with the accusative pronouns; e.g., attu-a and attu-cunu (S. H. A., 190, 23). We also get anacu used with a preposition (assu) in assu апаси, "of myself" (S. H. A., 190, 24). Assur-bani-pal, again (S.H.A. 187 k), has the strange form ikhallici for ikhallic after pani, where the final vowel seems to have a conditional force. So the astrological tablets have ikhkhar, ikhkhiram, with initial m suppressed from makharu.

30. Not only is this common in the verbs (which always admitted the omission more or less), but we even find yu-tag-gil-a-ni for yu-tag-gil-an-ni, "he confided to me;" as well as the converse (e.g. i-sac-can-nu for isaccanu, "they place").

31. So, again, ma-na-e, as plural of mana, and ta-a-din (or ta-din) for taddin. Similarly we find the ungrammatical form abbattiv-va (S.H.A. 189, 13), instead of abattiv.

32. Besides the use of a quasi-article, N with the accusative became common, especially in the case of the first personal pronoun, e.g., at-tu-a, "me" ("). The change of into, which is already effected in Hebrew (except in a few archaisms like 7, Gen. xiv.), has also begun in Achæmenian Assyrian (e.g. itahma by the side of utahma).

In spite of its preservation of many archaic forms, Assyrian has entered upon a stage of corruption and degeneracy. The attempt at system displayed in its secondary conjugations is perhaps an instance. The dual has for the most part perished; it is only found in a few nouns (as in Hebrew) which express duality; and it is rarely met with in the verb. The apocopated aorist has become the most usual form. Niphal has acquired a passive signification. The cases of the noun which are accurately distinguished in the earliest inscriptions tend to be more and more improperly used until in the Persian period even -u has ceased to be the mark of the nominative. The same

So it has disappeared from the verb in modern Arabic, and was wanting in Ethiopic.

2 Traces of the case-terminations are to be found in Hebrew (i Genesis i. 24, Numbers xxiv. 3, 15, Psalms cxiv. 8; in construct, e.g. Genesis xlix. 11, Isaiah i. 21; local). So, too, in proper names, Methuselah, Methu-sha-el (where the Assyrian sign of the genitive appears), Penu-el, Khammuel (1 Chronicles iv. 26), etc. In the Sinaitic inscriptions the

has been the fate of Arabic; in most dialects of modern Arabic they have even disappeared altogether. The Assyrian third plural of the verb-tenses has lost its final terminations na and nu, which Hebrew has in some rare cases retained: probably this was in great measure caused by the addition of ni, the characteristic of the subjunctive. Both nu and na have been weakened to ni in the perfect and future. The plural of nouns has degenerated into an, and even i or e for masculine, and at or et for feminine. Hence, in many instances, the plural and the second case of the singular have exactly the same form. Verbs undergo contraction, as in the allied dialects (though the nomen agentis takes the same form as in Arabic and Aramaic, e.g. da-i-is or da-is, "trampling on," instead of por Dip). Verbs y except that a preceding u assimilates e.

are regular,

Dr. Hincks believed that in an early stage the Assyrian made no distinction between the genders of the personal pronouns. A bilingual tablet of Accadian laws reads atta for atti, and su for sa, besides izir for tazir and igtabi for tagtabi ; nominative in proper names and titles only ends in u, and the genitive takes i if the nomen regens and the nomen rectum are connected so as to form a compound. Gashmu in Nehemiah (vi. 6), elsewhere Geshem (ii. 19), is another instance. In the old Egyptian monuments names of places in Palestine, which end, in a consonant in the Old Testament, have u final; So in Phoenician Hasdrubal, etc., while Samaritan shows -u and -i in certain words before suffixes (especially 1); similarly Aramaic. The Abd-Zohar coins (Levy, Z. D. M. G. xv.) have (e.g. in "D) before ", and the proper names, as in the inscriptions of Palmyra, the Hauran, and the Nabathean kings, terminate in 1. In Ethiopic the sign of the accusative a has been preserved (also the termination of the status constructus). According to Palgrave, the three terminations are still to be heard in central Arabia; further south and east a stands for i, and nearer the coast all three have entirely disappeared. Nöldeke disputes, to a certain extent, the existence of the case-endings in Hebrew, and affirms that they are peculiar to Arabic. Assyrian, however, opposes this conclusion.

.Baal = בעלו,Neged - נגבו thus

and he compared the (supposed) archaic use of as of common gender in the Pentateuch.

and y

But the tablet

states that it was written in the reign of Assur-bani-pal, and it is a mere assumption that it is a transcript of an older translation. We do not find any disregard of gender in the inscriptions of Tiglath-Pileser I. Moreover, it is very possible that the translator was an Accadian, and but imperfectly' acquainted with Assyrian. This is rendered almost certain by the ungrammatical use of the verbs, which follow the genderless Turanian idiom. The same looseness of grammar characterizes a letter to Assur-bani-pal from the Elamite king Umman-aldasi (S. H. A., p. 252); and in one place we even have su for the feminine (mahaśśu for mahad-sa, S. H. A., 291, m).

The introduction of attu to form the accusative shows that already in the time of Assur-bani-pal the case-endings had begun to lose their meaning, and we are not surprised, therefore, to find the different terminations confounded one with the other.

LITERATURE OF THE ASSYRIAN LANGUAGE.

The first conscious attempts at the formation of a grammar -older probably than the earliest of the Hindu grammarians -seem to have been made by the Semitic Assyrians. It was found necessary to explain the Accadian language, the original possessor of the cuneiform system of writing, in which were contained, stored up in the libraries of Huru and Senkereh, which Sargina had founded in the sixteenth century B.C., all the treasures of borrowed Assyrian science and religion. By the command, therefore, of Essar-haddon and

66

Assur-bani-pal, syllabaries, grammars, dictionaries, and translations were drawn up. The last king states that Nebo and Tasmitu had inspired him to attempt the re-editing of the 'royal tablets," which no previous king had attempted, and at the same time to explain and chronicle all the difficulties, "as many as existed," "for the inspection of his people." This implies that there was a considerable amount of culture in the country at the time. The nouns are always given in the nominative, generally with the mimmation added, which was therefore considered the typical form of the word. The third persons singular and plural of the aorist and present are the only parts of the verb which we find; it would seem that they took the place of the nominative of the nouns; from them the other persons could at once be derived. The most important fact which we have to notice is the full recognition of triliteralism. No radix consists of less than three letters, and the rule is accurately observed in the defective verbs: thus we have da-'a-cu (17), ba-a-bu (), si-'i-mu, pu-'u-ru, ma-lu-'u (No▲), ka-bu-u (p) Just as Sanskrit grammar begins with the recognition of monosyllabic roots, Semitic grammar begins with the recognition of a triliteral basis. Assyrian passed away before the encroaching influence of Aramæan, but as late as the reign of Antiochus we have the cuneiform characters (and apparently the language also) still used. Since the decipherment of the inscriptions the following works upon the subject have appeared :—

(קבה) ka-bu-'w ,(מל

E. Botta, "Mémoire sur l'écriture cunéiforme Assyrienne" (in Journ. Asiat.), 1847. De Sauley, "Recherches sur l'écriture cunéiforme Assyrienne," Paris, 1848. E. Botta and E. Flandin, "Monument de Ninive," 5 vols., Paris, 1849-50.

E.

(The inscriptions in vols. iii. and iv. contain Sargon's annals from Khorsabad.) Sir H. Rawlinson, "Commentary on the Cun. Inscr. of Babylon and Assyria," London, 1850. Hincks, in Transact. of R. Irish Soc., 1850 (the names of Sennacherib and Nebuchadnezzar identified). Dr. G. F. Grotefend, in the Götting. Gelehrt. Anzeigen, 1850, No. 13 (on the age of the Black Obelisk). E. Hincks, Journ. of R. Asiat. Soc., xiv., 1851, pt. 1. H. Ewald, in Götting. Gel. Anz., 1851, No. 60. A. H. Layard, "Inscriptions in the Cuneiform Character from Assyr. Monum." (Brit. Mus.), 1851 (untrustworthy copies; contains the inscr. of the Black Obelisk). Grotefend, "Bemerkungen zur Inschrift eines Thongefässes mit Niniv. Keilschrift," Göttingen, 1850-51 (Grotefend had already published a memoir on this inscription in 1848, and had attempted the Assyrian inscriptions in a paper, "Zur Erläuter. d. Babylon. Keilschr.," 1840); "Die Tributverzeichniss d. Obelisken aus Nimrud nebst Vorbemerkungen über d. verschied. Ursprung u. Charakter d. persischen u. Assyr. Keilschr.," Göttingen, 1852; "Erläuter. d. Keilinschr. Babylon. Backsteine," Hanover, 1852. Dr. E. Hincks, "On the Language and Mode of Writing of the Ancient Assyrians," read before the Brit. Asso., 1850. In Transact. of Royal Irish Soc., xxii., 1852, xxiv., 1854 (the numerals made out, and the Babylonian characters deciphered). J. Bonomi, "Nineveh and its Palaces," London, 1852. Grotefend, "Erläuter. der Babyl. Keilinschr. aus Behistun," Göttingen, 1853. Rawlinson, "Memoir on the Babylonian and Assyrian Inscriptions," 1854. De Sauley, in Journal Asiatique ("Traduction de l'Inscription Assyr. de Behistoun"), 1854-55. C. C. Bunsen, "Outlines of a Philosophy of Universal History," vol. i.,