390 



of those who believed that the Iberians are the descendants of Tubal. 

 This accordance, b^^ no means an nnlikely one to be true, appears to 

 conciliate the different views adopted on this subject, the several autho- 

 rities that seem at first sight in contradiction, and even the varieties 

 of etymologies that exist. Nevertheless we do not hesitate to affirm, 

 ivith the best critical writers who have treated of Spanish history, that 

 we ignore not only the first inhabitants of Spain, but those even of all 

 Europe."^* 



MohedanOj further, inveighing against the fabulous chronology of the 

 fictitious Berosus, which assigns 142 years after the deluge for the 

 epoch of the first population of Spain, and also against Garibay and 

 D'Ocampo, who have adopted the same date evidently from the same 

 fabulous source, justly observes, that within a period of forty years 

 after the dispersion at Sennaar, the population of so remote a region as 

 that of Spain was an impossibility ; and he cites a passage from Shuck- 

 worth in his " History of the "World, Profane and Sacred," to show that 

 the human race could not have multiplied sufficiently in 130 years, the 

 time allowed according to his estimate for this great peopling of Asia 

 Minor, so as to admit of such extensive migrations from the East as we 

 are told took place. 



" In the opinion of Shuckworth the most that can be admitted is 

 that, immediately after the dispersion, some of the scattered people had 

 proceeded to the distant regions of Europe, settled there, and in course 

 of time were followed by colonies of their race from the East. 



"The period, then, of the arrival of the first peoplers of Spain," ob- 

 serves Mohedano, cannot be antecedent to the birth of Phaleg, in whose 

 time, according to the Scriptures, the dispersion at Sennaar took place. 

 The deluge took place in the year of the world, 1656. The birth of 

 Phaleg was in the year 1757. The confusion of tongues, and disper- 

 sion at Sennaar, cannot be of a date very distant from that year, and in 

 all probability the date of those events was the year of the world 1770 

 (or 114 years after the deluge) ; before the Christian era 2230 years." 



In the same work, " Historia Litteraria de Espana desde su primeira 

 Poblacion," we find in the 1st book of the first volume this very candid 

 summary of its contents : — 



" We ignore the first inhabitants of Spain. The primitive people of 

 it were neither civilized nor enlightened. The several provinces of 

 Spain did not form one common state. The government of the principal 

 persons was a kind of monarchy of those small territories. We ignore 

 the laws, religion, and customs of the primitive inhabitants. 



The only historical documents we possess in relation to the ancient 

 Spanish people consist of scanty notices scattered over the works of 

 Greek and Latin authors. If the sages of the Erench Academy of In- 

 scriptions and Belles Lettres complain of want of knowledge on the 

 same subjects, in relation to the ancient inhabitants of Gaul, how much 

 more reason have Spaniards to lament their utter ignorance on these 



* Mohedano's " Hist. Litt. de Espana," torn, i., sec. 37. 



