Brinton.] '^'^ [April 19, 



According to Lehraann, however, the people at the parting of 

 the rivers, the Akkads, were Semitic;* and Zimmern, who 

 believes them Sumerians, acknowledges that they spoke a 

 "younger," i. e., more Semitized dialect.f This seems to inti- 

 mate that if there was a Sumerian people, its culture was 

 learned from an earlier inland Semitic nation, and not the re- 

 verse, as Sa3'ce and others above quoted have maintained. This 

 supposition, it appears to me, would explain away more of the 

 difficulties in the case than any theory yet offered ; and I do not 

 remember that it has heretofore been suggested. 



The Elamites, Kashites, Ansanians and Proto-Medes. 



As will be seen above, the consensus of opinion is in favor of 

 considering these as branches of one stock. 



The main difficulty is with the Kashites (Kashshu). Their 

 territory adjoined Elam, and just about where it was situated 

 Herodotus locates a region " Kissia," and Strabo and Pliny, a 

 free, mountain bandit tribe, the Cossjei, The effort has been 

 made to distinguish between these ; but the identities of both 

 name and location are too complete to admit reasonable doubt 

 but that the same people was intended. | The Kashites are de- 

 scribed as mountaineers living in tents, just as Strabo depicts 

 the mode of life of the Cossfei. 



The ancient inscriptions in the various dialects of this stock, 

 to wit, the Susie, the Neo-Susic, the Ansanian, the Apirian and 

 the Proto-Medic, are comparatively numerous, but it must be 



* ShamaxJishamukin, p. 57. 



fWhat is known as the g dialect. Zimmern, Balnjlmnsche Busfpsalmen, p. 7. The myth 

 of the culture-hero, Cannes, lialf man, half fish, rising from the waters of the Persian 

 Gulf, has, of course, no historic value, any more than that of Ea, the marine god, who 

 created the first man. 



JFriedrich Delitzsch asserts that the proper names in the Proto-Medic inscriptions, 

 " fast unverkennbar arischcs Geprage tragen " (Die Sprache der Cornier, p. 49). Dr. Hugo 

 W^iukler says that there is "kaum eine andere Moglichkeit vorhanden," than that the 

 Kashites belonged with the Medes and Elamites ; GescMchte Babylon iens. p. 78. McCurdy, 

 reviewing the evidence, decides this is so, "in all probability." Iliston/, etc., p. 143. 

 They ruled Babylonia six hundred j-ears and their names do not seem to be Semitic, ex- 

 cept where such were adopted. Their name for Babylon was Kardtmiash. Gesenius 

 long ago suggested that the Chaldees might be "the Chardim," allied to Kard. Kurd, 

 names applied to Aryan peoples, derived from old Persian Kard, Ossctic, Kliard, etc., the 

 ancient Aryan term for the sword or dagger, and also for iron (Schradcr, Prehistoric Ai}r 

 tiquities of the Aryan Peoples, p. 224). There was a tribe, the Kaldani, among the Kurds, 

 who claimed to be lineal descendants of the ancient Chaldeans (Lofius, Travels, p. 99). 

 What if the primitive Babylonian civilization should turn out to be of Aryan origin 

 after all? 



