226 THE SHEPHERD KINGS OF EGYPT. 



Mstorical and hai-dly worthy of the name, so that this reflux actually 

 marks the beginning of true Asiatic civilization. Although Ashchur 

 was the god of Assyria, the country was known by the name of the 

 son of Shem, at least to the sacred writers. Yet it is well to observe 

 two passages of Scripture in which Asshur and Moab are united, 

 showing that the old Shethite alliances still subsisted after the family 

 of Ashchur had removed to the east. These passages are Numbers 

 xxiv. 17, 22, 24; Psalm Ixxxiii. 8. Names which clearly present 

 the distinction between the words Asshur and Ashchur are Sacchoris 

 and Shagaraktiyach. The first of these is a Babylonian king 

 mentioned by Aelian, who was the grandfather of Tilgamus, another 

 monarch of the same country. ■^° The second is one of the recently 

 deciphered riames of Babylonian sovereigns who, at Sippara, where ' 

 Xisuthrus laid up the memorials of his flood, built a temple. Kiprat 

 Arba, the fovir races, as it is supposed, are connected with Shagarak- 

 tiyach and his family. It is hard not to find Kirjath Arba here, "in 

 relation to the father of the four sons of Naarah. I have already 

 mentioned the Bushiu- Asshur of Assyria as presenting a name not 

 unlike the Egyptian Busiris. The descendants of Ashchur certainly 

 did reign in Assyria, which sustained a somewhat similar relation 

 to Babylonia to that which the Shepherds sustained towards the 

 Horite line in Egypt. It is instructive to read the series of Ash- 

 churite names which Sir Henry Rawlinson has found in the inscrip- 

 tion upon the black obelisk which stood in the centre of the mound 

 at JSTimroud. In Temen-bar, whose inscription it is, v^e have a 

 reminiscence of Temeni or Timan-hor. He adores Assarac (Ashchur), 

 Husi (Achuzam), and Set (Sheth), and calls himself King of Zahiri 

 (Zohar). 



Achuzam I have already identified with Aos, who is the same as 

 the Husi of Assyria and the Hea of other monuments. Taauth, we 

 learn, was the female reproduction of Ao, and in her name the 

 Egyptian Thoth or Athothes, whom we have found to be Achuzam, 

 again appears. The character and functions of this god agree ■ in 

 every respect with those of the Egyptian deity. He is the ruler of 

 the abyss, the king of rivers, the regulator of aqueducts or it may be 

 f-of drainage, the serpent, the source of all knowledge and science. In 

 : a form similar to tliat which appears in the words Dioscuri and Tasm, 

 he is presented to xis as Dhizan or Desanaus, confirmation of the 



10 Aeliani de Animal, xii. 21. 



