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loose it from the left hand. Knot it with seven knots; do so twice. Sprinkle it with bright wine. Bind it round the head of the sick man. Bind it round his hands and feet, like manacles and fetters. Sit down on his bed. Sprinkle holy water over him. He shall hear the voice of Hea, Davkina* shall protect him, and the Eldest Son of Heaven shall find him a happy habitation."

TRANSLATION OF A LETTER.

(Written in Assyria more than 2,500 years ago, by an officer named
Bel-basa, to Sennacherib.)

TO THE KING MY LORD,

From thy servant Bel-basa :

May there be peace to the King my Lord; may the gods Nebo and Merodach greatly bless the Lord my King.

Concerning the palace of the queen which is in the city of Kalzi, which the King has appointed us; the house is decaying, the house is opening its foundation, its bricks are bulging. When will the King, our Lord, command the master of works? An order let him make, that he may come and the foundation that he may strengthen.

ARABIC LITERATURE.

Himyaritic Inscriptions.-The high-spirited war-loving tribes that roved over the tablelands of Arabia, as well as the more refined inhabitants of her ports on the Red Sea, doubtless cultivated letters. We may suppose the former to have given their florid fancies vent in pastorals, rude songs for the desert bivouac, or triumphal odes. More finished species of poetry would have been congenial to the courtly residents of the cities, whose knowledge of the world was extended by trading expeditions to India, and along the African coast as far as the Mozambique Channel.

Yet of this probable literature we possess little that is older than the era of Mohammed (600 A.D.), at which time the Arabians awoke to a new life, for centuries leading the van of the nations in the march of literature and science. But the little that we have is not without interest.

* God and goddess of the sea and of the lower regions.

HIMYARITIC INSCRIPTIONS.

115

At least eighteen hundred years before the Christian Era, descendants of Joktan, called Sabæans and afterward Himyarites, established themselves in southwestern Arabia; but not until about 800 B.C. do they appear to have gained permanent dominion over the neighboring tribes. Inscriptions. in their language, the Himyaritic, a Semitic tongue closely related to the Arabic, if not sufficiently like it to be called by the same name, have been found in the lower part of the Arabian peninsula on walls, tombs, dikes, and bronze tablets.

These are the oldest known Arabic writings, and are believed by scholars to represent the golden age of the Himyarite monarchy (100 B.C.-500 A.D.). Gems have also been discovered, inscribed with these same characters.

PHOENICIAN LITERATURE.

Its Lost Treasures.-In the most ancient records, the narrow strip of coast between the Lib'anus Mountains and the Mediterranean was recognized as an important centre of civilization. Its cities were seats of art and commerce; Africa, Sicily, and Spain, were dotted with its colonies and tradingstations; the sails of its merchantmen sparkled on every sea; its language was known throughout the ancient world.

It cannot be that a nation so advanced in knowledge was without a literature; and if works on their philosophy and religion, on history, geography, navigation, and agriculture, didactic poems and love-songs, constitute a literature, vast indeed was that of the Phoenicians. No department of science or belles-lettres appears to have been overlooked by their authors.

The famous "Book City," Kir'jath-Se'pher, which, during the conquest of Canaan, was taken by Othniel the future Judge, is thought to have been a Phoenician town. Its name implies that it was a repository of books, probably public records and works on law-perhaps an Athens to the nations of

Canaan, whither their youth flocked to consult its libraries and receive instruction at its academies. Its valuable collection of manuscripts was doubtless committed to the flames by the Hebrew conqueror.

In like manner, the whole constellation of Phoenician hymns, and lyrics, and prose pieces, has become extinct, except a lonely star left here and there in the works of foreign authors; or a faint light glimmering on some coin or tablet, gem or tombstone.

The only important Phoenician writer known to us is Sanchoni'athon. Fragments of his History, written perhaps in the fourteenth century B.C., have survived through a Greek translation. In accounting for the origin of the universe, Sanchoniathon taught the theory of evolution, that “from certain animals not having sensation, intelligent animals were produced."

Phoenician Carthage also developed an extensive literature. The records of the city were kept by native historians; and we know that Ma'go's great work on agriculture, in twentyeight parts, was highly appreciated at Rome, and there rendered into Latin. When the city of Hannibal fell before her more powerful rival, her vast library was scattered among the African allies of the Romans, and lost to history.

An interesting relic of Carthaginian literature is the Circumnavigation of Hanno, the history of a voyage undertaken in the sixth century B.C. to the coasts of Libya—the oldest history of a voyage existing. This work of Hanno, which used to hang in a temple at Carthage, describes a savage people called Gorillas, whose bodies were covered with hair and who defended themselves with stones. The narrator says: "Three women were taken, but they attacked their conductors with their teeth and hands, and could not be prevailed on to accompany us. Having killed them, we flayed them, and brought their skins with us to Carthage."

CHALDEAN LEARNING.

117

NOTES ON ASSYRIO-BABYLONIAN LITERATURE.

The

Oldest Chaldean book, a work on astrology written before 2000 B.C. golden age, 2000-1850 B.C.; oral traditions collected and committed to writing; tile-libraries in all the principal Chaldean cities. Decline begins 1550 B.C. The term Chaldean long synonymous with man of learning.

Rise of Assyrian literature, 1500 B.C.; confined to archives and records for a number of centuries. Renaissance under Sardanapalus I. and his son Shalmane'ser II. (885-823 B.C.). Enlargement of the national library in the reign of Tig'lath-Pile'ser II. (745–727 B.C.) and of Sargon (722-705 B.C.), followed by a revival of the study of ancient literature. Copies made of the masterpieces of antiquity. Reign of Sardanapalus II. (667-647 B.C.), the golden age of Assyrian letters. Fall of Nineveh, 625 B.C.

Babylon succeeds as the seat of power and the centre of literature in western Asia; attains the height of its glory under Nebuchadnezzar (604-561 B.C.). Great revival of ancient learning: "the Lady of Kingdoms" soon boasts of a library emulating in extent and variety that of her former rival Nineveh. Little of this later Babylonian literature recovered: its restoration left for future laborers in the field of philology.

During these centuries, a wild poetry probably flourished on the highland wastes of Arabia, and Phoenician cities attained literary greatness.-Coins made of British tin, the money of Phoenician commerce.

CHAPTER VI.

EGYPTIAN LITERATURE.

The Egyptian Language.-There yet remains one field of Oriental literature for us to visit, and it is specially interesting on account of the valuable treasures it long concealed. These have recently been brought to light in the writings of that people who settled the fertile valley of the Nile in prehistoric times, and adorned the land of Egypt with pyramids and obelisks inscribed with their mysterious characters.

Some have found in the ancient Egyptian a resemblance to the Indo-European tongues, and argue that it was an offshoot from an original parent-stock in which Semitic and Aryan

were blended before they separated into distinct languages. Between the Egyptian and the Semitic tongues, however, there is a much more striking likeness and a more probable relationship.

EGYPTIAN WRITING.

Hieroglyphics.-There is little doubt that the Egyptians practised writing in the days of Me'nes, founder of their monarchy, more than forty centuries ago. The earliest characters were colored pictures, called hieroglyphics (sacred carvings) by the Greeks, who erroneously believed them to have been used by the priestly caste alone. Just as we have adapted our letters to a running hand, so the hieroglyphic was soon abridged into the hieratic character, suitable for rapid writing. This in turn, in the seventh century B.C., gave place to the still simpler demotic, or popular hand, the letters of which, mainly phonetic, bore no likeness to the original pictures.

As stated on page 19, the hieroglyphic characters were partly pictorial and partly symbolical. Thus, the figure of a man with upraised hands symbolized praise; a reed with an ink-pot, writing; an enraged monkey, anger. Day was denoted by a drawing of the sun; bravery, by the head of a lion; adoration, by a box with burning incense; cunning, by a jackal. A frog suggested the notion of large numbers; while a tadpole implied a million.

This picture - writing, not in itself complete, was supplemented to a certain extent with a phonetic system. An object for which there was no appropriate symbol was represented by the sign of any other object that had the same name when spoken; as if we should denote the mint where money is coined by a painting of the plant so called,—or pike, both the weapon and the fish, by a picture of either. Serious confusion resulted from this practice; till at last it fortunately occurred to some thinker to substitute for the numberless symbols and pictures in use signs corresponding

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