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find the Aequiculani in the valley of the Salto con- | It is joined on the left bank by the Caresus, another stituting a regular municipal body, so that "Res | stream which flows from Cotylus; and then taking Publica Aequiculanorum" and a " Municipium Ae- a NE. and N. course, it enters the Propontis, bequicolanorum are found in inscriptions of that tween the mouth of the Granicus and the city of period (Orell. no. 3931; Ann. dell. Inst. vol. vi. Cyzicus. The modern naine appears not to be p. 111, not.). Probably this was a mere aggregation clearly ascertained Leake calls it Boklu. [G. L.] of scattered villages and hamlets such as are still AESE'RNIA (Aloepvía: Eth. Aeserninus; but found in the district of the Cicolano. In the Liber Pliny and later writers have Eserninus), a city of SamColoniarum (p. 255) we find mention of the Eciey- nium, included within the territory of the Pentrian lanus ager," evidently a corruption of Aequiculanus, tribe, situated in the valley of the Vulturnus, on a as is shown by the recurrence of the same form in small stream flowing into that river, and distant 14 charters and documents of the middle ages (Holsten. miles from Venafrum. The Itinerary (in which the not. ad Cluver. p. 156). name is corruptly written Serni) places it on the road from Aufidena to Bovianum, at the distance of 28 M. P. from the former, and 18 from the latter; but the former number is corrupt, as are the distances in the Tabula. (Itin. Ant. p. 102; Tab. Peut.; Plin. iii. 12. 17; Ptol. iii. 1. § 67; Sil. Ital. viii. 568.) The modern city of Isernia retains the ancient site as well as name. The first mention of it in history occurs in B. C. 295, at which time it had already fallen into the hands of the Romans, together with the whole valley of the Vulturnus. (Liv x. 31.) After the complete subjugation of the Samnites, a colony, with Latin rights (colonia Latina) was settled there by the Romans in B. C. 264; and this is again mentioned in B. C. 209 as one of the eighteen which remained faithful to Rome at the most trying period of the Second Punic War. (Liv. Epit. xvi. xxvii. 10; Vell. Pat. i. 14.) During the Social War it adhered to the Roman cause, and was gallantly defended against the Samnite general Vettius Cato, by Marcellus, nor was it till after a long protracted siege that it was compelled by famine to surrender, B. C. 90. Henceforth it continued in the hands of the confederates; and at a later period of the contest afforded a shelter to the Samnite leader, Papius Mutilus, after his defeat by Sulla. It even became for a time, after the successive fall of Corfinium and Bovianum, the head quarters of the Italian allies. (Liv. Epit. Ixxii, lxxiii.; Appian. B. C. i. 41, 51; Diod. xxxvii. Exc. Phot. p. 539; Sisenna ap. Nonium, p. 70.) At this time it was evidently a place of importance and a strong fortress, but it was so severely punished for its defection by Sulla after the final defeat of the Samnites, that Strabo speaks of it as in his time utterly deserted. (Strab. v. p. 238, 250.) We learn, however, that a colony was sent there by Caesar, and again by Augustus; but apparently with little success, on which account it was recolonized under Nero. It never, however, enjoyed the rank of a colony, but appears from inscriptions to have been a municipal town of some importance in the time of Trajan and the Antonines. To this period belong the remains of an aqueduct and a fine Roman bridge, still visible; while the lower parts of the modern walls present considerable portions of polygonal construction, which may be assigned either to the ancient Samnite city, or to the first Roman colony. The modern city is still the see of a bishop, and contains about 7000 inhabitants. (Lib. Colon. pp. 233, 260; Zumpt, de Coloniis, pp. 307, 360,

It is not a little remarkable that the names of scarcely any cities belonging to the Aequians have been transmitted to us. Livy tells us that in the decisive campaign of B. c. 304, forty-one Aequian towns were taken by the Roman consuls (ix. 45): but he mentions none of them by name, and from the ease and rapidity with which they were reduced, it is probable that they were places of little importance. Many of the smaller towns and villages now scattered in the hill country between the vallies of the Sacco and the Anio probably occupy ancient sites: two of these, Civitella and Olevano, present remains of ancient walls and substructions of rude polygonal masonry, which may probably be referred to a very early period (Abeken, Mittel Italien, pp. 140, 147; Bullett. dell. Inst. 1841, p. 49). The numerous vestiges of ancient cities found in the valley of the Salto, may also belong in many instances to the Aequians, rather than the Aborigines, to whom they have been generally referred. The only towns expressly assigned to the Aequiculi by Pliny and Ptolemy are CARSEOLI in the upper valley of the Turano, and CLITERNIA in that of the Salto. To these may be added ALBA FUCENSIS, which we are expressly told by Livy was founded in the territory of the Aequians, though on account of its superior importance, Pliny ranks the Albenses as a separate people (Pliny iii. 12. 17; Ptol.iii. 1. § 56; Liv. x. 1). VARIA, which is assigned to the Aequians by several modern writers, appears to have been properly a Sabine town. NERSAE, mentioned by Virgil (Aen. vii. 744) as the chief place of the Aequiculi, not noticed by any other writer, and its site is wholly uncertain. Besides these, Pliny (7. c.) mentions the Comini, Tadiates, Cae lici, and Alfaterni as towns or communities of the Aequiculi, which had ceased to exist in his time: all four names are otherwise wholly unknown.

[E. H. B.] AEQUINOC’TIUM or AEQUINOC'TIAE (Fischament), a Roman fort in Upper Pannonia, situated upon the Danube, and according to the Notitia Imperii, the quarters of a squadron of Dalmatian cavalry. (Tab. Peut.; Itin. Antonin.) [W.B.D.] AEROPUS, a mountain in Greek Illyria, on the river Aous, and opposite to Mount Asnaus. Aeropus probably corresponds to Trebusin, and Asnaus to Nemértzika. (Liv. xxxii. 5; Leake, Northern Greece, vol. i. p. 389.)

AESE PUS ( Alontos), a river of Northern Mysia, mentioned by Homer (Il. ii. 825, &c.) as flowing past Zeleia, at the foot of Ida; and in another passage (II. xii. 21) as one of the streams that flow from Ida. According to Strabo's interpretation of Homer, the Aesepus was the eastern boundary of Mysia. The Aesepus is the largest river of Mysia. According to Strabo, it rises in Mount Cotylus, one of the summits of Ida (p. 602), and the distance between its source and its outlet is near 500 stadia.

AISERNING

COIN OF AESERNIA.

392; Inscrr. ap. Romanelli, vol. ii. pp. 470, 471; Craven's Abruzzi, vol. ii. p. 83; Hoare's Classical Tour, vol. i. p. 227.)

The coins of Aesernia, which are found only in copper, and have the legend AISERNINO, belong to the period of the first Roman colony; the style of their execution attests the influence of the neighbouring Campania. (Millingen, Numismatique de TItalie, p. 218.) [E. H. B.]

AE'SICA, was a Roman frontier castle in the line of Hadrian's rampart, and probably corresponds to the site of Greatchester. It is, however, placed by some antiquaries at the Danish village of Netherby, on the river Esk. It is mentioned by George of Ravenna, and in the Notitia Imperii, and was the quarters of Cohors I. Astorum. [W. B. D.] AESIS (Alois, Strab.; Aloivos, App.), a river on the east coast of Italy, which rises in the Apennines near Matilica, and flows into the Adriatic, between Ancona and Sena Gallica; it is still called the Esino. It constituted in early times the boundary between the territory of the Senonian Gauls and Picenum; and was, therefore, regarded as the northern limit of Italy on the side of the Adriatic. But after the destruction of the Senones, when the confines of Italy were extended to the Rubicon, the Aesis became the boundary between the two provinces of Umbria and Picenum. (Strab. v. pp. 217, 227, 241; Plin. iii. 14. 19; Mela, ii. 4; Ptol. iii. 1. § 22, where the name is corruptly written 'Aotos; Liv. v. 35.) According to Silius Italicus (viii. 446) it derived its appellation from a Pelasgian chief of that name, who had ruled over this part of Italy. There can be no doubt that the Aesinus of Appian (B. C. i. 87), on the banks of which a great battle was fought between Metellus and Carinas, the lieutenant of Carbo, in B. C. 82, is the same with the Aesis of other writers. In the Itinerary we find a station (AD AESIM) at the mouth of the river, which was distant 12 M. P. from Sena Gallica, and 8 from Ancona. (Itin. Ant. p. 316.) [E. H. B.]

AESIS or AE'SIUM (Alois, Ptol.; Atotov, Strab.; Eth. Aesinas, -atis), a town of Umbria situated on the N. bank of the river of the same name, about 10 miles from its mouth. It is still called Iesi, and is an episcopal town of some consideration. Pliny mentions it only as an ordinary municipal town: but we learn from several inscriptions that it was a Roman colony, though the period when it attained this rank is unknown. (Inscrr. ap. Gruter. p. 446. 1, 2; Orelli, no. 3899, 3900; Zumpt, de Colon. p. 359.) According to Pliny (H. N. xi. 42, 97) it was noted for the excellence of its cheeses.

The form Aesium, which is found only in Strabo, is probably erroneous, Aloor being, according to Kramer, a corrupt reading for 'Aolotov. (Strab. v. p. 227; Ptol. iii. 1. § 53; Plin. iii. 14. 19.) [E.H.B.] AESITAE (Aloirai or Avoîrai, Ptol. v. 19. § 2; comp. Bochart. Phaleg. i. 8), were probably the inhabitants of the region upon the borders of Chaldaea, which the Hebrews designated as the land of Uz (Job,i. 1, xv. 17; Jerem. xxv. 20), and which the 70 translators render by the word Avoîris (comp. Winer, Bibl. Realwörterb. vol. ii. p. 755). Strabo (p. 767) calls the Regio Aesitarun Macina (Makin). They were a nomade race, but from their possessing houses and villages, had apparently settled pastures on the Chaldaean border. [W. B. D.]

AESON or AESO'NIS (Alowv, Alowvis: Eth. Alowvios), a town of Magnesia in Thessaly, the name of which is derived from Aeson, the father of

Jason. (Apoll. Rhod. i. 411, and Schol.; Steph. B. s. v.)

AE'STUI (this is the correct reading), a people of Germany, consisting of several tribes (Aestuorum gentes), whose manners are minutely described by Tacitus (Germ. 45). They dwelt in the NE. of Germany, on the SE. or E. of the Baltic, bordering on the Venedi of Sarmatia. In their general appearance and manners they resembled the Suevi: their language was nearer to that of Britain. They worshipped the mother of the gods, in whose honour they wore images of boars, which served them as amulets in war. They had little iron, and used clubs instead of it. They worked more patiently at tilling the land than the rest of the Germans. They gathered amber on their coasts, selling it for the Roman market, with astonishment at its price. They called it Glessum, perhaps Glas, i. e. glass. They are also mentioned by Cassiodorus (Var. v. Ep. 2.) They were the occupants of the present coast of Prussia and Courland, as is evident by what Tacitus says about their gathering amber. Their name is probably collective, and signifies the East men. It appears to have reached Tacitus in the form Easte, and is still preserved in the modern Esthen, the German name of the Esthonians. The statement of Tacitus, that the language of the Aestui was nearer to that of Britain, is explained by Dr. Latham by the supposition that the language of the Aestui was then called Prussian, and that the similarity of this word to British caused it to be mistaken for the latter. On the various questions respecting the Aestui, see Ukert, vol. iii. pt. i. pp. 420-422, and Latham, The Germania of Tacitus, p. 166, seq. [P. S.]

AE'SULA (Eth. Aesulanus), a city of Latium, mentioned by Pliny among those which in his time had entirely ceased to exist (iii. 5. § 9). It appears from his statement to have been one of the colonies or dependencies of Alba, but its name does not occur in the early history of Rome. In the Second Punic War, however, the Arx Aesulania is mentioned by Livy as one of the strongholds which it was deemed necessary to occupy with a garrison on the approach of Hannibal. (Liv. xxvi. 9.) The well-known allusion of Horace (Carm. iii. 29. 6) to the "declive arvum Aesulae," shows that its name at least was still familiarly known in his day, whether the city still existed or not, and points to its situation in full view of Rome, probably on the hills near Tibur. Gell has with much probability placed it on the slope of the mountain called Monte Affliano, about 2 miles SE. of Tivoli, which is a conspicuous object in the view from Rome, and the summit of which commands an extensive prospect, so as to render it well adapted for a look-out station. The Arx mentioned by Livy was probably on the summit of the mountain, and the town lower down, where Gell observed vestiges of ancient roads, and "many foundations of the ancient walls in irregular blocks.” Nibby supposes it to have occupied a hill, called in the middle ages Colle Faustiniano, which is a lower offshoot of the same mountain, further towards the S.; but this position does not seem to correspond so well with the expressions either of Livy or Horace. (Gell, Topography of Rome, p. 9; Nibby, Dintorni di Roma, vol. i. p. 32.) Velleius Paterculus (i. 14) speaks of a colony being sent in the year 246 B. C. to AESULUM; but it seems impossible that a place so close to Rome itself should have been colonized at so late a period, and that no subsequent mention

should be found of it; it is therefore probable that we should read ASCULUM. [E. H. B.]

AESYME. [OESYME.] AETHAEA (Al@aia: Éth. Albaicus), a town of Messenia of unknown site, the inhabitants of which revolted from Sparta with the Thuriatae in B. c. | 464. (Thuc. i. 101; Steph. B. 8. v.)

AETHICES, a barbarous Epirot clan, who lived by robbery, are placed by Strabo on the Thessalian side of Pindus. They are mentioned by Homer, who relates that the Centaurs, expelled by Peirithous from Mt. Pelion, took refuge among the Aethices. (Hom. II. ii. 744; Strab. pp. 327, 434; Steph. B. 8. v. Αἰθικία.)

AETHIOPIA ( Alliomla, Herod. iii. 114; Dion Cass. liv. 5; Strab. pp. 2, 31, 38, &c.; Plin. H. N. v. 8. § 8, vi. 30. § 35; Seneca, Q. N. iv. 2, &c.; Steph. B.: Eth. Aldíoy, Albioneús, Aethiops, fem. Aiboris: Adj. Aliominós, Aethiopicus: the KUSH of the Hebrews, Ezech. xxxix. 10; Job. xxviii. 19; Amos ix. 7), corresponds, in its more extended acceptation, to the modern regions of Nubia, Sennaar, Kordofan and northern Abyssinia. In describing Aethiopia however, we must distinguish between the employment of the name as an ethnic or generic designation on the one hand, and, on the other, as restricted to the province or kingdom of Meroë, or the civilised Aethiopia († Ailionía inèр Alyvnтоυ, or únò AÏYURTоv, Herod. ii. 146; Ptol. iv. 7.)

Aethiopia, as a generic or ethnic designation, comprises the inhabitants of Africa who dwelt between the equator, the Red Sea, and the Atlantic, for Strabo speaks of Hesperian Aethiopians S. of the Pharusii and Mauri, and Herodotus (iv. 197) describes them as occupying the whole of South Libya. The name Aethiopians is probably Semitic, and if indigenous, certainly so, since the Aethiopic language is pure Semitic. Mr. Salt says that to this day the Abyssinians call themselves Itiopjawan. The Greek geographers however derived the name from afew

come successively upon the promontory of Rhaptum ('РаTτóν oρos), Noti Cornu (NóτOυ Képas), Point Zingis (Ζιγγίς), Aromata (ἀρωμάτων ἄκρον: Cape Guardafui), the easternmost point of Africa; the headland of Elephas ('Eλepas: Djebel Feeh or Cape Felix); Mnemium (Munueîov: Cape Calmez), the extreme spur of Mt. Isium ("Iotov ŏpos), and, finally, the headland of Bazium, a little to the south of the Sinus Immundus, or Foul Bay, nearly in the parallel of Syene. The coast line was much indented, and contained some good harbours, Avaliticus Sinus, Aduliticus Sinus, &c., which in the Macedonian era, if not earlier, were the emporia of an active commerce both with Arabia and Libya. (Ptol.; Strabo; Plin.)

From the headland of Bazium to Mount Zingis, a barrier of primitive rocks intermingled with basalt and limestone extends and rises to a height of 8000 feet in some parts. In the north of this range were the gold mines, from which the Aethiopians derived an abundance of that metal. Aethiopia was thus separated from its coast and harbours, which were accessible from the interior only by certain gorges, the caravan roads. The western slope of this range was also steep, and the streams were rapid and often dried up in summer. A tract, called the eastern desert, accordingly intervened between the Arabian hills and the Nile and its tributary the Astaboras. The river system of Aethiopia differed indeed considerably from that of Egypt. The Nile from its junction with the Astaboras or Tacazzé presented, during a course of nearly 700 miles, alternate rapids and cataracts, so that it was scarcely available for inland navigation. Its fertilising overflow was also much restricted by high escarped banks of limestone, and its alluvial deposit rarely extended two miles on either side of the stream, and more frequently covered only a narrow strip. Near the river dhourra or millet was rudely cultivated, and canals now choked up with sand, show that the Aethiopians practised the art of irrigation. Further from the Nile were pastures and

, and applied it to all the sun-burnt dark-com-thick plexioned races above Egypt. Herodotus (iii. 94, vii. 70) indeed speaks of Aethiopians of Asia, whom he probably so designated from their being of a darker hne than their immediate neighbours. Like the Aethiopians of the Nile, they were tributary to Persia in the reign of Darius. They were a straight-haired race, while their Libyan namesakes were, according to the historian, woolly-haired. But the expression (oùλóтаTOν тρixwua) must not be construed too literally, as neither the ancient Aethiopians, as depictured on the monuments, nor their modern representatives, the Bisháries and Shangallas, have,strictly speaking, the negro-hair. The Asiatic Aethiopians were an equestrian people, wearing crests and head armour made of the hide and manes of horses. From Herodotus (c.) we infer that they were a Mongolic race, isolated in the steppes of Kurdistan.

The boundaries of the African Aethiopians are necessarily indefinite. If they were, as seems probable, the ancestors of the Shangallas, Bishúries, and Nu bians, their frontiers may be loosely stated as to the S. the Abyssinian Highlands, to the W. the Libyan desert, to the N. Egypt and Marmarica, and to the E. the Indian Ocean and the Red Sea. The boundaries of Aethiopia Proper, or Meroë, will admit of more particular definition.

Their Eastern frontier however being a coast line may be described. It extended from lat. 9 to lat. 24 N. Beginning at the headland of Prasum (Cape del Gardo), where Africa Barbaria commences, we

jungle-forests, where, in the rainy seasons, the gadfly prevailed, and drove the herdsmen and their cattle into the Arabian hills. The jungle and swamps abounded with wild beasts, and elephants were both caught for sale and used as food by the natives. As rain falls scantily in the north, Aethiopia must have contained a considerable portion of waste land beside its eastern and western deserts. In the south the Abyssinian highlands are the cause of greater humidity, and consequently of more general fertility. The whole of this region has at present been very imperfectly explored. The natives who have been for centuries carried off by their northern neighbours to the slave-markets are hostile to strangers. Bruce and Burckhardt skirted only the northern and southern borders of Aethiopia above Meroë: jungle fever and wild beasts exclude the traveller from the valleys of the Astapus and Astaboras: and the sands have buried most of the cultivable soil of ancient Aethiopia. Yet it is probable that two thousand years have made few changes in the general aspect of its inhabitants.

The population of this vague region was a mixture of Arabian and Libyan races in combination with the genuine Aethiopians. The latter were distinguished by well formed and supple limbs, and by a facial outline resembling the Caucasian in all but its inclination to prominent lips and a somewhat sloping forehead. The elongated Nubian eye, depictured on the monuments, is still seen in the Shangallas. As neither Greeks nor Romans penetrated beyond Napata,

the

the ancient capital of Meroë, our accounts of the various Aethiopian tribes are extremely scanty and perplexing. Their principal divisions were the Colobi, | the Bleminyes, the Icthyophagi, the Macrobii, and the Troglodytae. But besides these were various tribes, probably however of the same stock, which were designated according to their peculiar diet and employments. The Rhizophagi or Root-eaters, who fed upon dhourra kneaded with the bark of trees; Creophagi, who lived on boiled flesh, and were a pa toral tribe; the Chelenophagi, whose food was shell-fish caught in the saline estuaries; the Acridophagi or locust-eaters; the Struthophagi and Elephantophagi, who hunted the ostrich and elephant, and some others who, like the inhabitants of the island Gaganda, took their name from a particular locality. The following, however, had a fixed habitation, although we find them occasionally mentioned at some distance from the probable site of the main tribe.

(1.) The BLEMMYES, and MEGABARI, who dwelt between the Arabian hills and the Tacazzé were according to Quatremère de Quincy (Mémoires sur Egypte, ii. p. 127), the ancestors of the modern Bischaries, whom earlier writers denominate Bejas or Bedjas. They practised a rude kind of agriculture; but the greater part were herdsmen, hunters, and caravan guides. [BLEMMYES.] (2) ICTHYOPHAGI or fisheaters, dwelt on the sea coast between the Sinus Adulicus and the Regio Troglodytica, and of all these savage races were probably the least civilised. According to Diodorus, the Icthyophagi were a degraded branch of the Troglodytae. Their dwellings were clefts and holes in the rocks, and they did not even possess any fishing implements, but fed on the fish which the ebb left behind. Yet Herodotus informs us (iii. 20) that Cambyses employed Icthyophagi from Elephantine in Upper Egypt, as spies previous to his expedition into the interior- an additional proof of the uncertain site and wide dispersion of the Aethiopian tribes. (3) The MACROBII or long-lived Aethiopians. Of this nation, if it were not the people of Meroë, it is impossible to discover the site. From the account of Herodotus (iii. 17) it appears that they were advanced in civilisation, since they possessed a king, laws, a prison, and a market; understood the working of metals, had gold in abundance, and had made some progress in the arts. Yet of agriculture they knew nothing, for they were unacquainted with bread. Herodotus places them on the shore of the Indian Ocean " at the furthest corner of the earth." But the Persians did not approach their abode, and the Greeks spoke of the Macrobii only from report. Bruce (ii. p. 554) places them to the north of Fazukla, in the lower part of the gold countries, Cuba and Nuba, on both sides of the Nile, and regards them as Shangallas. (4) The TROGLODYTAE or cave-dwellers were seated between the Blemmyes and Megabari, and according to Agatharcides (ap. Diod. i. 30. § 3, iii. 32, 33) they were herdsmen with their separate chiefs or princes of tribes. Their habitations were not merely clefts in the rocks, but carefully wrought vaults, laid out in cloisters and squares, like the catacombs at Naples, whither in the rainy season they retired with their herds. Their food was milk and clotted blood. In the dry months they occupied the pastures which slope westward to the Astaboras and Nile.

The boundaries of Aethiopia Proper (ʼn Alliomía inèр Аlyúтоυ) are more easy to determine. To the south indeed they are uncertain, but probably com

|

menced a little above the modern village of Khartoum, where the Bahr el Azrek, Blue or Dark River, unites with the Bahr el Abiad, or White Nile. (Lat. 15° 37' N., long. 33° E.) The desert of Bahiouda on the left bank of the Nile formed its western limit: its eastern frontier was the river Astaboras and the northern upland of Abyssinia-the Kpnμvol Ts 'Apasías of Diodorus (i. 33). To the N. Aethiopia was bounded by a province called Dodecaschoenus or Aethiopia Aegypti—a debateable land subject sometimes to the Thebaid and sometimes to the kings of Meroë. The high civilisation of Aethiopia, as attested by historians and confirmed by its monuments, was confined to the insular area of Meroë and to Aethiopia Aegypti, and is more particularly described under the head of MEROE.

The connection between Egypt and Aethiopia was at all periods very intimate. The inhabitants of the Nile valley and of Aethiopia were indeed branches of the same Hamite stream, and differed only in degree of civilisation. Whether religion and the arts descended or ascended the Nile has long been a subject of discussion. From Herodotus (ii. 29) it would appear that the worship of Ammon and Osiris (Zeus and Dionysus) was imparted by Meroë to Egypt. The annual procession of the Holy Ship, with the shrine of the Ram-headed god, from Thebes to the Libyan side of the Nile, as depicted on the temple of Karnak and on several Nubian monuments, probably commemorates the migration of Ammonworship from Meroë to Upper Egypt. Diodorus also says (iii. 3) that the people above Meroë worship Isis, Pan, Heracles, and Zeus: and his assertion would be confirmed by monuments in Upper Nubia bearing the head of Isis, &c., could we be certain of the date of their erection. The Aethiopian monarchy was even more strictly sacerdotal than that of Egypt, at least the power of the priesthood was longer undisputed. "In Aethiopia," says Diodorus (iii. 6), “ the priests send a sentence of death to the king, when they think he has lived long enough. The order to die is a mandate of the gods." In the age of Ptolemy Philadelphus (B. C.284-246) however an important revolution took place. Ergamenes, a monarch who had some tincture of Greek arts and philosophy, put all the priests to death (Diod. iii. 6. § 3), and plundered their golden temple at Napata (Barkal ?). If Herodotus (ii. 100) were not misinformed by the priests of Memphis, 18 Aethiopian kings were among the predecessors of Sesortasen. The monuments however do not record this earlier dynasty. Sesortasen is said by the same historian to have conquered Aethiopia (Herod. ii. 106); but his occupation must have been merely transient, since he also affirms that the country above Egypt had never been conquered (iii. 21). But in the latter part of the 8th century B. C. an Aetmopian dynasty, the 25th of Egypt, reigned in Lower Egypt, and contained three kings-Sabaco, Sebichus, and Taracus or Tirhakah. At this epoch the annals of Aethiopia become connected with universal history. Sabaco and his successors reigned at Napata, probably seated at that bend of the Nile where the rocky island of Mogreb divides its stream. The invasion of Egypt by the Aethiopian king was little more than a change of dynasty, as the royal families of the two kingdoms had previously been united by intermarriages. Bocchoris, the last Egyptian monarch of the 24th dynasty, was put to a cruel death by Sabaco, yet Diodorus (i. 60) commends the latter as exemplarily pious and merciful. Herodotus (ii. 137) represents Sabaco as substituting for criminals corn

pulsory labour in the mines for the punishment of death. Diodorus also celebrates the mildness and justice of another Aethiopian king, whom he calls Actisanes, and rumours of such virtues may have procured for the Aethiopian race the epithet of" the blameless." (Hom. I. i. 423.)

reason to consider these, who from their name may
have once composed the left wing of the Egyptian
army, the exiled war-caste.
In that frontier po-
sition they would have been available to their
adopted country as a permanent garrison against
invasion from the north.

The Persian dynasty was scarcely established in Egypt, when Cambyses undertook an expedition into Aethiopia. He prepared for it by sending certain Icthyophagi from Elephantine as envoys, or rather as spies, to the king of the Macrobians. (Herod. iii. 17—25.) But the invasion was so ill-planned, or encountered such physical obstacles in the desert, that the Persian army returned to Memphis, enfeebled and disheartened. Of this inroad the magazines of Cambyses (Taμieła Kaμbúσov, Ptol. iv. 7. § 15), probably the town of Cambysis (Plin. H. N. vi. 29), on the left bank of the Nile, near its great curve to the west, was the only permanent record. The Persian occupation of the Nilevalley opened the country above Philae to Greek travellers. The philosopher Democritus, a little younger than Herodotus, wrote an account of the hieroglyphics of Meroë (Diog. Laert. ix. 49), and from this era we may probably date the establishment of Greek emporia upon the shore of the Red Sea. Under the Ptolemies, the arts, as well as the enterprise of the Greeks, entered Aethiopia, and led to the destruction of the sacerdotal government, and to the foundation or extension of the Hellenic colonies Dire-Berenices, Arsinoë, Adule, Ptolemais-Theron, on the coast, where, until the era of the Saracen invasion in the 7th century A. D., an active trade was carried on between Libya, Arabia, and Western India or Ceylon (Ophir? Taprobane).

Sebichus, the So or Seva of the Scriptures, was the son and successor of Sabaco. He was an ally of Hoshea, king of Israel; but he was unable, or too tardy in his movements, to prevent the capture of Samaria by Shalmaneser, king of Assyria, in B. C. 722. One result of the captivity of Israel was an influx of Hebrew exiles into Egypt and Aethiopia, and eventually the dissemination of the Mosaic religion in the country north of Elephantine. Before this catastrophe, the Psalmist and the Prophets (Psalm, lxxxvii. 4; Isaiah, xx. 5; Nahum, iii. 9; Ezek. xxx. 4) had celebrated the military power of | the Aethiopians, and the historical writings of the Jews record their invasions of Palestine. Isaiah (xix. 18) predicts the return of Israel from the land of Cush; and the story of Queen Candace's treasurer, in the Acts of the Apostles (ch. viii.), shows that the Hebrew Scriptures were current in the more civilised parts of that region. Sebichus was succeeded by Tirhakah the Tarcus or Taracus of Manetho. The commentators on the Book of Kings (iii. 19) usually describe this monarch as an Arabian chieftain; but his name is recorded on the propylon of a temple at Medinet-Aboo, and at Gebelel-Birkel, or Barkal, in Nubia. He was, therefore, of Aethiopian lineage. Strabo (i. p. 61, xv. p. 687) says, that Tirhakal rivalled Sesortasen, or Rameses III., in his conquests, which extended to the Pillars of Hercules, meaning, probably, the Phoenician settlements on the northern coast of Africa. From Hebrew records (2 Kings, xviii, xix.; Isaiah, xxxvi, xxxvii.), we know that Tirhakah was on his march to relieve Judaea from the invasion of Sennacherib (B. C. 588); but his advance was rendered unnecessary by the pestilence which swept off the Assyrian army near Pelusium (Herod. ii. 141; Horapoll. Hierogl. i. 50). Tirhakah, however, was sovereign only in the Thebaid: one, if not two, native Egyptian kings, reigned contemporaneously with him at Memphis and Sais. According to the inscription at Gebel-el-Birkel, Tirhakah reigned at least twenty years in Upper Egypt. Herodotus, indeed, regards the 25th or Aethiopian dynasty in Egypt as comprised in the reign and person of Sabaco alone, to whom he assigns a period of fiftylation of Aethiopia had become almost Arabian, and years. But there were certainly three monarchs of this line, and a fourth, Ammeris, is mentioned in the list of Eusebius. The historian (ii. 139) ascribes the retirement of the last Aethiopian monarch to a dream, which may perhaps be interpreted as a mandate from the hierarchy at Napata to forego his conquests below Philae.

In the reign of Augustus, the Aethiopians, under their Queen Candace, advanced as far as the Roman garrisons at Parembole and Elephantine. They were repulsed by C. Petronius, the legatus of the prefect of Egypt, Aelius Gallus, who placed a Roman garrison in Premnis (Ibrim), and pursued the retreating army to the neighbourhood of Napata. (Dion Cass. liv. 5.) In a second campaign Petronius compelled Candace to send overtures of peace and submission to Augustus (B. C. 22-23) But the Roman tenure of Aethiopia above Egypt was always precarious; and in Diocletian's reign (A. D. 284-305), the country south of Philae was ceded generally by that emperor to the Nubae. Under the Romans, indeed, if not earlier, the popu

continued so after the establishment of Christian churches and sees, until the followers of Mahomet overran the entire region from the sources of the Astaboras to Alexandria, and confirmed the predominance of their race.

ID

Such were the general divisions, tribes, and history of Aethiopia in the wider import of the term. the interior, and again beginning from the south near the sources of the Astaboras we find the fol

In the reign of Psammetichus (B. c. 630), the entire war-caste of Egypt migrated into Aethiopia. Herodotus (ii. 30) says that the deserters (Auto-lowing districts. Near the headland Elephas were moli) settled in a district as remote from the Aethiopian metropolis (Napata) as that city was from Elephantine. But this statement would carry them below lat. 16°, the extreme limit of Aethiopian civilisation. Diodorus (i. 67) describes the Automoli as settled in the most fertile region of Aethiopia. North-west of Meroë, however, a tribe had established themselves, whom the geographers call Enonymitae, the Asmach of Herodotus (ii. 30; Strab. xvii. p. 786; Plin. vi. 30), and there is

the Mosyli (Mórvλo), the Molibae (Moxía), and Soboridae (Zo6opída:) (Ptol. iv. 7. § 28). Next, the Regio Axiomitarum [AXUME], immediately to the north of which was a province called Tenesis (Tŋveris) occupied by the Sembritae of Strabo (p. 770), or Semberritae of Pliny (H. N. vi. 30. § 35). North of Tenesis was the Lake Coloe, and between the Adulitae and Mount Taurus on the coast were the Colobi, who according to Agatharcides (ap. Diod. iii. 32) practised the rite of circumcision, and dwelt in

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