BABYLONIAN LITERATURE. 



93 



libraries, in Greek no less than in Arabic 

 manuscripts, contain considerable fragments 

 of Nabatha3an literature. I will only offer 

 one example, because it presents the sin- 

 gular instance of a discovery made with 

 extraordinary penetration, by a scholar of 

 the great French school of the early part of 

 the seventeenth century, and which, buried 

 in oblivion for nearly two hundred years, 

 has acquired an unexpected importance 

 from the researches of modern criticism. 

 In the preface l to his treatise, De Annis 

 Climactcricis et Antiqua Astrologia (Leyde, 

 1648), Salmasius, after having quoted Ten- 

 kelusha according to Xasireddin Tousi, adds : 

 " lij&J autem sive Tenkclus ille Babylonius 

 quern memorat Nasirodinus, is omnino est 

 qui Tsvxpos Ba0uAo>vio Gra?cis vocatur, et 

 fortasse in scriptis Grsecorum perperam 

 hodie legitur Tuxpo$ pro TiWpos, idque 

 denVxum ox illo nomine Babylonio Tenclus. 

 Nisi sit verms Grsccos ad nomen sibi 

 familiarc proptcr adtinitatem soni vocabulum 



1 This preface is not paged ; the catch word of the leaf is c. 3. 



