72 NOTE ON THE EMPIRE OF THE HITTITES. 
extended to the borders of Egypt. Although it is thought from the evidence 
of the Hittite proper names, that some of the tribes north of Carchemish 
and Aleppo were of the same race, we have no proof that they ever spread 
north of the Taurus chain. To the south, however, as well as at Hebron, there 
are philological traces of the tribe having lived at some epoch or other at 
Hit on the Euphrates, at Tell Hatteh near Kadesh, and even at Kefr Hatteh 
in Philistia. From all this it will be seen that there is plenty of room for 
believing that Hittite record, if it is ever known, may take us back to pre- 
historic times. As to the inscriptions which are at present known to be in 
this script, there are five basaltic texts in relief at Hamath, one at Aleppo, 
six at Jerabis. At Ibreez there is a bas-relief. There is an inscription on 
the so-called statue of Sesostris at Karabel, and another on the statue of the 
weeping Niobe on Mount Sipylos. There are texts at Boghaz Keui, and at 
Eyuk, which is not far inland from the shores of the Black Sea. A stone 
bowl has lately been found at Babylon with an incised inscription of the 
same character as the Hamath stones. Upon this Captain Conder, in his 
recent volume on “Syrian Stone Lore,” tentatively based the conjecture that 
the key to the language might be found in Babylonia. Then there are the 
terra seals, discovered by Sir Henry Layard in the Record Chamber of 
Sennacherib’s Palace at Kounyunjik, which are now in the British Museum ; 
and the silver boss of Tarkondemos, with Hittite and cuneiform inscription, 
of which fortunately an electrotype fac-simile was taken, although the 
original was rejected by the British Museum as a forgery and is now believed 
to have been lost. All these examples have established the fact that this 
writing was used by a people who spread themselves over Asia Minor, 
Northern Syria, and Mesopotamia, possibly before Egypt was a Power. It 
will be of great interest to know whether Mr. Gladstone’s conjecture that 
they were identical with the Kyrewi, of Homer—the only allusion to them 
which has ever been detected in classic history—can be supported. Above 
all will it be interesting to see how far the arguments whereby Dr. Wright 
has endeavoured to assign to ‘The Empire of the Hittites’ its true place in 
ancient history can be verified.”—St. James’s Gazette. 
