PRESIDENT'S ADDRESS. 9 



of information concerning the Hittite people, we do not as yet 

 possess the key by which they can be read in consecutive order, for 

 the inscriptions are on scattered tablets, which cannot always be 

 placed together. Sometimes the date can be settled ; for instance, 

 when the names of Shalmenezer, Tiglath-pileser, and Sargon 

 appear, the Bible decides their epochs and succession. With the 

 exception of Chedorlaomer, the Bible makes no reference to the 

 earlier Egyptian and Assyrian monarchs. The soil of Canaan, 

 however, had seen the Babylonian armies passing through it. 

 Haran was well known to the Chaldaean kings, and Sargon I. of 

 Accad, who had carved his name on the rocks of the Mediterranean 

 coast and crossed over to the island of Cyprus, had made expedi- 

 tions in the far west. The campaign, therefore, of Chedorlaomer 

 and his allies mentioned in the fourteenth chapter of Genesis was 

 no new thing. The fragments of Manetho's Egyptian history, 

 preserved by Eusebius and other writers of the third century B.C., 

 and of Berosus of the fourth century, are not of much value. The 

 Lion inscription of king Kapini belongs to the ninth century B.C., 

 but the information concerning the Hittite people, given by the 

 Assyrian inscriptions, dates about two centuries before. Besides 

 Kapini's inscription there are others in Asia Minor belonging to the 

 latter part of the eighth century B.C. ; those of Etruria and Spain 

 are probably not older than the third century, A.D. 



There is an historico-genealogical record, not of Hittite history 

 alone, but of the whole ruling population of the East, made by 

 Hittite scribes in the eighteenth century B.C., and inserted by the 

 Editor of the Chronicles in the early chapters of the first book, and 

 brought by him or by a subsequent hand into relation with the 

 tribes of Israel. There are many passages in the record where incon- 

 sistency with an Israelite connection is so apparent that they would 

 not be allowed in the sacred text had there been the least suspicion 

 of deception or untruthf ulness. There is no evidence that the Jews 

 ever made use of this Kenite record for genealogical purposes. It 

 contains many names which are not Israelite ; some of them are 

 purely Egyptian, others are Kenite names, such as Otlmiel, Caleb, 



