^7^ 



1895.] * ^ [Brinton. 



The " Asiatic Ethiopians," mentioned by Herodotus and some 

 other early Greek writers, were not negroid. They are described 

 as having straight hair, and it has been shown by Georges Radet 

 that some of them at least were Semites.* 



2. An Alleged Primitive Hamitic (Gushite) Race. 



By the " Hamitic " stock, ethnographers and linguists now 

 mean those who speak dialects of the Berber languages of 

 northern Africa and their affined tongues, the Galla, Somali, 

 Danakil, etc., of eastern Africa. The "Gush" of the ancient 

 Egyptians was largely peopled by Hamites, and the oldest in- 

 habitants of Egypt itself were probably of Hamitic blood. 



The idea of locating members of this stock on west Asian 

 soil was no doubt first derived from the book of Genesis. f 

 That respected authority states that Nimrod, the son of Gush 

 and grandson of Ham, settled in the plain of Shinar and built 

 the first cities of Babylonia. This statement was eagerly 

 adopted by the early Assyriologists, notably by Sir Henry and 

 Prof. George Rawlinson, by Lepsius, Loftus and others. The 

 language of old Babylon was even identified with the mod- 

 ern Galla, and the passage of the Hamites or Cushites across 

 the Red Sea, by way of Arabia to the Persian Gulf, was accu- 

 rately traced ! % 



Another band was supposed to have entered Palestine and to 

 have left representatives in the light-complexioned Amorites of 

 the highlands. 



It must be acknowledged that later researches have accumu- 

 lated no evidence in favor of these ancient legends. Except in 



* See his extended discussion of the passages in the Rcime Archcologique, Tome xxii 

 (1893), p. 209, s<?. 



t The genealogical list of peoples in Genesis x is often appealed to in support of theo- 

 ries in ethnography. That list has much interest politically, geographically and even 

 historically ; but cannot at all be accepted on questions of ethnic affiliations. Schrader, 

 Hommel and Delitzsch have expressed the opinion that the " Cush" of Gen. x. 8, etc., 

 refers to the Kashites of the lower Tigris, who will be discussed later. Fried. Delitzsch, 

 Die Sprac.he der Kosiaer, p. 61, note. 



J See Prof. Rawlinson in Smith's Diet, of the Bible, s. v. "Chaldeans;" and Sir Henry 

 in tlie notes to his translation of Herodotus ; W. K. Loftus, Travels in CluUdea and Susi- 

 ana, pp. 69, 70, 93. Lepsius' views are severely criticised by Dr. VV. Max Miiller in his 

 erudite work, Asienund Earopa nach altegyptischen Tnschriflen (Leipzig, 1893), p. 343. The 

 theory has recently been developed by M. Lombard in his " Description ethnographique 

 de I'Asio Occidentale," in the Bidl. dc la Sm. d' Anthropolofjie of Paris, 1890, though his 

 connotation of the term chamitique differs from that of Rawlinson. 



PROC. AMER. PniLOS SOC. XXXIV. 147. J. PRINTED MAY 9, 1895. 



