PREHISTORIC CHALDEA.
We have already noted that prehistoric periods are those preceding
written records. Uncertainty enters into all attempts to reconstruct
such a period for any people, and especially has this been true of
Babylonia. However, when the library of Nineveh was unearthed, tablets
were discovered which shed some light on those remote ages.
The land we call Babylonia was once called Chaldea. So we shall call it
during its prehistoric age--as we call the British Island Britain in the
beginning of its history, and later, England. By the term Chaldea we are
to understand that portion of the valleys which extended around the
Persian Gulf. It was inhabited at the earliest period known. Probably
its first settlers were a branch of the Turanian or Yellow Race, to
which the Chinese, Japanese, Monguls and present-day Turks belong. That
the Chaldeans came from some other locality into this land is not
doubted, but from whence they came is not known.
The southern part of Chaldea was called Shumir--the Hebrews writing it
_Shinar_; the land immediately north they called Accad. The dwellers in
both districts came from the same stock and spoke practically the same
language. The name _Accad_ means mountains, or highlands, and it has
been surmised that it may have attached to the inhabitants from some
earlier home.
These early people may have migrated to Chaldea five or six thousand
years before the Christian era. Of their coming and first settlements,
nothing is known. When we first learn of them, they had reached quite a
degree of civilization, having canals for irrigating the lands unreached
by the river; they had also devised the cuneiform system of writing--an
advance on the picture system, earlier in use.
The history of their strange symbols was probably this: in ages bygone
they had invented a system of picture writing, as all primitive people
seem to have done. As they advanced, too much time was required to copy
the elaborate pictures in their entirety, and so the principal outlines
were used to represent the pictures themselves. When these people
migrated to Chaldea, and were reduced to clay tablets on which to write,
it was easier to make straight lines than curved ones. In this way the
written language continued to undergo changes until it was eventually
made up of wedge-shaped symbols, one of the clear results of the use of
the clay tablets.
Our principal knowledge concerning the Chaldeans pertains to their
religion, which is believed to have been one of the earliest religions
of the world.
The religious instinct seems to have been inborn with man. Some form and
degree of worship has been found among all primitive people and is
cruder or more elevated according to the stage of development. Primitive
man felt himself able to cope with many of the conditions around him,
but he soon found that the very agencies which helped might also injure
him. The sun, whose light and warmth gave life to his growing crops,
might also wither them with its intense heat. The rain which renewed and
refreshed the fields, might come in torrents and lay them low. Gradually
all these agencies were regarded as _Beings_, which must be importuned.
The religion of the Chaldeans taught man how to guard himself against
the harmful forces in the world, and every animate and inanimate thing
was endowed with a spirit.
A series of tablets treating of this ancient religion was recovered by
Rassam, and they fall into three divisions: those treating of "Evil
Spirits," others concerning diseases, and last, those devoted to prayers
and hymns of praise.
The Accadian conceived of the earth as resembling a huge, inverted bowl.
The thickness represented the earth's crust; the hollow beneath was
thought of as a bottomless pit, destined to be the final dwelling place
of man, and was the abode of demons. Above the earth were two heavens;
the higher, supported by a lofty mountain; the lower containing seven
kind and friendly planets, which wandered at will through its wide
domains. Opposed to these were seven fiery phantoms. Over all dwelt the
great Spirit Ana.
"Between the lower heaven and the surface of the earth is the
atmospheric region, the realm of Mermer, the Wind, where he drives the
clouds, rouses the storms, and whence he pours down the rain, which is
stored in the great reservoir of Ana, in the heavenly Ocean. As to the
earthly Ocean, it is fancied as a broad river, flowing all around the
edge of the imaginary inverted bowl; in its waters dwells Ea, the great
Spirit of the Earth and Waters, either in the form of a fish, whence he
is frequently called "Ea the fish," or "the exalted fish," or on a
magnificent ship, with which he travels around the earth, guarding and
protecting it.
"The minor spirits of the earth are not much spoken of except in a body,
a sort of host or legion. All the more terrible are the seven spirits of
the abyss, the Maskim, of whom it is said that, although their seat is
in the depths of the earth, yet their voice resounds on the heights
also; they reside at will in the immensity of space, 'not enjoying a
good name either in heaven or on earth.' Their greatest delight is to
subvert the orderly course of nature, to cause earthquakes, inundations,
ravaging tempests."[1]
The Maskim were ever feared and hated as is shown by the following,
translated from one of the tablets:
"They are seven! they are seven!--Seven are they in the depths of
Ocean,--seven they are, disturbers of the face of Heaven.--They arise
from the depths of Ocean, from hidden lurking-places.--They spread like
snares.--Male they are not, female they are not. Wives they have not,
children are not born to them.--Order they know not, nor
beneficence;--prayers and supplications they hear not. Horses grown in
the bowels of the mountains--foes of EA--they are throne-bearers of the
gods--they sit in the roads and make them unsafe.--The fiends! The
fiends! They are seven, they are seven, seven are they!
"Spirit of Heaven, be they conjured! Spirit of Earth, be they conjured!"
A CHARM.
Seven are they, they are seven;
In the caverns of ocean they dwell,
They are clothed in the lightnings of heaven,
Of their growth the deep waters can tell;
Seven are they, they are seven.
Broad is their way and their course is wide,
Where the seeds of destruction they sow,
O'er the tops of the hills where they stride,
To lay waste the smooth highways below,--
Broad is their way and their course is wide.
Man they are not, nor womankind,
For in fury they sweep from the main,
And have wedded no wife but the wind,
And no child have begotten but pain,--
Man they are not, nor womankind.
Fear is not in them, nor awe;
Supplication they heed not, nor prayer,
For they know no compassion nor law,
And are deaf to the cries of despair,--
Fear is not in them, nor awe.
Cursed they are, they are cursed,
They are foes to wise EA'S name;
By the whirlwind are all things dispersed
On the paths of the flash of their flame,--
Cursed are they, they are cursed.
Spirit of Heaven, oh help! Help, oh Spirit of Earth!
They are seven, thrice said they are seven;
For the gods they are Bearers of Thrones,
But for men they are Breeders of Dearth
And the authors of sorrows and moans.
They are seven, thrice said they are seven.
Spirit of Heaven, oh help! Help, oh Spirit of Earth!
--_Rendered into verse by Dyer._
Besides these seven hated ones, there were numberless demons who could
work all manner of evil for man. They were invisible and brought
sickness, sorrow, insanity, and grief. No house was secure against them,
and no bolt strong enough to keep them out.
To contend against so much evil, it was necessary to employ conjurers
and those skilled in magic, who by incantations and mixtures of herbs
might discover the demons and put them to flight. Like the Egyptians,
the Chaldeans believed that when one was ill, a demon had taken
possession of his body, which must be driven out before recovery would
be possible. As a result of this belief, the science of medicine never
developed in Babylonia. Even in its advanced period, magicians treated
the sick.
Charms and talismans were in great demand to ward off demons. They were
worn by the living and adorned the dead. Many articles of furniture were
made to serve two purposes--as household conveniences or ornaments, and
talismans. Thus the winged bulls which have been found guarding the
portals of royal palaces were placed there to keep out demons who would
manage in some way to creep in unless prevented by eternal vigilance.
It was believed that certain of these demons were so forbidding in
aspect that should they but catch sight of their own faces, they would
be frightened away. Therefore a most dreadful demon was fashioned, as
terrible and fierce as human ingenuity could conceive. This impersonated
the south-west wind--the wind which brought burning heat and drought in
its wake. An image thus made was placed in southwest windows, with the
hope that the approaching demon might look upon himself and flee in
terror.
As time went on, the Chaldeans progressed in their religious beliefs,
and the third series of tablets record prayers and hymns of adoration.
Nothing was more natural than that they should worship the sun, as a
manifestation of divinity which provided heat, light and life itself,
for the children of the earth. Some of these hymns are beautiful in
their conception.
"O Sun, I have called unto thee in the bright heavens. In the shadow of
the cedar art thou; Thy feet are on the summits--The countries have
wished for thee, they have longed for thy coming, O Lord! Thy radiant
light illumines all countries. Thou makest lies to vanish, thou
destroyest the noxious influence of portents, omens, spells, dreams and
evil apparitions; thou turnest wicked plots to a happy issue.
"O Sun! thou hast stepped forth from the background of heaven, thou hast
pushed back the bolts of the brilliant heaven,--yea, the gate of heaven.
O Sun! above the land thou hast raised thy head! O Sun! thou hast
covered the immeasurable space of heaven and countries!"
The sun disappeared at evening tide, and during the night contended with
the spirits of darkness. Some other protection was needed for man while
darkness reigned. So fire was brought into existence, and was also
regarded as worthy of worship:
"Thou who drivest away the evil Maskim, who furtherest the well-being of
life, who strikest the breast of the wicked with terror,--Fire, the
destroyer of foes, dread weapon which drivest away Pestilence."
Certain wandering Turanian tribes today cling to a religion much like
the one so briefly described. Like their remote ancestors, they have
conjurers instead of priests.
When they had reached this stage of development, the Chaldeans were
overpowered by a vast barbaric horde.
THE STORY OF GENESIS RELATIVE TO THE FIRST SETTLEMENT IN SHUMIR.
"And the whole earth was of one language, and of one speech. And it came
to pass, as they journeyed from the east, that they found a plain in the
land of _Shinar_; and they dwelt there. And they said one to another, Go
to, let us make brick, and burn them thoroughly. And they had brick for
stone, and slime had they for mortar. And they said, Go to, let us build
us a city and a tower, whose top may reach unto heaven; and let us make
us a name, lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth.
And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower which the children
of men builded. And the Lord said, Behold, the people is one, and they
have all one language; and this they begin to do; and now nothing will
be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do. Go to, let us
go down and there confound their language, that they may not understand
one another's speech. So the Lord scattered them abroad from thence upon
the face of all the earth; and they left off to build the city.
Therefore is the name of it called Babel;[2] because the Lord did there
confound the language of all the earth; and from thence did the Lord
scatter them abroad upon the face of all the earth.
* * * * *
"And Nimrod was a mighty hunter before the Lord; wherefore it is said,
Even as Nimrod the mighty hunter before the Lord. And the beginning of
his kingdom was Babel, and Erech, and Accad, and Calnch, in the land of
Shinar. Out of that land went forth Asshur, and builded Nineveh, and the
city Rehoboth, and Calah. And Resen between Nineveh and Calah; the same
is a great city.
* * * * *
"And Terah took Abram his son, and Lot the son of Haran, his son's son,
and Sarai his daughter-in-law, his son Abram's wife; and they went forth
with them from Ur of the Chaldees, to go into the land of Canaan; and
they came unto Haran, and dwelt there."--_Genesis 10 and 11._
The first great Semitic invasion took place probably about the beginning
of the fourth millennium B.C., and it seems impossible to assign to it a
more definite date. The later Babylonians, like the Chinese, gave great
antiquity to their nation, reckoning back into hundreds of thousands of
years. Their beginnings belonged to so remote a time that adding years
inconceivably was but another way of saying that certain events happened
very long ago, so long, indeed, that no record or monument remained to
give evidence of events which had survived only in stories handed down,
from father to son, for thousands of generations.
Like the Hebrews and Arabs, these people belonged to the Semitic race,
and from whence they came has long been a matter of conjecture. Scholars
are now agreed that Arabia had been their home and that there they had
lived as shepherds and herdsmen. They poured in overwhelming forces into
the land of Chaldea, killing some of the inhabitants, driving others
out of the country, and assimilating the rest.
The Chaldeans had reached a much higher degree of culture than their
conquerors, who rapidly took on the civilization of their adopted
country. As in England the Saxon and Norman for some generations after
the conquest pursued each his native life and customs, little influenced
by the other, so in Chaldea at first the Semitic herdsman followed his
pastoral life outside the brick-walled cities of the Chaldeans.
Some have thought that an invasion of Cushites, or Ethiopians, had
preceded the invasion of the Semites in Chaldea, and have claimed that
the language, customs and culture in the land when conquered by the
Semites was the result of a blending of Turanian and Ethiopian. The
theory has been vigorously opposed by other authorities who contend that
the invading Semites found only pure Turanian stock. However that may
be, the civilization and culture of Chaldea, whether simply Turanian, or
Turanian-Cushite, was soon taken on by the newcomers. Adopting the
Chaldean language, they used it for all their inscriptions, writings and
literature. Even after the speech of the people had become quite a
different tongue, as a result of its assimilation with the Semitic,
still in all written records the early Chaldean language--or Sumerian,
as it is generally called--was alone used. Assyriologists have often
noted that "while the language was Sumerian, the spirit of the writings
was Semitic."
Because the land of Chaldea was so accessible, and offered advantages so
superior to surrounding countries--plentiful water and a fertile
soil,--it became a veritable bee-hive of humanity. When the Semites
first came thither, they were a fierce, warlike people; but soon, under
new conditions, they became peace-loving, as the Turanians before them
had been. Shortly they were unable to hold the valley against new tribes
that unceasingly swarmed into the country.
Prior to 2000 B.C. Ashur had been settled probably in part at least, by
emigrants from the south who may have united with other Semites from
North Mesopotamia and in time they founded the state of Assyria.
Somewhat later, the ancestors of the Hebrews, according to one of the O.
T. traditions, departed from the land of Chaldea for Harran in
Mesopotamia, and later entered Canaan, on the east coast of the
Mediterranean Sea. Each of these little bands founded states which
developed such peculiar characteristics, that after the lapse of a few
ages, it would scarcely have occurred to an observer that the ancestry,
early environment, and traditions of all had been the same.
It was not strange, then, that the Hebrews of later time, trying to
account for the diversity of languages and nations, made this swarming
valley the site of the scattering of the tribes and the confusion of
tongues.
Those who remained in Chaldea became a peaceful farming people, caring
not at all for war. The Assyrians, while of the same stock, developed
very differently. There were several reasons for this. First, their
country was less accessible than Chaldea, whose shore was washed by the
Persian Gulf, and so it suffered less from invasions, and was allowed to
keep a more purely Semitic civilization. Again, having gone out from
Chaldea before they became devoted to peaceful pursuits, the Assyrians
retained and fostered their original warlike dispositions. The more
temperate climate of Assyria was more invigorating and produced men of
greater endurance than did the kingdom to the south.
Both Chaldea and Assyria alike, developed small states, each led by a
city in which had been built a temple sacred to some local deity. Each
community was presided over by one who combined the duties of king and
priest.
Such was the condition of affairs when the first written records, more
or less complete, bring some degree of certainty and less conjecture
into the development of these nations. And here we arrive at the
beginning of Mesopotamian history, properly so-called.
[Illustration: A JAR-SHAPED COFFIN OF CLAY.]
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Ragozin: Chaldea.
[2] This is a late popular etymology. Babel means "the gate of God," and
has no connection with the Hebrew verb _balal_ "to confound."