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ascend to heaven. But God commanded the wind to carry the king into the clouds. Arrived there, he was dashed down again, and fell into the sea of Gurgân. Keychosrau, son of Shâwush, coming to that coast, employed the same chariot to convey him to Babylon. When he came to the locality of the modern Rey, people said, bireyy âmed Keychosrau, on a chariot came Keychosrau.' He caused a city to be built at this place, which was called Rey, because a chariot is so called in Persian.1

With

Granting all this, it is generally only accessory features added to the main stem of the story that owe their origin to a mistaken attempt at etymologising. The existence and first origin of an entire story can scarcely be produced by an unsatisfactory etymology. regard to the Hebrew stories, in which etymologising plays a considerable part, the same rule is, generally speaking, to be observed. There also the story is enriched in details by etymological attempts suggested later. But it is not brought into life in the first instance by this factor. On the contrary, as a connexion must be discovered between the name and the circumstances of its bearer, and the original mythical relation between them has been long lost to memory, features quite foreign to the name itself, but characteristic of the story, are sometimes brought into etymological connexion with the name and fitted on to the story. From this source emanates the striking insufficiency of many of these etymological explanations, e.g. of the interpretation of Abhrâhâm by Abh hâmôn Father of a multitude,' and Nôach (Noah) by nicham to comfort.' In the Hebrew Myth of Civilisation, Noah is the most prominent founder of agriculture and inventor of agricultural implements; consequently it is he that procures comfort for men against the curse imposed on the soil. This feature is not etymologically

See some useful quotations in L. Löw's Beiträge zur jüd. Alterthumskunde, Szegedin 1875, II. 388; and very interesting references in Pott's Wilhelm von Humboldt und die Sprachwissenschaft, Berlin 1876, p. CIX. et seq.

expressed in the name Noah; but the later formation of the story about him invented a false etymology, in order to connect it with the name. The case is the same with the story of the Languages, in which Bâbhel is derived from bâlalto mix.' The etymology relates quite as frequently to a very subordinate feature in the story, as for instance in the interpretation of most of the names of Jacob's sons in Gen. XXIX, XXX, or in the derivation of the name Kayin (Cain) from ķânâ to gain.' Sometimes, lastly, the etymon is given correctly, while its original relation to the person bearing the name is lost with the loss of the mythical consciousness. In such cases there frequently arises a new feature of the story. Thus, for instance, it is quite correctly affirmed that Yischâk (Isaac) comes from şâchak to laugh:' but it is no longer understood that the word designates the Laughing one' (the Sun), and so the laughter of the aged mother to whom the birth of a son is announced beforehand, or the laughter of other people on hearing the announcement, is introduced. In the etymology of the name Ya'akôbh (Jacob) both the etymon and that to which it refers ('âkêbh 'heel') are correctly preserved, not however without the introduction of a foreign etymological element (ikkêbh 'to cheat'), which became prominent in the subsequent development of the story. The same phenomenon also appears on the domain of the Arabian stories, a region of Semitism which has still to be explored for mythological questions. I have no doubt that the genealogical tables of the Arabs contain names which will be discovered by sound etymology to be Solar designations. This seems to me, for example, to be the case with Hâshim. The story that he and his twin-brother 'Abd Shams were born with their foreheads joined together, or with the forehead of one joined to the hand of the other, resembles the myths of the birth of Jacob and

1 Zeitsch. d. D. M. G., 1853, VII. p. 28.

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Esau, and of that of Perez and Zerah.' It was worked out with an object during the later dynastic rivalry between the Hâshimites and Ummayads (descendants of 'Abd Shams). But Hâshim is the Breaker,' thus answering perfectly to Peres (Perez) or Gide'ôn. When the mythical consciousness was lost, a story bearing an obviously apocryphal character was fabricated to give it an etymology. It is this. On occasion of a famine resulting from a bad harvest, Hâshim went to Syria, where he had a quantity of bread baked. This he put into large sacks, loaded his camels with it, and took it to Mekka. There hashama, i.e. he broke up the bread into bits, sent for butchers, and distributed it among the people of Mekka. Therefore, it is said, he was called Hâshim, the Breaker.' 2 We have here the very same process in the history of etymology which we had occasion to observe in the etymological explanation of Biblical names. Thus, as is obvious in the above-quoted Hebrew examples, it must be admitted that the later etymological conception frequently forced itself into the foreground so much as to obtain recognition as a portion of the narrative. But no entire story, such as that of the Confusion of Tongues at Babel, can be proved to have been formed upon no other basis than an indifferent etymology. So we may with confidence hold to the above-suggested occasion for the origin of this story of the variety of languages. There is good ground for hoping that before very long the recently discovered mythical texts of the Assyrian and Babylonian literature will pour an increasing flood of light on the question discussed in this chapter. The richness of the stores contained in the two latest works of the meritorious scholar George Smith-Assyrian Discoveries: an account of exploration and discoveries' (1876), and The Chaldean Account of Genesis' (1876)—allow us to entertain the best

1 See supra, pp. 133, 183.

2 Ibn Dureyd, Kitâb al-Ishtikak, ed. Wüstenfeld, Göttingen 1853, p. 9. See Ewald, History of Israel, I. 19 et seg.

hopes of this result. It is greatly to be desired that an unprejudiced conception of the matter of Hebrew mythic stories may be promoted by these discoveries. But to attain to the result of true freedom from old errors, it is essential to put away all fears, and to be guided solely and simply by the interests of the Holiest of Holies, namely, scientific truth, in forming a judgment on the priority or simultaneous origin of such stories in different nations.

EXCURSUS.

A. (Page 30.)

Agadic Etymologies.

In another direction also the Agâdâ is wont to supply the omissions of the Scripture. In passages where the Bible itself gives no reason for the choice or origin of a name, the Agâdâ quite independently gives its own etymological reason: this peculiarity occurs excessively often (e.g. in the etymology of the name Miriam in the Midrash to the Song of Songs, II. 12, that of the names of the two midwives Shiphrah and Puah, who in addition are identified with Jochebed and Miriam, in the Talmud Bab. tr. Sôțâ, fol. 11. b, etc.).1 Here I will bring forward out of a great number of instances one which affords an opportunity of exhibiting an interesting coincidence between the Jewish and the Mohammedan Agâdâ, and affords a proof how extensive and how far-reaching into the smallest detail are the loans taken by the Mohammedan from the Rabbinical theologians, and on the other hand how independently and how completely in an Arabian spirit these borrowed treasures were worked up.

In Gen. XLVI. 21, Benjamin's sons are enumerated without any etymological observations. The Agâdâ supplies the deficiency, and puts every one of the names of Joseph's nephews into connexion with Benjamin's melancholy remembrance of his lost brother. The interpretations in question are contained in the Talmud and Midrâsh; and they are found in a different, but probably the most original form in the Targûm Jerus. on the passage; and it is sufficient to refer to this. According to this, Benjamin named his ten sons 'al perishûthâ de-Yôsêph achôhî 'for the separation

I have referred to this in Zeitschr. d. D.M.G. 1870, XXIV. 207.

Z