(Vol. viii., p. 290.)
Many questions are proposed by G.W., to which it is extremely improbable
that any but a conjectural answer can ever be given. That tin was in common
use 2800 years ago, is certain. Probably evidence may be obtained, if it
have not been so {345} already, of its use at a still earlier period; but
it is unlikely that we shall ever know who first brought it from Cornwall
to Asia, and used it to harden copper. It is, however, a matter of interest
to trace the mention of this metal in the ancient inscriptions, Egyptian
and Assyrian, which have of late years been so successfully interpreted.
Mistakes have been made from time to time, which subsequent researches have
rectified. It was thought for a long time that a substance, mentioned in
the hieroglyphical inscriptions very frequently, and in one instance said
to have been procured from Babylon, was _tin_. This has now been
ascertained to be a mistake. Mr. Birch has proved that it was _Lapis
lazuli_, and that what was brought from Babylon was an artificial
blue-stone in imitation of the genuine one. I am not aware whether the true
hieroglyphic term for _tin_ has been discovered. Mention was again supposed
to have been made of _tin_ in the annals of Sargon. A tribute paid to him
in his seventh year by Pirhu (Pharaoh, as Col. Rawlinson rightly identifies
the name; not Pihor, Boccharis, as I at one time supposed), king of Egypt,
Tsamtsi, queen of Arabia, and Idhu, ruler of the Isabeans, was supposed to
have contained tin as well as gold, horses, and camels. This, however, was
in itself an improbable supposition. It is much more likely that incense or
spices should have been yielded by the countries named than tin. At any
rate, I have recently identified a totally different word with the name of
tin. It reads _anna_; and I supposed it, till very lately, to mean "rings."
I find, however, that it signifies a metal, and that a different word has
the signification "rings." When Assur-yuchura-bal, the founder of the
north-western palace at Nimrud, conquered the people who lived on the banks
of the Orontes from the confines of Hamath to the sea, he obtained from
them twenty talents of silver, half a talent of gold, one hundred talents
of _anna_ (tin), one hundred talents of iron, &c. His successor received
from the same people all these metals, and also copper.
It is already highly probable, and farther discoveries may soon convert
this probability to certainty, that the people just referred to (whom I
incline strongly to identify with the _Shirutana_ of the Egyptian
inscriptions) were the merchants of the world before Tyre was called into
existence; their port being what the Greeks called Seleucia, when they
attempted to revive its ancient greatness. It is probably to them that the
discovery of Britain is to be attributed; and it was probably from them
that it received its name.
In G. W.'s communication, a derivation of the name from _barat-anac_, "the
land of tin," is suggested. He does not say by whom, but he seems to
disclaim it as his own. I do not recollect to have met with it before; but
it appears to me, even as it stands, a far more plausible one than
_bruit-tan_, "the land of tin:" the former term being supposed to be Celtic
for _tin_, and the latter a termination with the sense of _land_: or than
_brit-daoine_, "the painted (or separated) people."
I am, however, disposed to think that the name is not of Phoenician origin,
but was given by their northern neighbours, whom I have mentioned as their
predecessors in commerce. These were evidently of kindred origin, and spoke
a language of the same class; and I think it all but certain, that in the
Assyrian name for tin (_anna_) we have the name given to it by this people,
from whom the Assyrians obtained it. "The land of tin" would be in their
language _barat_ (or probably _barit_) _anna_, from which the transition to
Britannia presents no difficulty. I assume here that _b-r-t_, without
expressed vowels, is a Phoenician term for "land of." I assume it on the
authority of the person, whoever he may be, that first gave the derivation
that G. W. quotes. I have no Phoenician authority within reach: but I can
readily believe the statement, knowing that _banit_ would be the Assyrian
word used in such a compound, and that _n_, _r_, and _b_ are perpetually
interchanged in the Semitic languages, and notoriously so in this very
root. _Ummi banitiya_, "of the mother who produced me," is pure Assyrian;
and so would _banit-anna_, "the producer of tin," be; all names of lands
being feminine in Assyrian.
It would be curious if the true derivation of the world-renowned name of
Britain should be ascertained for the first time through an Assyrian
medium.