THE HUMAN SPECIES. 399 



THE GAURS AND PERSIANS. 



WHETHER the Chaldeans, or Chasdim of the Hebrews, 

 were only hordes of robbers at the time they are 

 placed by geographers in Arabia Petrsea, or whether 

 they were a distinct people from the learned caste of 

 Chaldees at Babylon, is not quite clear, though in 

 either case they must still be regarded as mountaineers 

 before they were established in Babylonia. The phy- 

 sical characters of the Assyrians, and their locality 

 alike attest that they, the same, or a kindred race 

 were also mountaineers, who had migrated, by marching 

 along the flank of the Caspian chain, till they establish- 

 ed themselves in eastern Armenia ; but whether they 

 were allied to the Karduchi, Kurds of the present time, 

 does not appear, although, in Persian tradition, the 

 Gaurs were the first conquerors of Aria or Iran. The 

 name, again, indicates mountaineers or giants ; and the 

 region whence they departed, was no doubt Paropami- 

 sus, or the Gordii Montes. In that case, they passed 

 most likely by the Helmund to Lake Zurra, and spread- 

 ing over Aria, they were ultimately driven forward to 

 the present Kurdistan, probably by the Persians, who 

 in their turn had been tenants of Bactria ; for all the 

 traditionary events of the first dynasty are referred to 

 the time when they were expelled by the Ou-sun, fair- 

 haired tribes from Thibet, or by Massagetae from the 



