BABYLONIAN LITERATURE. 77 



contradictory and absurd genealogies to 

 Canaan, son of Ham. Nemrod, is, accord- 

 ing to them, a title common to all the 

 sovereigns of the Nabathseans, on which 

 account they have made a plural to it 

 *&\*A\ l An Arabian geography, which M. 

 Quatremere believes to be anonymous, but 

 which M. Eeinaud 2 has shown to be the 

 work of Dimeshki, enumerating the nations 

 comprised under the name of Nabathoeans, 

 places among them the Chaldseans, Cas- 

 dseans, Jenbans, Garmeeans, Kutaris, and 

 Canaanites? M. Quatremere 4 quotes at the 

 same time a passage from the "Agricul- 

 ture" where the Canaanites and the inhabi- 

 tants of Syria are comprehended among the 

 Nabatheeans. The total want of judgment 

 and accuracy which characterises Arabian 

 historians, when treating of ancient history, 

 does not however admit of any safe conclu- 

 sions being drawn from these passages. 



1 Crrwolson, pp. 67-68 ; Quatremere, pp. 57-58, 62. 



2 Introd. a la Geographie d'Aboulfeda, p. 150 ff. 



3 Quatremere, pp. 62-63. * P. 61. 



