CHAP. I.] 



THE GKEEKS. 



551 



torical notice of Ceylon that has come down to us 1 as 

 the memoirs of Alexander's Indian officers, on whose 



size of a country of which Onesi- 

 critus and Nearchus had just brought 

 home accounts so surprising 1 ; and 

 that he should speak of it with con- 

 fidence as an island, although the 

 question of its insularity remained 

 somewhat uncertain at a much later 

 period. 



1 FABBICTUS, in the supplemental 

 volume of his Codex Pseudepiyraphi 

 veteris Testamenti, Hamb., A.D. 1723, 

 says, " Samarita, Genesis, yiii. 4, tra- 

 dit Noae arcam requievisse super 

 montem r}<; Serendib sive Zeylan. 

 P. 30; and it was possibly upon 

 this authority that it has been stated 

 in KITTO'S Cyclopaedia of Biblical 

 Literature, vol. i. p. 199, as " a curi- 

 ous circumstance that in Genesis, 

 viii. 4, the Samaritan Pentateuch 

 has Sarandib, the Arabic name of 

 Ceylon," instead of Ararat, as the 

 resting place of the ark. Were this 

 true, it would give a triumph to spe- 

 culation, and serve by a single but 

 irresistible proof to dissipate doubt, 

 if there were any, as to the early 

 intercourse between the Hebrews and 

 that island as the country from which 

 Solomon drew his triennial supplies 

 of ivory, apes, and peacocks (1 Kings, 

 x. 22). Assuming the correctness 

 of the opinion that the Samaritan 

 Pentateuch is as old as the separa- 

 tion of the tribes in the reign of 

 Rehoboam, B. c. 975-958, this would 

 not only furnish a notice of Ceylon 

 far anterior to any existing autho- 

 rity ; but would assign an antiquity 

 irreconcilable with historical evidence 

 as to its comparatively modern name 

 of " Serendib." The interest of the 

 discovery would still be extraordinary, 

 even if the Samaritan Pentateuch 

 be referred to the later date assigned 

 to it by Frankel, who adduces evi- 

 dence to show that its writer had 

 made use of the Septuagint. The 

 author of the article in the Biblical 

 Cyclopaedia is however in error. 

 Every copy of the Samaritan Pen- 

 tateuch, both those printed in the 

 Paris Polyglot and in that of WALTON, 



as weU as the five MSS. in the Bod- 

 leian Library at Oxford, which con- 

 tain the eighth chapter of Genesis, 

 together with several collations of the 

 Hebrew and Samaritan text, make 

 no mention of Sarandib, but all ex- 

 hibit the word " Ararat " in its pro- 

 per place in the eighth chapter of 

 Genesis. "Ararat" is also found 

 correctly in BLATNEY'S Pentat. 

 Hebrceo-Samarit., Oxford, 1790. 



But there is another work in 

 which " Sarandib " does appear in 

 the verse alluded to. PIETRO DELLA 

 VALLE, in that most interesting letter 

 in which he describes the manner 

 in which he obtained at Damascus, 

 in A. D. 1616, a manuscript of the 

 Pentateuch on parchment in the 

 Hebrew language, but written in 

 Samaritan characters ; relates that 

 along with it he procured another on 

 paper, in which not only the letters, 

 but the language, was Samaritan 

 "che non solo e scritto con lettere 

 Samaritane, ma in lingua anche 

 propria de' Samaritani, che e un 

 misto della Ebraica e della Caldea." 

 Viaggi, 8fc., Lett, da Aleppo, 15. 

 di Giugno A.D. 1616. 



The first of these two manuscripts 

 is the Samaritan Pentateuch, the 

 second is the " Samaritan version " of 

 it. The author and age of the second 

 are alike unknown; but it cannot, in 

 the opinion of Frankel, date earlier 

 than the second century, or a still 

 later period. (DAVISON'S Biblical Cri- 

 ticism, vol. i. ch. xv. p. 242.) Like 

 all ancient targums, it bears in some 

 particulars the character of a para- 

 phrase ; and amongst other departures 

 from the literal text of the original 

 Hebrew, the translator, following the 

 example of Onkelos and others, has 

 substituted modern geographical 

 names for some of the more ancient, 

 such as Gerizim for Mount Ebal 

 (Deut. xxvii. 4), Paneas for Dan, and 

 Ascalon for Gerar; and in the 4th 

 verse of the viiith chapter of Genesis 

 he has made the ark to rest" upon 

 the mountains of Sarandib." Onkelos 



