1903.] 



JASTROW—THE HAMITES AND SEMITES. 185 



constitution of mankind. The inscriptions of the Assyrian 

 kings abound in geographical details,' and the interest of 

 both Babylonians and Assyrians is still further attested by 

 the numerous geographical lists' that have been found in 

 Ashurbanapal's Library and elsewhere. While it is true that these 

 lists, as a rule, were prepared for practical purposes, in connection 

 with the campaigns or as tribute lists or as exercises to serve in the 

 training of scribes, yet a theoretical interest must also in the course 

 of time have been awakened and some of the lists clearly betray 

 such interest. What applies to Assyria is true also of Babylonia, 

 with perhaps this difference : that in a land like the latter in which 

 culture had reached a higher level than in the north, the theoreti- 

 cal or, as we might also put it, the scientific interest must, if any- 

 thing, have been much stronger. That the intellectual class among 

 the Hebrew writers was acquainted with Babylonian literature 

 admits scarcely of doubt," and whether the compilers of the Priestly 

 Code actually had some cuneiform models before them to serve as 

 the bases for such a list as is found in P, it is certainly permissible 

 and indeed a most reasonable supposition to attribute to Babylo- 

 nian-Assyrian influence the striking feature of P's list that it deals 

 so largely with groups of peoples that are of interest to Babylonian - 

 Assyrian history and of scarcely any at all to Hebrew history. So 

 of the sons of Japheth, Gomer, Madai, Tubal and Meshech occur 

 more or less frequently in Assyrian inscriptions/ and to these we 

 may add Ashkenaz,' and perhaps Togarmah.^ Nor can it be 

 entirely accidental that so many of the groups included under Jap- 

 heth should be encountered again in the exilic prophet Ezekiel 

 living in Babylonia. He refers to Gomer, Gog, Javan, Tubal, 



1 A glance at the Indices to such works as Schrader's Ksilinschriften und 

 GescJiichtsforschung, Delitzsch's Wo Lag das Paradies. and Winckler-Zim- 

 mern's Keilvischriften und das Alte Testament will suffice to show how large 

 the geographical horizon represented by the cuneiform annals is. 



2 E.g., Rawlinson, ii, 50-53. 



3 See, e.g., D. H. Miiller's Ezechiel Studien, pp. 56-62, who gives some inter- 

 esting illustrations that seem to point conclusively to Ezekiel's acquaintance with 

 Babylonian literature. See also Winckler's paper, " Der Gebrauch der Keil- 

 schrift bei den Juden " {Altorientalische Forschungen, iii, i, pp. 165-174)- 



*See the Indexes in the works above referred to. 



^See above, p. 176, note 2, and also Baer's Libti Danielis, Ezrae et Nehe- 

 miae (Leipzig, 1882), p. ix. ^ • r ■ 7 



6 See Delitzsch's IVo Lag das Paradies, p. 246, and Jeremias' A. T. im Lichte 

 des Alten Orients, p. 152. 



