not follow out the larger details of his scheme; but in regard to the touching points and intersective dovetailing of the Mongoloids and the Melanochroi and Xanthrochroi, his illustrations are suggestive in the extreme.1

Sir Henry Rawlinson's researches in this direction, based upon his independent examination of the ancient Cuneiform inscriptions, are embodied in his article in the Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, Vol. XV. o.s. pp. 215-260, and largely support such a view of the important part played by Scythism, or its synonym Turánism, in ancient days, which I shall have to refer to more at large under the Persian division of these notes.

CHALDEA.

Recent cuneiform discoveries have definitively established the priority, in point of time, of the Turánian races in the valley of the Tigris and Euphrates, who had achieved no inconsiderable degree of culture, including an original system of picture or ideographic writing, before they were interfered with by other sections of the four nations. The so-called "cradle of the human race" was, in effect, a focus of international civilization, peopled, in the first instance, by the Turánian branches of Akkad and Sumer.2

1 The Xanthrochroic type (No. 6) is defined as, "a third and extremely welldefined type of mankind is exhibited by the greater part of the population of Central Europe. These are the Xanthrochroi, or 'fair whites.' On the south and west this type comes into contact and mixes with the 'Melanochroi,' or dark whites,' while on the north and east it becomes mingled with the people of the Mongoloid type."-p. 408.

2 La ville de Suse, située sur le fleuve Eulæus . . fût déjà, vers la fin du 3me millenium avant J. c., la capitale d'un royaume puissant et le siége d'une dynastie touranienne qui, en 2283 avant J.C., conquit Babylone et régna sur la Chaldée pendant 224 ans. Le pays dont elle était la ville principale, était nommé Elam par les Sémites, Uvaza ou Khuz par les Aryens, et Nime par le peuple de Sumer; il s'appelait Kussi "Les Kosséens."-J. Oppert, First Congress of Orientalists, p. 179.

See also Etudes Cunéiformes. M. F. Lenormant. Journal Asiatique, 1877, pp. 42, 235 et seq.

From this it will be clear that to speak of an Assyrian or even a Chaldæan Empire is altogether erroneous. Assyrian and Babylonian civilization was Turanian, and had its source in the highlands of Élam-Kharris-Kurra—“ the mountain of the East," whence the Accadai or "highlanders" had descended, and to which their ritual always looked back.-A. H. Sayce, Zeitsch. Egyp. 1870, p. 151. See also Mr. Sayce's articles, Transactions of the Society of Biblical Archæology, vol. iii. p. 465.

The position of women of rank in Chaldæa must be assumed indirectly from the traditional equality and ultimate supremacy, in certain cases, conceded to the female deities in the Pantheon of the land, under the succeeding dynasties of the second and third Monarchies. Canon Rawlinson's enumeration of the members of the local Pantheon is as follows:

The

"At the head of the Pantheon stands a god, Il or Ra, of whom but little is known. Next to him is a Triad, Ana, Bil or Belus, and Hea or Hoa. Each of these is accompanied by a female principle or wife. Then follows a further Triad. members of this Triad are again accompanied by female powers or wives. Hurki (the Moon), by a goddess whose name is wholly uncertain, but whose common title is the great lady."Rawlinson, The First Monarchy (Chaldæa), vol. i. p. 141.

Beltis is far more than the mere female power of BelNimrod, being in fact a separate and very important deity. Her common title is "the Great goddess." Her favourite title was "the Mother of the Gods," . . . the "Dea Syria" worshipped at Hierapolis under the Aryan appellation of Mabog (ma-baga).

In the Assyrian Pantheon, Beltis, "the great mother," the feminine counterpart of Bel, ranked in Assyria next to "the (great) Triad," and was "regarded as the queen of fertility," etc.-The Third Monarchy, vol. ii. p. 246.

In referring to the status of women, in this part of the old world, I must not omit to notice that, in some form or

1 "The decipherment of the cuneiform inscriptions has brought out one very prominent fact with regard to Babylonian Semitic culture-namely, the great extent to which the Semitic rulers of the land were indebted to their predecessors, the non-Semitic Akkadians, for their mythology, arts and sciences. One of the most marked characteristics of that complex group of nations denominated Turanian, and, in fact, the one common factor, is the belief in magic in its various forms. The belief in good and evil luck attached to certain days or certain localities is found in almost every branch. The Chinese superstition of fung shui-i.e.wind and water'-influences a great deal of the daily life of the native of the Celestial Empire. Similar beliefs are current among all the branches of the vast Tartar race. Among the Turks it has been to some extent influenced by the creed of Islam. In Babylonia, under the non-Semitic Akkadian rule, the dominant creed was the fetish worship, with all its ritual of magic and witchcraft; and when the Semites conquered the country, the old learning of the land became the property of the priests and astrologers, and the Akkadian language the Latin of the empire. This being the case, it is not astonishing that we find the greater portion of this tablet written in the Akkadian, not only in ideographic groups, but in full phonetic form in many cases."-Mr. St. C. Boscawen, The Academy, Nov. 17, 1877. See also M. F. Lenormant, The Academy, July 20, 1878, p. 65, and Mr. Boscawen's further reply.

other, they were thus early in possession of a language of their own. The following passage is taken from a review of F. Delitzsch's late work, which appeared in the Academy of May 11, 1878:

"Another interesting fact disclosed by the syllabaries is the existence of a woman's language among the Accadians. Certain words, we are told, were peculiar to the women and not used by the men. This was also the case among the Caribs, where women were usually stolen from an alien tribe; so, too, the pronunciation of the women in Greenland is said to differ from that of the men, and the Basque verb has special forms for addressing a woman. Even in this country we are familiar with the language of the nursery. It is evident, however, that the existence of a woman's language points to a want of intercourse between husband and wife, and may indicate, as among the Caribs, a difference of race. We know from other documents that the mother in Accad occupied the chief place in the family, in contrast to the later Semitic usage which regarded the women as inferior to the men."

With reference to questions that will have to be considered in future sections of this paper, I cite, in its appropriate place, the late Mr. G. Smith's observations on the succession of Turánian brothers in olden times:

"The law of succession to the crown was the same in Elam as the old Turkish law, that is, on the death of a king his brother succeeded in preference to his sons, and these latter had to wait until after the death of their uncles. Umman-aldas I. had left sons, but they were passed over in favour of Urtaki, brother of Umman-aldas. Urtaki also left sons, but these were passed over in favour of Teumman." - G. Smith, "Assyria, from the Monuments," p. 154.

EGYPT.

I need scarcely enlarge upon the ascertained position of women in Egypt, from the first recognition of the right of females to reign, under Binothris of the Second Dynasty of Thinite kings-proceeding onwards to their title to admission into the ranks of the Priesthood under Kephren-but

1 G. Wilkinson, vol. ii. p. 26. Birch, Egypt from the Monuments, p. 27.

we can now quote from authentic Hieroglyphic Monuments of about 1600 B.C. the example of Hasheps, the sister, wife and co-ordinate ruler with her brother Thothmes II., who, on his death, assumed effective sovereignty, and designated herself, on the pedestals of the triumphal obelisks at Karnak, "the pure gold of monarchs." At a later period she associated herself with Thothmes III., but takes precedence of him upon the monuments.1

The power, relative rank, and peculiar fraternal relations of the Arsenoes and Cleopatras of the age of the Ptolemies are sufficiently expatiated upon by later classical writers,2 the details of which are further confirmed by the extant hieroglyphic and Greek inscriptions which have recently been fully deciphered.3

Herodotus has also told us of the business-like aptitude of the females, and the subordination in some respects of the males; and some very curious and valuable documents, bearing on the customs of marriages in Egypt, have lately been interpreted by M. Eug. Revillout (in the Journal Asiatique of Août-Septembre, 1877).5 These documents, translated from

1 Birch, pp. 83-5. Wilkinson (vol. ii. p. 52) notices that "her dress is that of a king.'

2 Diod. Sic. i. 2: "It is a custom among them, that they honour a queen, and allow her more power and authority than a king, and in their contracts of marriage authority is given to the wife over her husband."-- Booth's translation.

The following recent_writers on the subject may also be consulted:S. Sharpe, "History of Egypt," 1852, vol. i. p. 18, vol. ii. p. 1. W. Adam, Cansanguinity in Marriage," Fortnightly Review, 1865, November 1st and 15th. A. H. Huth, "Marriage of Near Kin," London, 1875, pp. 9-13. See also an admirable series of papers on the Coins of the Ptolemies, by Mr. R. S. Poole, in the Numismatic Chronicle, vol. iv. N.s. 1864, and vol. v. 1865.

3 Βασιλευς Πτολεμαῖος Πτολεμαίου καὶ ̓Αρσινόης, θεῶν ̓Αδελφῶν, καὶ βασίλισσα Βερενίκη ἡ ἀδελφη καὶ γυνὴ αὐτοῦ, τὸ τέμενος Οσίρει. "Le roi Ptolémée, fils de Ptolémée et d'Arsinoé, dieux frères, et la reine Bérénice, sa sœur et sa femme, (ont élevé) ce temple à Osiris."-Letronne, Insc. de l'Egypte, p. 2.

Recherches sur le Calendrier Macédonien en Egypte, etc., par Robiou, p. 17, Mémoires, p. D. S. a l'Académie, tom. ix. 1878: L'an xxiv. "Le roi de la haute et basse Egypte, fils de dieux Epiphanes, Chéri de Ptah, fils du soleil, Ptolémée (Ptolis) vivant à toujours, Chéri de Ptah, avec sa sœur, épouse Ammonienne princesse dame de deux régions Cléopâtre (Kleoptra)." See p. 37, for corresponding Hieroglyphs. 4 ii. 35.

5 66

Translation of an Egyptian Contract of Marriage," by Eugène Revillout. This interesting contract of marriage is written in the demotic character upon a small sheet of papyrus, No. 2432, Cat. Egyptien, Musée du Louvre. It is dated in the month of Xoidx, year 33 of Ptolemy Philadelphus, and the contracting parties are Patma, son of Pchelkhons, and the lady, Ta-outem, the daughter of Rehu. The terms of the deed are extremely singular as to the amount of dowry required on both sides, together with the clauses providing for repudiation.

early papyri, all tend to show the independence, and, in so far, supremacy of the weaker sex, that the female is always the conciliated party-her rights being recognized in "pinmoney and pocket-money;" but more important still, the first-born of all these marriages past, present, or conditional take rank by the female side, as inheritor of the father's and, in certain cases, of even ancestral goods. But the essential matter took the form (in the words of the translator) of "Ton fils aîné, mon fils aîné, sera l'héritier de tous mes biens présents et à venir. Je t'établirai comme femme." The translator sammarizes the tenor of the five contracts he is able to cite as: i. l'acceptation pour femme; ii. le don nuptial; iii. la pension annuelle promise à la femme pour tous les ans, mais tout particulièrement pour la première année; iv. la déclaration que le fils aîné des deux époux sera l'héritier de tous les biens du mari; with subordinate details under clauses v. vi. vii. viii.

The important ethnical question of the distribution of the nations in the Mediterranean basin has also been largely illustrated by the later decipherments of Egyptologists-a single passage from which seems to claim a notice in this place:

"Les ancêtres des Sardes, des Sicules, des Étrusques, des Grecs mêmes, sous le nom d'Achéens qu'ils portent communément dans Homère, des Lyciens, qui tiennent dans l'Iliade une place exceptionnelle parmi les alliés de Priam, figurent, dans le récit de cette invasion, avec les peuples de l'Afrique septentrionale. M. Chabas reconnaît aussi, dans les textes du nouvel empire, les Teucriens ou Troyens, les Dardaniens, qu'Homère aussi en distingue, les Mysiens, les Méoniens, et parmi les peuples européens, les Dauniens et les Osques, qui se sont répandus en Italie."-Rapport, Oriental Congress of Paris, 1873, p. 17.1

After the actual dowry is recited, the rights of the children which may hereafter come from the marriage, as well as the payment of the mother's pin-money, are secured by the following clause: "Thy pocket money for one year is besides thy toilet money which I give thee each year, and it is thy right to exact the payment of thy toilet money, and thy pocket money, which are to be placed to my account, which I give thee. Thy eldest son, my eldest son, shall be the heir of all my property, present and future. I will establish thee as wife.”—Society of Biblical Archæology, Academy, April 13th, 1878.

See also Dr. Birch, "Egypt from the Monuments," p. 130, under the reign of Menephtah, the Pharaoh of the Exodus.