or that at the north-west side of Nimrond, was not erected before B.C. 900; and the principal building of Kouyunjik, the greatest glory of Nineveh, was only founded by Sennacherib, about B.C. 700. In this time, it is expressly mentioned as the residence of the Assyrian monarchs; and the prophetic announcements of Assyria's downfall are henceforth chiefly directed against Nineveh. In this period, the commerce of Nineveh was of prodigious extent; it commanded not only the trade down the navigable Tigris, and entertained a constant intercourse with all parts of Mesopotamia, facilitated by the ford of Balad, where the river is passable without a bridge; but its caravans travelled to the distant east and north; it was the centre of the Asiatic commerce, and the connecting point between the east and west; and its merchants, who formed its wealth and strength, are, by the prophet Nahum, said to have been more numerous than the stars. But the day when they should pay with their power for their growing pride and arrogance did not tarry; Nineveh was, about B.C. 625, by the united armies of Cyaxares, king of Media, and of Nabopolassar, king of Babylon, converted into a heap of stones, which soon lost even the resemblance of a city; for not more than 200 years later, Xenophon passed these ruins, without knowing that he beheld the remains of the most magnificent city of the ancient world; and though Alexander the Great was in their vicinity, before the battle of Arbela, none of his historians mentions their existence; and later writers class Nineveh among the cities which have tracelessly disappeared. They have, indeed, preserved the traditions concerning the tombs of Ninus and of Sardanapalus; but how vague this information was, is proved by Ovid, who places the tomb of Ninus near Babylon. Under Claudius and the succeeding emperors, however, a Roman colony, called Niniva Claudiopolis, existed either on the site or in the vicinity of ancient Nineveh; the name of the latter is repeatedly mentioned by the Arabic writers of the middle ages, by Benjamin of Tudela and Abulfaraj, and frequently by Assemani; and all of them state correctly its situation on the eastern bank of the Tigris, opposite Mosul, although they write it sometimes Ninawi, and sometimes Ninue. The ruins which have attracted the attention of the travellers at the end of the preceding and the beginning of the present century, have now been carefully examined; and palaces have been excavated which, even in their dilapidated and crumbled state, excite amazement; their designs have been restored, and the inscriptions partially deciphered. The palace of Kouyunjik, opposite Mosul, was no doubt the residence of the kings of Assyria; and the area immediately surrounding it is the site of ancient Nineveh.

11. The situation of Rehoboth Ir is uncertain, especially because this was a name given, like Succoth, to many towns, and occurring in almost every province. The greatest probability is, however, in favour of those extensive ruins on the eastern bank of the Euphrates, which lie about four miles south-west of the town Mayadin, and which still bear the name of Rehoboth.

12. But almost unquestionably the town Calah is to be identified with the large mound Kalah Sherghat, which lies about fifty-five miles south of Mosul, on the right bank of the Tigris. Calah possessed one of the most extensive palaces, and it is, on the black obelisk of the central palace of Nimroud, several times mentioned as the residence of the king.

13. Between Calah and Nineveh, that is, between Kalah Shergat and Kouyunjik, was situated Resen, emphatically and pre-eminently called the great town. It appears to us undeniable, if reliance is at all to be placed upon the accuracy of the survey recently made of the mounds and ruins of Mesopotamia, that Resen is identical with Nimroud, that once magnificent locality, the remains of which still form a parallelogram of about 1,800 feet in length, and 900 in breadth; which consists at least of seven different extensive and noble buildings; and which includes some of the earliest monuments of Assyrian art. It is situated about four geographical miles south of Kouyunjik, and

nine north of Kalah Shergat, thus completely agreeing, in its position, with the Biblical description. Nimroud seems, then, either not at all, or at least not in early times, to have belonged to the town of Nineveh; it appears not to have been enclosed within the same walls with Kouyunjik; and we can only for certain periods, if at all, admit, that Nineveh formed a square, the extreme points of which were, Kouyunjik, Khorsabad, Nimroud, and Karamles.-According to Diodorus, Nineveh consisted of an oblong square, the two longer sides of which measured 150, the smaller 90 stadia; and had, therefore, like Babylon, a circumference of 480 stadia, or upwards of 55 miles, which would agree with the three days' journey of the prophet Jonah. For, from Kouyunjik to Khorsabad is about 12 miles; from Khorsabad down to Karamles, 15; and, if from here a line be drawn to the Tigris, 13 miles long, we have, from this point up to Kouyunjik, again 15 miles; which four distances, forming almost a complete parallelogram, make the stated number of 55 miles. Nimroud would then lie 7 miles south of the point of the Tigris, which formed the south-western boundary of Nineveh.

II. MIZRAIM, that is, EGYPT, is the second son of Cush (ver. 6). A consideration of the physiognomy and bodily structure of the Egyptians proves, that they are, with indisputable correctness, derived from the Hamites, provided that this term be properly understood. It is not necessary to consider all Egyptians as negroes, black in complexion, and curly-haired; this is contradicted by their mummies, and their portraits; the former exhibit mostly the osteology, and the latter the physiognomy of an Asiatic or Arabic race; they show the skull and the facial outline of the Caucasians; they are, indeed, darker in complexion; brown, with a tinge of red, and great varieties in the shades; they have often a fuller lip, and a more elongated, almond-shaped eye, half-shut and languishing, and turned up at the outer angles; sedate and placid countenances, round and soft features, and large mouths: but these differences are sufficiently accounted for, partly by the influences of the climate, and partly by the intermarriages with the western or Libyan, and the southern or Nubian and Ethiopian races: the valley of the Nile was, no doubt, very early peopled by tribes emigrating from the north and east; and this historical fact was preserved by the tradition, that the Hamites comprise both Arabic and Egyptian nations; although the results of the comparative study of languages are not yet sufficiently established to guarantee a linguistic relationship also. Blumenbach discovered three varieties of physiognomy on the Egyptian paintings and sculptures; and he describes the general or national type as possessing "a peculiarly turgid habit, flabby cheeks, a short chin, large prominent eyes, and a plump form of body." The present Copts exhibit further a certain approximation to the Negro; they have a yellowish, dusky complexion; a puffed face; swollen eyes; a broad, flat, and short nose, and dilated nostrils; thick lips, a large mouth, placed at a considerable distance from the nose; projecting cheek-bones; black and crisp hair and beard; crooked legs, and long, flat fect: for, the influences above alluded to, have, in the course of millenniums, confirmed and increased the modifications from the original type. The descendants of Mizraim are:1. THE LUDIM (ver. 13.) They were a warlike nation, famed for their skill with the spear and the bow, and therefore sought for as auxiliary troops by the Egyptians and Tyrians. It is clear that we must here understand an African nation, and that therefore the Lydians of Asia Minor cannot be meant (see on ver. 22). As conjecture alone is left in a case where all certain notices or inferences fail, we venture to identify Lud here with Letopolis, which is, by Stephanus Byzantius, and some ancient travellers, called Letus. Towns dedicated to the goddess Leto, who is identical with Athor, one of the eight higher deities of Egypt, were both ancient and numerous, and later, even a part of Alexandria was called Letöeis. Letopolis, or Letus, was situated in Lower Egypt, just at the beginning of the Delta, a few miles north of Memphis, and belonging to this nomos.

2. About the Anamim who are mentioned in no other part of the Old Testament, but who, no doubt, likewise represent either an Egyptian or an Ethiopian town, it is still less possible to give any decided opinion. It is scarcely profitable to mention the various suppositions which have been hazarded on so obscure a point. If we were permitted to increase the number of conjectures, we should point to the similarity of Anam and Anoub, and propose that the Anamim are either the inbabitants of a town consecrated to the god Anoubis, who corresponds to the Greek Hermes, and is represented with the head of a dog, or the worshippers of that deity generally, whose adoration was, however, chiefly concentrated in the Cynopolite district, a nome of Middle Egypt of the Heptanomis, with the capital Cynopolis But; both in the Delta, and in other parts of the country, were cities of the same name, proving the great extent of that religious worship.

3. The Lehabim are undoubtedly the Libyans, who are in other passages, with a contraction common in Hebrew, called Lubim. That name is almost everywhere coupled with Ethiopia and Egypt; and, in fact, Libya, in ancient geography, where it is not ignorantly made a part of Asia or Europe, comprises the third large territory which, together with the former two, constitutes the continent of Africa. It was considered to be bounded by the Nile in the east, and the Atlantic ocean in the west; it reached, in the north, to the Mediterranean; but the southern limits were extended with the progress of geographical knowledge. The existence, and vast extent of Libya, were known to the Hebrews through the Phoenicians, who explored and colonised it at an early period, though they took every possible precaution not to admit others into this new field of enterprize and wealth, which yielded them gold and precious stones, ivory and aromatics. A more careful investigation of the interior of Africa was reserved to our own age, and it has been commenced with encouraging results. Men who will be immortal in the history of geography, have risked their lives in the ardent pursuit of knowledge.

4. We take the Naphtuhim for the inhabitants of the Libyan town Napata, in the north of the province of Meroe, probably at the eastern extremity of that curve of the Nile which skirts the desert of Bahiouda. It was the capital of an Ethiopian kingdom, and a royal residence, and belonged to the richest and most magnificent towns of Africa. Its connection with Egypt is proved by the character of the monuments preserved among its ruins. A temple dedicated to Osiris, and another sacred to Ammon, both on the western bank of the Nile, contain religious sculptures of admirable execution; they are built after the plan of the great Egyptian temples, and are adorned with avenues of sphinxes. There is, besides, a necropolis, on the gateway of which Osiris is represented as receiving gifts as the god of the lower world. The pyramids, which are built of sand-stone, are in a dilapidated state, but are still infallible witnesses of the wealth and perseverance of their constructors. Two lions of red granite, of exquisite design and execution, dating from the time of the eighteenth Egyptian dynasty, the one bearing the name of Amuneph III., the other that of Amuntuonch, were brought to England by Lord Prudhoe. The position of Napata favoured the enterprising inhabitants in their extensive commercial schemes; it lay within the route of several important caravans; it connected Arabia and Libya, and interchanged their respective products. This city was, therefore, important enough to claim, in the genealogical list, a place among the dependencies of Egypt; it flourished through many centuries, till it was (in B.C. 22), under Augustus taken and plundered by Petronius; after which time it rapidly declined, and soon entirely disappeared.

5. The Pathrusim are undoubtedly the land and the people of Upper Egypt, or Thebais; for the proper noun, Pathros, is an Egyptian name, signifying the southern country, so that it might possibly include Nubia also; and the district of Thebais is, by

Roman writers, called nomus Phaturites. Although the word Mizraim included originally Thebais, the latter is often expressly added, not only on account of its magnitude and importance, but of the independent attitude which it frequently assumed in opposition to the kings of Memphis; so that it is called by the prophet Ezekiel, the origin of the Egyptian empire; as it seems, indeed, to have been the first colonized part of the country, and the earliest birth-place of Egyptian civilization. It is, however, but natural that, in a geographical list, the part should be subordinated to the whole, though the former may, chronologically, have been of earlier existence. The extent of Upper Egypt is almost fixed by natural boundaries; it is a narrowing valley, included between the islands of Philae and Elephantine in the south, and the apex of the Delta (near Cercasorum) in the north; this is the primitive land, whilst from thence, northwards, begin the alluvial plains which form Lower Egypt, and which are in their climate, their fauna, and their flora, markedly different from the former. In Upper Egypt, the sycamore and the acacia are rarely seen, whilst the palm-tree assumes new and characteristic forms, and the crocodile and jackal, the hippopotamus and the hyena, occur in greater numbers. Later, that district was subdivided into two parts, the more northern one, or Middle Egypt (Heptanomis), from the Delta to Hermopolis Magna; and the southern part, or Upper Egypt Proper (or the Thebaid), from Hermopolis to Syene and Philae. The prophet Isaiah, therefore, appropriately places Pathros between Mizraim and Cush, or Lower Egypt and Ethiopia.

6. The Casluhim seem to be the inhabitants of the primitive Egyptian town Chemnis, later called Panopolis, which was the capital of one of the principal districts of the Thebaid, or of Pathros; and belonged to the most ancient settlements of Egypt. The name of Ham, or Cham, itself, is evidently contained in its appellation, and this town was no doubt holy to Chem, the Egyptian Pan. The Dorie heroes deduced their origin from Chemnis, through Perseus, who was here worshipped, probably as Pthah or Vulcan, in a magnificent temple, fortified by a strong wall, surrounded by a plantation of date-trees, and adorned by colossal statues; and if the Greek tribes had a tradition of their origin from Chemnis, it is certainly permitted to suppose that the earliest colonisers of Philistia emigrated from the same once powerful and populous district; but as they are, in some passages, represented as settlers from the Caphtorim, who are next mentioned in our text, they may have been increased from that source; and Caphtor may, for some time, have been the abode of Casluhim also, who later joined their kinsmen in Philistia, when the latter had here acquired territory and power.

7. About the Philistim see Commentary on Exodus, pp. 230 and 273. Their power, and the light in which they were regarded by the Israelites, may be inferred from the vehement prophecies pronounced against them.

8. We identify Caphtor with Coptos, a chief city in the Upper Thebaid, a few miles north of Thebes, and at present called Kouft, or Keft. The Coptites carried on an extensive caravan trade between Libya and Egypt, and Arabia and India; in their immediate neighbourhood were the great porphyry-quarries; and the adjoining hills yielded emeralds and other precious stones. The city remained long in a flourishing state, and was still important in the latest time of Roman emperors; and that it was of a very early origin, is testified by the ruins still extant in Kouft, which bear the name of Thothmes III., the same whom some authors declare to have been the Pharaoh at the time of the Exodus. It is natural that a people so habitually engaged in distant commercial journeys, should be easily tempted to emigration; a considerable number left Coptos and joined the Casluhim, in the southern plains of the coast of Canaan, where, after having subdued and extirpated the tribes which had before occupied those tracts, they either assumed, or received the name of the "emigrants"; but so that Philistia itself was sometimes called the

maritime country of Caphtor, and that they obtained, either by their number or by their courage, the ascendancy over the former kindred settlers, who were later no more mentioned among the population of Philistia. And if we, besides, suppose that the district of Chemmis comprised originally Coptos also, as there are, indeed, traces of a much higher antiquity of the former, and that from thence the first emigrants proceeded to Philistia; whilst later, when the population of Coptos grew, other colonists followed: we shall have another reason why the Philistines are here represented as settlers from the Casluhim, and later from the Caphtorim.

III. PHUT is, in the Old Testament, either coupled with Cush and Lud, or the Ludim, or with Cush and Persia; the former connection describes it as an African nation; the latter as a warlike, well-armed tribe, desired as allies, and dreaded as enemies. We may explain Phut by Buto, or Butos, the capital town of the Delta of the Nile, on its Sebennytic arm, and the southern shore of the Butic lake. A city famous for the temples and oracle of the goddess Buto (the Greek Leto), of Horus (Apollo), and Bubastis (Artemis), is still traceable in the modern Kem Kasir. As it is more than improbable that in the whole genealogy of Ham, there should not be one representative of the people of Lower Egypt, which became of such painful interest to the Hebrews, the almost perfect resemblance of the names of Put and Buto, may not improperly lead us to suppose their actual identity.

IV. The youngest son of Ham is CANAAN. The descendants here ascribed to him (vers. 15—19), fix the extent of the land which bears his name, from the boundaries of Syria in the north, to Gaza, or almost the Egyptian frontier, in the south, including Phoenicia, and those parts of the southern coast which were not inhabited by the Philistines, whilst it is in the east bounded by the Jordan, although its more powerful tribes manifested a tendency to spread beyond its banks, in the tempting districts of Gilead. If we allow the author of the Pentateuch any geographical knowledge at all, we must admit him to have been familiar with the inhabitants of Canaan, their character and their origin; and if he distinctly represents them as belonging to the race of Ham, it is bold, indeed, on the part of some critics, to transform them into Shemites; for which dictatorial assertion, the only alleged reasons are, that the kings of the Philistines had the Shemitic name, Abimelech; that the five Philistine towns also have Shemitic appellations, and the Hebrews apparently understood the language of the Philistines; whilst they were unable to converse with the Egyptians. Now it is, in the first place, obvious, that in these arguments the Philistines are tacitly substituted for the Canaanites, whilst both are in our list represented as different nations. Further, there scarcely exists a more precarious support than that derived from linguistic inferences; modern studies in comparative philology have shown the relationship of the principal Asiatic and African languages, and have proved especially the general analogy in the primitive, or fundamental notions. That many Hebrews should, in the course of time, have learnt to understand the idioms of the Philistines and Canaanites, is but natural, if we consider their constant intercourse, the vicinity of their domiciles, and their frequent, though unlawful, intermarriages, none of which circumstances assisted them in acquiring the language of the Egyptians. Nor can it be surprising that after the Hebrews had been for many centuries the chief occupants of Canaan, their language should have been called the "tongue of Canaan," whereas we have positive proofs that the Hebrews did not even generally understand the Aramæan language, of which the Canaanitish idiom is said to be a dialect. If the candid student is, indeed, willing to penetrate into the spirit of the Biblical records, he must perceive the direct opposition which prevails throughout between the Canaanites and the Hebrews; in their religious notions and their social organisation; in their ultimate aims and their ordinary pursuits. The former emigrated into the land from the south, the others from the cast; the one transplanted into their new abodes all the superstitions and abomina