104. HORMUZD RASSAM, ESQ:, 
It may be remembered that on a former occasion* I had 
to bring to the notice of this Institute the valuable and most 
lportant discovery which was made by the above-named 
scholar of another Cush around which ran the river Gihon. 
He proved then -and since, before the “Society of Biblical 
Archeology,” ¢ that this Cush was the country mentioned in 
Genesis 11, 13, and consequently the river that compassed it 
must have been the Gihon, the second river of the Garden of 
Eden. Now to find that identical river is the difficulty ; but 
if we take it for granted that some unnatural causes, such as 
earthquakes, volcanic eruption, or even upheaving of 
terrestrial bodies had taken place at the sources of the 
Euphrates and the Tigris, then the obscurity which hangs 
over the river of Eden erould vanish. 
The river Gihon I take to be the ancient Pyramus, now 
called by the natives of Asia Minor Gehan (a corruption of 
Gihon) which rises almost from the same spot as one of the 
tributaries of the Euphrates named Tookma; and after it is 
joined by another river at Maraash, called in Turkish “ Aksoo ” 
(or white water), which flows down from three small lakes 
called also in Turkish “ Maadan-Gool” (or the Mine’s-lake), it 
runs into the gulf of Alexandretta, a distance of about 200 
miles. 
It has been erroneously alleged that the word Gehan was 
the common name amongst the Arabs for a river. It is not 
so, because Gehan is not an Arabic word, but Turkish and 
Persian, which means a Universe and applied by the Turks, 
generally, to all great rivers, just like the Arabs of Meso- 
potamia call all large rivers Firra, a corruption of the word 
Firrath or Euphrates. It is most probable that the Pyramus 
(a Greek appeliation) was known formerly by its primitive 
name Gihon, and was corrupted in after time by the Tartars 
into Gehan, that is to say, the Universe. 
With reference to the influence which volcanoes and earth- 
quakes have had on rivers even up to late years, I cannot 
do better than refer to well-known peslogics authorities 
who have written on the subject. 
* Babylonian Cities, read before the Victoria Institute, see vol. xvii. 
+ “Proceedings of the Society of Biblical Archeology,” December, 1881. 
t There is a remarkable allusion made in the Book of the Prophet 
Joel, regarding the Garden of Eden, in connexion with God’s terrible 
judgment upon Zion. In the 3rd verse of the 2nd chapter it is prophesied 
thus: “ A fire devoureth before them ; and behind them a flame burneth ; 
the land is as the Garden of Eden before them, and behind them a desolate 
wilderness ; yea, and nothing shall escape them.” (Note p. 119.) 
