical office in connection with his
+father Namaroti, a work which resembles in its sentiments the devotions
+of Bamses II. to the memory of Seti. He succeeded in arranging a
+marriage between his son Osorkon and a princess of the royal line, the
+daughter of Psiukhannit II., by which alliance he secured the Tanite
+succession; he obtained as a wife for his second son Auputi, the
+priestess of Amon, and thus obtained an indirect influence over the Said
+and Nubia.*
+
+     * The date of the death of Painotmu II. is fixed at the
+     XVIth year of his reign, according to the inscriptions in
+     the pit at Deir el-Bahari. This would be the date of the
+     accession of Auputi', if Auputi succeeded him directly, as I
+     am inclined to believe; but if Psiukhannit was his immediate
+     successor, and if Nsbindidi succeeded Manakhpirri, we must
+     place the accession of Auputi some years later.
+
+[Illustration: 413.jpg NSITANIBASHIRU]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph by E. Brugsch-Bey.
+
+This priestess was probably a daughter or niece of Painotmu II., but
+we are unacquainted with her name. The princesses continued to play a
+preponderating part in the transmission of power, and we may assume
+that the lady in question was one of those whose names have come down to
+us--Nsikhonsu, Nsitani-bashiru, or Isimkhobiu II., who brought with her
+as a dowry the Bubastite fief. We are at a loss whether to place Auputi
+immediately after Painotmu, or between the ephemeral pontificates of
+a certain Psiukhannit and a certain Nsbindidi. His succession imposed
+a very onerous duty upon him. Thebes was going through the agonies of
+famine and misery, and no police supervision in the world could secure
+the treasures stored up in the tombs of a more prosperous age from the
+attacks of a famished people. Arrests, trials, and punishments were
+ineffectual against the violation of the sepulchres, and even the
+royal mummies--including those placed in the chapel of Amenothes I. by
+previous high priests--were not exempt from outrage. The remains of the
+most glorious of the Pharaohs were reclining in this chapel, forming a
+sort of solemn parliament: here was Saqnunri Tiuaqni, the last member
+of the XVIIth dynasty; here also were the first of the XVIIIth--Ahmosis,
+Amenothes I., and the three of the name Thutmosis, together with the
+favourites of their respective harems--Nofritari, Ahhotpu II., Anhapu,
+Honittimihu, and Sitkamosis; and, in addition, Ramses I., Seti I.,
+Ramses II. of the XIXth dynasty, Ramses III. and Ramses X. of the XXth
+dynasty. The "Servants of the True Place" were accustomed to celebrate
+at the appointed periods the necessary rites established in their
+honour. Inspectors, appointed for the purpose by the government,
+determined from time to time the identity of the royal mummies, and
+examined into the condition of their wrappings and coffins: after each
+inspection a report, giving the date and the name of the functionary
+responsible for the examination, was inscribed on the linen or the lid
+covering the bodies. The most of the mummies had suffered considerably
+before they reached the refuge in which they were found. The bodies of
+Sitamon and of the Princess Honittimihu had been completely destroyed,
+and bundles of rags had been substituted for them, so arranged with
+pieces of wood as to resemble human figures. Ramses I., Ramses II., and
+Thutmosis had been deprived of their original shells, and were found in
+extemporised cases. Hrihor's successors, who regarded these sovereigns
+as their legitimate ancestors, had guarded them with watchful care, but
+Auputi, who did not feel himself so closely related to these old-world
+Pharaohs, considered, doubtless, this vigilance irksome, and determined
+to locate the mummies in a spot where they would henceforward be secure
+from all attack. A princess of the family of Manakhpirri--Isimkhobiu, it
+would appear--had prepared a tomb for herself in the rocky cliff which
+bounds the amphitheatre of Deir el-Bahari on the south. The position
+lent itself readily to concealment. It consisted of a well some 130 feet
+deep, with a passage running out of it at right angles for a distance of
+some 200 feet and ending in a low, oblong, roughly cut chamber, lacking
+both ornament and paintings. Painotmu II. had been placed within this
+chamber in the XVIth year of the reign of Psiukhannit II., and several
+members of his family had been placed beside him not long afterwards.
+Auputi soon transferred thither the batch of mummies which, in the
+chapel of Amenothes I., had been awaiting a more definite sepulture; the
+coffins, with what remained of their funerary furniture, were huddled
+together in disorder. The chamber having been filled up to the roof, the
+remaining materials, consisting of coffers, boxes of _Ushabti,_ Canopic
+jars, garlands, together with the belongings of priestly mummies, were
+arranged along the passage; when the place was full, the entrance was
+walled up, the well filled, and its opening so dexterously covered that
+it remained concealed until-our own time. The accidental "sounding" of
+some pillaging Arabs revealed the place as far back as 1872, but it was
+not until ten years later (1881) that the Pharaohs once more saw the
+light. They are now enthroned--who can say for how many years longer?
+--in the chambers of the Gizeh Museum. Egypt is truly a land of marvels!
+It has not only, like Assyria and Chaldaea, Greece and Italy, preserved
+for us monuments by which its historic past may be reconstructed, but it
+has handed on to us the men themselves who set up the monuments and made
+the history. Her great monarchs are not any longer mere names deprived
+of appropriate forms, and floating colourless and shapeless in the
+imagination of posterity: they may be weighed, touched, and measured;
+the capacity of their brains may be gauged; the curve of their noses and
+the cut of their mouths may be determined; we know if they were bald, or
+if they suffered from some secret infirmity; and, as we are able to do
+in the case of our contemporaries, we may publish their portraits taken
+first hand in the photographic camera. Sheshonq, by assuming the control
+of the Theban priesthood, did not on this account extend his sovereignty
+over Egypt beyond its southern portion, and that part of Nubia
+which still depended on it. Ethiopia remained probably outside his
+jurisdiction, and constituted from this time forward an independent
+kingdom, under the rule of dynasties which were, or claimed to be,
+descendants of Hrihor. The oasis, on the other hand, and the Libyan
+provinces in the neighbourhood of the Delta and the sea, rendered
+obedience to his officers, and furnished him with troops which were
+recognised as among his best. Sheshonq found himself at the death of
+Psiukhannit II., which took place about 940 B.C., sole master of Egypt,
+with an effective army and well-replenished treasury at his disposal.
+What better use could he make of his resources than devote them to
+reasserting the traditional authority of his country over Syria? The
+intestine quarrels of the only state of any importance in that region
+furnished him with an opportunity of which he found it easy to take
+advantage. Solomon in his eyes was merely a crowned vassal of Egypt, and
+his appeal for aid to subdue Gezer, his marriage with a daughter of
+the Egyptian royal house, the position he had assigned her over all his
+other wives, and all that we know of the relations between Jerusalem
+and Tanis at the time, seem to indicate that the Hebrews themselves
+acknowledged some sort of dependency upon Egypt. They were not, however,
+on this account free from suspicion in their suzerain's eyes, who seized
+upon every pretext that offered itself to cause them embarrassment.
+Hadad, and Jeroboam afterwards, had been well received at the court of
+the Pharaoh, and it was with Egyptian subsidies that these two rebels
+returned to their country, the former in the lifetime of Solomon, and
+the latter after his death. When Jeroboam saw that he was threatened by
+Rehoboam, he naturally turned to his old protectors. Sheshonq had two
+problems before him. Should he confirm by his intervention the division
+of the kingdom, which had flourished in Kharu for now half a century,
+into two rival states, or should he himself give way to the vulgar
+appetite for booty, and step in for his own exclusive interest? He
+invaded Judaea four years after the schism, and Jerusalem offered no
+resistance to him; Rehoboam ransomed his capital by emptying the royal
+treasuries and temple, rendering up even the golden shields which
+Solomon was accustomed to assign to his guards when on duty about his
+person.*
+
+     * 1 Kings xiv. 25-28; cf. 2 Chron. xii. 1-10, where an
+     episode, not in the _Book of Kings_, is introduced. The
+     prophet Shemaiah played an important part in the
+     transaction.
+
+This expedition of the Pharaoh was neither dangerous nor protracted, but
+it was more than two hundred years since so much riches from countries
+beyond the isthmus had been brought into Egypt, and the king was
+consequently regarded by the whole people of the Nile valley as a great
+hero. Auputi took upon himself the task of recording the exploit on the
+south wall of the temple of Amon at Karnak, not far from the spot where
+Ramses II. had had engraved the incidents of his Syrian campaigns. His
+architect was sent to Silsilis to procure the necessary sandstone to
+repair the monument. He depicted upon it his father receiving at the
+hands of Amon processions of Jewish prisoners, each one representing a
+captured city. The list makes a brave show, and is remarkable for the
+number of the names composing it: in comparison with those of Thutmosis
+III., it is disappointing, and one sees at a glance how inferior, even
+in its triumph, the Egypt of the XXIInd dynasty was to that of the
+XVIIIth.
+
+[Illustration: 419.jpg AMON PRESENTING TO SHESHONQ THE LIST OF THE
+CITIES CAPTURED IN ISRAEL AND JUDAH]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph by Beato.
+
+It is no longer a question of Carchemish, or Qodshu, or Mitanni,
+or Naharaim: Megiddo is the most northern point mentioned, and the
+localities enumerated bring us more and more to the south--Eabbat,
+Taanach, Hapharaim, Mahanaim,* Gibeon, Beth-horon, Ajalon, Jud-hammelek,
+Migdol, Jerza, Shoko, and the villages of the Negeb. Each locality,
+in consequence of the cataloguing of obscure towns, furnished enough
+material to cover two, or even three of the crenellated cartouches in
+which the names of the conquered peoples are enclosed, and Sheshonq
+had thus the puerile satisfaction of parading before the eyes of
+his subjects a longer _cortege_ of defeated chiefs than that of his
+predecessor. His victorious career did not last long: he died shortly
+after, and his son Osorkon was content to assume at a distance authority
+over the Kharu.**
+
+     * The existence of the names of certain Israelite towns on
+     the list of. Sheshonq has somewhat astonished the majority
+     of the historians of Israel. Renan declared that the list
+     must "put aside the conjecture that Jeroboam had been the
+     instigator of the expedition, which would certainly have
+     been readily admissible, especially if any force were
+     attached to the Greek text of 1 Kings xii. 24, which makes
+     Jeroboam to have been a son-in-law of the King of Egypt;"
+     the same view had been already expressed by Stade; others
+     have thought that Sheshonq had conquered the country for his
+     ally Jeroboam. Sheshonq, in fact, was following the Egyptian
+     custom by which all countries and towns which paid tribute
+     to the Pharaoh, or who recognised his suzerainty, were made
+     to, or might, figure on his triumphal lists whether they had
+     been conquered or not: the presence of Megiddo or Mahanaim
+     on the lists does not prove that they were _conquered_ by
+     Sheshonq, but that the prince to whom they owed allegiance
+     was a tributary to the King of Egypt. The name of Jud-ham-
+     melek, which occupies the twenty-ninth place on the list,
+     was for a long time translated as king or kingdom of Judah,
+     and passed for being a portrait of Rehoboam, which is
+     impossible. The Hebrew name was read by W. Max Millier Jad-
+     ham-meleh, the hand, the fort of the king. It appears to me
+     to be more easy to see in it Jud-liam-meleh and to associate
+     it with Jehudah, a town of the tribe of Dan, as Brugsch did
+     long ago.
+
+     ** Champollion identified Osorkon I. with the Zerah, who,
+     according to 2 Chron. xiv. 9-15, xvi. 8, invaded Judah and
+     was defeated by Asa, but this has no historic value, for it
+     is clear that Osorkon never crossed the isthmus.
+
+It does not appear, however, that either the Philistines, or Judah,
+or Israel, or any of the petty tribes which had momentarily gravitated
+around David and Solomon, were disposed to dispute Osorkon's claim,
+theoretic rather than real as it was. The sword of the stranger had
+finished the work which the intestine quarrel of the tribes had
+begun. If Rehoboam had ever formed the project of welding together the
+disintegrated elements of Israel, the taking of Jerusalem must have been
+a death-blow to his hopes. His arsenals were empty, his treasury at low
+ebb, and the prestige purchased by David's victories was effaced by
+the humiliation of his own defeat. The ease with which the edifice so
+laboriously constructed by the heroes of Benjamin and Judah had been
+overturned at the first shock, was a proof that the new possessors of
+Canaan were as little capable of barring the way to Egypt in her old
+age, as their predecessors had been when she was in her youth and
+vigour. The Philistines had had their day; it seemed by no means
+improbable at one time that they were about to sweep everything before
+them, from the Negeb to the Orontes, but their peculiar position in the
+furthest angle of the country, and their numerical weakness, prevented
+them from continuing their efforts for a prolonged period, and they were
+at length obliged to renounce in favour of the Hebrews their ambitious
+pretensions. The latter, who had been making steady progress for some
+half a century, had been successful where the Philistines had signally
+failed, and Southern Syria recognised their supremacy for the space of
+two generations. We can only conjecture what they might have done if a
+second David had led them into the valleys of the Orontes and Euphrates.
+They were stronger in numbers than their possible opponents, and their
+troops, strengthened by mercenary guards, would have perhaps triumphed
+over the more skilled but fewer warriors which the Amorite and Aramaean
+cities could throw into the field against them. The pacific reign
+of Solomon, the schism among the tribes, and the Egyptian invasion
+furnished evidence enough that they also were not destined to realise
+that solidarity which alone could secure them against the great Oriental
+empires when the day of attack came.
+
+The two kingdoms were then enjoying an independent existence. Judah, in
+spite of its smaller numbers and its recent disaster, was not far
+behind the more extensive Israel in its resources. David, and afterwards
+Solomon, had so kneaded together the various elements of which it was
+composed--Caleb, Cain, Jerahmeel and the Judsean clans--that they had
+become a homogeneous mass, grouped around the capital and its splendid
+sanctuary, and actuated with feelings of profound admiration and strong
+fidelity for the family which had made them what they were. Misfortune
+had not chilled their zeal: they rallied round Rehoboam and his race
+with such a persistency that they were enabled to maintain their ground
+when their richer rivals had squandered their energies and fallen
+away before their eyes. Jeroboam, indeed, and his successors had never
+obtained from their people more than a precarious support and a lukewarm
+devotion: their authority was continually coming into conflict with
+a tendency to disintegration among the tribes, and they could only
+maintain their rule by the constant employment of force. Jeroboam had
+collected together from the garrisons scattered throughout the country
+the nucleus of an army, and had stationed the strongest of these
+troops in his residence at Tirzah when he did not require them for some
+expedition against Judah or the Philistines. His successors followed
+his example in this respect, but this military resource was only an
+ineffectual protection against the dangers which beset them. The kings
+were literally at the mercy of their guard, and their reign was entirely
+dependent on its loyalty or caprice: any unscrupulous upstart might
+succeed in suborning his comrades, and the stroke of a dagger might
+at any moment send the sovereign to join his ancestors, while the
+successful rebel reigned in his stead.* The Egyptian troops had no
+sooner set out on their homeward march, than the two kingdoms began to
+display their respective characteristics. An implacable and truceless
+war broke out between them. The frontier garrisons of the two nations
+fought with each other from one year's end to another--carrying off each
+other's cattle, massacring one another, burning each other's villages
+and leading their inhabitants into slavery.**
+
+     * Among nineteen kings of Israel, eight were assassinated
+     and were replaced by the captains of their guards--Nadab,
+     Elah, Zimri, Joram, Zachariah, Shallum, Pekahiah, and Pekah.
+
+     ** This is what is meant by the Hebrew historians when they
+     say "there was war between Rehoboam and Jeroboam all the
+     days of his life" (1 Kings xv. 6; cf. 2 Ohron. xii. 15), and
+     "between Abijam and Jeroboam" (1 Kings xv. 7; 2 Ohron. xiii.
+     2), and "between Asa and Baasha" (1 Kings xv. 16, 32) "all
+     their days."
+
+From time to time, when the situation became intolerable, one of the
+kings took the field in person, and began operations by attacking such
+of his enemy's strongholds as gave him the most trouble at the time.
+Ramah acquired an unenviable reputation in the course of these early
+conflicts: its position gave it command of the roads terminating in
+Jerusalem, and when it fell into the hands of Israel, the Judaean capital
+was blockaded on this side. The strife for its possession was always
+of a terrible character, and the party which succeeded in establishing
+itself firmly within it was deemed to have obtained a great success.*
+
+     * The campaign of Abijah at Mount Zemaraim (2 Chron. xiii.
+     3-19), in which the foundation of the narrative and the
+     geographical details seem fully historical. See also the
+     campaign of Baasha against Ramah (1 Kings xv. 17-22; cf. 2
+     Chron. xvi. 1-6).
+
+The encounter of the armies did not, however, seem to produce much more
+serious results than those which followed the continual guerilla warfare
+along the frontier: the conqueror had no sooner defeated his enemy
+than he set to work to pillage the country in the vicinity, and, having
+accomplished this, returned promptly to his headquarters with the booty.
+Rehoboam, who had seen something of the magnificence of Solomon, tried
+to perpetuate the tradition of it in his court, as far as his slender
+revenues would permit him. He had eighteen women in his harem, among
+whom figured some of his aunts and cousins. The titular queen was
+Maacah, who was represented as a daughter of Absalom. She was devoted to
+the _asheras_, and the king was not behind his father in his tolerance
+of strange gods; the high places continued to be tolerated by him as
+sites of worship, and even Jerusalem was not free from manifestations
+of such idolatry as was associated with the old Canaanite religion. He
+reigned seventeen years, and was interred in the city of David;* Abijam,
+the eldest son of Maacah, succeeded him, and followed in his evil ways.
+Three years later Asa came to the throne,** no opposition being raised
+to his accession. In Israel matters did not go so smoothly. When
+Jeroboam, after a reign of twenty-two years, was succeeded by his son
+Nadab, about the year 905 B.C., it was soon evident that the instinct
+of loyalty to a particular dynasty had not yet laid any firm hold on the
+ten tribes. The peace between the Philistines and Israel was quite as
+unstable as that between Israel and Judah: an endless guerilla warfare
+was waged on the frontier, Gibbethon being made to play much the same
+part in this region as Ramah had done in regard to Jerusalem. For the
+moment it was in the hands of the Philistines, and in the second year
+of his reign Nadab had gone to lay siege to it in force, when he was
+assassinated in his tent by one of his captains, a certain Baasha,
+son of Ahijah, of the tribe of Issachar: the soldiers proclaimed the
+assassin king, and the people found themselves powerless to reject the
+nominee of the army.***
+
+     * 1 Kings xiv. 22-24; cf. 2 Chron. xi. 18-23, where the
+     details given in addition to those in the Booh of Kings seem
+     to be of undoubted authenticity.
+
+     ** 1 Kings xv. 1-8; cf. 2 Chron. xiii. The Booh of Kings
+     describes his mother as Maacah, the daughter of Absalom (xv.
+     10), which would seem to indicate that he was the brother
+     and not the son of Abijam. The uncertainty on this point is
+     of long standing, for the author of Chronicles makes
+     Abijam's mother out in one place to be Micaiah, daughter of
+     Uriel of Gibcah (xiii. 2), and in another (xi. 20) Maacah,
+     daughter of Absalom.
+
+     *** 1 Kings xv. 27-34.
+
+Baasha pressed forward resolutely his campaign against Judah. He seized
+Eamah and fortified it;* and Asa, feeling his incapacity to dislodge him
+unaided, sought to secure an ally. Egypt was too much occupied with its
+own internal dissensions to be able to render any effectual help, but a
+new power, which would profit quite as much as Judah by the overthrow
+of Israel, was beginning to assert itself in the north. Damascus had,
+so far, led an obscure and peaceful existence; it had given way before
+Egypt and Chaldaea whenever the Egyptians or Chaldseans had appeared
+within striking distance, but had refrained from taking any part in the
+disturbances by which Syria was torn asunder. Having been occupied
+by the Amorites, it threw its lot in with theirs, keeping, however,
+sedulously in the background: while the princes of Qodshu waged war
+against the Pharaohs, undismayed by frequent reverses, Damascus did
+not scruple to pay tribute to Thutmosis III. and his descendants, or to
+enter into friendly relations with them. Meanwhile the Amorites had
+been overthrown, and Qodshu, ruined by the Asiatic invasion, soon
+became little more than an obscure third-rate town;** the Aramaeans made
+themselves masters of Damascus about the XIIth century, and in their
+hands it continued to be, just as in the preceding epochs, a town
+without ambitions and of no great renown.
+
+     * 1 Kings xv. 17; cf. 2 Ghron. xvi. 1.
+
+     ** Qodshu is only once mentioned in the Bible (2 Sam. xxiv.
+     6), in which passage its name, misunderstood by the
+     Massoretic scribe, has been restored from the Septuagint
+     text.
+
+We have seen how the Aramaeans, alarmed at the sudden rise of the Hebrew
+dynasty, entered into a coalition against David with the Ammonite
+leaders: Zoba aspired to the chief place among the nations of Central
+Syria, but met with reverses, and its defeat delivered over to the
+Israelites its revolted dependencies in the Hauran and its vicinity,
+such as Maacah, Geshur, and even Damascus itself.* The supremacy was,
+however, shortlived; immediately after the death of David, a chief named
+Rezon undertook to free them from the yoke of the stranger. He had
+begun his military career under Hada-dezer, King of Zoba: when disaster
+overtook this leader and released him from his allegiance, he collected
+an armed force and fought for his own hand. A lucky stroke made him
+master of Damascus: he proclaimed himself king there, harassed the
+Israelites with impunity during the reign of Solomon, and took over the
+possessions of the kings of Zoba in the valleys of the Litany and the
+Orontes.** The rupture between the houses of Israel and Judah removed
+the only dangerous rival from his path, and Damascus became the
+paramount power in Southern and Central Palestine. While Judah and
+Israel wasted their strength in fratricidal struggles, Tabrimmon,
+and after him Benhadad I., gradually extended their territory in
+Coele-Syria;*** they conquered Hamath, and the desert valleys which
+extend north-eastward in the direction of the Euphrates, and forced a
+number of the Hittite kings to render them homage.
+
+     * Cf. what is said in regard to these events on pp. 351,
+     352, supra.
+
+     ** 1 Kings xi. 23-25. The reading "Esron" in the Septuagint
+     (1 Kings xi. 23) indicates a form "Khezron," by which it was
+     sought to replace the traditional reading "Rezon."
+
+     *** Hezion, whom the Jewish writer intercalates before
+     Tabrimmon (1 Kings xv. 18), is probably a corruption of
+     Rezon; Winckler, relying on the Septuagint variants Azin or
+     Azael (1 Kings xv. 18), proposes to alter Hezion into
+     Hazael, and inserts a certain Hazael I. in this place.
+     Tabrimmon is only mentioned in 1 Kings xv. 18, where he is
+     said to have been the father of Benhadad.
+
+They had concluded an alliance with Jeroboam as soon as he established
+his separate kingdom, and maintained the treaty with his successors,
+Nadab and Baasha. Asa collected all the gold and silver which was
+left in the temple of Jerusalem and in his own palace, and sent it to
+Benhadad, saying, "There is a league between me and thee, between thy
+father and my father: behold, I have sent unto thee a present of silver
+and gold; go, break thy league with Baasha, King of Israel, that he may
+depart from me." It would seem that Baasha, in his eagerness to complete
+the fortifications of Ramah, had left his northern frontier undefended.
+Benhadad accepted the proposal and presents of the King of Judah,
+invaded Galilee, seized the cities of Ijon, Dan, and Abel-beth-Maacah,
+which defended the upper reaches of the Jordan and the Litany, the
+lowlands of Genesareth, and all the land of Naphtali. Baasha hastily
+withdrew from Judah, made terms with Benhadad, and settled down in
+Tirzah for the remainder of his reign;* Asa demolished Eamah, and built
+the strongholds of Gebah and Mizpah from its ruins.** Benhadad retained
+the territory he had acquired, and exercised a nominal sovereignty
+over the two Hebrew kingdoms. Baasha, like Jeroboam, failed to found
+a lasting dynasty; his son Blah met with the same fate at the hands
+of Zimri which he himself had meted out to Nadab. As on the former
+occasion, the army was encamped before Gibbethon, in the country of the
+Philistines, when the tragedy took place.
+
+     * 1 Kings xv. 21, xvi. 6.
+
+     ** 1 Kings xv. 18-22; of. 2 Ghron. xvi. 2-6.
+
+Elah was at Tirzah, "drinking himself drunk in the house of Arza, which
+was over the household;" Zimri, who was "captain of half his chariots,"
+left his post at the front, and assassinated him as he lay intoxicated.
+The whole family of Baasha perished in the subsequent confusion, but
+the assassin only survived by seven days the date of his crime. When the
+troops which he had left behind him in camp heard of what had occurred,
+they refused to accept him as king, and, choosing Omri in his place,
+marched against Tirzah. Zimri, finding it was impossible either to
+win them over to his side or defeat them, set fire to the palace, and
+perished in the flames. His death did not, however, restore peace to
+Israel; while one-half of the tribes approved the choice of the army,
+the other flocked to the standard of Tibni, son of Ginath. War raged
+between the two factions for four years, and was only ended by the
+death--whether natural or violent we do not know--of Tibni and his
+brother Joram.*
+
+     * 1 Kings xvi. 8-22; Joram is not mentioned in the
+     Massoretic text, but his name appears in the Septuagint.
+
+Two dynasties had thus arisen in Israel, and had been swept away by
+revolutionary outbursts, while at Jerusalem the descendants of David
+followed one another in unbroken succession. Asa outlived Nadab by
+eleven years, and we hear nothing of his relations with the neighbouring
+states during the latter part of his reign. We are merely told that his
+zeal in the service of the Lord was greater than had been shown by any
+of his predecessors. He threw down the idols, expelled their priests,
+and persecuted all those who practised the ancient religions. His
+grandmother Maacah "had made an abominable image for an asherah;" he cut
+it down, and burnt it in the valley of the Kedron, and deposed her
+from the supremacy in the royal household which she had held for
+three generations. He is, therefore, the first of the kings to receive
+favourable mention from the orthodox chroniclers of later times, and it
+is stated that he "did that which was right in the eyes of the Lord, as
+did David his father."* Omri proved a warlike monarch, and his reign,
+though not a long one, was signalised by a decisive crisis in the
+fortunes of Israel.** The northern tribes had, so far, possessed no
+settled capital, Shechem, Penuel, and Tirzah having served in turn as
+residences for the successors of Jeroboam and Baasha. Latterly Tirzah
+had been accorded a preference over its rivals; but Zimri had burnt the
+castle there, and the ease with which it had been taken and retaken was
+not calculated to reassure the head of the new dynasty. Omri turned
+his attention to a site lying a little to the north-west of Shechem and
+Mount Ebal, and at that time partly covered by the hamlet of Shomeron or
+Shimron--our modern Samaria.***
+
+     * 1 Kings xv. 11; cf. 2 Ohron. xiv. 2. It is admitted,
+     however, though without any blame being attached to him,
+     that "the high places were not taken away" (1 Kings xv. 14;
+     cf. 2 Chron. xv. 17).
+
+     ** The Hebrew writer gives the length of his reign as twelve
+     years (1 Kings xvi. 23). Several historians consider this
+     period too brief, and wish to extend it to twenty-four
+     years; I cannot, however, see that there is, so far, any
+     good reason for doubting the approximate accuracy of the
+     Bible figures.
+
+     *** According to the tradition preserved in 1 Kings xvi. 24,
+     the name of the city comes from Shomer, the man from whom
+     Ahab bought the site.
+
+His choice was a wise and judicious one, as the rapid development of the
+city soon proved. It lay on the brow of a rounded hill, which rose in
+the centre of a wide and deep depression, and was connected by a narrow
+ridge with the surrounding mountains. The valley round it is fertile
+and well watered, and the mountains are cultivated up to their summits;
+throughout the whole of Ephraim it would have been difficult to find
+a site which could compare with it in strength or attractiveness. Omri
+surrounded his city with substantial ramparts; he built a palace for
+himself, and a temple in which was enthroned a golden calf similar to
+those at Dan and Bethel.* A population drawn from other nations besides
+the Israelites flocked into this well-defended stronghold, and Samaria
+soon came to be for Israel what Jerusalem already was for Judah, an
+almost impregnable fortress, in which the sovereign entrenched
+himself, and round which the nation could rally in times of danger.
+His contemporaries fully realised the importance of this move on Omri's
+part; his name became inseparably connected in their minds with that of
+Israel. Samaria and the house of Joseph were for them, henceforth, the
+house of Omri, Bit-Omri, and the name still clung to them long after
+Omri had died and his family had become extinct.**
+
+     * Amos viii. 14, where the sin of Samaria, coupled as it is
+     with the life of the god of Dan and the way of Beersheba,
+     can, as Wellhausen points out, only refer to the image of
+     the calf worshipped at Samaria.
+
+     ** Shalmaneser II. even goes so far as to describe Jehu, who
+     exterminated the family of Omri, as _Jaua ahal Khumri_,
+     "Jehu, son of Omri."
+
+He gained the supremacy over Judah, and forced several of the
+south-western provinces, which had been in a state of independence since
+the days of Solomon, to acknowledge his rule; he conquered the country
+of Medeba, vanquished Kamoshgad, King of Moab, and imposed on him a
+heavy tribute in sheep and wool.* Against Benhadad in the north-west
+he was less fortunate. He was forced to surrender to him several of the
+cities of Gilead--among others Bamoth-gilead, which commanded the fords
+over the Jabbok and Jordan.**
+
+     * Inscription of Meslia, 11. 5-7; cf. 2 Kings iii. 4.
+
+     ** 1 Kings xx. 34. No names are given in the text, but
+     external evidence proves that they were cities of Persea,
+     and that Ramoth-gilead was one of them.
+
+[Illustration: 432.jpg THE HILL OF SAMARIA]
+
+     Drawn by Boudier, from photograph No. 2G of the _Palestine
+     Exploration Fund._
+
+He even set apart a special quarter in Samaria for the natives of
+Damascus, where they could ply their trades and worship their gods
+without interference. It was a kind of semi-vassalage, from which he was
+powerless to free himself unaided: he realised this, and looked for help
+from without; he asked and obtained the hand of Jezebel, daughter of
+Bthbaal, King of the Sidonians, for Ahab, his heir. Hiram I., the friend
+of David, had carried the greatness of Tyre to its highest point; after
+his death, the same spirit of discord which divided the Hebrews made its
+appearance in Phoenicia. The royal power was not easily maintained over
+this race of artisans and sailors: Baalbazer, son of Hiram, reigned for
+six years, and his successor, Abdastart, was killed in a riot after a
+still briefer enjoyment of power. We know how strong was the influence
+exercised by foster-mothers in the great families of the Bast; the four
+sons of Abda-start's nurse assassinated their foster-brother, and the
+eldest of them usurped his crown. Supported by the motley crowd of
+slaves and adventurers which filled the harbours of Phoenicia, they
+managed to cling to power for twelve years. Their stupid and brutal
+methods of government produced most disastrous results. A section of the
+aristocracy emigrated to the colonies across the sea and incited them
+to rebellion; had this state of things lasted for any time, the Tyrian
+empire would have been doomed. A revolution led to the removal of the
+usurper and the restoration of the former dynasty, but did not bring
+back to the unfortunate city the tranquillity which it sorely needed.
+The three surviving sons of Baalbezer, Methuastarfc, Astarym, and
+Phelles followed one another on the throne in rapid succession, the
+last-named perishing by the hand of his cousin Ethbaal, after a reign of
+eight months. So far, the Israelites had not attempted to take advantage
+of these dissensions, but there was always the danger lest one of their
+kings, less absorbed than his predecessors in the struggle with Judah,
+might be tempted by the wealth of Phoenicia to lay hands on it. Ethbaal,
+therefore, eagerly accepted the means of averting this danger by an
+alliance with the new dynasty offered to him by Omri.*
+
+     * 1 Kings xvi. 31, where the historian has Hebraicised the
+     Phonician name Ittobaal into "Ethbaal," "Baal is with
+     him." Izebel or Jezebel seems to be an abbreviated form of
+     some name like Baalezbel.
+
+The presence of a Phonician princess at Samaria seems to have had
+a favourable effect on the city and its inhabitants. The tribes of
+Northern and Central Palestine had, so far, resisted the march of
+material civilization which, since the days of Solomon, had carried
+Judah along with it; they adhered, as a matter of principle, to the rude
+and simple customs of their ancestors. Jezebel, who from her cradle had
+been accustomed to all the luxuries and refinements of the Phoenician
+court, was by no means prepared to dispense with them in her adopted
+country. By their contact with her, the Israelites--at any rate, the
+upper and middle classes of them--acquired a certain degree of polish;
+the royal office assumed a more dignified exterior, and approached more
+nearly the splendours of the other Syrian monarchies, such as those of
+Damascus, Hamath, Sidon, Tyre, and even Judah.
+
+Unfortunately, the effect of this material progress was marred by a
+religious difficulty. Jezebel had been brought up by her father, the
+high priest of the Sidonian Astarte, as a rigid believer in his faith,
+and she begged Ahab to permit her to celebrate openly the worship of her
+national deities. Ere long the Tyrian Baal was installed at Samaria with
+his asherah, and his votaries had their temples and sacred groves to
+worship in: their priests and prophets sat at the king's table. Ahab did
+not reject the God of his ancestors in order to embrace the religion of
+his wife--a reproach which was afterwards laid to his door; he remained
+faithful to Him, and gave the children whom he had by Jezebel names
+compounded with that of Jahveh, such as Ahaziah, Joram, and Athaliah.*
+
+     * 1 Kings xvi. 31-33. Ahaziah and Joram mean respectively
+     "whom Jahveh sustaineth," and "Jahveh is exalted." Athaliah
+     may possibly be derived from a Phoenician form, _Ailialith
+     or Athlifh,_ into which the name of Jahveh does not enter.
+
+This was not the first instance of such tolerance in the history of the
+Israelites: Solomon had granted a similar liberty of conscience to all
+his foreign wives, and neither Rehoboam nor Abijam had opposed Maacah in
+her devotion to the Canaanitish idols. But the times were changing, and
+the altar of Baal could no longer be placed side by side with that of
+Jahveh without arousing fierce anger and inexorable hatred. Scarce a
+hundred years had elapsed since the rupture between the tribes, and
+already one-half of the people were unable to understand how place could
+be found in the breast of a true Israelite for any other god but Jahveh:
+Jahveh alone was Lord, for none of the deities worshipped by foreign
+races under human or animal shapes could compare with Him in might and
+holiness. From this to the repudiation of all those practices associated
+with exotic deities, such as the use of idols of wood or metal, the
+anointing of isolated boulders or circles of rocks, the offering up of
+prisoners or of the firstborn, was but a step: Asa had already furnished
+an example of rigid devotion in Judah, and there were many in Israel who
+shared his views and desired to imitate him. The opposition to what
+was regarded as apostasy on the part of the king did not come from the
+official priesthood; the sanctuaries at Dan, at Bethel, at Shiloh, and
+at Gilgal were prosperous in spite of Jezebel, and this was enough for
+them. But the influence of the prophets had increased marvellously since
+the rupture between the kingdoms, and at the very beginning of his reign
+Ahab was unwise enough to outrage their sense of justice by one of his
+violent acts: in a transport of rage he had slain a certain Naboth, who
+had refused to let him have his vineyard in order that he might enlarge
+the grounds of the palace he was building for himself at Jezreel.* The
+prophets, as in former times, were divided into schools, the head of
+each being called its father, the members bearing the title of "the sons
+of the prophets;" they dwelt in a sort of monastery, each having his own
+cell, where they ate together, performed their devotional exercises or
+assembled to listen to the exhortations of their chief prophets:** nor
+did their sacred office prevent them from marrying.***
+
+     * 1 Kings xxi., where the later tradition throws nearly all
+     the blame on Jezebel; whereas in the shorter account, in 2
+     Kings ix. 25, 26, it is laid entirely on Ahab.
+
+     ** In 1 Sam. xix. 20, a passage which seems to some to be a
+     later interpolation, mentions a "company of the prophets,
+     prophesying, and Samuel standing as head over them." Cf. 2
+     Kings vi. 1-7, where the narrative introduces a congregation
+     of prophets grouped round Elisha.
+
+     *** 2 Kings iv. 1-7, where an account is given of the
+     miracle worked by Elisha on behalf of "a woman of the wives
+     of the sons of the prophets."
+
+As a rule, they settled near one of the temples, and lived there on
+excellent terms with the members of the regular priesthood. Accompanied
+by musical instruments, they chanted the songs in which the poets of
+other days extolled the mighty deeds of Jahveh, and obtained from this
+source the incidents of the semi-religious accounts which they narrated
+concerning the early history of the people; or, when the spirit moved
+them, they went about through the land prophesying, either singly, or
+accompanied by a disciple, or in bands.* The people thronged round them
+to listen to their hymns or their stories of the heroic age: the great
+ones of the land, even kings themselves, received visits from them, and
+endured their reproaches or exhortations with mingled feelings of awe
+and terror. A few of the prophets took the part of Ahab and Jezebel,**
+but the majority declared against them, and of these, the most
+conspicuous, by his forcibleness of speech and action, was Elijah. We
+do not know of what race or family he came, nor even what he was:*** the
+incidents of his life which have come down to us seem to be wrapped in a
+vague legendary grandeur. He appears before Ahab, and tells him that
+for years to come no rain or dew shall fall on the earth save by his
+command, and then takes flight into the desert in order to escape the
+king's anger.
+
+     * 1 Sam. x. 5, where a band of prophets is mentioned "coming
+     down from the high place with a psaltery, and a timbrel, and
+     a pipe, and a harp, before them, prophesying;" cf. ver. 10.
+     In 2 Kings ii. 3-5, bands of the "children of the prophets"
+     come out from Bethel and Jericho to ask Elisha if he knows
+     the fate which awaits Elijah on that very day.
+
+     ** Cf. the anonymous prophet who encourages Ahab, in the
+     name of Jahveh, to surprise the camp of Benhadad before
+     Samaria (1 Kings xx. 13-15, 22-25, 28); and the prophet
+     Zedekiah, who gives advice contrary to that of his fellow-
+     prophet Micaiah in the council of war held by Ahab with
+     Jehoshaphat, King of Judah, before the attack on Ramobh-
+     gilead (1 Kings xxii. 11, 12, 24).
+
+     *** The ethnical inscription, "Tishbite," which we find
+     after his name (1 Kings xvii. 1, xxi. 17), is due to an
+     error on the part of the copyist.
+
+He is there ministered unto by ravens, which bring him bread and meat
+every night and morning. When the spring from which he drinks dries up,
+he goes to the house of a widow at Zarephath in the country of Sidon,
+and there he lives with his hostess for twelve months on a barrel of
+meal and a cruse of oil which never fail. The widow's son dies suddenly:
+he prays to Jahveh and restores him to life; then, still guided by an
+inspiration from above, he again presents himself before the king. Ahab
+receives him without resentment, assembles the prophets of Baal, brings
+them face to face with Elijah on the top of Mount Carmel, and orders
+them to put an end to the drought by which his kingdom is wasted. The
+Phoenicians erect an altar and call upon their Baalim with loud cries,
+and gash their arms and bodies with knives, yet cannot bring about
+the miracle expected of them. Elijah, after mocking at their cries and
+contortions, at last addresses a prayer to Jahveh, and fire comes
+down from heaven and consumes the sacrifice in a moment; the people,
+convinced by the miracle, fall upon the idolaters and massacre them, and
+the rain shortly afterwards falls in torrents. After this triumph he is
+said to have fled once more for safety to the desert, and there on Horeb
+to have had a divine vision. "And, behold, the Lord passed by, and a
+great and strong wind rent the mountains, and brake in pieces the rocks
+before the Lord; but the Lord was not in the wind: and after the wind
+an earthquake; but the Lord was not in the earthquake: and after the
+earthquake a fire; but the Lord was not in the fire: and after the
+fire a still small voice. And it was so, when Elijah heard it, that He
+wrapped his face in his mantle, and went out, and stood in the entering
+in of the cave. And, behold, there came a voice unto him, and said,
+'What doest thou here, Elijah?'" God then commanded him to anoint Hazael
+as King of Syria, and Jehu, son of Nimshi, as King over Israel, and
+Elisha, son of Shaphat, as prophet in his stead, "and him that escapeth
+from the sword of Hazael shall Jehu slay: and him that escapeth from the
+sword of Jehu shall Elisha slay." The sacred writings go on to tell us
+that the prophet who had held such close converse with the Deity was
+exempt from the ordinary laws of humanity, and was carried to heaven
+in a chariot of fire. The account that has come down to us shows the
+impression of awe left by Elijah on the spirit of his age.*
+
+Ahab was one of the most warlike among the warrior-kings of Israel. He
+ruled Moab with a strong hand,** kept Judah in subjection,*** and in his
+conflict with Damascus experienced alternately victory and honourable
+defeat. Hadadidri [Hadadezer], of whom the Hebrew historians make a
+second Benhadad,**** had succeeded the conqueror of Baasha.^
+
+     * The story of Elijah is found in 1 Kings xvii.-xix., xxi.
+     17-29, and 2 Kings i., ii. 1-14.
+
+     ** Inscription of Mesha, 11. 7, 8.
+
+     *** The subordination of Judah is nowhere explicitly
+     mentioned: it is inferred from the attitude adopted by
+     Jehoshaphat in presence of Ahab (1 Kings xxii. 1, et seq.).
+
+     **** The Assyrian texts call this Dadidri, Adadidri, which
+     exactly corresponds to the Plebrew form Hadadezer.
+
+     ^ The information in the Booh of Kings does not tell us at
+     what time during the reign of Ahab his first wars with
+     Hadadezer (Benhadad II.) and the siege of Samaria occurred.
+     The rapid success of Shalmaneser's campaigns against
+     Damascus, between 854 and 839 B.C., does not allow us to
+     place these events after the invasion of Assyria. Ahab
+     appears, in 854, at the battle of Karkar, as the ally of
+     Benhadad, as I shall show later.
+
+The account of his campaigns in the Hebrew records has only reached us
+in a seemingly condensed and distorted condition. Israel, strengthened
+by the exploits of Omri, must have offered him a strenuous resistance,
+but we know nothing of the causes, nor of the opening scenes of the
+drama. When the curtain is lifted, the preliminary conflict is over, and
+the Israelites, closely besieged in Samaria, have no alternative before
+them but unconditional surrender. This was the first serious attack
+the city had sustained, and its resistance spoke well for the military
+foresight of its founder. In Benhadad's train were thirty-two kings, and
+horses and chariots innumerable, while his adversary could only
+oppose to them seven thousand men. Ahab was willing to treat, but
+the conditions proposed were so outrageous that he broke off the
+negotiations. We do not know how long the blockade had lasted, when
+one day the garrison made a sortie in full daylight, and fell upon the
+Syrian camp; the enemy were panic-stricken, and Benhadad with difficulty
+escaped on horseback with a handful of men. He resumed hostilities
+in the following year, but instead of engaging the enemy in the
+hill-country of Ephraim, where his superior numbers brought him no
+advantage, he deployed his lines on the plain of Jezreel, near the town
+of Aphek. His servants had counselled him to change his tactics: "The
+God of the Hebrews is a God of the hills, therefore they were stronger
+than we; but let us fight against them in the plain, and surely we
+shall be stronger than they." The advice, however, proved futile, for he
+sustained on the open plain a still more severe defeat than he had met
+with in the mountains, and the Hebrew historians affirm that he was
+taken prisoner during the pursuit. The power of Damascus was still
+formidable, and the captivity of its king had done little to bring
+the war to an end; Ahab, therefore, did not press his advantage, but
+received the Syrian monarch "as a brother," and set him at liberty after
+concluding with him an offensive and defensive alliance. Israel at this
+time recovered possession of some of the cities which had been lost
+under Baasha and Omri, and the Israelites once more enjoyed the right
+to occupy a particular quarter of Damascus. According to the Hebrew
+account, this was the retaliation they took for their previous
+humiliations. It is further stated, in relation to this event, that a
+certain man of the sons of the prophets, speaking by the word of the
+Lord, bade one of his companions smite him. Having received a wound, he
+disguised himself with a bandage over his eyes, and placed himself in
+the king's path, "and as the king passed by, he cried unto the king: and
+he said, Thy servant went out into the midst of the battle; and, behold,
+a man turned aside, and brought a man unto me, and said, Keep this man:
+if by any means he be missing, then shall thy life be for his life, or
+else thou shalt pay a talent of silver. And as thy servant was busy here
+and there, he was gone. And the King of Israel said unto him, So shall
+thy judgment be; thyself has decided it. Then he hasted, and took the
+headband away from his eyes, and the King of Israel discerned him that
+he was one of the prophets. And he said unto him, Thus saith the Lord,
+Because thou hast let go out of thy hand the man whom I had devoted to
+destruction, therefore thy life shall go for his life, and thy people
+for his people. And the King of Israel went to his house heavy and
+displeased, and came to Samaria." This story was in accordance with the
+popular feeling, and Ahab certainly ought not to have paused till he had
+exterminated his enemy, could he have done so; but was this actually in
+his power?
+
+We have no reason to contest the leading facts in this account, or to
+doubt that Benhadad suffered some reverses before Samaria; but we may
+perhaps ask whether the check was as serious as we are led to believe,
+and whether imagination and national vanity did not exaggerate its
+extent and results. The fortresses of Persea which, according to the
+treaty, ought to have been restored to Israel, remained in the hands of
+the people of Damascus, and the loss of Ramoth-gilead continued to be a
+source of vexation to such of the tribes of Gad and Reuben as followed
+the fortunes of the house of Omri:* yet these places formed the most
+important part of Benhadad's ransom.
+
+     * "And the King of Israel said unto his servants, Know ye
+     that Ramoth-gilead is ours, and we be still, and take it not
+     out of the hand of the King of Syria?"
+
+The sole effect of Ahab's success was to procure for him more lenient
+treatment; he lost no territory, and perhaps gained a few towns, but he
+had to sign conditions of peace which made him an acknowledged vassal to
+the King of Syria.*
+
+     * No document as yet proves directly that Ahab was vassal to
+     Benhadad II. The fact seems to follow clearly enough from
+     the account of the battle of Karkar against Shalmaneser II.,
+     where the contingent of Ahab of Israel figures among those
+     of the kings who fought for Benhadad II. against the
+     Assyrians.
+
+Damascus still remained the foremost state of Syria, and, if we rightly
+interpret the scanty information we possess, seemed in a fair way to
+bring about that unification of the country which neither Hittites,
+Philistines, nor Hebrews had been able to effect. Situated nearly
+equidistant from Raphia and Carchemish, on the outskirts of the
+cultivated region, the city was protected in the rear by the desert,
+which secured it from invasion on the east and north-east; the dusty
+plains of the Hauran protected it on the south, and the wooded cliffs of
+Anti-Lebanon on the west and north-west. It was entrenched within these
+natural barriers as in a fortress, whence the garrison was able to
+sally forth at will to attack in force one or other of the surrounding
+nations: if the city were victorious, its central position made it easy
+for its rulers to keep watch over and preserve what they had won; if it
+suffered defeat, the surrounding mountains and deserts formed natural
+lines of fortification easy to defend against the pursuing foe, but
+very difficult for the latter to force, and the delay presented by this
+obstacle gave the inhabitants time to organise their reserves and bring
+fresh troops into the field. The kings of Damascus at the outset brought
+under their suzerainty the Aramaean principalities--Argob, Maacah, and
+Geshur, by which they controlled the Hauran, and Zobah, which secured
+to them Coele-Syria from Lake Huleh to the Bahr el-Kades. They had taken
+Upper Galilee from the Hebrews, and subsequently Perasa, as far as the
+Jabbok, and held in check Israel and the smaller states, Amnion and
+Moab, which followed in its wake. They exacted tribute from Hamath, the
+Phoenician Arvad, the lower valley of the Orontes, and from a portion
+of the Hittites, and demanded contingents from their princes in time
+of war. Their power was still in its infancy, and its elements were not
+firmly welded together, but the surrounding peoples were in such a
+state of weakness and disunion that they might be left out of account as
+formidable enemies. The only danger that menaced the rising kingdom was
+the possibility that the two ancient warlike nations, Egypt and Assyria,
+might shake off their torpor, and reappearing on the scene of their
+former prowess might attack her before she had consolidated her power by
+the annexation of Naharaim.
+
+END OF VOL. VI.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria,
+Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 6 (of 12), by G. Maspero
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