580 A SKETCH OF BABYLONIAN SOCIETY. 



named, which differ in relative level at two points ; at one place the 

 water of the Euphrates flows over and feeds the Tigris, while 100 miles 

 southward an equalization occurs by the reflux of the Tigris into the 

 Euphrates. 



If we consider the climate of the country, we find in the south, in the 

 whole of Babylonia, the characteristics of the hot desert climate modi- 

 fied only by the moisture from the rivers. The desert extends up along 

 the Euphrates and spreads far away beyond it over to Mesopotamia. 

 Nevertheless we must form no false picture of the Mesopotamian des- 

 ert. After heavy rains it is overgrown by vegetation with wonderful 

 rapidity ; and the traveler from the Occident is often amazed when, 

 after the rain, the entire desert appears yellow with crocus plants or 

 blue with other growths. At such times the Arabian nomads cross the 

 Euphrates to pasture their cattle, and thus thousands of years ago 

 strife arose between the residents and the invaders, which continued 

 yet further during the historical development. 



So far as historical notices accessible up to this time extend, there 

 still remains the sole probability that in the south of the country trav- 

 ersed by the two streams, northward, eastward, and westward from the 

 Persian Gulf, originally dwelt people of a race who used an agglutina- 

 tive language, were characterized by a compact bodily frame, and were 

 of a Mongoloid type. I do not wish to enter deeply into several much 

 too radical theories concerning the Sumerians and their racial affinities; 

 I would merely like to refer to the fact that I have already in my 

 book, Hittite Inscriptions, called attention to the possibility of a connec- 

 tion between the so-called Hittites, non- Aryan proto-Armeniaus, and 

 Sumerians, and that the ancient population of Elam might easily be 

 included with these. But even in the earliest times Semites appear to 

 the north of the district bordering on the Persian Gulf. As in the 

 historical development between 2000 and 600 B. C, two invasions and 

 settlements of Semitic nomads can be recorded, in which connection the 

 theory advanced by Winckler concerning the Aramaeans and the Chal- 

 deans is especially to be noticed, it is very natural to assume also for 

 these most ancient Semites a nomadic period, which had already ended 

 when history begins to raise the curtain before our searching eyes. 



The political supremacy of these oldest Semites introduced racial 

 variations. We may look upon the invading Kassites from the Kas- 

 sa;an mountains as a third element, which also for a time furnished the 

 acknowledged rulers of Babylonia. 1 The second 2 wave of Semitic immi- 

 gration, the Aramaic tribes, had begun in the time of the Kassu rule, 

 and for centuries furnished the nomadic population of the steppes, 

 against whom the population of the cities were engaged in struggle. The 



1 These Kassites soon succumbed to the higher civilization of the Semites, who, in 

 their turn, stood upon the shoulders of the Sumerians. 



2 Or the third, if it is necessary, as now appears to be clear, to assume, after the 

 Babylonian-Semitic immigration, a Canaanitic one. (I, dynasty from Babylon.) 



