territory (K. A. T. 90); and this moreover, although it is easy to see from the Persian text of Behistûn that Sanherib merely called Judah a "distant" land, and did so quite correctly. If one who has been a sober investigator learns to distort thus relations with which he is accurately acquainted, how can we be sure that he will measure correctly things which are wholly in the dark, or at least are so to him.

The reviewer may here be allowed to touch on a point on which Gutschmid is purposely silent. Two years ago, in this periodical, the reviewer expressed in a very mild form his doubts as to the value of the dilettante philological treatment of these texts, which have been correctly read, perhaps, so far as the sound is concerned. Schrader soon answered 2 in an Article which showed that he had not clearly understood the exact aim of the reviewer's Article, and that he had misunderstood several details of it, in some cases in an extraordinary way. A superficial reader might have really thought that all the reviewer's objections were refuted, that some of them had been shown to be purely crotchety. Men who really know Semitic languages think otherwise. It would be easy to point out in Schrader's books dozens of impossible etymologies, and meanings which must appear extremely forced, at least to one who is somewhat at home in the Arabic or Aramaic idioms. Reviewer finds in Schrader a constant effort to translate as if there were a complete connection in sense, where for the present no connected transla tion is possible. As in historical relations, so in language, there is a desire to know the language, just as there is a desire to know the historical facts more exactly than they can be known; and in order to hide from themselves the fact that some things are unknown, some people do not shrink from the most questionable etymological tricks, and from the use, in a hurried, careless way, of untrustworthy dictionaries. The philologist, like the historian, may use the decipherings of Assyriologists only with the utmost caution. The claim

1 Leip. Lit. Cent. blatt. 1874, No. 26.

Jena Lit. Ztg. 1874, No. 27.

which appeared lately in this paper 1-viz. that the results of Oppert, Sayce, and Schrader should be used as quite good material in the scientific comparative study of the Semitic languages, must be, we think, rejected.

Although Gutschmid's pamphlet is essentially polemic and negative, it contains also much careful, positive investigation and many valuable results. We may point, e.g. to the discussion of the origin of the Median empire, which is well elucidated by the analogous rise of the Parthian empire. We may point also to the Excursus on the Assyrian Eponyms, and to many other parts of the work. How rich are the treasures of knowledge which are at the command of our author, how correctly he handles the historical method, and how interestingly he can write, are well known from his former writings. Even historians and philologists who have little or nothing to do with the ancient Orient will find the book very instructive on account of the facts which it communicates, and especially on account of its method, and will find it also for the most part highly attractive reading.

A few more details: We hold decidedly, on the strength of varied and quite independent testimonies, that Phul was an Assyrian king, who ruled for a time in Babylon. Gutschmid's conclusion that he was king over a portion only of the country along the Euphrates above Babylon has not yet fully convinced us. The cultivable land on both sides of the Euphrates above Hît is so narrow that it affords no territory such as we must ascribe to a ruler who interfered so largely as Phul did in the affairs of distant Palestine. However, in any case, the condition of the Assyrian-Babylonian states was at that time very complicated. Some very skilful hypothesis is necessary, if we are to get rid of all difficulty. But we must nevertheless keep in mind that the condition of these countries at the time, e.g. of the Bouides and Hamadanites (10th Cent. A.D.) was at least equally confused.

בר הרד is a translation of the Aramaic בן חדר The view that

is sustained by the fact that the LXX, Targum, and Peshito

do translate the Hebrew in this name by "son" without any hesitation, and thus both of the latter get back to Moreover, the viòs 'Adép of the LXX depends on the reading with r in Hebrew, not on a corruption of the Greek text. The name of the Syrian bishop (of whom no one will believe that he was named after the old heathen king) was actually written with d. This is proved by the Greek orthography Βαράδοτος. There are thus quite decisive grounds for holding that (with d) is the right name, and that its bearer was different from Binidri, or as it is to be read, the king of Imirisu (Is it really " Ass's Tower" [see ABK 325]? That would be a most singular name).

A better geographer than the Assyriologists, namely, Jâqût, confounded two places which they confound; but he made the mistake exactly the converse of theirs. For he confounds Kamch, the place from which the country Kopμayŋvý likely got its name (see Ibn Chord. 83; Belâdh. 184; and cf. Sprenger's " Post and Travel Routes" 106 f.) with Kamach (Byz. Κάμαχος, Κάμαχα, Κάμαχη).

For philological reasons we cannot believe that we have Iranian forms in the names of the princes Kundaspi and Kustaspi (= Vindâspa and Vistaspa), as Gutschmid thinks we have. Besides, it is very improbable that here in Western Upper Armenia there should have lived pure Iranians, in the strict sense of the term.

In connection with the interesting legends of Moses, we may remark that the same occurs in the Persian heroic legend (see the Dârâ). Firdausî locates it on the Euphrates, and even the smearing with pitch is not wanting. Another form of the story, in Ibn Athîr (i. 196), i.e. Tabari, locates it on the Persian Kur, and at Persepolis. Did the story originate in Egypt or in Babylon?

From Arpâd to Samaria is not "very much farther” than from Arpâd to Nineve (see p. 118). As the crow flies the distances must be about equal; and the actual journey must have required in each case about the same length of time.

1 Procop. Pers. ii. 13.

We (reviewer) reckon, according to Arabic geographers, that to Mosul from Haleb, which was about three German miles from Arpâd, was sixteen to seventeen days journey; and it was sixteen days journey from Haleb to Samaria. Any shortened route through Mesopotamia which is not noticed by Arabic itineraries cannot have been suitable for the Assyrian armies. Of course Gutschmid is decidedly right in saying that an expedition from Arpâd to Samaria cannot have been considered a mere insignificant side excursion.

It is not only probable, but it is certain, that magupati is the prototype of môbadh. The Pehlevi still writes the exAs early as the fourth century it must

מגופת,pression thus

.

have been pronounced môpat, Syriac Respecting the very correct opinion that the Assyrians were in truth an unspeakably abominable people, we may note that Assyriologists have really thought so too. See, e.g. Maspero's "Hist. anc. des peuples de l'orient,” p. 283. By passages like this quoted one he makes up, in some measure, for the many serious faults of his book.

May Gutschmid's book have the effect of making Assyriologists more methodical, less at their ease, and more self-denying; but may it also inspire those who are not Assyriologists with a wholesome distrust of these decipherings. Gutschmid justly considers it a questionable proceeding that the results of these men should be given to the public, and this by authority, too, as if the investigations were completed and closed. The wish to check this authoritative publication, as far as lay in his power, has led him to enter into controversy which must of necessity be aimed chiefly against Schrader. If Gutschmid attacks this Assyriologist more zealously than he attacks others, if he occasionally praises this other man or that for a more correct judgment on some question of detail, still, of course, he by no means. considers Schrader to be the weakest of them all. There are several other decipherers who would have afforded Gutschmid far more abundant material for criticism.

Th. N.

ARTICLE VI.

SYMMETRY AND RHYTHM.

BY REV, THOMAS HILL, D.D., LL.D., FORMERLY PRESIDENT OF HARVARD

COLLEGE.

IT is a fault, or else an excellence, of human language that no word long remains perfectly unambiguous. We at first coin a word to express an idea, and presently either expand its meaning to cover kindred ideas, or contract it, and restrict it to a part of its original signification. Even in the mathematics, where, if anywhere, we should find words absolutely unambiguous, every symbol, every term, conveys more than one meaning, according to the connection of thought. The words "symmetry" and "rhythm" are, of course, no excep tion to this general law. Symmetry primarily, according to its etymological derivation, refers simply to equality of measure. But no man can consider seriously his own conception of symmetry, without discovering that he usually perceives in an object which he calls symmetrical something deeper and of more importance than a mere equality of dimensions. Hence we come to recognize two principal significations in the word. The first is a regularity of form which can be determined by compass and rule, consisting merely in the equidistance of points from some point, line, or plane of reference. The second meaning demands, in addition to this equidistance, - nay, even sometimes finds, in spite of failure to conform to the standard of rule and compass, a higher quality, akin to beauty. This second meaning of symmetry contains an implicit recognition of geometric law. In like manner, rhythm refers primarily to a mere equal division of similarly recurring divisions of time; but in a higher sense asks that this regularly recurring division of time should be such as will produce agreeable