KEILSCHRIFTTEXTE SARGON'S KÖNIGS VON ASSYRIEN. Von Dr. D. G. LYON, Professor an der Harvard Universität, Cambridge, U. S. A. Leipzig: J. C. Hinrichs'sche Buchhandlung.

1883.

Sargon is the Assyrian king of whom the Bible says so little and the inscriptions of Nineveh so much. When Botta unearthed the palace of Khorsabad he saw one central figure everywhere. Drawing the bow, fording rivers, receiving captives, riding in processions, pouring out libations to the gods, appeared the same towering form, the same commanding features. Who was this hero? It was Sargon, according to the cuneiform writing Sarru-Kênu. Here was the speaking portrait of the conqueror of Samaria and the father of Sennacherib.

It is no small service which Professor Lyon has rendered the reading public in editing the chief texts relating to this monarch. The very enumeration of the inscriptions transliterated and translated is a bird's-eye view of Assyrian art and religion. The Cylinder Inscription of seventyseven lines recalls the hexagonal or octagonal barrels of clay, tiny in bulk and fragile in substance, on which the children of Asshur loved to record their greatest deeds. The Bull Inscription conjures up those colossal creations, half man, half beast, the personification of repose and vigilance, which awe the traveler with their bearded and crowned heads, as once their huge legs, parted by written tablets, dazzled and curbed the native. The fourfold inscription of Bronze, of Silver, of Gold, and of Antimony keeps us from forgetting the stone casket in which these builders of the Tigris were wont to place their fundamental documents and the solemn dedication made in the new moon of the "brick month" by the kings of Asshur to the Gods of heaven and earth.

The work of the author is opportune to the scholar no less than interesting to the reader. Like Dr. Paul Haupt, Professor Lyon is able to call Friedrich Delitzsch his teacher. In the preparation of his volume he has had access to the collections and the learning of this rising Assyriologue. Since Dr. Julius Oppert gave his last revision of a portion of the same inscription in the "Records of the Past," 1878, rapid progress has been made in Assyrian philology and lexicography. The "Assyrische Bibliothek " under Delitzsch and Haupt needed a better text and translation than was extant. The British Museum and the Louvre furnished the originals, and Professor Lyon first copied, then transliterated, and finally interpreted the documents in what we may call a masterly way. the first time, the Bronze Inscription is given in a modern tongue. All the other inscriptions are rendered so that Theophilus G. Pinches, the successor of George Smith at the British Museum, has ventured the opinion that in Dr. Lyon's "Sargon" we have a better book than Dr. Lotz's Tiglath-Pileser. Such praise is doubtless excessive. The author would not communicate nor countenance it. That it has been spoken marks an era, none the less, in American cuneiform scholarship, and opens the way for an examination of the volume itself.

For

The Introduction has the merit of brevity and comprehensiveness. One section is On the Publication of the Original Text. Here the author tells us he has made the first of the two texts existing at Paris the basis of his work, and enables us to surmise that a fourth at London, now in the hands of a private gentleman, was held rather more tightly from American eyes than might have been expected. Fortunately, Mr. Pinches made good the omission of his compatriot. The section on VOL. I. NO. 6.

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Transcription explains the absence of hyphens and determinatives on the ground of the presence of one in the glossary and the other in text. It also treats of the length of the vowels, the doubling of consonants, and the vocal ê, which, like Pognon's é, is held to have been an original i in certain Assyrian as in Syriac and Hebrew forms of the verb. In the plural, the ê must be retained throughout, as nišê, malkê, kakkê. Two sections follow on the Translation and on the Commentary and Glossary. Perhaps, however, the most interesting section of the Introduction is the first, which treats of the name and person of Sargon. Discussing the second part of the royal name GI-NA =ideogram for Kênu (written Ki-nu), he deviates from the verbal derivation of Schrader, by which Sarru-ukîn would mean "He (i. e., the God) established the king." Professor Lyon prefers the adjectival. His reason is Sargon's phrase in the fiftieth line of the Cylinder Inscription. This runs: "Corresponding to the name I bear, with which the great Gods have named me to guard justice and righteousness, to govern the infirm, to do no injury to the weak." For the full value of this name we need to have Sargon = this synonym of "true, faithful, righteous prince." In word, then, Sargon, like the hero of Isaiah's prophecy, is "the righteous king."

The German translation, which faces the transliterated and follows the cuneiform text, is clear and strong. Exactness rather than elegance has been sought. Conjectures are used sparingly. Where a word is unknown it does not wear a mask of familiarity. Meanings are justified by abundant references to the Cuneiform Inscriptions of Western Asia by Rawlinson and Norris. Sobriety and independence mark the use of authorities. The notes elucidate instead of obscure. In compression they equal, in perspicuity they surpass, many German productions in kindred fields. If they expose blunders trenchantly, they recognize insight generously.

After all, Assyrian lexicography is yet in its childhood. Till the dictionary of the future appears, glossaries and commentaries like those of Professor Lyon must take the place of it. In this aspect we should be grateful for the new material which has been brought together so laboriously for the identification of important terms. Take nartabu, for instance. Oppert reads it "foundation." This omits the first of two signs. Lyon shows that the group IS-PIN means canal of irrigation. TiglathPileser Col. VI.: 101-104, speaks of the increased crops by the increase of nartabê. Also the same ideogram occurs IV. Rawlinson, 58 and 59. In this passage, among the many places where penitents should supplicate pardon of the gods, nartabê meet us. "Lying, sitting, eating, drinking, by the hearth, at the tablet, on horseback, ina ûḥi narṭabi, ina âhî bûri, ina âhî nâri, ina ûhî êlippi,'' on the bank of the WATER CHANNELS, on the bank of the spring, on the bank of the river, on board of the ship,' -at sunrise and sunset, entering and leaving the city, by the gate, in the house, on the street, in the temple, - everywhere, should one implore pardon." The rivers of Babylon are sacred as Mount Zion.

Were we to blame anything in this excellent work, it would be its somewhat controversial tone toward Dr. Julius Oppert. To say that his edition of "Dour-Sarkayan" is critically worthless and swarms with blunders is needlessly severe. At the same time our author's scientific conscience must have been roused by this savant's sins of omission and commission. That Oppert should have rendered "eclipse over Harran,”

in line 6 of the Cylinder Inscription, is exasperating, for he can only do this by intruding a false subject and extruding the true, while giving to a third word a meaning which it never has. For this impossible translation Lyon gives, simply and satisfactorily, "Who stretched out his shadow over the city of Harran." On the other hand, our author expressly recognizes Oppert's services as a pioneer in the realm of cuneiform and the unassailableness of his translation in its fundamental particulars, not hesitating here and there to adopt Oppert's rendering in preference to his own.

The lines from 30 to 42 are the Gordian knot of the Inscription. In general it is untied, not severed, by Professor Lyon. Where Oppert translates line 41: "Ašša sămni balti amêlûti mupašših bu'ânê mina mâtî'a lâ akârîma Šamaššammê kî nirba ina mahîri šâmi." "Tunc fuit impositus labor hominum evellentium herbas malas in terra mea non verum pretium reddente, et lolia, una cum deo Serah in opere isto; our author has the plainer and preciser sentence, "Not to let oil, the life of men, the healer of wounds, become dear in my land, and to fix sesame in price like corn." This is a pleasing glimpse of a ruler great in peace as in war. With no little ingenuity and thoroughness Professor Lyon analyzes the ideogram nirba for ni-ir-ba. Its three parts are AN Dingir, God; ŠE grain, and a third compounded of ŠE and IR (read êlteg,) +d. = a kind of grain. With the sign for God (Dingir) as a determinative, we have a deity corresponding to Demeter-Ceres, who watches over the springing and the ripening harvest. From the deity to the grain itself is but a step backwards, and we get the designation "corn." II. R. 36: 17 illustrates the former use; V. R. 1: 48 the latter. This text is a medallion. Professor Lyon scours it and the traits of the monarch appear. We see the wise king, the bearer of gracious words, the planter of high cliffs, the irrigator of many a moor where canal had never come, the scatterer of water with full hands, quenching the thirst of every subject, and filling the broad land of Asshur with bread enough and to spare.

We are not sorry that this valuable work appears in the German tongue. In this dress it will reach Continental scholars; it will not escape Americans. Sargon, "the Vicegerent of Bel, the sublime Prince of Asshur, the favorite of Anu and Dagon," will be better known because of the inscriptions in the first palace exhumed at Nineveh, as unlocked by the first Professor of Assyrian at Harvard. The Summer School of Professor Harper, at Worcester, will, it is hoped and expected, be able, through Professor Lyon's learning, patience, and enthusiasm, to lead many a student of the Bible through the eight gates of Khorsabad, untouched by the final curse of the royal Builder, "Wer meiner Hände Werk ändern, meine Bauten zerstören, die Mauern die ich gemauert, wegschaffen, meine Insignien verschleudern wird dessen Namen und Samen mögen Asur, Samas, Raman, und die Götter, die alldort wohnen, im Lande wegraffen und ihn zu Füssen seines Feindes sitzen lassen gebunden!"

John Phelps Taylor.

NOVUM TESTAMENTUM GRAECE. Ad antiquissimos testes denuo recensuit, apparatum criticum apposuit, CONSTANTINUS TISCHENDORF. Editio octava critica major. Volumen III. Prolegomena scripsit CASPARUS RENATUS GREGORY, additis curis † EZRAE ABBOT. Pars Prior, pp. vi., 440. Leipzig: J. C. Hinrichs. 1884.

Dr. Scrivener remarks (in his "Plain Introduction," etc., p. 482), "Tischendorf left almost no papers behind him. Hence the task of writing Prolegomena to his eighth edition, gallantly undertaken by two American scholars, Dr. Caspar René Gregory of Leipzig and Dr. Ezra Abbot of Cambridge, U. S., but for their own independent researches, might seem to resemble that of making bricks without straw." The courage of the undertaking has been more than matched by the patience and enterprise, the scholarly research and unflinching toil, with which now for wellnigh eight years it has been prosecuted, as this first half of the achieved result abundantly evinces.

Professor Tischendorf's preface to his seventh edition was hastily prepared, in consequence (as is supposed) of his preoccupation with plans for a new critical journey. The subjects to which the American scholars have devoted the four hundred and forty pages just published are dispatched there in one hundred and ninety-three; and of these less than fifty seem to have been retained in the present volume. The latter, therefore, may justly claim to be in the main a new and original work.

Of the thirteen Sections into which, as appears from a schedule prefixed, the contents of the entire Prolegomena will be distributed, the volume now published comprises seven, which are occupied principally with the following topics. In Section I. a compendious sketch of Tischendorf's life is followed by a detailed list, covering fifteen pages and evidently prepared with extreme care, of the deceased Professor's publications, in their chronological order. Section II. treats of the four classes of critical helps (namely, Greek manuscripts, ancient versions, patristic quotations, printed editions) as used by Tischendorf in preparing his text. Some impression of his marvelous industry and success as a palæographer is afforded by the facts that the number of uncial manuscripts of the New Testament discovered by him was fifteen, first employed by him twentythree, edited by him twenty-one, copied by him four, collated by him thirteen. He also discovered and used at least six new manuscripts in cursive characters; edited five manuscripts of that form of the Latin version known as the Itala, besides the Amiatinus text of the Vulgate. The third Section is occupied with a discussion of the principles on which these and the other critical helps are to be used in reproducing the Greek text. Here the practice is briefly vindicated of seeking to recover that text solely from ancient testimonies, and primarily from Greek manuscripts, the evidence from versions and fathers being chiefly corroborative. Then Tischendorf's example is followed in giving an exposition of the five rules, that "peculiarities are to be suspected," "obvious clerical errors eliminated," "in parallel passages the divergent reading to be regarded as the probable one," "that reading in which the others originated to be accepted as the original one," "the linguistic characteristics of the several authors to be heeded." In Section IV. we have an exhibition of orthographical and other details respecting the language, together with the reasons for adhering in these particulars to the general usage of the more ancient manuscripts. Material here to which the

seventh edition gave but seventeen pages has been so augmented as to fill fifty-seven. It is no disparagement to the labors of his predecessors, and particularly to the careful collections of Professor Hort, to say that Dr. Gregory has brought together here a store of information, valuable alike to the student of the Greek language and to one investigating the distinctive characteristics of the several New Testament manuscripts, which for fullness and for lucid arrangement is quite unmatched. Section V. deals with the order of succession of the several groups into which the New Testament books were early distributed, together with the position of individual books in their groups, as well as with ancient and modern divisions of the text into chapters, reading-lessons, and the like. This portion of the work also has grown from ten pages to fifty-two. Moreover, the reader will be especially gratified to meet with a thorough discussion of the origin of our modern division into chapters (which for cogent reasons is ascribed to Cardinal Stephen Langton, Archbishop of Canterbury, who died A. D. 1228), together with a special Excursus of fifteen pages by Dr. Abbot, exhibiting the disagreement as respects verse-division to be found in fifty-one editions of the Greek text, and nine translations including King James's, the original division in Robert Stephens's Greek Testament of 1551 being taken as the standard. This laborious Essay displays the characteristic diligence, clearness, accuracy, of its lamented author. The reader, however, should not fail to correct at once a few typographical blemishes, noted on p. v., which slipped in through an unfortunate misunderstanding after the Essay left his hands. Then follows

The

in Section VI. a history of the Greek text, both written and printed. latter, which has evidently been prepared with extreme care, closes with a collation (covering forty-eight pages) of the texts of Tregelles and Professors Westcott and Hort, the two recent critical editions the readings of which are not noted by Professor Tischendorf in the running commentary beneath his text. The seventh and concluding Section is devoted to a detailed account of the uncial manuscripts, which occupies one hundred and three pages as against sixty-four in the seventh edition. Here, again, the work by its orderly method and its completeness far surpasses anything hitherto published. Incidentally, too, it may be remarked that many readers will be glad to see the calumnious charge sometimes brought against Tischendorf, of bad faith in his mode of securing possession of the Codex Sinaiticus, put forever to rest.

The present limits forbid extended comment on the work of which the public are favored with a specimen in the present volume. But among its conspicuous merits every student will count, first, its tables and other summaries, such, for example, as those on pages, 31, 33, 78, 84, 93 sq., 197 sq., 200 sqq., 338 sq.; second, the lucid order observed in its treatment of topics, an incalculable amount of time and patience will be saved, for instance, by the methodical and uniform way in which the uncial manuscripts are handled; third, and above all, the copious bibliographical and other references given in the foot-notes. In this last particular there is no work extant which approaches it; nothing, however fugitive or recondite, seems to have escaped the editors in the literature of Germany, France, Italy, England, America. As a thesaurus of references on the topics which it covers, it will have an independent value.

In short, the editors have done credit to themselves, brought honor to their country, and richly rewarded the public patience. Many besides