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emblems — ^the winged Baalim in several forms. Important, 

 therefore, is the change which has now taken place in the solar 

 emblem. The winged king^s-head is become what the sacred 

 eagle was before. Another step and our investigation will be 

 brought to a conclusion. 



We have seen several instances of the adaptation of the 

 other solar emblems to the zodiacal signs, expressive of the 

 attributes of kings, or of the influence of seasons. I believe 

 the signs of the zodiac to have been antediluvian. But I 

 believe them then to have been simply the figures of men and 

 animals, expressive of the seasons over which they then, and 

 in that country, presided, and that the compound signs, such 

 as we now possess, were the results of Sabsean composition in 

 the Babylonian chamber of imagery. Take for example the 

 Capricorn. In the Indian zodiac this sign is composed of the 

 Goat and the Fish as separate animals. A beautiful emblem 

 of the season, when in Assyria the mountain rains caused the 

 rivers to overflow. The union of these two into one animal is 

 plainly shewn in the ancient Babylonian gem, where the priest 

 appears to be worshipping the new moon, in the sign of the 

 Capricorn ; above is the branch of an ashre or grove, and the 

 ladder-like figure below, I believe to represent the five degrees, 

 which, according to the ancient division of the circle, into sixty 

 parts, would belong to each sign. Sagittarius is another com- 

 pound sign, and one which comes closer to our present appli- 

 cation. A figure from the zodiac of Dendera may be referred 

 to. It is expressive of the hunting season — not in Egypt, 

 where the country in the autumn is flooded — but in Chaldea, 

 from whence its origin is apparent. The figure of a king 

 with two faces under one crown, aptly representing the united 

 kingdoms of Nineveh and Babylon, and the whole emblem 

 forming no very imaginative allusion to the founder of both 

 empires — that "hunter mighty before God" — Nimrod him- 

 self, in commemoration of whom this sign became altered in 

 Chaldea. But how was it altered ? Amongst the beautiful 



