360 



on the alleged fragments of Berosus and Manetho. The great mischief 

 done by Annius to Spanish history, especially, was in destroying the 

 authentic character of that portion of the early Spanish annals which 

 might be worthy of some credit and aathenticity, as brief though imper- 

 fect notices of early historical events and personages. 



Those brief notices and data were woven by him into a regular 

 system of chronology, making out of the mention of a few of the pri- 

 mitive sovereigns a complete series of kings in chronological order, from 

 Tubal downwards to the fusion of the Iberian races in the nation of 

 their Eoman victors. 



The Cavalier Don Joseph Pellicer was the first Spanish writer to 

 expose effectually the imposture of Annius ; and this task he effected 

 very successfully in his work entitled " Beroso de Babilonia in Chaldea, 

 distinguido del Beroso de Annio de Yiterbo en Italia." 



Pellicer observes that the true Berosus is thus made mention of by 

 Eusebius in his Evangelical Preparation :" — Berosus, the Babylonian^ 

 a priest of Belus, who flourished in the time of Alexander the Great, 

 and dedicated to Antiochus the Third, the successor of Seleucus, the 

 History of the Chaldeans, in three books ; and who recorded the ex- 

 ploits of their kings, amongst whom he makes mention of one named 

 ^abuchadonosor. 



The works of Berosus exist no longer, except in fragments preserved 

 in some ancient authors. His histories of the Babylonians of Chaldea, 

 of the Modes and Persians, and of the Assyrians, as they are called, are 

 referred to by Josephus, Athenseus, Tacianus, Clemens Alexandrinus^ 

 Polyhistor, and some early monkish writers. 



There are numerous evidences of fraud, according to Pellicer, in the 

 references of the Berosus of Annius to the Celts. 



In the reign of the fourteenth Assyrian monarch, he says, the Celts 

 of the country subsequently called Gaul were ruled over by Lugao ; and 

 at that time Celtica began to be called Lugdunense, and its inhabitants 

 Ludovicos. The former name is feigned, and the latter is not Celtic, 

 but German. Lugduno, or Lyons, was hardly known till the time of 

 Augustus. The third European nation of the spurious Berosus is Ke- 

 thim, as he calls Italy, the Ketim of Moses, which in the Scriptures is 

 plainly described as being in Greece ; and in the Eirst Book of the Mac- 

 cabees is said to be in Macedon, from which ''land of Ketim Alex- 

 ander marched to encounter Darius." 



His fourth nation of the Tuyscones, or Germans, Annius evidently 

 borrowed the name of from Tacitus, as, in his account of the manners of 

 Germans, he makes m^ention of a people called Tuystanes. But in the 

 time of Berosus, neither this name nor that of Germania was known. 

 He describes a fifth European nation, but without giving its series of 

 kings, that of Ionia in Greece. The true Ionia, says Pellicer, was in 

 Asia Minor, in Caria of ^olia ; it was not a kingdom, but a region di- 

 vided into twelve remarkable cities. It was the colonies of this Ionia 

 which were established in Peloponnesus, Attica, and Thebes, which pro- 



