144 



appear to me at least very problematical*. The 

 god of the Moabites, Chamos, or Camosch-f-, 

 who has so wearied the patience of the learned, 

 Apollo Chomens cited byStrabo and by Ammi- 

 anus Marcellinus, Beelphegor, Amun or Ha- 

 mon, and Adonis, all, without doubt, represent 

 the Sun in the winter solstice ; but what can 

 we conclude from a solitary and fortuitous re- 

 semblance of sounds, in languages that have 

 nothing besides in common? 



The Maypure tongue is still spoken at Atures, 

 although the mission is inhabited only by Gua- 

 hivoes and Macoes. At Maypures the Guareken 

 and Pareni tongues only, are now spoken. From 

 the Rio Anaveni, which falls into the Oroonoko 

 north of Atures, as far as beyond Jao, and to 

 the mouth of the Guaviare (between the fourth 

 and sixth degrees of latitude), we every where 

 find rivers, the termination of which, veni%, re- 

 calls to mind the extent to which the Maypure 

 tongue heretofore prevailed. Veni, or weni, sig- 

 nifies water, or a river. The words camosi and 

 keri, which we have just cited, are of the idiom 



* There appeared in 1806 at Leipsick a book with this 

 title. Untersuchungen ueber dice von Humboldt am Orinoco ent_ 

 deckten Spuren der Phcenicishen Sprache. 



f Voss. Theol. Gent. Lib. 2, cap. ? , p. 174. Creuzer Sym- 

 bolik der alien Falker, vol. 3, p. 248. De Wette, Hebr. arch. 

 1814, p. 281. 



t Anaveni, Mataveni, Mariveni, &c. 



