THE DISPERSION 189 



Susiana, were those primitive people, preceding the 

 Elamites of history, who are said to have spoken an 

 agglutinate language, 1 then we have at least one 

 stage of this migration. A second line leads west to 

 the eastern coast of the Mediterranean, to Egypt and 

 to North Africa. A third passes south-westward 

 through Southern Arabia and across the Red Sea 

 into interior Africa. To the sons of Japhet are 

 ascribed two lines of migration, one through Asia 

 Minor and the northern coasts of the Mediterranean ; 

 another north-west, around the Black Sea. The 

 Semites would seem to have been a less wandering 

 people at the first, but subsequently to have encroached 

 on and mingled with the Hamites, and especially on 

 that western line of migration leading to the Mediter- 

 ranean. All this can be gathered from undisputed 

 national names in the several lines of migration above 

 sketched, without touching on the more obscure and 

 doubtful names or referring to tribes which remained 

 near the original centre. We must, however, inquire 

 a little more particularly into the movements bearing 

 on Palestine and Egypt. 



1 Sayce (Hibbert Lectures) and Bagster's Records oj the Past. 

 Inscriptions of Cyrus published in the last volume of the latter appear 

 to set at rest the vexed questions relating to early Elam. It would 

 seem that in the earliest -times Cushites and Semitic Elamites 

 contended for the fertile plains and the mountains east of the Tigris, 

 and were finally subjugated by Japhetic Medes and Persians. Thus 

 this region first formed a part of the Cushite Nimrodic empire 

 (Genesis ii. n, x. 8) ; it then became the seat of a conquering Elamite 

 power (Genesis xiv. I to 4) ; and was finally a central part of the 

 Medo-Persian empire. All this agrees with the Bible and the 

 inscriptions, as well as in the main with Herodotus. 



