BOOK II.

ACCOUNT OF THE FIRST AGES OF THE INDIAN AND AFRICAN TRADE--THE

FIRST PEOPLING OF ABYSSINIA AND ATBARA--SOME CONJECTURES

CONCERNING THE ORIGIN OF LANGUAGE THERE.

CHAP. I.

_Of the India trade in its earliest ages--Settlement of

Ethiopia--Troglodytes--Building of the first Cities._

The farther back we go into the history of Eastern nations, the more

reason we have to be surprised at the accounts of their immense

riches and magnificence. One who reads the history of Egypt is like

a traveller walking through its ancient, ruined, and deserted towns,

where all are palaces and temples, without any trace of private or

ordinary habitation. So in the earliest though now mutilated, accounts

which we have of them, all is power, splendour, and riches, attended

by the luxury which was the necessary consequence, without any clue

or thread left us by which we can remount, or be conducted, to the

source or fountain whence this variety of wealth had flowed; without

ever being able to arrive at a period, when these people were poor and

mean, or even in a state of mediocrity, or upon a footing with European

nations.

The sacred scriptures, the most ancient, as well as the most credible

of all histories, represent Palestine, of which they particularly

treat, in the earliest ages, as not only full of polished, powerful,

and orderly states, but abounding also in silver and gold[211], in a

greater proportion than is to be found this day in any state in Europe,

though immensely rich dominions in a new world have been added to the

possession of that territory, which furnished the greatest quantity

of gold and silver to the old. Palestine, however, is a poor country,

left to its own resources and produce merely. It must have been always

a poor country, without some extraordinary connection with foreign

nations. It never contained either mines of gold or silver, and though,

at most periods of its history, it appears to have been but thinly

inhabited, it never of itself produced wherewithal to support and

maintain the few that dwelt in it.

Mr de Montesquieu[212], speaking of the wealth of Semiramis, imagines

that the great riches of the Assyrian empire in her reign, arose from

this queen’s having plundered some more ancient and richer nation,

as they, in their turn, fell afterwards a prey to a poorer, but more

warlike enemy. But however true this fact may be with regard to

Semiramis, it does not solve the general difficulty, as still the same

question recurs, concerning the wealth of that prior nation, which the

Assyrians plundered, and from which they received their treasure. I

believe the example is rare, that a large kingdom has been enriched by

war. Alexander conquered all Asia, part of Africa, and a considerable

portion of Europe; he plundered Semiramis’s kingdom, and all those that

were tributary to her; he went farther into the Indies than ever she

did, though her territories bordered upon the river Indus itself; yet

neither Macedon, nor any of the neighbouring provinces of Greece, could

ever compare with the small districts of Tyre and Sidon for riches.

War disperses wealth in the very instant it acquires it; but commerce,

well regulated, constantly and honestly supported, carried on with

œconomy and punctuality, is the only thing that ever did enrich

extensive kingdoms; and one hundred hands employed at the loom will

bring to a country more riches and abundance, than ten thousand bearing

spears and shields. We need not go far to produce an example that will

confirm this. The subjects and neighbours of Semiramis had brought

spices by land into Assyria. The Ishmaelites and Midianites, the

merchants and carriers of gold from Ethiopia, and more immediately from

Palestine, met in her dominions; and there was, for a time, the mart of

the East India trade. But, by an absurd expedition with an army into

India, in hopes to enrich herself all at once, she effectually ruined

that commerce, and her kingdom fell immediately afterwards.

Whoever reads the history of the most ancient nations, will find the

origin of wealth and power to have risen in the east; then to have

gradually advanced westward, spreading itself at the same time north

and south. They will find the riches and population of those nations

decay in proportion as this trade forsakes them; which cannot but

suggest to a good understanding, this truth constantly to be found in

the disposition of all things in this universe, that God makes use of

the smallest means and causes to operate the greatest and most powerful

effects. In his hand a pepper-corn is the foundation of the power,

glory, and riches of India; he makes an acorn, and by it communicates

power and riches to nations divided from India by thousands of leagues

of sea.

Let us pursue our consideration of Egypt. Sesostris, before the time

we have been just speaking of, passed with a fleet of large ships

from the Arabian Gulf into the Indian Ocean; he conquered part of

India, and opened to Egypt the commerce of that country by sea. I

enter not into the credibility of the number of his fleet, as there is

scarce any thing credible left us about the shipping and navigation

of the ancients, or, at least, that is not full of difficulties and

contradictions; my business is with the expedition, not with the number

of the ships. It would appear he revived, rather than first discovered,

this way of carrying on the trade to the East Indies, which, though

it was at times intermitted, (perhaps forgot by the Princes who

were contending for the Sovereignty of the continent of Asia), was,

nevertheless, perpetually kept up by the trading nations themselves,

from the ports of India and Africa, and on the Red Sea from Edom.

The pilots from these ports alone, of all the world, had a secret

confined to their own knowledge, upon which the success of these

voyages depended. This was the phænomena of the trade-winds[213]

and monsoons, which the pilots of Sesostris knew; and which those

of Nearchus seem to have taught him only in part, in his voyage

afterwards, and of which we are to speak in the sequel. History says

further of Sesostris, that the Egyptians considered him as their

greatest benefactor, for having laid open to them the trade both of

India and Arabia, for having overturned the dominion of the _Shepherd_

kings; and, lastly, for having restored to the Egyptian individuals

each their own lands, which had been wrested from them by the violent

hands of the Ethiopian _Shepherds_, during the first usurpation of

these princes.

In memory of his having happily accomplished these events, Sesostris

is said to have built a ship of cedar of a hundred and twenty yards

in length, the outside of which he covered with plates of gold, and

the inside with plates of silver, and this he dedicated in the temple

of Isis. I will not enter into the defence of the probability of his

reasons for having built a ship of this size, and for such a purpose,

as one of ten yards would have sufficiently answered. The use it was

made for, was apparently to serve for a hieroglyphic, of what he had

accomplished, viz. that he had laid open the gold and silver trade from

the mines in Ethiopia, and had navigated the ocean in ships made of

wood, which were the only ones, he thereby insinuated, that could be

employed in that trade. The Egyptian ships, at that time, were all made

of the reed papyrus[214], covered with skins or leather, a construction

which no people could venture to present to the ocean.

There is much to be learned from a proper understanding of these last

benefits conferred by Sesostris upon his Egyptian subjects. When

we understand these, which is very easy to any that have travelled

in the countries we are speaking of, (for nations and causes have

changed very little in these countries to this day), it will not be

difficult to find a solution of this problem, What was the commerce

that, progressively, laid the foundation of all that immense grandeur

of the east; what polished them, and cloathed them with silk, scarlet,

and gold; and what carried the arts and sciences among them, to a

pitch, perhaps, never yet surpassed, and this some thousands of years

before the nations in Europe had any other habitation than their native

woods, or cloathing than the skins of beasts, wild and domestic, or

government, but that first, innate one, which nature had given to the

strongest?

Let us inquire what was the connection Sesostris brought about between

Egypt and India; what was that commerce of Ethiopia and Arabia,

by which he enriched Egypt, and what was their connection with the

peninsula of India; who were those kings who bore so opposite an

office, as to be at the same time _Shepherds_; and who were those

_Shepherds_, near, and powerful enough to wrest the property of their

lands from four million of inhabitants.

To explain this, it will be necessary to enter into some detail,

without which no person dipping into the ancient or modern history

of this part of Africa, can have any precise idea of it, nor of the

different nations inhabiting the peninsula, the source of whose wealth

consisted entirely in the early, but well-established commerce between

Africa and India. What will make this subject of more easy explanation

is, that the ancient employment and occupations of these people in the

first ages, were still the same that subsist at this day. The people

have altered a little by colonies of strangers being introduced among

them, but their manners and employments are the same as they originally

were. What does not relate to the ancient history of these people, I

shall only mention in the course of my travels when passing through, or

sojourning amongst them.

Providence had created the inhabitants of the peninsula of India under

many disadvantages in point of climate. The high and wholesome part

of the country was covered with barren and rugged mountains; and, at

different times of the year, violent rains fell in large currents

down the sides of these, which overflowed all the fertile land below;

and these rains were no sooner over, than they were succeeded by

a scorching sun, the effect of which upon the human body, was to

render it feeble, enervated, and incapable of the efforts necessary

for agriculture. In this flat country, large rivers, that scarce

had declivity enough to run, crept slowly along, through meadows of

fat black earth, stagnating in many places as they went, rolling

an abundance of decayed vegetables, and filling the whole air with

exhalations of the most corrupt and putrid kind. Even rice, the general

food of man, the safest and most friendly to the inhabitants of that

country, could not grow but by laying under water the places where it

was sown, and thereby rendering them, for several months, absolutely

improper for man’s dwelling. Providence had done this, but, never

failing in its wisdom, had made to the natives a great deal more than a

sufficient amends.

Their bodies were unfit for the fatigues of agriculture, nor was the

land proper for common cultivation. But this country produced spices

of great variety, especially a small berry called Pepper, supposed, of

all others, and with reason, to be the greatest friend to the health

of man. This grew spontaneously, and was gathered without toil. It

was, at once, a perfect remedy for the inclemencies and diseases of

the country, as well as the source of its riches, from the demand of

foreigners. This species of spice is no where known but in India,

though equally useful in every putrid region, where, unhappily, these

diseases reign. Providence has not, as in India, placed remedies so

near them, thus wisely providing for the welfare of mankind in general,

by the dependency it has forced one man to have upon another. In India,

and similar climates, this spice is not used in small quantities, but

in such, as to be nearly equal to that of bread.

In cloathing, Providence had not been less kind to India. The silk

worm, with little fatigue and trouble to man, almost without his

interference, provided for him a stuff, at once the softest, the

most light and brilliant, and consequently the best adapted to warm

countries; and cotton, a vegetable production, growing every where

in great abundance, without care, which may be considered as almost

equal to silk, in many of its qualities, and superior to it in some,

afforded a variety still cheaper for more general use. Every tree

without culture produced them fruit of the most excellent kind; every

tree afforded them shade, under which, with a very light and portable

_loom_ of cane, they could pass their lives delightfully in a calm

and rational enjoyment, by the gentle exercise of weaving, at once

providing for the health of their bodies, the necessities of their

families, and the riches of their country.

But however plentifully their spices grew, in whatever quantity the

Indians consumed them, and however generally they wore their own

manufactures, the superabundance of both was such, as naturally led

them to look out for articles against which they might barter their

superfluities. This became necessary to supply the wants of those

things that had been with-held from them, for wise ends, or which, from

wantonness, luxury, or slender necessity, they had created in their own

imaginations.

Far to the westward of them, but part of the same continent, connected

by a long desert, and dangerous coast, was the peninsula of Arabia,

which produced no spices, tho’ the necessities of its climate subjected

its inhabitants to the same diseases as those in India. In fact, the

country and climate were exactly similar, and, consequently, the

plentiful use of these warm productions was as necessary there, as in

India, the country where they grew.

It is true, Arabia was not abandoned wholly to the inclemency of its

climate, as it produced myrrh and frankincense, which, when used as

perfumes or fumigations, were powerful antiseptics of their kind, but

administered rather as preventatives, than to remove the disorder

when it once prevailed. These were kept up at a price, of which, at

this day, we have no conception, but which never diminished from any

circumstance, under which the country where they grew, laboured.

The silk and cotton of India were white and colourless, liable to soil,

and without any variety; but Arabia produced gum and dyes of various

colours, which were highly agreeable to the taste of the Asiatics.

We find the sacred scriptures speak of the party-coloured garment as

the mark of the greatest honour[215]. Solomon, in his proverbs, too,

says, that he decked his bed with coverings of tapestry of Egypt[216].

But Egypt had neither silk nor cotton manufactory, no, nor even wool.

Solomon’s coverings, though he had them from Egypt, were therefore an

article of barter with India.

Balm, or Balsam[217], was a commodity produced in Arabia, sold at a

very high price, which it kept up till within these few centuries in

the east; when the Venetians carried on the India trade by Alexandria,

this Balsam then sold for its weight in gold; it grows in the same

place, and, I believe, nearly in the same quantity as ever, but, for

very obvious reasons[218], it is now of little value.

The basis of trade, or a connection between these two countries, was

laid, then, from the beginning, by the hand of Providence. The wants

and necessities of the one found a supply, or balance from the other.

Heaven had placed them not far distant, could the passage be made by

sea; but violent, steady, and unconquerable winds presented themselves

to make that passage of the ocean impossible, and we are not to doubt,

but, for a very considerable time, this was the reason why the commerce

of India was diffused through the continent, by land only, and from

this arose the riches of Semiramis.

But, however precious the merchandise of Arabia was, it was neither in

quantity, nor quality, capable of balancing the imports from India.

Perhaps they might have paid for as much as was used in the peninsula

of Arabia itself, but, beyond this there was a vast continent called

Africa, capable of consuming many hundred fold more than Arabia; which

lying under the same parallel with India, part of it still farther

south, the diseases of the climate, and the wants of its numerous

inhabitants, were, in many parts of it, the same as those of Arabia and

India; besides which there was the Red Sea, and divers communications

to the northward.

Neither their luxuries nor necessaries were the same as those of

Europe. And indeed Europe, at this time, was probably inhabited by

shepherds, hunters, and fishers, who had no luxury at all, or such as

could not be supplied from India; they lived in woods and marshes, with

the animals which made their sport, food, and cloathing.

The inhabitants of Africa then, this vast Continent, were to be

supplied with the necessaries, as well as the luxuries of life, but

they had neither the articles Arabia wanted, nor those required in

India, at least, for a time they thought so; and so long they were not

a trading people.

It is a tradition among the Abyssinians, which they say they have had

from time immemorial, and which is equally received among the Jews and

Christians, that almost immediately after the flood, Cush, grandson of

Noah, with his family, passing through Atbara from the low country of

Egypt, then without inhabitants, came to the ridge of mountains which

still separates the flat country of Atbara from the more mountainous

high-land of Abyssinia.

By casting his eye upon the map, the reader will see a chain of

mountains, beginning at the Isthmus of Suez, that runs all along like

a wall, about forty miles from the Red Sea, till it divides in lat.

13°, into two branches. The one goes along the northern frontiers of

Abyssinia, crosses the Nile, and then proceeds westward, through Africa

towards the Atlantic Ocean. The other branch goes southward, and then

east, taking the form of the Arabian Gulf; after which, it continues

southward all along the Indian Ocean, in the same manner as it did in

the beginning all along, the Red Sea, that is parallel to the coast.

Their tradition says, that, terrified with the late dreadful event the

flood, still recent in their minds, and apprehensive of being again

involved in a similar calamity, they chose for their habitation caves

in the sides of these mountains, rather than trust themselves again on

the plain. It is more than probable, that, soon after their arrival,

meeting here with the tropical rains, which, for duration, still exceed

the days that occasioned the flood, and observing, that going through

Atbara, that part of Nubia between the Nile and Astaboras, afterwards

called Meroë, from a dry climate at first, they had after fallen

in with rains, and as those rains increased in proportion to their

advancing southward, they chose to stop at the first mountains, where

the country was fertile and pleasant, rather than proceed farther at

the risk of involving themselves, perhaps in a land of floods, that

might prove as fatal to their posterity as that of Noah had been to

their ancestors.

This is a conjecture from probability, only mentioned for illustration,

for the motives that guided them cannot certainly be known; but it is

an undoubted fact, that here the Cushites, with unparalleled industry,

and with instruments utterly unknown to us, formed for themselves

commodious, yet wonderful habitations in the heart of mountains of

granite and marble, which remain entire in great numbers to this day,

and promise to do so till the consummation of all things. This original

kind of dwellings soon extended themselves through the neighbouring

mountains. As the Cushites grew populous, they occupied those that were

next them, spreading the industry and arts which they cultivated, as

well to the eastern as to the western ocean, but, content with their

first choice, they never descended from their caves, nor chose to

reside at a distance on the plain.

It is very singular that St Jerome does not know where to look for

this family, or descendents of Cush; though they are as plainly

pointed out, and as often alluded to by scripture, as any nation in

the Old Testament. They are described, moreover, by the particular

circumstances of their country, which have never varied, to be in the

very place where I now fix them, and where, ever since, they have

remained, and still do to this present hour, in the same mountains, and

the same houses of stone they formed for themselves in the beginning.

And yet Bochart[219], professedly treating this subject, as it were

industriously, involves it in more than Egyptian darkness. I rather

refer the reader to his work, to judge for himself, than, quoting it by

extracts, communicate the confusion of his ideas to my narrative.

The Abyssinian tradition further says, they built the city of Axum some

time early in the days of Abraham. Soon after this, they pushed their

colony down to Atbara, where we know from Herodotus[220], they early

and successfully pursued their studies, from which, Josephus says[221],

they were called Meroëtes, or inhabitants of the island of Meroë.

The prodigious fragments of colossal statues of the dog-star, still

to be seen at Axum, sufficiently shew what a material object of their

attention they considered him to be; and Seir, which in the language

of the Troglodytes, and in that of the low country of Meroë, exactly

corresponding to it, signifies a _dog_, instructs us in the reason why

this province was called _Sirè_, and the large river which bounds it,

_Siris_.

I apprehend the reason why, without forsaking their ancient domiciles

in the mountains, they chose this situation for another city, Meroë,

was owing to an imperfection they had discovered (both in Sirè and in

their caves below it) to result from their climate. They were within

the tropical rains; and, consequently, were impeded and interrupted in

the necessary observations of the heavenly bodies, and the progress

of astronomy which they so warmly cultivated. They must have seen,

likewise, a necessity of building Meroë farther from them than perhaps

they wished, for the same reason they built Axum in the high country

of Abyssinia in order to avoid the fly (a phænomenon of which I shall

afterwards speak) which pursued them everywhere within the limits of

the rains, and which must have given an absolute law in those first

times to the regulations of the Cushite settlements. They therefore

went the length of lat. 16°, where I saw the ruins supposed to be

those of Meroë[222], and caves in the mountains immediately above that

situation, which I cannot doubt were the temporary habitation of the

builders of that first seminary of learning.

It is probable that, immediately upon their success at Meroë, they lost

no time in stretching on to Thebes. We know that it was a colony of

Ethiopians, and probably from Meroë, but whether directly, or not, we

are not certain. A very short time might have passed between the two

establishments, for we find above Thebes, as there are above Meroë, a

vast number of caves, which the colony made provisionally, upon its

first arrival, and which are very near the top of the mountain, all

inhabited to this day.

Hence we may infer, that their ancient apprehensions of a deluge

had not left them whilst, they saw the whole land of Egypt could be

overflowed every year without rain falling upon it; that they did not

absolutely, as yet, trust to the liability of towns like those of Sirè

and Meroë, placed upon columns or stones, one laid upon the other, or

otherwise, that they found their excavations in the mountains were

finished with less trouble, and more comfortable when complete, than

the houses that were built. It was not long before they assumed a

greater degree of courage.

CHAP. II.

_Saba and the South of Africa peopled--Shepherds, their

particular Employment and Circumstances--Abyssinia occupied

by seven stranger Nations--Specimens of their several

Languages--Conjectures concerning them._

While these improvements were going on so prosperously in the central

and northern territory of the descendents of Cush, their brethren

to the south were not idle, they had extended themselves along the

mountains that run parallel to the Arabian Gulf; which was in all

times called Saba, or Azabo, both which signify _South_, not because

Saba was south of Jerusalem, but because it was on the south coast

of the Arabian Gulf, and, from Arabia and Egypt, was the first land

to the southward which bounded the African Continent, then richer,

more important, and better known, than the rest of the world. By that

acquisition, they enjoyed all the perfumes and aromatics in the east,

myrrh, and frankincense, and cassia; all which grow spontaneously in

that stripe of ground, from the Bay of Bilur west of Azab, to Cape

Gardefan, and then southward up in the Indian Ocean, to near the coast

of Melinda, where there is cinnamon, but of an inferior kind.

Arabia probably had not then set itself up as a rival to this side

of the Red Sea, nor had it introduced from Abyssinia the myrrh and

frankincense, as it did afterwards, for there is no doubt that the

principal mart, and growth of these gums, were always near Saba. Upon

the consumption increasing, they, however, were transplanted thence

into Arabia, where the myrrh has not succeeded.

The Troglodyte extended himself still farther south. As an astronomer,

he was to disengage himself from the tropical rains and cloudy skies

that hindered his correspondent observations with his countrymen at

Meroë and Thebes. As he advanced within the southern tropic, he,

however, still found rains, and made his houses such as the fears

of a deluge had instructed him to do. He found there solid and high

mountains, in a fine climate; but, luckier than his countrymen to

the northward, he found gold and silver in large quantities, which

determined his occupation, and made the riches and consequence of his

country. In these mountains, called _the Mountains of Sofala_, large

quantities of both metals were discovered in their pure unmixed state,

lying in globules without alloy, or any necessity of preparation or

separation.

The balance of trade, so long against the Arabian and African

continents, turned now in their favour from the immense influx of these

precious metals, found in the mountains of Sofala, just on the verge of

the southern tropical rains.

Gold and silver had been fixed upon in India as proper returns for

their manufactures and produce. It is impossible to say whether it was

from their hardness or beauty, or what other reason governed the mind

of man in making this standard of barter. The history of the particular

transactions of those times is lost, if, indeed, there ever was such

history, and, therefore, all further inquiries are in vain. The choice,

it seems, was a proper one, since it has continued unaltered so many

ages in India, and has been universally adopted by all nations pretty

much in the proportion or value as in India, into which continent gold

and silver, from this very early period, began to flow, have continued

so to do to this day, and in all probability will do to the end of

time. What has become of that immense quantity of bullion, how it is

consumed, or where it is deposited, and which way, if ever it returns,

are doubts which I never yet found a person that could satisfactorily

solve.

The Cushite then inhabited the mountains, whilst the northern colonies

advanced from Meroë to Thebes, busy and intent upon the improvement of

architecture, and building of towns, which they began to substitute

for their caves; they thus became traders, farmers, artificers of all

kinds, and even practical astronomers, from having a meridian night and

day free from clouds, for such was that of the Thebaid. As this was

impossible to their brethren, and six months continual rain confined

them to these caves, we cannot doubt but that their sedentary life made

them useful in reducing the many observations daily made by those of

their countrymen who lived under a purer sky. Letters too, at least one

sort of them, and arithmetical characters, we are told, were invented

by this middle part of the Cushites, while trade and astronomy, the

natural history of the winds and seasons, were what necessarily

employed the part of the colony established at Sofala most to the

southward.

The very nature of the Cushites commerce, the collecting of gold, the

gathering and preparing his spices, necessarily fixed him perpetually

at home; but his profit lay in the dispersing of these spices through

the continent, otherwise his mines, and the trade produced by the

possession of them, were to him of little avail.

A carrier was absolutely necessary to the Cushite, and Providence had

provided him one in a nation which were his neighbours. These were in

most respects different, as they had long hair, European features, very

dusky and dark complexion, but nothing like the black-moor or negro;

they lived in plains, having moveable huts or habitations, attended

their numerous cattle, and wandered from the necessities and particular

circumstances of their country. These people were in the Hebrew called

_Phut_, and, in all other languages, _Shepherds_; they are so still,

for they still exist; they subsist by the same occupation, never had

another, and therefore cannot be mistaken; they are called Balous,

Bagla, Belowee, Berberi, Barabra, Zilla and Habab[223], which all

signify but one thing, namely that of _Shepherd_. From their place of

habitation, the territory has been called _Barbaria_ by the Greeks

and Romans, from Berber, in the original signifying _shepherd_. The

authors that speak of the Shepherds seem to know little of those of

the _Thebaid_, and still less of those of _Ethiopia_, whilst they

fall immediately upon the shepherds of the Delta, that they may get

the sooner rid of them, and thrust them into Assyria, Palestine, and

Arabia. They never say what their origin was; how they came to be

so powerful; what was their occupation; or, properly, the land they

inhabited; or what is become of them now, though they seem inclined to

think the race extinct.

The whole employment of the shepherds had been the dispersing of the

Arabian and African goods all over the continent; they had, by that

employment, risen to be a great people: as that trade increased, their

quantity of cattle increased also, and consequently their numbers, and

the extent of their territory.

Upon looking at the map, the reader will see a chain of mountains

which I have described, and which run in a high ridge nearly straight

north, along the Indian Ocean, in a direction parallel to the coast,

where they end at Cape Gardefan. They then take the direction of the

coast, and run west from Cape Gardefan to the Straits of Babelmandeb,

inclosing the frankincense and myrrh country, which extends

considerably to the west of Azab. From Babelmandeb they run northward,

parallel to the Red Sea, till they end in the sandy plain at the

Isthmus of Suez, a name probably derived from Suah, _Shepherds_.

Although this stripe of land along the Indian Ocean, and afterwards

along the Red Sea, was necessary to the shepherds, because they carried

their merchandise to the ports there, and thence to Thebes and Memphis

upon the Nile, yet the principal seat of their residence and power

was that flat part of Africa between the northern tropic and the

mountains of Abyssinia. This is divided into various districts; it

reaches from Masuah along the sea-coast to Suakem, then turns westward,

and continues in that direction, having the Nile on the south, the

tropic on the north, to the deserts of Selima, and the confines of

Libya on the west. This large extent of country is called _Beja_. The

next is that district[224] in form of a shield, as Meroë is said to

have been; this name was given it by Cambyses. It is between the Nile

and Astaboras, and is now called Atbara. Between the river Mareb, the

ancient Astusaspes on the east, and Atbara on the west, is the small

plain territory of Derkin, another district of the shepherds. All that

range of mountains running east and west, inclosing Derkin and Atbara

on the south, and which begins the mountainous country of Abyssinia,

is inhabited by the negro woolly-headed Cushite, or Shangalla, living

as formerly in caves, who, from having been the most cultivated and

instructed people in the world, have, by a strange reverse of fortune,

relapsed into brutal ignorance, and are hunted by their neighbours like

wild beasts in those forests, where they used to reign in the utmost

luxury, liberty, and splendour. But the noblest, and most warlike of

all the shepherds, were those that inhabited the mountains of the

Habab, a considerable ridge reaching from the neighbourhood of Masuah

to Suakem, and who, still dwell there.

In the ancient language of this country, _So_, or _Suah_, signified

shepherd, or shepherds; though we do not know any particular rank or

degrees among them, yet we may suppose these called simply _shepherds_

were the common sort that attended the flocks. Another denomination,

part of them bore, was _Hycsos_, sounded by us Agsos, which signifies

_armed shepherds_, or such as wore harness, which may be supposed the

soldiers, or armed force of that nation. The third we see mentioned

is Ag-ag, which is thought to be the nobles or chiefs of those armed

shepherds, whence came their title _King of Kings_[225]. The plural of

this is Agagi, or, as it is written in the Ethiopic, Agaazi.

This term has very much puzzled both Scaliger and Ludolf; for, finding

in the Abyssinian books that they are called Agaazi, they torment

themselves about finding the etymology of that word. They imagine them

to be Arabs from near the Red Sea, and Mr Ludolf[226] thinks the term

signifies _banished men_. Scaliger, too, has various guesses about them

nearly to the same import. All this, however, is without foundation;

the people assert themselves at this day to be Agaazi, that is, a race

of Shepherds inhabiting the mountains of the Habab, and have by degrees

extended themselves through the whole province of Tigré, whose capital

is called Axum, from Ag and Suah, the metropolis, or principal city of

the shepherds that wore arms.

Nothing was more opposite than the manners and life of the Cushite,

and his carrier the shepherd. The first, though he had forsaken his

caves, and now lived in cities which he had built, was necessarily

confined at home by his commerce, amassing gold, arranging the invoices

of his spices, hunting in the season to provide himself with ivory,

and food throughout the winter. His mountains, and the cities he built

afterwards, were situated upon a loomy, black earth, so that as soon

as the tropical rains began to fall, a wonderful phænomenon deprived

him of his cattle. Large swarms of flies appeared wherever that loomy

earth was, which made him absolutely dependent in this respect upon the

shepherd, but this affected the shepherd also.

This insect is called _Zimb_; it has not been described by any

naturalist. It is in size very little larger than a bee, of a thicker

proportion, and his wings, which are broader than those of a bee,

placed separate like those of a fly; they are of pure gauze, without

colour or spot upon them; the head is large, the upper jaw or lip

is sharp, and has at the end of it a strong-pointed hair of about a

quarter of an inch long; the lower jaw has two of these pointed hairs,

and this pencil of hairs, when joined together, makes a resistance to

the finger nearly equal to that of a strong hog’s bristle. Its legs are

serrated in the inside, and the whole covered with brown hair or down.

As soon as this plague appears, and their buzzing is heard, all the

cattle forsake their food, and run wildly about the plain, till they

die, worn out with fatigue, fright, and hunger. No remedy remains, but

to leave the black earth, and hasten down to the sands of Atbara, and

there they remain while the rains last, this cruel enemy never daring

to pursue them farther.

What enables the shepherd to perform the long and toilsome journies

across Africa is the camel, emphatically called by the Arabs, the _ship

of the desert_. He seems to have been created for this very trade,

endued with parts and qualities adapted to the office he is employed

to discharge. The driest thistle, and the barest thorn, is all the

food this useful quadruped requires, and even these, to save time, he

eats while advancing on his journey, without stopping, or occasioning

a moment of delay. As it is his lot to cross immense deserts, where no

water is found, and countries not even moistened by the dew of heaven,

he is endued with the power at one watering-place to lay in a store,

with which he supplies himself for thirty days to come. To contain this

enormous quantity of fluid, Nature has formed large cisterns within

him, from which, once filled, he draws at pleasure the quantity he

wants, and pours it into his stomach with the same effect as if he

then drew it from a spring, and with this he travels, patiently and

vigorously, all day long, carrying a prodigious load upon him, through

countries infected with poisonous winds, and glowing with parching and

never-cooling sands. Though his size is immense, as is his strength,

and his body covered with a thick skin, defended with strong hair, yet

still he is not capable to sustain the violent punctures the fly makes

with his pointed proboscis. He must lose no time in removing to the

sands of Atbara; for, when once attacked by this fly, his body, head,

and legs break out into large bosses, which swell, break, and putrify,

to the certain destruction of the creature.

Even the elephant and rhinoceros, who, by reason of their enormous

bulk, and the vast quantity of food and water they daily need, cannot

shift to desert and dry places as the season may require, are obliged

to roll themselves in mud and mire, which, when dry, coats them over

like armour, and enables them to stand their ground against this winged

assassin; yet I have found some of these tubercles upon almost every

elephant and rhinoceros that I have seen, and attribute them to this

cause.

All the inhabitants of the sea-coast of Melinda, down to Cape Gardefan,

to Saba, and the south coast of the Red Sea, are obliged to put

themselves in motion, and remove to the next sand in the beginning

of the rainy season, to prevent all their stock of cattle from being

destroyed. This is not a partial emigration; the inhabitants of all the

countries from the mountains of Abyssinia northward, to the confluence

of the Nile and Astaboras, are once a-year obliged to change their

abode, and seek protection in the sands of Beja; nor is there any

alternative, or means of avoiding this, though a hostile band was in

their way, capable of spoiling them of half their substance; and this

is now actually the case, as we shall see when we come to speak of

Sennaar.

Of all those that have written upon these countries, the prophet

Isaiah alone has given an account of this animal, and the manner of

its operation. Isa. vii. ch. 18. and 19. ver. “And it shall come to

pass, in that day, that the Lord shall _hiss_ for the fly that is in

the uttermost part of the rivers of Egypt,”--“And they shall come, and

shall rest all of them in the desolate vallies[227], and in the holes

of the rocks, and upon all thorns, and upon all bushes.”

The mountains that I have already spoken of, as running through the

country of the Shepherds, divide the seasons by a line drawn along

their summit, so exactly, that, while the eastern side, towards the

Red Sea, is deluged with rain for the six months that constitute our

_winter_ in Europe, the western side toward Atbara enjoys a perpetual

sun, and active vegetation. Again, the six months, when it is our

_summer_ in Europe, Atbara, or the western side of these mountains, is

constantly covered with clouds and rain, while, for the same time, the

shepherd on the eastern side, towards the Red Sea, feeds his flocks

in the most exuberant foliage and luxuriant verdure, enjoying the

fair weather, free from the fly or any other molestation. These great

advantages have very naturally occasioned these countries of Atbara and

Beja to be the principal residence of the shepherd and his cattle, and

have entailed upon him the necessity of a perpetual change of places.

Yet so little is this inconvenience, so short the peregrination, that,

from the rain on the west side, a man, in the space of four hours, will

change to the opposite season, and find himself in sun-shine to the

eastward.

When Carthage was built, the carriage of this commercial city fell

into the hands of Lehabim, or Lubim, the Libyan peasants, and became

a great accession to the trade, power, and number of the shepherds.

In countries to which there was no access by shipping, the end of

navigation was nearly answered by the immense increase of camels; and

this trade, we find, was carried on in the very earliest ages on the

Arabian side, by the Ishmaelite merchants trading to Palestine and

Syria, from the south end of the peninsula, with camels. This we learn

particularly from Genesis, they brought myrrh and spices, or pepper,

and sold them for silver; they had also balm, or balsam, but this it

seems, in those days, they brought from Gilead.

We are sorry, in reading this curious anecdote preserved to us in

scripture, to find, in those early ages of the India trade, that

another species of commerce was closely connected with it, which modern

philanthropy has branded as the disgrace of human nature. It is plain,

from the passage, the commerce of selling men was then universally

established. Joseph[228] is bought as readily, and sold as currently

immediately after, as any ox or camel could be at this day. Three

nations, Javan, Tubal, and Meshech[229], are mentioned as having their

principal trade at Tyre in the selling of men; and, as late as St

John’s time[230], this is mentioned as a principal part of the trade

of Babylon; notwithstanding which, no prohibition from God, or censure

from the prophets, have ever stigmatized it either as irreligious or

immoral; on the contrary, it is always spoken of as favourably as any

species of commerce whatever. For this, and many other reasons which I

could mention, I cannot think, that purchasing slaves is, in itself,

either cruel or unnatural. To purchase any living creature to abuse

it afterwards, is certainly both base and criminal; and the crime

becomes still of a deeper dye, when our fellow-creatures come to be the

sufferers. But, although this is an abuse which accidentally follow

the trade, it is no necessary part of the trade itself; and, it is

against this abuse the wisdom of the legislature should be directed,

not against the trade itself.

On the eastern side of the peninsula of Africa, many thousand slaves

are sold to Asia, perfectly in the same manner as those on the west

side are sent to the West Indies; but no one, that ever I heard, has

as yet opened his mouth against the sale of Africans to the East

Indies; and yet there is an aggravation in this last sale of slaves

that should touch us much more than the other, where no such additional

grievance can be pretended. The slaves sold into Asia are most of them

Christians; they are sold to Mahometans, and, with their liberty, they

are certainly deprived of their religion likewise. But the treatment

of the Asiatics being much more humane than what the Africans, sold

to the West Indies, meet with, no clamour has yet been raised against

this commerce in Asia, because its only bad consequence is apostacy; a

proof to me that religion has no part in the present dispute, or, as

I have said, it is the abuse that accidentally follows the purchasing

of slaves, not the trade itself, that should be considered as the

grievance.

It is plain from all history, that two abominable practices, the

one the eating of men, the other of sacrificing them to the devil,

prevailed all over Africa. The India trade, as we have seen in very

early ages, first established the buying and selling of slaves; since

that time, the eating of men, or sacrificing them, has so greatly

decreased on the eastern side of the peninsula, that now we scarcely

hear of an instance of either of these that can be properly vouched. On

the western part, towards the Atlantic Ocean, where the sale of slaves

began a considerable time later, after the discovery of America and the

West Indies, both of these horrid practices are, as it were, general,

though, I am told, less so to the northward since that event.

There is still alive a man of the name of Matthews, who was present at

one of those bloody banquets on the west of Africa, to the northward of

Senega. It is probable the continuation of the slave-trade would have

abolished these, in time, on the west side also. Many other reasons

could be alledged, did my plan permit it. But I shall content myself

at present, with saying, that I very much fear that a relaxation and

effeminacy of manners, rather than genuine tenderness of heart, has

been the cause of this violent paroxysm of philanthropy, and of some

other measures adopted of late to the discouragement of discipline,

which I do not doubt will soon be felt to contribute their mite to the

decay both of trade and navigation that will necessarily follow.

The Ethiopian shepherds at first carried on the trade on their own

side of the Red Sea; they carried their India commodities to Thebes,

likewise to the different black nations to the south-west; in return,

they brought back gold, probably at a cheaper rate, because certainly

by a shorter carriage than by that from Ophir.

Thebes became exceedingly rich and proud, though, by the most extensive

area that ever was assigned to it, it never could be either large or

populous. Thebes is not mentioned in scripture by that name; it was

destroyed before the days of Moses by Salatis prince of the Agaazi,

or Ethiopian shepherds; at this day it has assumed a name very like

the ancient one. The first signification of its name, Medinet Tabu, I

thought was the Town of our Father. This, history says, was given it by

Sesostris in honour of his father; in the ancient language, its name

was _Ammon No_. The next that presented itself was Theba, which was the

Hebrew name for the Ark when Noah was ordered to build it--Thou shalt

“make thee an Ark (Theba) of gopher-wood[231].”

The figure of the temples in Thebes do not seem to be far removed from

the idea given us of the Ark. The third conjecture is, that being

the first city built and supported on pillars, and, on different and

separate pieces of stone, it got its name from the architects first

expression of approbation or surprise, Tabu, that it stood insulated

and alone, and this seems to me to be the most conformable both to the

Hebrew and Ethiopic.

The shepherds, for the most part, friends and allies of the Egyptians,

or Cushite, at times were enemies to them. We need not, at this time

of day, seek the cause; there are many very apparent, from opposite

manners, and, above all, the difference in the dietetique regimen. The

Egyptians worshipped the cow, the Shepherds killed and ate her. The

Shepherds were Sabeans, worshipping the host of heaven--the sun, moon,

and stars. Immediately upon the building of Thebes and the perfection

of sculpture, idolatry and the grossest materialism greatly corrupted

the more pure and speculative religion of the Sabeans. Soon after the

building of Thebes, we see that Rachel, Abraham’s wife, had idols[232];

we need seek no other probable cause of the devastation that followed,

than difference of religion.

Thebes was destroyed by Salatis, who overturned the first Dynasty

of Cushite, or Egyptian kings, begun by Menes, in what is called

the second age of the world, and founded the first Dynasty of the

Shepherds, who behaved very cruelly, and wrested the lands from their

first owners; and it was this Dynasty that Sesostris destroyed, after

calling Thebes by his father’s name, Ammon No, making those decorations

that we have seen of the harp in the sepulchres on the west, and

building Diospolis on the opposite side of the river. The second

conquest of Egypt by the Shepherds was that under Sabaco, by whom it

has been imagined Thebes was destroyed, in the reign of Hezekiah king

of Judah, who is said to have made peace with So[233] king of Egypt, as

the translator has called him, mistaking So for the name of the king,

whereas it only denoted his quality of shepherd.

From this it is plain, all that the scripture mentions about Ammon

No, applies to Diospolis on the other side of the river. Ammon No and

Diospolis, though they were on different sides of the river, were

considered as one city, thro’ which the Nile flowed, dividing it into

two parts. This is plain from profane history, as well as from the

prophet Nahum[234], who describes it very exactly, if in place of the

word _sea_ was substituted _river_, as it ought to be.

There was a third invasion of the Shepherds after the building of

Memphis, where a [235]king of Egypt[236] is said to have inclosed two

hundred and forty thousand of them in a city called _Abaris_; they

surrendered upon capitulation, and were banished the country into the

land of Canaan. That two hundred and forty thousand men should be

inclosed in one city, so as to bear a siege, seems to me extremely

improbable; but be it so, all that it can mean is, that Memphis, built

in Lower Egypt near the Delta, had war with the Shepherds of the

Isthmus of Suez, or the districts near them, as those of Thebes had

before with the Shepherds of the Thebaid. But, however much has been

written upon the subject, the total expulsion of the Shepherds at any

one time by any King of Egypt, or at any one place, must be fabulous,

as they have remained in their ancient seats, and do remain to this

day; perhaps in not so great a number as when the India trade was

carried on by the Arabian Gulf, yet still in greater numbers than any

other nation of the Continent.

The mountains which the Agaazi inhabit, are called _Habab_, from which

it comes, that they themselves have got that name. Habab, in their

language, and in Arabic likewise, signifies a _serpent_, and this I

suppose explains that historical fable in the book of Axum, which says,

a serpent conquered the province of Tigré, and reigned there.

It may be asked, Is there no other people that inhabit Abyssinia, but

these two nations, the Cushites and the Shepherds? Are there no other

nations, whiter or fairer than them, living to the southward of the

Agaazi? Whence did these come? At what time, and by what name are they

called? To this I answer, That there are various nations which agree

with this description, who have each a particular name, and who are all

known by that of _Habesh_, in Latin _Convenæ_, signifying a number of

distinct people meeting accidentally in one place. The word has been

greatly misunderstood, and misapplied, both by Scaliger and Ludolf,

and a number of others; but nothing is more consonant to the history

of the country than the translation I have given it, nor will the word

itself bear any other.

The Chronicle of Axum, the most ancient repository of the antiquities

of that country, a book esteemed, I shall not say how properly, as the

first in authority after the holy scriptures, says, that between the

creation of the world and the birth of our Saviour there were 5500

years[237]; that Abyssinia had never been inhabited till 1808 years

before Christ[237]; and 200 years after that, which was in the 1600,

it was laid waste by a flood, the face of the country much changed

and deformed, so that it was denominated at that time Ourè Midre, or,

_the country laid waste_, or, as it is called in scripture itself, a

land which the waters or floods had spoiled[238]; that about the 1400

year before Christ it was taken possession of by a variety of people

speaking different languages, who, as they were in friendship with the

Agaazi, or Shepherds, possessing the high country of Tigrè, came and

sat down beside them in a peaceable manner, each occupying the lands

that were before him. This settlement is what the Chronicle of Axum

calls _Angaba_, the entry and establishment of these nations, which

finished the peopling of Abyssinia.

Tradition further says, that they came from Palestine. All this seems

to me to wear the face of truth. Some time after the year 1500, we know

there happened a flood which occasioned great devastation. Pausanius

says, that this flood happened in Ethiopia in the reign of Cecrops;

and, about the 1490 before Christ, the Israelites entered the land of

promise, under Caleb and Joshua. We are not to wonder at the great

impression that invasion made upon the minds of the inhabitants of

Palestine. We see by the history of the harlot, that the different

nations had been long informed by prophecies, current and credited

among themselves, that they were to be extirpated before the face

of the Israelites, who for some time had been hovering about their

frontiers. But now when Joshua had passed the Jordan, after having

miraculously dried up the river[239] before his army had invaded

Canaan, and had taken and destroyed Jericho, a panic seized the whole

people of Syria and Palestine.

These petty states, many in number, and who had all different

languages, seeing a conqueror with an immense army already in

possession of part of their country, and who did not conduct himself

according to the laws of other conquerors, but put the vanquished under

saws and harrows of iron, and destroyed the men, women, and children;

and sometimes even the cattle, by the sword, no longer could think of

waiting the arrival of such an enemy, but sought for safety by speedy

flight or emigration. The Shepherds in Abyssinia and Atbara were the

most natural refuge these fugitives could seek; commerce must have long

made them acquainted with each others manners, and they must have been

already entitled to the rights of hospitality by having often passed

through each other’s country.

Procopius[240] mentions that two pillars were standing in his time

on the coast of Mauritania, opposite to Gibraltar, upon which were

inscriptions in the Phœnician tongue: “We are Canaanites, flying from

the face of Joshua, the son of Nun, the _robber_:” A character they

naturally gave him from the ferocity and violence of his manners. Now,

if what these inscriptions contain is true, it is much more credible,

that the different nations, emigrating at that time, should seek their

safety near hand among their friends, rather than go to an immense

distance to Mauritania, to risk a precarious reception among strangers,

and perhaps that country not yet inhabited.

Upon viewing the several countries in which these nations have their

settlements, it seems evident they were made by mutual consent, and in

peace; they are not separated from each other by chains of mountains,

or large and rapid rivers, but generally by small brooks, dry the

greatest part of the year; by hillocks, or small mounds of earth, or

imaginary lines traced to the top of some mountain at a distance; these

boundaries have never been disputed or altered, but remain upon the old

tradition to this day. These have all different languages, as we see

from scripture all the petty states of Palestine had, but they have no

letters, or written character, but the Geez, the character

of the Cushite shepherd by whom they were first invented and used, as

we shall see hereafter. I may add in further proof of their origin,

that the curse[241] of Canaan seems to have followed them, they have

obtained no principality, but served the kings of the Agaazi or

Shepherds, have been hewers of wood and drawers of water, and so they

still continue.

[Illustration: Geez]

[Illustration: Amhara]

[Illustration: Falasha]

[Illustration: Damot Agow]

[Illustration: Tcheratz Agow]

[Illustration: Gafat]

[Illustration: Galla]

The first and most considerable of these nations settled in a province

called _Amhara_; it was, at first coming, as little known as the

others; but, upon a revolution in the country, the king fled to that

province, and there the court staid many years, so that the Geez, or

language of the Shepherds, was dropt, and retained only in writing,

and as a dead language; the sacred scriptures being in that language

only, saved the Geez from going totally into disuse. The second were

the Agows of Damot, one of the southern provinces of Abyssinia, where

they are settled immediately upon the sources of the Nile. The third

are the Agows of Lasta, or Tcheratz Agow, from Tchera, their principal

habitation; theirs too is a separate language; they are Troglodytes

that live in caverns, and seem to pay nearly the same worship to the

Siris, or Tacazzè, that those of Damot pay to the Nile.

I take the old names of these two last-mentioned nations, to be sunk in

the circumstances of this their new settlement, and to be a compound of

two words Ag-oha, the Shepherds of the River, and I also imagine, that

the idolatry they introduced in the worship of the Nile, is a further,

proof that they came from Canaan, where they imbibed materialism in

place of the pure Sabean worship of the Shepherds, then the only

religion of this part of Africa.

The fourth is a nation bordering upon the southern banks of the

Nile near Damot. It calls itself Gafat, which signifies oppressed

by violence, torn, expelled, or chaced away by force. If we were to

follow the idea arising merely from this name, we might be led to

imagine, that these were part of the tribes torn from Solomon’s son

and successor, Rehoboam. This, however, we cannot do confident with

the faith to be kept by a historian with his reader. The evidence of

the people themselves, and the tradition of the country, deny they

ever were Jews, or ever concerned with that colony, brought with

Menilek and the queen of Saba, which established the Jewish hierarchy.

They declare, that they are now Pagans, and ever were so; that they

are partakers with their neighbours the Agows in the worship of the

river Nile, the extent or particulars of which I cannot pretend to

explain.--The fifth is a tribe, which, if we were to pay any attention

to similarity of names, we should be apt to imagine we had found here

in Africa a part of that great Gaulish nation so widely extended in

Europe and Asia. A comparison of their languages, with what we know

exists of the former, cannot but be very curious.--These are the

Galla, the most considerable of these nations, specimens of whose

language I have cited. This word, in their own language, signifies

_Shepherd_[242]; they say that formerly they lived on the borders of

the southern rains, within the southern tropic; and that, like these in

Atbara, they were carriers between the Indian and Atlantic Oceans, and

supplied the interior part of the peninsula with Indian commodities.

The history of this trade is unknown; it must have been little less

ancient, and nearly as extensive, as the trade to Egypt and Arabia.

It probably suffered diminution, when the mines of Sofala were given

up, soon after the discovery of the new world. The Portuguese found

it still flourishing, when they made their first conquests upon that

coast; and they carry it on still in an obscure manner, but in the same

tract to their settlements near Cape Negro on the western ocean. From

these settlements would be the proper place to begin to explore the

interior parts of the peninsula, on both sides of the southern tropic,

as protection and assistance could probably be got through the whole

course of it, and very little skill in language would be necessary.

When no employment was found for this multitude of men and cattle,

they left their homes, and proceeding northward, they found themselves

involved near the Line, in rainy, cold, and cloudy weather, where they

scarcely ever saw the sun. Impatient of such a climate, they advanced

still farther, till about the year 1537, they appeared in great numbers

in the province of Bali, abandoning the care of camels for the breeding

of horses. At present they are all cavalry. I avoid to say more of them

in this place, as I shall be obliged to make frequent mention of them

in the course of my narrative.

The Falasha, too, are a people of Abyssinia, having a particular

language of their own; a specimen of which I have also published, as

the history of the people seems to be curious. I do not, however, mean

to say of them, more than of the Galla, that this was any part of those

nations who fled from Palestine on the _invasion_ of Joshua. For they

are now, and ever were, Jews, and have traditions of their own as to

their origin, and what reduced them to the present state of separation,

as we shall see hereafter, when I come to speak of the translation of

the holy scripture.

In order to gratify such as are curious in the study and history of

language, I, with great pains and difficulty, got the whole book of the

Canticles translated into each of these languages, by priests esteemed

the most versant in the language of each nation. As this barbarous

polyglot is of too large a size to print, I have contented myself with

copying six verses of the first chapter in each language; but the whole

book is at the service of any person of learning that will bestow his

time in studying it, and, for this purpose, I left it in the British

Museum, under the direction of Sir Joseph Banks, and the Bishop of

Carlisle.

These _Convenæ_, as we have observed, were called _Habesh_, a number

of distinct nations meeting in one place. Scripture has given them a

name, which, though it has been ill translated, is precisely _Convenæ_,

both in the Ethiopic and Hebrew. Our English translation calls

them the _mingled people_[243], whereas it should be the _separate

nations_, who, though met and settled together, did not mingle, which

is strictly _Convenæ_. The inhabitants then who possessed Abyssinia,

from its southern boundary to the tropic of Cancer, or frontiers of

Egypt, were the Cushites, or polished people, living in towns, first

Troglodytes, having their habitations in caves. The next were the

Shepherds; after these were the nations who, as we apprehend, came from

Palestine--Amhara, Agow of Damot, Agow of Tchera, and Gafat.

Interpreters, much less acquainted with the historical circumstances

of these countries than the prophets, have, either from ignorance

or inattention, occasioned an obscurity which otherwise did not

arise from the text. All these people are alluded to in scripture by

descriptions that cannot be mistaken. If they have occasioned doubts or

difficulties, they are all to be laid at the door of the translators,

chiefly the Septuagint. When Moses returned with his wife Zipporah,

daughter of the sovereign of the Shepherds of Midian, carriers of

the India trade from Saba into Palestine, and established near their

principal mart Edom, in Idumea or Arabia, Aaron, and Miriam his sister,

quarrelled with Moses, because he had married one who was, as the

translator says, an Ethiopian[244]. There is no sense in this cause;

Moses was a fugitive when he married Zipporah; she was a noble-woman,

daughter of the priest of Midian, head of a people. She likewise, as

it would seem, was a Jewess[245], and more attentive, at that time, to

the preservation of the precepts of the law, than Moses was himself;

no exception, then, could lie against Zipporah, as she was surely,

in every view, Moses’s superior. But if the translator had rendered

it, that Aaron and Miriam had quarrelled with Moses, because he had

married a _negro_, or _black-moor_, the reproach was evident; whatever

intrinsic merit Zipporah might have been found to have possessed

afterwards, she must have appeared before the people, at first sight,

as a _strange_ woman, or Gentile, whom it was prohibited to marry.

Besides, the innate deformity of the complexion, negroes were, at all

times, rather coveted for companions of men of luxury or pleasure, than

sought after for wives of sober legislators, and governors of a people.

The next instance I shall give is, Zerah of Gerar[246], who came out

to fight Asa king of Israel with an army of a million of men, and

three hundred chariots, whilst both the quarrel and the decision are

represented as immediate.

Gerar was a small district, producing only the Acacia or gum-arabic

trees, from which it had its name; it had no water but what came from

a few wells, part of which had been dug by Abraham[247], after much

strife with the people of the country, who sought to deprive him of

them, as of a treasure.

Abraham and his brother Lot returning from Egypt, though poor

shepherds, could not subsist there for want of food, and water, and

they separated accordingly, by consent[248]. Now it must be confessed,

as it is not pretended there was any miracle here, that there is not

a more unlikely tale in all Herodotus, than this must be allowed to

be upon the footing of the translation. The translator calls Zerah an

Ethiopian, which should either mean he dwelt in Arabia, as he really

did, and this gave him no advantage, or else that he was a stranger,

who originally came from the country above Egypt; and, either way,

it would have been impossible, during his whole life-time, to have

collected a million of men, one of the greatest armies that ever stood

upon the face of the earth, nor could he have fed them though they had

ate the whole trees that grew in his country, nor could he have given

every hundredth man one drink of water in a day from all the wells he

had in his country.

Here, then, is an obvious triumph for infidelity, because, as I have

said, no supernatural means are pretended. But had it been translated,

that Zerah was a _black-moor_, a _Cushite-negro_, and prince of the

Cushites, that were carriers in the Isthmus, an Ethiopian shepherd,

then the wonder ceased. Twenty camels, employed to carry couriers upon

them, might have procured that number of men to meet in a short space

of time, and, as Zerah was the aggressor, he had time to choose when

he should attack his enemy; every one of these shepherds carrying with

them their provision of flour and water, as is their invariable custom,

might have fought with Asa at Gerar, without eating a loaf of Zerah’s

bread, or drinking a pint of his water.

The next passage I shall mention is the following: “The labour of

Egypt, and merchandise of Ethiopia, and of the Sabeans, men of

stature, shall come over unto thee, and they shall be thine[249].” Here

the several nations are distinctly and separately mentioned in their

places, but the whole meaning of the passage would have been lost,

had not the situation of these nations been perfectly known; or, had

not the Sabeans been mentioned separately, for both the Sabeans and

the Cushite were certainly Ethiopians. Now, the meaning of the verse

is, that the fruit of the agriculture of Egypt, which is wheat, the

commodities of the negro, gold, silver, ivory, and perfumes, would be

brought by the Sabean shepherds, their carriers, a nation of great

power, which should join themselves with you.

Again, Ezekiel says,[250] “And they shall know that I am the Lord,

when I have set a fire in Egypt, and when all her helpers shall be

destroyed.”--“In that day shall messengers go forth from me in ships,

to make the careless Ethiopians afraid.” Now, Nebuchadnezzar was to

destroy Egypt[251], from the frontiers of Palestine, to the mountains

above Atbara, where the Cushite dwelt. Between this and Egypt is a

great desert; the country beyond it, and on both sides, was possessed

by half a million of men. The Cushite, or negro merchant, was secure

under these circumstances from any insult by land, but they were open

to the sea, and had no defender, and messengers, therefore, in ships

or a fleet had easy access to them, to alarm and keep them at home,

that they did not fall into danger by marching into Egypt against

Nebuchadnezzar, or interrupting the service upon which God had sent

him. But this does not appear from translating Cush, _Ethiopian_; the

nearest Ethiopian to Nebuchadnezzar, the most powerful and capable of

opposing him, were the Ethiopian shepherds of the Thebaid, and these

were not accessible to ships; and the shepherds, so posted near to the

scene of destruction to be committed by Nebuchadnezzar, were enemies

to the Cushites living in towns, and they had repeatedly themselves

destroyed them, and therefore had no temptation to be other than

spectators.

In several other places, the same prophet speaks of Cush as the

commercial nation, sympathising with their countrymen dwelling in the

towns in Egypt, independent of the shepherds, who were really their

enemies, both in civil and religious matters. “And the sword shall come

upon Egypt, and great pain shall be in Ethiopia, when the slain shall

fall in Egypt[252].” Now Ethiopia, as I have before said, that is, the

low country of the shepherds, nearest Egypt, had no common cause with

the Cushites that lived in towns there; it was their countrymen, the

Cushites in Ethiopia, who mourned for those that fell in Egypt, who

were merchants, traders, and dwelt in cities like themselves.

I shall mention but one instance more: “Can the Ethiopian change his

skin, or the leopard his spots?[253]” Here Cush is rendered Ethiopian,

and many Ethiopians being white, it does not appear why they should be

fixed upon, or chosen for the question more than other people. But had

Cush been translated Negro, or Black-moor, the question would have

been very easily understood, Can the negro change his skin, or the

leopard his spots?

Jeremiah[254] speaks of the chiefs of the mingled people that dwell

in the deserts. And Ezekiel[255] also mentions them independent of

all the others, whether Shepherds, or Cushites, or Libyans their

neighbours, by the name of the Mingled People. Isaiah[256] calls them

“a nation scattered and peeled; a people terrible from their beginning

hitherto; a nation meted out and trodden down, whose land the rivers

have spoiled:” which is a sufficient description of them, as having

been expelled their own country, and settled in one that had suffered

greatly by a deluge a short time before.

CHAP. III.

_Origin of Characters or Letters--Ethiopic the first

Language--How and why the Hebrew Letter was formed._

The reader will observe what I have already said concerning the

language of Habesh, or the Mingled Nations, that they have not

characters of their own; but when written, which is very seldom, it

must be by using the Geez alphabet. Kircher, however, says, there are

two characters to be found in Abyssinia; one he calls the Sacred Old

Syrian, the other the Vulgar, or Common Geez character, of which we are

now speaking. But this is certainly a mistake; there never was, that I

know, but two original characters which obtained in Egypt. The first

was the Geez, the second the Saitic, and both these were the oldest

characters in the world, and both derived from hieroglyphics.

Although it is impossible to avoid saying something here of the origin

of languages, the reader must not expect that I should go very deep

into the fashionable opinions concerning them, or believe that all

the old deities of the Pagan nations were the patriarchs of the Old

Testament. With all respect to Sanchoniatho and his followers, I can

no more believe that Osiris, the first king of Egypt, was a real

personage, and that Tot was his secretary, than I can believe Saturn

to be the patriarch Abraham, and Rachel and Leah, Venus and Minerva. I

will not fatigue the reader with a detail of useless reasons; if Osiris

is a real personage, if he was king of Egypt, and Tot his secretary,

they surely travelled to very good purpose, as all the people of Europe

and Asia seem to be agreed, that in person they first communicated

letters and the art of writing to them, but at very different, and very

distant periods.

Thebes was built by a colony of Ethiopians from Sirè, the city of Seir,

or the Dog Star. Diodorus Siculus says, that the Greeks, by putting O

before Siris, had made the word unintelligible to the Egyptians: Siris,

then, was Osiris; but he was not the Sun, no more than he was Abraham,

nor was he a real personage. He was Syrius, or the dog-star, designed

under the figure of a dog, because of the warning he gave to Atbara,

where the first observations were made at his heliacal rising, or his

disengaging himself from the rays of the sun, so as to be visible to

the naked eye. He was the Latrator Anubis, and his first appearance

was figuratively compared to the barking of a dog, by the warning it

gave to prepare for the approaching inundation. I believe, therefore,

this was the first hieroglyphic; and that Isis, Osiris, and Tot, were

all after inventions relating to it; and, in saying this, I am so far

warranted, because there is not in Axum (once a large city) any other

hieroglyphic but of the dog-star, as far as I can judge from the huge

fragments of figures of this animal, remains of which, in differrent

postures, are still distinctly to be seen upon the pedestals everywhere

among the ruins.

It is not to be doubted, that hieroglyphics then, but not astronomy,

were invented at Thebes, where the theory of the dog-star was

particularly investigated, because connected with their rural year.

Ptolemy[257] has preserved us an observation of an helaical rising of

Sirius on the 4th day after the summer solstice, which answers to the

2250 year before Christ; and there are great reasons to believe the

Thebans were good practical astronomers long before that period[258];

early, as it may be thought, this gives to Thebes a much greater

antiquity than does the chronicle of Axum just cited.

As such observations were to be of service for ever, they became more

valuable and useful in proportion to their priority. The most ancient

of them would be of use to the astronomers of this day, for Sir Isaac

Newton appeals to these of Chiron the Centaur. Equations may indeed be

discovered in a number of centuries, which, by reason of the smallness

of their quantities, may very probably have escaped the most attentive

and scrupulous care of two or three generations; and many alterations

in the starry firmament, old stars being nearly extinguished, and new

emerging, would appear from a comparative slate of the heavens made

for a series of ages. And a Theban _Herschel_[259] would have given us

the history of planets he then observed, which, after appearing for

ages, are now visible no more, or have taken a different form.

The dial, or gold circle of Osimandyas, shews what an immense progress

they had made in astronomy in so little time. This, too, is a proof

of an early fall and revival of the arts in Egypt, for the knowledge

and use of Armillæ had been lost with the destruction of Thebes, and

were not again discovered, that is, revived, till the reign of Ptolemy

Soter, 300 years before the Christian æra. I consider that immense

quantity of hieroglyphics, with which the walls of the temples, and

faces of the obelisks, are covered, as containing so many astronomical

observations.

I look upon these as the ephemerides of some thousand years, and that

sufficiently accounts for their number. Their date and accuracy were

indisputable; they were exhibited in the most public places, to be

consulted as occasion required; and, by the deepness of the engraving,

and hardness of the materials, and the thickness and solidity of the

block itself upon which they were carved, they bade defiance at once to

violence and time.

I know that most of the learned writers are of sentiments very

different from mine in these respects. They look for mysteries and

hidden meanings, moral and philosophical treatises, as the subjects

of these hieroglyphics. A sceptre, they say, is the hieroglyphic of a

king. But where do we meet a sceptre upon an antique Egyptian monument?

or who told us this was an emblem of royalty among the Egyptians at

the time of the first invention of this figurative writing? Again, the

serpent with the tail in its mouth denotes the eternity of God, that

he is without beginning and without end. This is a Christian truth,

and a Christian belief, but no where to be found in the polytheism

of the inventors of hieroglyphics. Was Cronos or Ouranus without

beginning and without end? Was this the case with Osiris and Tot,

whose fathers and mothers births and marriages are known? If this was

a truth, independent of revelation, and imprinted from the beginning

in the minds of men; if it was destined to be an eternal truth, which

must have appeared by every man finding it in his own breast, from the

beginning, how unnecessary must the trouble have been to write a common

known truth like this, at the expence of six weeks labour, upon a table

of porphyry or granite.

It is not with philosophy as with astronomy; the older the

observations, the more use they are of to posterity. A lecture of an

Egyptian priest upon divinity, morality, or natural history, would

not pay the trouble, at this day, of engraving it upon stone; and

one of the reasons that I think no such subjects were ever treated

in hieroglyphics is, that in all those I ever had an opportunity of

seeing, and very few people have seen more, I have constantly found the

same figures repeated, which obviously, and without dispute, allude to

the history of the Nile, and its different periods of increase; the

mode of measuring it, the Etesian winds; in short, such observations

as we every day see in an almanack, in which we cannot suppose, that

forsaking the obvious import, where the good they did was evident, they

should ascribe different meanings to the hieroglyphic, to which no key

has been left, and therefore their future inutility must have been

foreseen.

I shall content myself in this wide field, to fix upon one famous

hieroglyphical personage, which is _Tot_, the secretary of Osiris,

whose function I shall endeavour to explain; if I fail, I am in good

company; I give it only as my opinion, and submit it chearfully to the

correction of others. The word _Tot_ is Ethiopic, and there can be

little doubt it means the dog-star. It was the name given to the first

month of the Egyptian year. The meaning of the name, in the language of

the province of Siré, is an _idol_, composed of different heterogeneous

pieces; it is found having this signification in many of their books.

Thus a naked man is not a _Tot_, but the body of a naked man, with a

dog’s head, an ass’s head, or a serpent instead of a head, is a _Tot_.

According to the import of that word, it is, I suppose, an almanack,

or section of the phænomena in the heavens which are to happen in the

limited time it is made to comprehend, when exposed for the information

of the public; and the more extensive its use is intended to be, the

greater number of emblems, or signs of observation, it is charged with.

Besides many other emblems or figures, the common Tot, I think, has

in his hand a cross with a handle, as it is called _Crux Ansata_,

which has occasioned great speculation among the decypherers. This

cross, fixed to a circle, is supposed to denote the _four elements_,

and to be the symbol of the influence the sun has over them.

Jamblichus[260] records, that this cross, in the hand of Tot, is the

name of the _divine Being_ that travels through the world. Sozomen[261]

thinks it means the _life_ to come, the same with the ineffable image

of eternity. Others, strange difference! say it is the _phallus_,

or human genitals, while a later[262] writer maintains it to be the

mariner’s compass. My opinion, on the contrary is, that, as this figure

was exposed to the public for the reason I have mentioned, the Crux

Ansata in his hand was nothing else but a monogram of his own name TO,

and [TOT] signifying TOT, or as we write Almanack upon a collection

published for the same purpose.

[Illustration: _London Published December 1^{st}. 1789 by G. Robinson &

Co_]

The changing of these emblems, and the multitude of them, produced the

necessity of contrasting their size, and this again a consequential

alteration in the original forms; and a stile, or small portable

instrument, became all that was necessary for finishing these small

_Tots_, instead of a large graver or carving tool, employed in making

the large ones. But men, at last, were so much used to the alteration,

as to know it better than under its primitive form, and the engraving

became what we may call the first elements, or root, in preference to

the original.

The reader will see, that, in my history of the civil wars in

Abyssinia, the king, forced by rebellion to retire to the province of

Tigré, and being at Axum, found a stone covered with hieroglyphics,

which, by the many inquiries I made after inscriptions, and some

conversations I had had with him, he guessed was of the kind which I

wanted. Full of that princely goodness and condescension that he ever

honoured me with, throughout my whole stay, he brought it with him when

he returned from Tigré, and was restored to his throne at Gondar.

It seems to me to be one of those private Tots, or portable almanacks,

of the most curious kind. The length of the whole stone is fourteen

inches, and six inches broad, upon, a base three inches high,

projecting from the block itself, and covered with hieroglyphics. A

naked figure of a man, near six inches, stands upon two crocodiles,

their heads turned different ways. In each of his hands he holds two

serpents, and a scorpion, all by the tail, and in the right hand hangs

a noose, in which is suspended a ram or goat. On the left hand he holds

a lion by the tail. The figure is in great relief; and the head of it

with that kind of cap or ornament which is generally painted upon the

head of the figure called Isis, but this figure is that of a man. On

each side of the whole-length figure, and above it, upon the face of

the stone where it projects, are marked a number of hieroglyphics of

all kinds. Over this is a very remarkable representation; it is an old

head, with very strong features, and a large bushy beard, and upon it

a high cap ribbed or striped. This I take to be the Cnuph, or Animus

Mundi, though Apuleus, with very little probability, says this was

made in the likeness of no creature whatever. The back of the stone is

divided into eight compartments[263], from the top to the bottom,

and these are filled with hieroglyphics in the last stage, before they

took the entire resemblance of letters. Many are perfectly formed; the

Crux Ansata appears in one of the compartments, and Tot in another.

Upon the edge, just above where it is broken, is 1119, so fair and

perfect in form, that it might serve as an example of caligraphy, even

in the present times; 45 and 19, and some other arithmetical figures,

are found up and down among the hieroglyphics.

[Illustration: _N^o. 2_

A TABLE OF _HIEROGLYPHICS_, FOUND AT AXUM 1771.

London Publish’d Dec^r. 1. 1789. by G. Robinson & Co.]

This I suppose was what formerly the Egyptians called a book,

or almanack; a collection of these was probably hung up in some

conspicuous place, to inform the public of the state of the heavens,

and seasons, and diseases, to be expected in the course of them, as is

the case in the English almanacks at this day. Hermes is said to have

composed 36,535 books, probably of this sort, or they might contain

the correspondent astronomical observations made in a certain time at

Meroë, Ophir, Axum, or Thebes, communicated to be hung up for the use

of the neighbouring cities. Porphyry[264] gives a particular account of

the Egyptian almanacks. “What is comprised in the Egyptian almanacks,

says he, contains but a small part of the Hermaic institutions; all

that relates to the rising and setting of the moon and planets, and of

the stars and their influence, and also some advice upon diseases.”

It is very remarkable, that, besides my Tot here described, there

are five or six, precisely the same in all respects, already in the

British Museum; one of them, the largest of the whole, is made of

sycamore, the others are of metal. There is another, I am told, in

Lord Shelburn’s collection; this I never had an opportunity of seeing;

but a very principal attention seems to have been paid to make all of

them light and portable, and it would seem that by these having been

formed so exactly similar, they were the Tots intended to be exposed

in different cities or places, and were neither more nor less than

Egyptian almanacks.

Whether letters were known to Noah before the flood, is no where said

from any authority, and the inquiry into it is therefore useless. It

is difficult, in my opinion, to imagine, that any society, engaged in

different occupations, could subsist long without them. There seems to

be less doubt, that they were invented, soon after the dispersion, long

before Moses, and in common use among the Gentiles of his time.

It seems also probable, that the first alphabet was Ethiopic, first

founded on hieroglyphics, and afterwards modelled into more current,

and less laborious figures, for the sake of applying them to the

expedition of business. Mr Fourmont is so much of this opinion, that

he says it is evident the three first letters of the Ethiopic alphabet

are hieroglyphics yet, and that the Beta resembles the door of a house

or temple. But, with great submission, the doors of houses and temples,

when first built, were square at the top, for arches were not known.

The Beta was taken from the doors of the first Troglodytes in the

mountains, which were rounded, and gave the hint for turning the arch,

when architecture advanced nearer to perfection.

Others are for giving to letters a divine original: they say they

were taught to Abraham by God himself; but this is no where vouched;

though it cannot be denied, that it appears from scripture there were

two sorts of characters known to Moses, when God spoke to him on Mount

Sinai. The first two tables, we are told, were wrote by the finger of

God, in what character is not said, but Moses received them to read

to the people, so he surely understood them. But, when he had broken

these two tables, and had another meeting with God on the mount on

the subject of the law, God directs him specially not to write in the

Egyptian character or hieroglyphics, but in the current hand used by

the Ethiopian merchants, _like the letters_ upon a signet; that is,

he should not write in hieroglyphics by a _picture_, representing the

_thing_, for that the law forbids; and the bad consequences of this

were evident; but he should write the law in the current hand, by

characters representing sounds, (though nothing else in heaven or on

earth,) or by the letters that the Ishmaelites, Cushites, and India

trading nations had long used in business for signing their invoices,

engagements, &c. and this was the meaning of being _like the letters of

a signet_.

Hence, it is very clear, God did not invent letters, nor did Moses,

who understood both characters before the promulgation of the law upon

Mount Sinai, having learned them in Egypt, and during his long stay

among the Cushites, and Shepherds in Arabia Petrea. Hence it should

appear also, that the sacred character of the Egyptian was considered

as profane, and forbid to the Hebrews, and that the common Ethiopic was

the Hebrew sacred character, in which the copy of the law was first

wrote. The text is very clear and explicit: “And the stones shall be

with the _names_ of the children of Israel, twelve, according to their

_names, like_ the engravings of _signet_; every one with his _name_,

shall they be according to the twelve tribes[265].” Which is plainly,

You shall not write in the way used till this day, for it leads the

people into idolatry; you shall not type Judah by a _lion_, Zebulun by

_ship_, Issachar by an _ass_ couching between two burdens; but, instead

of writing by pictures, you shall take the other known hand, the

merchants writing, which signifies _sounds_, not _things_; write the

names Judah, Zebulun, Issachar, in the letters, such as the merchants

use upon their signets. And, on Aaron’s breast-plate of pure gold, was

to be written, in the same alphabet, like the engravings of a signet,

HOLINESS TO THE LORD[266].

These signets, of the remotest antiquity in the East, are worn still

upon every man’s hand to this day, having the name of the person that

wears them, or some sentence upon it always religious. The Greeks,

after the Egyptians, continued the other method, and described figures

upon their signet; the use of both has been always common in Britain.

We find afterwards, that, in place of stone or gold, for greater

convenience Moses wrote in a book, “And it came to pass, when Moses had

made an end of writing the words of this law in a book, until they were

finished;[267]”--

Although, then, Moses certainly did not invent either, or any

character, it is probable that he made two, perhaps more, alterations

in the Ethiopic alphabet as it then stood, with a view to increase

the difference still more between the writing then in use among the

nations, and what he intended to be peculiar to the Jews. The first

was altering the direction, and writing from right to left, whereas,

the Ethiopian was, and is to this day, written from left to right, as

was the hieroglyphical alphabet[268]. The second was taking away the

points, which, from all times, must have existed and been, as it were,

a part of the Ethiopic letters invented with them, and I do not see

how it is possible it ever could have been read without them; so that,

which way soever the dispute may turn concerning the antiquity of the

application of the Masoretic points, the invention was no new one, but

did exist as early as language was written. And I apprehend, that these

alterations were very rapidly adopted after the writing of the law, and

applied to the new character as it then stood; because, not long after,

Moses was ordered to submit the law itself to the people, which would

have been perfectly useless, had not reading and the character been

familiar to them at that time.

It appears to me also, that the Ethiopic words were always separated,

and could not run together, or be joined as the Hebrew, and that the

running the words together into one must have been matter of choice in

the Hebrew, to increase the difference in writing the two languages,

as the contrary had been practised in the Ethiopian language. Though

there is really little resemblance between the Ethiopic and the

Hebrew letters, and not much more between that and the Samaritan,

yet I have a very great suspicion the languages were once much nearer

a-kin than this disagreement of their alphabet promises, and, for

this reason, that a very great number of words are found throughout

the Old Testament that have really no root, nor can be derived from

any Hebrew origin, and yet all have, in the Ethiopic, a plain, clear,

unequivocal origin, to and from which they can be traced without force

or difficulty.

I shall now finish what I have to say upon this subject, by observing,

that the Ethiopic alphabet consists of twenty-six letters, each of

these, by a virgula, or point annexed, varying in sound, so as to

become, in effect, forty-two distinct letters. But I must further add,

that at first they had but twenty-five of these original letters,

the Latin P being wanting, so that they were obliged to substitute

another letter in the place of it. Paulus, for example, they called

Taulus, Oulus, or Caulus. Petros they pronounced Ketros. At last they

substituted T, and added this to the end of their alphabet, giving

it the force of P, though it was really a repetition of a character,

rather than invention. Besides these there are twenty others of the

nature of diphthongs, but I should suppose some of these are not of the

same antiquity with the letters of the alphabet, but have been invented

in later times by the scribes for convenience.

The reader will understand, that, speaking of the Ethiopic at present,

I mean only the Geez language, the language of the Shepherds, and of

the books. None of the other many languages spoken in Abyssinia have

characters for writing. But when the Amharic became substituted, in

common use and conversation, to the Geez, after the restoration of the

Royal family, from their long banishment in Shoa, seven new characters

were necessarily added to answer the pronunciation of this new

language, but no book was ever yet written in any other language except

Geez. On the contrary, there is an old law in this country, handed down

by tradition only, that whoever should attempt to translate the holy

scripture into Amharic, or any other language, his throat should be cut

after the manner in which they kill sheep, his family sold to slavery,

and his house razed to the ground; and, whether the fear of this law

was true or feigned, it was a great obstacle to me in getting those

translations of the Song of Solomon made which I intend for specimens

of the different languages of those distinct nations.

The Geez is exceedingly harsh and unharmonious. It is full of these

two letters, D and T, on which an accent is put that nearly resembles

stammering. Considering the small extent of sea that divides this

country from Arabia, we are not to wonder that it has great affinity to

the Arabic. It is not difficult to be acquired by those who understand

any other of the oriental languages; and, for a reason I have given

some time ago, that the roots of many Hebrew words are only to be found

here, I think it absolutely necessary to all those that would obtain a

critical skill in that language.

Wemmers, a Carmelite, has wrote a small Ethiopic dictionary in thin

quarto, which, as far as it goes, has considerable merit; and I am told

there are others of the same kind extant, written chiefly by Catholic

priests. But by far the most copious, distinct, and best-digested work,

is that of Job Ludolf, a German of great learning in the Eastern

languages, and who has published a grammar and dictionary of the Geez

in folio. This read with attention is more than sufficient to make

any person of very moderate genius a great proficient in the Ethiopic

language. He has likewise written a short essay towards a dictionary

and grammar of the Amharic, which, considering the very small help

he had, shews his surprising talents and capacity. Much, however,

remains still to do; and it is indeed scarcely possible to bring this

to any tolerable degree of forwardness for want of books, unless a

man of genius, while in the country itself, were to give his time and

application to it: It is not much more difficult than the former, and

less connected with the Hebrew or Arabic, but has a more harmonious

pronunciation.

CHAP. IV.

_Some Account of the Trade Winds and Monsoons--Application of

this to the Voyage to Ophir and Tarshish._

It is a matter of real affliction, which shews the vanity of all

human attainments, that the preceding pages have been employed in

describing, and, as it were, drawing from oblivion, the history of

those very nations that first conveyed to the world, not the elements

of literature only, but all sorts of learning, arts, and sciences in

their full detail and perfection. We see that these had taken deep

root, and were not easily extirpated. The first great and fatal blow

they received was from the destruction of Thebes, and its monarchy, by

the first invasion of the Shepherds under Salatis, which shook them to

the very foundation. The next was in the conquest of the Thebaid under

Sabaco and his Shepherds. The third was when the empire of Lower Egypt

(I do not think of the Thebaid) was transferred to Memphis, and that

city taken, as writers say, by the Shepherds of Abaris only, or of the

Delta, though it is scarcely probable, that, in so favourite a cause

as the destruction of cities, the whole Shepherds did not lend their

assistance.

These were the calamities, we may suppose, under which the arts in

Egypt fell; for, as to the foreign conquests of Nebuchadnezzar and

his Babylonians, they affected cities and the persons of individuals

only. They were temporary, never intended to have lasting consequences;

their beginning and end were prophesied at the same time. That of the

Assyrians was a plundering expedition only, as we are told by scripture

itself, intended to last but forty years[269], half the life of man,

given, for a particular purpose, for the indemnification of the king

Nebuchadnezzar, for the hardships he sustained at the siege of Tyre,

where the obstinacy of the inhabitants, in destroying their wealth,

deprived the conqueror of his expected booty. The Babylonians were a

people the most polished after the Egyptians. Egypt under them suffered

by rapacity, but not by ignorance, as it did in all the conquests of

the Shepherds.

After Thebes was destroyed by the first Shepherds, commerce, and it is

probable the arts with it, fled for a time from Egypt, and centered

in Edom, a city and territory, tho’ we know little of its history, at

that period the richest in the world. David, in the very neighbourhood

of Tyre and Sidon, calls Edom the strong city; “Who will bring me into

the strong city? Who will lead me into Edom[270]?” David, from an old

quarrel, and probably from the recent instigations of the Tyrians his

friends, invaded Edom[271], destroyed the city, and dispersed the

people. He was the great military power then upon the continent; Tyre

and Edom were rivals; and his conquest of that last great and trading

state, which he united to his empire, would yet have lost him the trade

he sought to cultivate, by the very means he used to obtain it, had not

Tyre been in a capacity to succeed to Edom, and to collect its mariners

and artificers, scattered abroad by the conquest.

David took possession of two ports, Eloth and Ezion-gaber[272], from

which he carried on the trade to Ophir and Tarshish, to a very great

extent, to the day of his death. We are struck with astonishment when

we reflect upon the sum that Prince received in so short a time from

these mines of Ophir. For what is said to be given by King David[273]

and his Princes for the building of the Temple of Jerusalem, exceeds in

value eight hundred millions of our money, if the talent there spoken

of is a Hebrew talent[274], and not a weight of the same denomination,

the value of which was less, and peculiarly reserved for and used

in the traffic of these precious metals, gold and silver. It was,

probably, an African or Indian weight, proper to the same mines, whence

was gotten the gold appropriated to fine commodities only, as is the

case with our ounce Troy different from the Averdupoise.

Solomon, who succeeded David in his kingdom, was his successor likewise

in the friendship of Hiram king of Tyre. Solomon visited Eloth and

Ezion-gaber[275] in person, and fortified them. He collected a number

of pilots, shipwrights, and mariners, dispersed by his father’s

conquest of Edom, most of whom had taken refuge in Tyre and Sidon, the

commercial states in the Mediterranean. Hiram supplied him with sailors

in abundance; but the sailors so furnished from Tyre were not capable

of performing the service which Solomon required, without the direction

of pilots and mariners used to the navigation of the Arabian Gulf and

Indian Ocean. Such were those mariners who formerly lived in Edom, whom

Solomon had now collected in Eloth and Ezion-gaber.

This last-mentioned navigation was very different in all respects from

that of the Mediterranean, which, in respect to the former, might

be compared to a pond, every side being confined with shores little

distant the one from the other; even that small extent of sea was so

full of islands, that there was much greater art required in the pilot

to avoid land than to reach it. It was, besides, subject to variable

winds, being to the northward of 30° of latitude, the limits to which

Providence hath confined those winds all over the globe; whereas the

navigation of the Indian Ocean was governed by laws more convenient and

regular, though altogether different from those that obtained in the

Mediterranean. Before I proceed, it will be necessary to explain this

phænomenon.

It is known to all those who are ever so little versant in the history

of Egypt, that the wind from the north prevails in that valley all the

summer months, and is called the _Etesian winds_; it sweeps the valley

from north to south, that being the direction of Egypt, and of the

Nile, which runs through the midst of it. The two chains of mountains,

which confine Egypt on the east and on the west, constrain the wind to

take this precise direction.

It is natural to suppose the same would be the case in the Arabian

Gulf, had that narrow sea been in a direction parallel to the land of

Egypt, or due north and south. The Arabian Gulf, however, or what we

call the Red Sea, lies from nearly north-west to south-east, from Suez

to Mocha. It then turns nearly east and west till it joins the Indian

Ocean at the Straits of Babelmandeb, as we have already said, and may

be further seen by consulting the map. Now, the Etesian winds, which

are due north in Egypt, here take the direction of the Gulf, and blow

in that direction steadily all the season, while it continues north

in the valley of Egypt; that is, from April to October the wind blows

north-west up the Arabian Gulf towards the Straits; and, from November

till March, directly contrary, down the Arabian Gulf, from the Straits

of Babelmandeb to Suez and the isthmus.

These winds are by some corruptly called the _trade-winds_; but this

name given to them is a very erroneous one, and apt to confound

narratives, and make them unintelligible. A trade-wind is a wind which,

all the year through, blows, and has ever blown, from the same point of

the horizon; such is the south-west, south of the Line, in the Indian

and Pacific Ocean. On the contrary, these winds, of which we have now

spoken, are called _monsoons_; each year they blow six months from the

northward, and the other six months from the southward, in the Arabian

Gulf: While in the Indian Ocean, without the Straits of Babelmandeb,

they blow just the contrary at the same seasons; that is, in summer

from the southward, and in winter from the northward, subject to a

small inflexion to the east and to the west.