80 The Birds of the Assyrian Monuments and Records. 
originally onomato-poetic, and expresses the hoarse guttural 
cry of the raven. Like our word crow, so common in various 
languages, is the word "raven" itself; the Latin corvus, 
Sanskrit, kdrava ; German, Babe, pace Max Miiller, who 
instances the fact of the Sanskrit kru or ru as embracing 
many cries, from the harshest to the softest, all of which 
may be perfectly true, but does not in the least affect the 
question that the word originally designated the ■ caw of 
the raven; for the word cru might subsequently have 
been used to express soft sounds as well as harsh ones. The 
bird -name aribu must be distinguished from the insect- 
name 'e-ri-bu HfW V**") J us ^ mentioned in con- 
nection with the locust bird. 'Eribu is to be referred to the 
Heb. root rdbdh (TiyV), ^ e multitudinous," as locusts pre- 
eminently are ; the same idea of multitudes is conveyed by 
the Accadian word BIR (^y) "hosts," "swarms," &c. Dis- 
tinction must be made between the Assyrian names of aribu 
a "raven," and 'eribu & "locust," and Dr. Delitzsch has 
already pointed this out in his explanation of one or two 
passages in the History of Sennacherib. One passage 
reads thus : " like an invasion of many aribi on the face of 
the country forcibly they came to make battle." Another 
passage is similar : " from the midst of the ships arabis " (an 
adverbial form) " like aribi they came." Now the word aribi 
has generally been rendered by "locusts"; swarms of these 
devastating insects seemed so natural, while on the other 
hand, " swarms of many ravens " seemed to convey, at a 
first glance, a natural history error ; ravens being almost 
always more or less solitary in their habits, seldom asso- 
ciating in numbers more than two together all the year 
round. It is true that the common raven does occasionally 
assemble, but not generally in great multitudes, when food 
in the shape of carrion presents itself ; a but Dr. Delitzsch is 
correct, both philologically and zoologically ; for in these pas- 
1 The raven's habit of congregating occasionally in flocks is, perhaps, more 
frequent than is usually supposed. See Seebohm's " History of British Birds," 
(Pt. ii, p. 535), now in course of publication. Naturalists will hail with delight 
the appearance of this admirable work, which breathes freshly of field, forest, 
hill, moor, lake, river, and sea. 
