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cian language, has gathered all that has been found on 

 coins and inscriptions, but the whole does not amount to a 

 small part of the present one. It is therefore of great 

 value as a relic of that nation, and the most careless ob- 

 server can trace our own alphabet up to these forms. It is 

 also identical with the ancient Hebrew and Samaritan, in 

 which the word of God was preserved for so many ages." 



Sidon, 16th Feb., 1855. 



The Secretary of the Institute, Mr. John E. Gavit, had 

 the inscription lithographed, and it was immediately sent 

 out in the name of the Albany Institute, among the learned 

 men of all countries, in advance of any other publication of 

 it. Soon after Prof. W. A. Miller read before the Institute 

 a paper on the phonetic analogy of languages, in which he 

 gave a synopsis of the inscription. Several linguists at- 

 tempted to render it into Hebrew ; but from the great an- 

 tiquity of the inscription, and the scanty knowledge of the 

 Phoenician, nothing clear and satisfactory was made of it. 



The Hon. Edward Everett having sent a copy to the 

 librarian of the Institute of France, that gentleman put it 

 into the hands of M. PAbbe Barges, professor of Hebrew in 

 the Sorbonne, who published a brochure in French, of forty 

 quarto pages, with plates, which he forwarded to the Insti- 

 tute, and from which the following particulars are gathered : 



The news of the discovery of a Phoenician inscription at 

 Sidon, he says, had excited a great sensation in the learned 

 world, who awaited with impatience the deciphering of the 

 epigraph. Being desirous to satisfy the wishes of those 

 who had called his attention to the subject, as well as to 

 gratify his own curiosity, he set about the task, but met 

 with so many solecisms in the inscription, that he began 

 seriously to doubt the authenticity of the copy submitted 

 to him, and to fear that he should be made the dupe of 

 some audacious forger, as he expresses it. Meanwhile, 

 another copy of the inscription having been sent to Mr. 

 Bunsen, of London, several learned men to whom it had 



