TEANSACTIONS OF SECTION H. 855 



There was an enormous difference between the chest capacity of the men and 

 that of the women, which could only be accounted for by the female practice of 

 wearing' corsets. 



3. On the Early Baces of Western Asia. By Major C. R. CoKDEB, E.I]. 



The students of Aryan and Semitic antiqixity hare found themselves confronted 

 for the last forty years in Western Asia, in Greece, and Italy, by languages and 

 racial types neither Aryan nor Semitic, and showing races whose civilisation is 

 earlier. In three cases these languages are found to be Turanian (in the more 

 limited meaning of the word), viz. Akkadian, Medic, and Etruscan. As regards 

 these languages the study of Akkadian, as it existed about oOOO B.C., shows a 

 grammar nearest to that of Turkic languages and even of the Manchu Tartars, and 

 a vocabulary which has been in great measure recovered, though in part still 

 doubtful, and which, while comparable with Finnic and Ugrian languages, is yet 

 nearest to the Turkic. The language of the Medes known from the inscriptions of 

 Darius, about 500 B.C., has a similar but more advanced grammar, and a vocabulary 

 held by Oppert and others to be nearest the Turkic. The Etruscan, of which the 

 numerals were shown by Dr. Isaac Taylor in 1874 to be Turanian, is also found to 

 compare in grammar and vocabulary with the Akkadian. 



The question now raised is whether the early population of Asia Minor and 

 Syria, of which traces are recoverable from various sources, did not belong to the 

 same stock. In Asia Minor, Lenormant believed a Turanian stock to have existed 

 very early, and in Syria this was the belief of the late Dr. Birch, and has been 

 urged by Captain Conder from 1883 onwards. 



(1) As regards Syria. — The names of towns and persons are recoverable from 

 Egyptian monuments and papyri in IGOO and 1340 PC. In the south these are 

 mainly Semitic. In the north the country of the Phreniciaus and Kheta gives us 

 200 town names and 20 royal names which are neither Semitic nor Aryan. Com- 

 paring these words with Akkadian, and with the living Turkic and Ugrian languages, 

 the author finds that the translation is suitable. Among the personal words. Tar, 

 Sar, Lvl, Nazi, Essehu and Tarkun are the most distinctive, and among geo- 

 graphical terms Tanii, ' building,' Su, ' river,' Tep, ' hill,' and others are distinctive 

 of the Turkic dialects. From these words it is fairly safe to conclude that a 

 Turanian population inhabited Syria in the earliest historic times akin to the Turks 

 and Turkomans still found in the same region. 



In iSorthern Syria also certain hieroglyphic inscriptions of a very archaic kind 

 are found, which, by general consent of archaeologists, have been attributed to the 

 same race ; and, by the same general consent, the hieratic character derived from 

 these hieroglyphics is recognisable in the later syllabary generally known as 

 Cypriote or Asianic. This connection was tirst discovered by Professor Sayce. 

 The author has proposed to treat these syllables as representing Turkic words, and 

 by this means to recover the sounds of the original hieroglyphics of Northern Syria. 

 He finds that by this method it is possible to read the short bi-lingual known as 

 the ' Boss of Tarkondemos.' The words Ma and Ku, for ' country ' and ' king,' 

 which he thus recovered in 1887, though questioned by Dr. Sayce as not being 

 Akkadian, are admitted by other authorities to belong to that language and are 

 ■widely-spread Turanian words. 



The evidence of physiognomy, dress, and religious customs among the Kheta, 

 or Hittites, points to the same conclusion. Their type of face is recognised to be 

 Tartaric or Mongolian, and their adoration of the sun, moon, mountains, clouds, 

 rivers, and the sea is similar to the beliefs of other Turanian peoples, as is their 

 practice of exogamy mentioned in the Bible. 



The author further points out that the Kara Khitai, or ' black Khitans,' of 

 Eastern Turkestan — an important people in Central Asia as early as the time of 

 the geographer Ptolemy — possessed a name identical with that of the Kheta. 

 Their language is similar in many words to Akkadian, their religious beliefs and 

 warlike customs resembled those of the Kheta. The pigtails found to be worn by 

 the latter are also of Tartar origin in China. 



