176 THE BIRTHPLACE OF ANCIENT 



the great Ptoenician stock, according to Dr. Movers/" is the nation of 

 the Philistines, and of them I cannot forbear quoting Hitzig's decided 

 language, " Ich habe gefundea : die Philisfaer sind keine Semiten, 

 sondern pelasgischen Stammes ; und ihre Sprache war deren sparliche 

 Ueberreste, meist Eigennamen, darthun, mit dem Sanskrit und dem 

 Griechischen verwandt.""^ It is not a little remarkable that the first 

 state we hear of after the destruction of the cities of the plain is that 

 of Abimelech, king of the Philistines of Gerar, who bordered closely 

 upon the Amalekites."^ These Philistines, who are shown from the 

 names Phicol, Ahuzzath, Gerar, etc., to have been of the Indo-European 

 or Japhetic family, like the Phoenician pastors of Egypt,"* were in a 

 favourable position for invading that country, as the Arabian tradition 

 charges them with doing ;"^ being situated just midway between the 

 old home on the Jordan, whence earthquake and flood expelled them, 

 and the coveted wealth of the Nile valley. A striking coincidence 

 appears in the earliest history of Persia, which has links to bind it 

 with that of almost every other people, and especially with the histories 

 of Egypt, India, Chaldea and Arabia. The first Iranian king, after 

 the great destruction of mankind, which came upon them on account 

 of their wickedness, was Gilshah or Kaiomers, whom the Arabs call 

 Ubul-Muluk, or the Father of Kings."" His grandson Houcheng, or 

 Pischdad, connects by the first name with the Indian Vichnou, and by 

 the second, removing the mere prefix of the Coptic article (Pi), with 

 the Arab Shedad, which is identical with the Welsh Seithwedd, the 

 Indian Soutadanna, the Egyptian (Fo)stat3 the Philistine Ashdod, and 

 the Athenian Astu or Fastu. "'^* The legend connected with this 

 name is invariably that of a flood. The son of Houcheng, again, 

 is Tahmouras, who is thoroughly identified with Demarous, or Dema- 

 roon, of Phoenicia, and Demophoon of the Greek story."^ This latter 



111 Movers die Phcenizier, i., p. 1, &c. 



112 " I have found it : the Pliilistuies are no Semites, but of a Pelasgian stock, and their 

 language, as the slenderj remains, mostly of proper names, prove, was related to the Sanskrit 

 and the Greek," 



lis Genesis, xx., xxvi. 



114 Hitzig, die Philistaer, 77, 119, 294, &e. 



115 Hitter, Comp. Geog. of Pal., iii., 269. Sale's Koran (Preliminary Discourse, Section 1). 

 ii« Bussell's Connection, ii., 28, 31. "6* Diod. Sic. i., 16. 



11' This connection appears in Dewbund (demon destroyer), a name of Tahmouras. Demo- 

 phoon is a word like Bellerophon. Movers (die Phoenizier, 661, &e.) connects Demarous 

 (Demaroon) with the river Damouras or Tamyras, in Phrenicia, and thus with Tamyras of 

 Cyprus. Tahmouras, like Tamyras, is the sun. 'As Demarous is the father of Melcartus, so 

 Tahmouras is father of Djemschid. As Demaroon is adopted son of Dagon, so is Tahmouras the 



