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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 15 March 2011
Assyriology offers such a vast field still unexplored that it is hardly possible to open a new tract without falling on some unexpected discovery. That is how, studying Babylonian astronomy, a subject so difficult that few scholars have ventured to take it, I arrived, after many doubts and hesitations, at the conclusion that, when the Akkadians appeared in Mesopotamia, the country was already occupied by a Semitic population possessing a certain degree of civilization and the art of writing.
page 410 note 1 Who however admits inability to detect the cause of this anomaly.
page 410 note 2 W. A. I. vol. ii. pl. 48, 1. 50.Google Scholar
page 410 note 3 ibid. 1. 53. These words are also found in the Semitic column in other lists.
page 410 note 4 W. A. I. vol. v. pl. 46, 1. 42. In the following pages, in the quotations of this work, the first number will indicate the volume, the second the plate, and the third the line.Google Scholar
page 411 note 1 W.A.I. iii. 37, 58.Google Scholar
page 411 note 2 W.A.I. ii. 47, 16; and v. 46, 12, in this last list is added after 
to be read rabu ‘great,’ qualificative of šame, with the determinative prefix of divinity, divinely great, so to say.Google Scholar
page 411 note 3 W.A.I. ii. 47, 17–23.Google Scholar
page 411 note 4 This tablet is written in a peculiar style; ti is always written 
instead of 
.
page 412 note 1 W.A.I. ii. 49, 47.Google Scholar
page 412 note 2 We find 
the first group being a compound ideogram, and the second the phonetic rendering, both used in connected texts.
page 412 note 3 This explanation is the more curious because Akkadian is never written phonetically in this way, and in this supposed compound the god Anu would be written in a very abnormal way, and the scribe had to neglect the name of another god 
Nin-gir-su, one of the oldest, whose name is found on the earliest inscriptions, and the great god of Gudea. The group of stars designated by the compound ideogram 
represented, no doubt, the tail of this god.
page 412 note 4 In his Eludes Akkadiennes.
page 413 note 1 I adopt the ingenious formulæ designed by Prof. Terrien de Laoouperie for Ms syntactical comparative study in his course of lectures at University College. The indices are:
page 413 note 2 The primitive position of the Akkadian genitive and adjective, which is given in this formula, is preserved in the compound expressions, as usually happens, so we have 
ana-saga-šu ‘in the midst of the sky,’ word for word ‘sky-midst-in.’
page 413 note 3 Often languages preserve in the verbal forms traces of the different stages through which they have passed. For instance, in French Le chat tue la souris gives s.+v.+a. of formula VI, which is the one of modern French; but, when the nouns are represented by pronouns il la tue, it gives s.+a.+v., which is the Latin formula; if now we consider that in the verb tu-e the subject is expressed by the suffix e, we have la tu-e a.+v.+s. formula II, which is that of the early Aryan languages.
page 413 note 4 I say Turanian influence, because I accept the Turanian affinity of Akkadian.
page 414 note 1 These examples, already noticed by Lenormant, F., were considered by him as abnormal constructions.Google Scholar
page 414 note 2 At Nineveh, which was far from the Akkadian centre of civilization, and where the Akkadians had remained, perhaps, in smaller number, the writers followed less closely the Babylonian syntactical order. Even in the official records of the Ninevite kings there is a great liberty in the arrangement of the words, the regimen of the verb is often rejected after it, etc. We have also in the Babylonian Semitic texts examples of similar inversions; but, of course, in literary works we must take into account the desire of the author for giving variety to his periods and the licence in which he indulges.
page 414 note 3 B. 66, 1. 34, and B. 83, 1. 8. The private tablets of this early period (Rim-Sin, Hammurabi and Samšu-Iluna) have been copied by Dr. Strassmaier and published in the Transactions of the Orientalists' Congress held at Berlin.
page 414 note 4 B. 57, 1. 14.
page 414 note 5 B. 42, 1. 35.
page 414 note 6 B. 65, 1. 14; 71,1. 31; 91, 1. 22, etc.
page 415 note 1 B. 32, 1. 7; 62, 1. 34; 78, 1. 27, etc.
page 415 note 2 B. 65, 1. 22; 73, 30.
page 415 note 3 B. 67,1. 43; 84, 1. 21; 89, 1. 18, etc.
page 415 note 4 B. 89, 1. 18.
page 415 note 5 B. 52, 1. 15; 73, 1. 9. See also Pinches, S.B.A. Proceedings, 1st December, 1885, p. 9.
page 415 note 6 S.B.A. Proceedings, 1885–1886, p. 48, 1. 33. In this name Samaš means not the Sun-god, but the ‘guiding light,’ as we say ‘his guiding star,’ and the French astre or étoile.Google Scholar
page 415 note 7 See Bertin, , Suggestions on the Formation of the Semitic Tenses, Journal of the R.A.S. Vol. XIV. pp. 105–118.Google Scholar
page 415 note 8 This tense is called present or future by those who wrote Arabic grammars, but this name cannot suit, as in Assyrian it designated generally the past, and became the historical tense. I have proposed, in the paper quoted above, the name of aorist-past for the permansive or preterit of the Hebrew, and aoristpresent for the other tense, in imitation of the terms adopted by de Rougé in his Egyptian Grammar. The permansive, as we know it in the late inscriptions, was not the one used in the early period, the first person in ku, and the third (this being the verbal theme in the masculine or feminine) may be the primitive forms, but the second person appears to be a later form introduced by Aramæan in fluence; the primitive forms of the permansive, which are composed by suffixing the personal possessive pronouns, must have been very similar to the aorist of Ethiopian.
page 416 note 1 B. 42, 1. 12; 53,1. 13, etc.
page 416 note 2 The form luštamar, which we have seen above, is the precative of the secondary Shaphel voice or Istaphel.
page 417 note 1 W.A.I. v. 46, 1. 40.Google Scholar There exists in Syriac a feminine form for the word ‘star,’ but here the termination shows that we have a masculine word.
page 417 note 2 B. 30, 1. 24; 36, 1. 24; 42, 1. 29.
page 417 note 3 On the other side, we have feminine noun with verb in the masculine, as Nidin-Nana and Gamil-Gula.
page 417 note 4 Strassmaier, No. 24, 1. 23.
page 418 note 1 In the Latin tongues, and especially in French, the subject is expressed in the same way, though the person is implied by the flexion.
page 418 note 2 We should expect the genitive kakkabi in this case, though the Babylonians often neglected it; we find Belit biri and Belit biru ‘the lady of Wisdom,’ one of the names of Tasmetum.
page 418 note 3 B. 24, 1. 25.
page 418 note 4 B. 55, 1. 24.
page 418 note 5 B. 52, 1. 60; 95, 1. 22.
page 418 note 6 B. 97, 1. 2.
page 418 note 7 See above.
page 419 note 1 F. Lenormaut has already pointed out this, and lays a great deal of stress on it. Many values used in the Babylonian Semitic texts must have come through Sumerian, as they indicate the phonetic changes of the two dialects. This arises, perhaps, because the Semitic renaissance took place when the Sumerian had acquired the supremacy, and some of the phonetic peculiarities of Sumerian may be due to the Semitic influence.
page 419 note 2 Pinches, T. G., Archaic Forms of B. Characters, in the Zeitschrift für Keilschriftforschung, vol. ii. p. 153.Google Scholar As the author here notices, the Sumerian texts give e-lum, written phonetically without the ideogram, that is one of the peculiarities of Sumerian, which being a dialect has developed the phonetism more than Akkadian. In Sumerian texts, when the words are expressed by ideograms, they are to be read in their dialectical forms, and it is when the Semitic Babylonians adopted these ideograms that they introduced Sumerian values in their syllabary.
page 419 note 3 W.A.I. i. 1, 99.Google Scholar The name of the character is vgudili (W.A.I. iii. 70, 33)Google Scholar; but as Prof. Sayce has noticed (S.B.A. vol. vi. p. 469)Google Scholar, when the characters of the syllabary were classified and named, the Babylonians had lost all idea of their primitive form and origin.
page 419 note 4 W.A.I. iii. 70, 82. No doubt such is also the origin of the ideogram for ‘tongue’ emne 
me inside, indicating the pronunciation.Google Scholar
page 419 note 5 W.A.I. ii. 2, 335. This ideogram is of very common use in the commercial documents down to the latest period. I have been very careful not to speak of the Semites as the inventors of writing, for I wish not to treat of this question now. though there is evidence to show that they borrowed this art. When the Semites used it, they never reformed it, and till the latest period they employed the same cumbrous and ill-fitted syllabary.Google Scholar
page 420 note 1 We have no example of the use of this group with the meaning of ‘mother,’ but we have no document of the early period in which it would have been in use.
page 420 note 2 W.A.I. iv. 14, 24.Google Scholar
page 420 note 3 Sayce's Syll. No. 147. In the early texts the phonetic complement is written outside, thus: 
page 420 note 4 In our modern languages we see foreign words for other reasons taking the place of such fundamental native ones, as in English papa for dada, the infantine appellation for ‘father,’ in French babé, is now mostly used; this came through fashion. In Akkadian ama was substituted for ana, because the mother's language is that of home, as the language of the priest is that of church; all the Mahomedan countries have for this reason adopted the word Alla for ‘God.’
page 421 note 1 I give here the archaic form, which has preserved clearly the compounding elements.
page 421 note 2 Nišu means ‘men’ as a collective, for this reason it also translates 
kalamma ‘country.’
page 421 note 3 W.A.I. ii. 2, 398.Google Scholar
page 421 note 4 ibid. ii. 1. 126.
page 421 note 5 There are few compounds in which the position of the elements indicates that they must have been created by the Akkadian before they had changed their grammar; these compounds represent ideas which did not exist among the Semites previous to the Akkadian invasion.
page 421 note 6 Sayce, Use of Papyrus, etc., S.B.A. Trans. vol. i. p. 343et seq.Google Scholar The use of papyrus or other similar materials was kept at all periods (see Pinches, , S.B.A. Trans. vol. vi. p. 210). I take the opportunity to notice that the form of the characters depends very much on the material used. The lineary characters are traced on soft stones, as sand-stone, for instance, and are no proof of the higher antiquity of the document. We find inscriptions of the same king written some in lineary and some in cuneiform characters.Google Scholar
page 422 note 1 The irregular arrangement of the characters in each division reminds ns of the Maya system of writing, sometimes called calculiform writing. There was the same or still greater hesitation and incertitude as to the sequence of the various elements in each division. There was, however, it seems, a greater tendency to arrange the characters in columns in Cuneiform as in Egyptian, especially if their forms fitted to this arrangement; as for the name of Lagaš (see above). It must be borne in mind that at a later time the Babylonian scribes altered their way of writing, so that the characters were placed on the side; therefore, the columns ran from left to right, and the groups followed one another also from left to right. It is thus that we print it in our quotations.
page 422 note 2 Unpublished inscription, but this order is rare for this name.
page 422 note 3 De Sarsec, , Découvertes en Chaldée, pl. 4, A; pl. 6, No. 4. It is the grouping mostly used no doubt because the characters fitted better in this order.Google Scholar
page 423 note 1 Ibid. pl. 8; pl. 16, etc.
page 423 note 2 I transcribe so, because it is the reading adopted by many Assyriologists; but it is a compound ideogram, that is, a group the elements of which do not correspond to the reading, but in which the various ideograms gave the idea rendered by the pronounced word. In the case of this group of four characters it is certain that it never was pronounced with the phonetic value of these characters.
page 423 note 3 Pinches, , Guide to the Kouyunjik Gallery, London, 1883, p. 7, note.Google Scholar
page 423 note 4 The reading of mut for 
is proved 1° by a variant in an unpublished tablet, which gives 
dil-mut and 
dil-mu, the masculine form perhaps, 2° by the fact that this group 
is used to write the name of the town identified with the modern delem 
dilmut would be the old feminine form. This name is besides a thorough Semitic word (see Freytag, , Diet. vol. ii. p. 51).Google Scholar
page 423 note 5 See above.
page 423 note 6 This value rim is also the one used in a star-name (W.A.I. ii. 47, 24). 
explained by i-ša-ri-im i-lak, which leaves us no doubt as to the reading of 
in the star-name. It is to he noticed that in the explanation the grammatical order is reversed: in the old name the verb was first. The word rim ‘wind’ may be compared with the Hebrew 
The Babylonian syllabary confuses the m and the w; rim is for riw. Babylonian weakens the aspirate, 
became no doubt 
, and then lost.Google Scholar
page 424 note 1 See S.B.A. Proceedings, vol. v. p. 20.Google Scholar
page 424 note 2 The word is always written phonetically even in the inscriptions of Ur-Baū, and in the lineary inscriptions. It is a thorough Turanian word, representing an idea unknown to the Semites, and for which there was no ideogram in the Semitic hieroglyphic writing. From this word very likely came the eastern Padisha (De Sarsec, , Déc. en Chaldée, pl. 8; also pl. 6, Mo. 4, etc.).Google Scholar
page 424 note 3 De Sarsec, , pl. 8, inscription of the Ur-Bau, also in the lineary inscriptions in the B.M. 82–7–14.Google Scholar
page 424 note 4 I have no doubt of the Semitic origin of this word, which meant a man as a worker. The word in Hebrew and Arabic has, as first vowel, the guttural 
which is often represented in Babylonian by a simple vowel. I do not give any more examples, which would require too much space in order to prove by comparison that the words are really Semitic. Akkadists are too prone to admit that words have been borrowed from Akkadian.
page 425 note 1 It may be that we have here another example of phonetic determinative, as the group 
kur-ra gives the Akkadian pronunciation of the word, which was used till a very late date, sometimes without the prefix (S.B.A. Proc. vol. iv. p. 13, 1. 8, 11, 16, 19, 20 and 23, and p. 14, etc.).Google Scholar
page 425 note 2 S.B.A. Proceed, vol. v. p. 75. I will repeat here what I said then, for I was, I am afraid, misunderstood. The ancients had primitively no idea of the cardinal points as we uaderstand them. The north, for instance, was not a point to which they could direct from several places their eyes, but a region. In fact two people might have walked towards the north (mer-t-meh in Egyptian) though walking obliquely from one another. The more accurate notion of the Egyptians as to the cardinal regions is due to the position of the valley in which they dwelt spreading from south to north, and the less accurate Babylonian notion on account of the valley of the Tigris and Euphrates spreading from northwest to south-east.Google Scholar
page 426 note 1 The name of the citadel of Rome has a similar etymology to the Babylonian temple, e-sag-il. As for the name of Babylon itself, there are many explanations. Some follow the Jews, and take it from Babel ‘confusion,’ on account of the many languages spoken there; but this fact would prove that it is not primitive, as, if there were people of many languages in the town when it was named Babel, this name is not primitive. Others say that this name is a play on the name Bab-ili ‘gate of God,’ which is itself a translation of the Akkadian 
Ka-dingir-ra-ki. At the time of the second Ninevite empire and second Babylonian Semitic empire, we find 
which might be read Bab-ilani ‘gate of gods,’ and the name phonetically spelt is Ba-bi-il-u, Ba-bi-i-li or Ba-bi-i-lam. Sometimes the double i is not expressed, Ba-bi-lu, etc. Perhaps on account of the different spellings some argue that the Akkadian name is the translation of a Semitic expression, but only of the sounds, not of the meaning (as we have seen for habaṣiranu); but this does not explain the etymology of Babel. I will venture in adding two more explanations to the several already given. 1. Ba is the primitive Semitic word for ‘house’ (see Bertin, , Origin of the Phœnician Alphabet, p. 12Google Scholar; it has been preserved in 
‘cavity, aperture, gate,’ and in the preposition’ 
see Gesenius's Dict.), and the god par excellence of the Semites was Bel ‘the lord’; we have therefore Ba-bel ‘the house of Bel,’ as we have 
‘the houBe of Istar,’ towns often taking for name that of the temple round which they grew (the etymology of bab-bel ‘the door of Bel,’ has been proposed long ago, see Gesenius Diet., sub voce). 2. It may be taken from the verb babalu ‘to dispense,’ with the idea of ‘to benefit’; if applied to the temple, it would be the participle babilu ’the benefactor, ‘the dispensing one.’ We have Babilat nuḥsi as one of the names of the Tigris, on account of his bringing fecundity to the land (W.A.I. ii. 1, 25).Google Scholar
page 427 note 1 The same thing happened in Egypt; but there it was a Semitic invasion of words which threatened the language of the Pharaohs. It became the fashion to Semiticize everything; if the word did not exist in the Semitic language, an Egyptian word was disfigured to give it a Semitic appearance (Maspero, , Histoire Ancienne, p. 337).Google Scholar
page 428 note 1 An unpublished fragment of a tablet in the British Museum gives a portion of a list of classic authors, with the names of their works; these show that the same authors have written poems or relations in Akkadian and also in Semitic Baby-lonian. Prof. Sayce has, in the preface of the second edition of G. Smith's Chaldæan Genesis, given a translation of the greatest part of this fragment.
page 428 note 2 This name is the one given by the Babylonians to that mountain chain extending from Armenia to the east side of the Persian Gulf. It seems to mark the limit which the Semitic element never passed to settle in a permanent way.
page 429 note 1 A syllabary (W.A.I. ii. 70)Google Scholar gives for the ideogram of Akkad, 
that is, 
gur thrice repeated, of the Akkadian reading uri the Assyrian is lost, but an unpublished fragment in the B.M. gives the Assyrian Akkad; gur is the oldest form of ur ‘strong’; so ‘gur-gur’ twice repeated represents the plural. Gesenius, it is to be noticed, had hit on the right explanation of the word Akkad, which is Semitic. Smith seems to have been of this opinion, for he transcribed the group by ur in the Akkadian line and Akkad in the Semitic (S.B.A. Trans. vol. iii. p. 336).Google Scholar The national name of these people is therefore Urians, but I preserve the usual name of Akkadians in respect for Sir H. Rawlinson, who was the first to detect (in 1852) the existence of the non-Semitic language of the syllabaries, and therefore of the non-Semitic population, and gave to this language the name of Akkadian (see Hicks's paper in the Royal Irish Ac. Transactions).
page 429 note 2 Justin i. 1.
page 429 note 3 S.B.A. Proc. vol. vii. p. 71. This idea of a kind of Messianic political prince is met with in a great many countries. The Servians expect the return of the ancient king, who will re-establish the great Servian Empire; so the Abyssinians, the Soudanese, etc.Google Scholar
page 429 note 4 The reading is still uncertain. Sargon never calls himself king of 
Akkad, but always of 
It is not proved that these two names designate the same town; the presumption is the reverse.
page 430 note 1 The king Sargon seems to have extended his rule over the whole of Western Asia, from Elam to Syria, and all the neighbouring countries were paying tribute to him; he built at or near Babylon a town or citadel called Dur-Sargani.
page 430 note 2 The texts of Sargon are principally known by Ninevite copies; in these the syntactic order is the same as in later times, being affected already by the Akkadian influence. The greatest part that has come down to us is astrological, for astrology was an especially Semitic science.
page 430 note 3 S.B.A. Trans. vol. iii. p. 357.Google Scholar
page 430 note 4 S.B.A. Proc. vol. iii. p. 37, and vol. vi. p. 193.Google Scholar
page 430 note 5 S.B.A. Trans. vol. v. p. 532.Google Scholar
page 431 note 1 Atra is the imperative of ataru ‘to come back,’ a well-known Assyrian word. The form atra-hasis is the primitive form, no doubt with the verb at the beginning; hasis-atra would be the form adopted after the Semites had, under the Akkadian influence, changed the order of their syntax (see next note).
page 431 note 2 In the Babylonian Flood-story the tale runs in the first person. Um-napištim relating to Gisdubar how he was preserved from the general destruction, in Column IV. Atra-hasis is introduced (1. 22) as messenger of Ea, and pronounces the blessing of Ea (1. 27–29). Then Um-napištim speaks again in the first person, having merely repeated the words of Atra-ḥasis. If Smith has assimilated this god to 
Um-napištim, it is an oversight, or through the desire to find in the Babylonian document an equivalent of Berosus's hero; but there is no evidence for the assimilation of the two names. Mr. Pinches points out to me that in an unpublished bilingual text the ideogram 
given as that of the name at-ra-ha-sis, 
is ḥasis and 
atra; so that in the ideogram of the name we have the form adopted by Berosus. This important passage shows also that this name cannot be the same as 
as the same name could hardly have two ideogrammatic ways of being written.
page 431 note 3 Philological Society, Presidential Address, for 1882, p. 80, note.Google Scholar
page 431 note 4 S.B.A. Trans. vol. v. p. 532. The ideogram 
is read umbara in Akkadian, and it has been suggested that the Akkadian reading of the name Umbara-Tutu was the name transcribed by 
(a variant of Ardates in Berosus' fragments); but we have then to suppose a mistake of transcription or restitute 
but even with this correction it is difficult to explain the loss of the m of umbara; 
is more probably mistranscription for 
.Google Scholar
page 432 note 1 The Greek transcriptions of the names known to us show what we may expect: aparanadios for asur-nadin, saosduchinos for Samas-sumu-ulcin, etc. Smith's assimilation (S.B.A. Trans, vol. v. p. 353) of 
which he read amil-uru-gal with the fifth king amegalaros, comes from an error, this group being an ideogram of the name of a priest or religious officer, not a proper name. The name of the fifth antediluvian king is besides read also megalaros et metalaros. Some names suggest no doubt Assyrian ones, but it is difficult to reconstruct them. In Euedoreschos or Euedoraehos we may detect for instance the name of Merodak, as in Ilouardam for Emil-Merodak; but the whole name escapes us. Sargon of Nineveh gives the name of the first Baby-lonian king as 
a-di-i-D.P. ur ‘my covenant (is) of Ur’ (the god Ur is the Moon-god), which is also a Semitic name, and in this King Adi-Ur we have perhaps the original name of the first king of Berosus 
This name, ‘my covenant is of the Moon God,’ is very appropriate for the first king, who, according to the legend, was chosen by God to instruct and conduct the Babylonians. The names of Annedotos or Oannes and his successors Euedokos (Merodak?), Eneubulos, etc., seem also to be Semitic.Google Scholar
page 432 note 2 The series of names are, in the tablet, interrupted by several gaps, the ends and beginnings of the columns being lost. In one of them must be placed Sargon of Agade. To this period must also belong the hero Gisdubar (this reading is still uncertain), who slew the foreign tyrant Humbaba. It is probable that the Kassite conquest contributed largely to weaken the Akkadian and Sumerian element, and hastened the return of the Semitic supremacy.
page 432 note 3 This name, as that of Akkad, is Semitic, and means ‘guardian’ (there are a great many places called so in the Bible); it answers to the old word ‘march’ in English, and designated the borderland, and especially that on the south. The name of 
(shomer) is still applied to the north-western portion of Arabia bordering on what was Babylonia. The compound ideogram which represents this word is 
but we have no syllabary giving its pronunciation. This group may be, after all, a compound ideogram to express the idea of the population of the marshy country at the mouth of the Euphrates and Tigris. 
is ‘place,’ 
‘lord,’ sometimes replaced by 
same ideographic meaning, and 
‘reed.’ Sumer would therefore be the ‘place’ or ‘land of the lord of the reed.’ It would be, in fact, the ‘lowland,’ in opposition to Akkad, ‘the highland,’ though the primitive meaning of the latter is ‘strong.’ The pronunciation of the group ki-en-gi may, however, be very different from that of the characters, as zir-gul-la is pronounced lagaš.
page 433 note 1 This proves the co-existence of the two populations and dialects. The vocabulary gives us also many proofs. The Akkadian texts have til, the dialectic form, instead of tin (change of n into l), which must have been borrowed from the southern population (Pinches, , Academy, 1882, July 22).Google Scholar The name of the Tigris gives us another striking example. It is written by means of two compound ideograms, 
the first is read idi ‘river,’ and is well known; together they are read idigna (W.A.I. iii. 70, 46)Google Scholar or idignu (ibid. V. 22, 30) in Akkadian, and i-di-ik-lat (ibid. iv. 12, 7) in Assyrian, reading proved by the Hebrew Hiddekel, Aram, diglah, Syr. deqlat; it shows the reading of the second compound to be in Akkadian gana, and if we found gala as the form from which the Semitic name is borrowed, it is that the Sumerian or dialectic influence has changed n into l, but not yet g into d. The full dialectic form is given as dalla (ibid. iii. 70, 47), and translated šupū (also in a text iv. 5, 61–62), the Shaphel of apu (cf. 
) ‘to shine,’ ‘to be light,’ and consequently ‘to make shine,’ or ‘to cause to be light,’ that is, ‘to pour forth light.’ The Tigris is therefore ‘the river shining or bright.’ This explanation has escaped Dr. Delitzsch, because he has not taken into account the meaning of the second compound ideogram as such (Wo lag das Paradise, p. 170–172)Google Scholar; but he is right when he says that the explanation given by the classics (Pliny vi. 127, Quintus Curtius iv. 9, 16, and Strabo x. 14, 8) is a folk-etymology of the Persian period. The l of diglat, being under the Aryan influence changed into r, we have the old Persian tigrā (Zend teg'er, Pelv. teg'era), a name used for the river at the time when the classics came in contact with the people of Mesopotamia. The form di-ik-lat, given in the inscription of Darius (W.A.I. iii. 39, 35)Google Scholar, is the Aramtæan form from which the Persians derived the name tigrā. The final t mark of the feminine, which was added to the Akkadian primitive name, is of course neglected.
page 434 note 1 It may be argued that the explanation is too ingenious to be true; but all the other explanations brought forward till now have failed to satisfy all the points. Some haye assimilated the legendary queen to Istar, without much ground; others to Hammurabi with only a faint similarity of sound; others to Sammuramat, the wife of Riman-Nirari, King of Nineveh; but this queen never ruled at Babylon, much less built it. This name, besides, does not correspond to that of the classics; it would have become in Greek either Samoramtis, the Greek adding always the termination to the foreign name, as in Beltis from Beltu, or Amormitis, the Greek dropping the initial s, as Arkeanos for Sargon.
page 434 note 2 A strong Kassite party maintained itself still for a long time in Babylonia, and they gave a long dynasty. The Kassite power seems to have been entirely broken down only by the Ninevites.
page 434 note 3 They call themselves ‘King of Sumer and Akkad.’
page 435 note 1 The ludicrous notion of kings having their own praises and mementos written on their monuments in a secret writing, which their own subjects could not read, ought to have stamped out this theory at the outset. It must be said, to the credit of British common sense, that it never had one partizan in England.
page 435 note 2 Perhaps we have, in the carved stones found at Hamath and other places of Syria, the remnants of this hieroglyphic stage. In this case the Cuneiform signs would have their prototypes in this hieroglyphic writing, and might give us the key to it.