•40 HOUMUZD IJASSAM, ESQ., ON BIBLICAL LANDS, THEIR 



With regard to the language, no one can deny that the 

 mother tongue of the present Chaldeans is akin to the 

 Clialdee of the Targam and some parts of the Books of 

 Daniel and Ezra, besides a number of Aramaic words used 

 in tlie Old and New Testaments like " Yagar-Sahadutha " 

 (heap of witness), "Bar" (son), "Abba" (father), '• Talitha- 

 -cumi" (damsel arise), " Marantha" (Our Lord's coming), c^-c. 



To show how near the Chaldee of Daniel is to the language 

 used by the present Chaldeans and the so-called Nestorians 

 in the mountains of Assyria and Media, I quote in the 

 appendix a few verses from the orthography of tlie 5th 

 cliapter of Daniel in parallel columns with the Chaldean text 

 called pesheto ('but erroneously termed in Europe '• Syriac "), 

 Avliich shows how stiiking is the resemblance between the 

 two versions. I have inserted the words without the vowels, 

 which were only introduced in the seventh century, inas- 

 much as all the ancient manuscripts were unpointed — like 

 the present Arabic in common use amongst the Arabic 

 speaking peoples all over the world. I have also omitted 

 to punctuate the Hebrew letters — to conform them to 

 the ' reading of the Chaldee of old ; because the vowel 

 points, like those introduced by modern Chaldeans and 

 Syrians, were adopted in the time of the compilation of 

 the Masorah.* 



Bar Hebra3us, also known as Abulfaragius, who lived in 

 the thirteenth century, in writing about the Aramean 

 language of the Cluddcans, remarks thus : — '• The Orientals 

 who are descendants of the Chaldeans are a wonderful 

 people, in their tongue there is no difference between the 

 pthaha and zkapa." These two vowels of the five, invented 

 for the Chaldean alphabet by Jacob, Bishop of Edessa in 

 the seventh century, are only used by the present Chaldeans 

 in their writings, and are pronounced now in the same way 

 as they were twelve hundred years ago. Then in another 

 place the same author in writing about the Aramean 

 alphabet remarks thus on the first letter Alep : " There 

 are three dialects of the Syrian tongue : 1st, the Aramean 

 or Syriac, properly so-called, which is the most elegant of all, 

 and used in Mesopotamia and by the inhabitants of Roha, 

 Edessa, Haran, and the outer Syria; 2nd. the dialect of 

 Palestine spoken by the inhabitants of Damascus, Mount 

 TJiianus, and the inner Syria ; 3rd, the Chaldean or 



* See Appendix. 



