SOME LINGUISTIC EVIDENCE REGARDING ITS DATE. 241 



made the net safe (?) around Tiamat, he seized the four winds 

 that she might not in any wise escape, the south wind, the north 

 wind, the east wind, the west wind. (Tablet IV, 41, 43.) Of 

 Ishtar it is said : " Ana shamami etela " ; She (lit. he) went up 

 to the skies. (Nimrod-Epos, 45, 81.) Again : Teumman kiam 

 iqbi, sha Ishtar ushannu milik temeshu " : So spoke Teumman, 

 the course of whose plan Ishtar had deranged (masc. form). 

 (Smith's Assurbanipal, 119, 23.) In Daniel the same con- 

 struction frequently occurs, though it is contrary to the grammar 

 of later Western and Eastern Aramaic alike. Examples will 

 be found in Dan. vii, 8, 19, etc., where in the Kthib the masc, 

 form of the verb is used, just as in these Assyrio-Baby Ionian 

 examples with fem. nouns. In the Qri, on the contrary, the 

 grammar is changed and the verb used in the fem., according 

 to later usage. So masculine pronominal suffixes are constantly 

 employed instead of feminine ; as, e.g., in Dan. vii, 8, 12, 19, 

 and in many other places. All such are corrected in the Qri. 

 They are not, however, mistakes of the transcriber, but proofs 

 of antiquity ; for the same thing is fouyid in the papyri. For 

 instance, in P. 13495, lines 18, and 20, 24, 27, the masc. occurs 

 for the fem.,* but no attempt has been made at correction, the 

 idiom being then admitted as in Daniel. Here again the papyri 

 prove the fact that Daniel was not the composition of the late 

 period to which the Higher Critics in general attribute it. 



A glance at the various readings in the Massoretic text of 

 Daniel, published by Ginsburg, will convince the reader that 

 the Jews in later, but still early, times found that in a large 

 number of details the spelling and the grammar of Daniel (and 

 in somewhat slighter measure that of the Aramaic of Ezra- 

 Nehemiah) differed from that finally recognized as correct. 

 That is to say, the Biblical Aramaic is in these respects archaic 

 in comparison with what ultimately came to be recognised as 

 the proper literary standard for composition in the language. 

 For example, in Daniel and Biblical Aramaic generally the 

 definite pi. of masc. nouns ending in -ay in the sing, is -dye. 



* As another instance of the same idiom from Assyrian we give the follow- 

 ing: " Issuk mulmula, ikhtepi karash-sha (var. -shu) " ; He placed the 

 spear, he rent her (var. his, though referring to Tiamat) belly (Creation 

 Tablets, IV, 101). So in Contract Tablets, -ka (thy, masc.) is often used for 

 -ki (thy, fem.), especially, perhaps, in Nabu-nahid's time. Vide Tallquist, 

 " Die Sprache d^ Contracte Nabu-na'ids," and Muss-Arn., p. 362. 



B 



