1898-99.| THE OLDEST WRITTEN RECORDS OF THE LEAGUE OF THE IROQUOIS, 247 
play. It looks as if they had little room to work in, and accordingly 
adopted an ancient fashion of shorthand with which to puzzle posterity, 
Nevertheless, every stroke in the compound character stands for a well- 
known phonetic syllable, and on careful investigation yields its value 
and meaning. This will be made clear in the inscriptions I have chosen 
for illustration, so that I need not tire the reader with examples of it at 
this stage. As the inscriptions given are copied from Forster’s Sinai 
Photographed, the numbers they bear in that work are appended. 
The first is Forster’s No. 36, and consists of six lines which, transliter- 
ated, yield the following: 
NO. shi-ko-ba 
ku da shi-ta shi-ba 
shi ba ma da ba_ ku-shi-no 
ku-ma dzu ta de ka-na-ta 
ku dza no-ba shi da shi ku da_ shi ta ba 
ku ma no to 
Turning this into as near an approach to current Japanese as its archaic 
style will allow of, it yields the following legend : 
shi kobe 
dead chief 
Kudashita shiba 
Kudashita death places 
shibume tobe Kushi no 
soldier opposing Kusht of 
Kumi dzuto Dekanata 
League head Dekanata 
kudzu Noba  satashi Kudashita be 
causes to descend Noba toatd Kudashtta under 
Kumi no to 
League of band 
Freely translated we read: “An opposing soldier of Kushi kills the 
deceased Chief Kudashita: Dekanata, the head of the League, causes 
the Band of the League, under Kudashita, descend to ally itself with 
Noba.” 
Here is the problem which this document presents. In the Wady 
Mokkateb, or written valley of the Sinaitic peninsula, is found an ancient 
inscription in virtually the same characters as those of the Yarmouth 
Stone and the West Newbury written rock, the former commemorating 
