the word itself, (nomen de nomine fingo ;) and, derive it from the English word fig, ascribing the position it represents in the Iliad, to the countries of Africa and Arabia, which together have a strong resemblance to a fig in shape, as may be plainly seen in the map.

This fixing of the position of the Scean Gates and of the you, may serve to shew that by the character of Antenor we are to understand Arabia, as will appear from 3 Il. 262,

Παρ δε οι Αντήνωρ περικαλλέα βήσατο διφρον Τωδε δια Σκαιων πεδίονδ' εχον ωκέας ίππος,

which two lines, expressive of Antenor and Priam's going out together at those Gates, not only prove that one of those Gates is rightly ascribed to the Straits of Babelmandeb, but that, as Priam represents Africa, so the opposite coast of Arabia is represented by Antenor; while the epithet περικαλλέα seems to contain an allusion to that division of it in particular, which is called Arabia Felix finally, in Meys, who slew the son of Antenor, thus representing Arabia, we may see a

personification of the famous city of Mecca, as in the following line, 5 II. 69,

Πηδαιον γαρ επεφνε Μέγης Αντήνορος υιον"

But it is time now to speak of the great hero of the Trojans, Hector. Here again stat nominis. umbra; by inverting the syllables of ExTwę, it becomes Twe-εx, or Turk, and I assign to him accordinglythe country of Asiatic Turkey. An instance of such an inversion of syllables has before occurred in the formation of the name of Ταλθύβιος, from tall boot, or Talbot: (a very remarkable one may be seen in the Greek word dix, or dia, justice, which is obviously derivable from the Arabic ca-di, a judge ;) and when the reversed modes of reading and writing, from left to right and from right to left (adopted respectively by the Europeans and Asiatics), are recollected, such an inversion of syllables may fairly be allowed to poets for the purpose of disguise, especially when it regards countries where such reversed mode of reading and writing takes place. But as Achilles, though representing the whole of Africa, is often to be

considered as confined to the course of the Nile; so Hector, though standing for the whole of Asiatic Turkey has frequently a confined relation to the Euphrates, the principal river of that country; which country, as it borders upon Persia, is, by a correspondent analogy, represented by the brother to Paris, who represents Persia, as included in or closely connected with India, as above stated. A drawing of Hector, as thus representing the course of the Euphrates, is given in

Fig. 165;

which is exactly copied from the line of that river,

together with the Tigris, and other rivers that fall into it; and an inspection of the drawing will immediately shew the aptitude of the common epithet nogtans, applied to Hector as pointing to the κορυθαίολος, beauty of his helmet and its cone; while by the epithets 10XT and IT (from 17705 and sea, cauda) applied to his helmet in the 469 and 495 lines of the 6 I. an allusion may further probably have been intended to the horse-tails, (as they are commonly called,) which are a badge of honour among the Turks, and mark the different degrees of their bashas. The extent of Hector's territory is marked in a special mannner, in the following lines, 6 Il. 313,

Εκτωρ δε προς δωματ' Αλεξάνδροιο βεβήκει -Ενθ' Εκτωρ εισηλθε Διι φίλος, ενδ' αρα χειρι Εγχος εχ ενδεκάπηχυ

where, by the spear of eleven cubits in length, there seems to be an allusion to the eleven degrees of latitude through which that territory extends, reckoning from the southern coast of the Black Sea to the entrance of the Euphrates into the Persian Gulf.

I proceed to the consideration of Andromache, the wife of Hector, whose representative character it has been by no means easy to fix: the difficulty of comprehending that character seems indeed to be noticed by the poet himself; for when Hector went home to his own territories (οίκονδε ελευσομαι, 6 11. 365), he did not, on going home, find his wife there, 6 II. 371:

Αίψα δ' επειτ' ικανε δεμός ευναιετάοντας
Ουδ' ευρ' Ανδρομαχην λευκώλενον εν μεγάροισιν

And again,

Ουκ ενδον αμυμονα τετμεν ακοιτι

whereupon he, in a strong manner, charges her attendants (the rivers) to tell him where she is, νημερτέα μυθήσασθε, 375, and ανωγα αλήθεα μυ θησασθαι, 384; and when he is told whither she is gone, he meets her, after going through his whole territories, at the Scaan Gates, 6 11. 392;