to the Ethnological Society of London. 345 



manners and customs of the old Assyrians. The style of 

 their sculptui'es is said to exhibit a higher state of ai-t, than 

 the monuments of Egypt. The excavations of Mr Layard at 

 Nimroud (supposed to be the city of Nimrod), are much more 

 extensive. The drawings of the sculptures there discovered, 

 are wonderful for the perfection of art which they display, 

 as well as for the state of preservation. These remains be- 

 long to the ancient dynasty of Assyrian kings, who reigned 

 at Nineveh before the age of Sardanapalus, and whose very 

 existence has long been doubted, though it rested partly on 

 scriptural record, and in part on the testimony of Greek 

 historians. 



The ethnological fact of greatest moment that may be 

 inferred from these discoveries, supposing the opinions which 

 I have cited as to the language of the Median writings to be 

 correct, and supposing also that the Assj'rian inscriptions 

 are in a Syro- Arabian dialect, which there is reason to be- 

 lieve, is the almost juxtaposition, or the existence in adjoin- 

 ing districts, during the earliest epoch of history, of the three 

 greatest Asiatic families of nations. Sir William Jones, in 

 his Historical Essays which at the time when they were 

 written, seemed to throw a new light on the history of eastern 

 nations, thought he found traces, which concentrated, or 

 brought near to one common point, the principal races of 

 men. He sought indications of the existence of the Indo- 

 European race, the Shemite or Assyrian orSyro-Arabian race, 

 and the Tartar or High Asiatic nations in some part of 

 the ancient Iran. But proof was at that time wanting, and 

 he was obliged to eke out a few plausible arguments by 

 abundance of conjectures. Now, however, we have the fact 

 as it is alleged before our eyes. We have long inscriptions 

 in the language of the Japhetic or Arian race of ancient 

 Persia, in the country where they were governed by their 

 native kings of the Achacmenian or Caianian dynasty. To 

 the northward is the adjoining region of Media, where it is 

 supposed that the language read by Westergaard was spoken, 

 and this, as we are told, was a Turanian or Tartar speech ; 

 while, at no great distance, on the western side of i\\Q Tigris, 

 liuman language had undergone a different culture, and that 



