Bittern C"IBp or llSp, kippocf; Sept. t\ivoc, i. e. hedgehog) occurs but three times in Scripture, in con- nection with the desolations of Babylon, Idumaea, and Nineveh (Isa. xiv, 23; xxxiv, 11; Zeph. ii, 14), and has been variously interpreted owl, osprey, tortoise, porcupine, otter, and, in the Arabic, bustard. Bochart, Shaw, Lowth, and other authorities, have supported the opinion that it refers to the porcupine (see espe- cially Keith, Evidence, ed. 1840, p. 435, 490), making the first syllable to be derived from i"I3£, Icaneh' ', " spine ;" in confirmation of which, Bochart, with his wonted learning, cites the Chaldee, Hebrew, Arabic, and Ethiopian names of the porcupine and hedgehog, which apparently confirm his opinion, while Gesenius defends the same identification, although by a different derivation, from ^2^, Jcaphad', "to contract," i. e. into a ball ; but this meaning is utterty irreconcilable with the context. In Isa. xiv, 23, " I will make it a possession for the bittern, and pools of water," etc., the words are plain and natural. Marshes and pools arc not the habitation of hedgehogs, for they shun water. In Isa. xxxiv, 11, it is said, the cormorant and the bittern shall possess it, the owl also and the raven shall dwell in it," etc., that is, in the ruins of Idumaea. Hero, again, the version is plain, and a hedgehog most surely would be out of place. Zeph. ii, 14, " Both the cormorant and the bittern shall lodge in the upper lin- tels of it, and their voice shall sing in the windows," etc. Surely here kippod cannot mean the hedgehog, a nocturnal, grovelling, worm-eating animal, entirely or nearly mute, and incapable of climbing up walls; one that does not haunt ruins, but earthy banks in wooded regions, and that is absolutely solitary in its habits. The arguments respecting the Heb. term it- self, drawn from indications of manners, such as the Beveral texts contain, are, on the contrary, positive, and leave no doubt that the animal meant is not a hedgehog, nor even a mammal, but a bird, and that of some aquatic species. Hence the word must bear an interpretation which is applicable to one of the feath- ered tribes, probably to certain wTading species, which hive, chiefly on the neck, long pointed feathers, more or less speckled. This is confirmed by the Arabic version, which has Al-hmibam, the name of a bird Which, according to Shaw, is of the size of a capon, but of a longer habit of body. The bittern answers these conditions, and is a solitary bird, loving marshy j ground. Its scientific name is Botaurus slellaris, and J it belongs to the GruidsB, or cranes. The Arabian bus- tard, in;,: houbara, might be selected if it were not that bustards keep always in dry deserts and uplands, and thai they never roost- their feet not admitting of perching— but rest on the ground. The term seems most applicable to the heron tribes, whose beaks are formidable Bpikes that often kill hawks— a fact well known to Eastern hunters. Of these, Xi/cticorax Eu- or common night-heron, with its pencil of white feathers in the Crest, is a Bpecies not uncommon in the marshes of Western Asia ; and of several species
of bittern, the Ardea (botaurus) stellaris has pointed long feathers on the neck and breast, freckled with black, and a strong pointed bill. After the breeding- season it migrates, and passes the winter in the south, frequenting the marshes and rivers of Asia and Eu- rope, where it then roosts high above ground, uttering a curious note before and after its evening flight, very distinct from the booming sound produced by it in the breeding-season, and while it remains in the marshes. Though not building, like the stork, on the tops of houses, it resorts, like the heron, to ruined structures, and is said to have been seen on the summit of Tank Kesra at Ctesiphon. The common bittern is a hird nearly of the size of the common heron, but differing from it greatlj'in the col- or of its plumage. The crown of the head is black, with a black spot also on each side about the —=«^^ angle of the mouth ; ^_ the back and upper part are elegantly variegated with dif- ferent colors, black, brown, and gray, in beautiful arrange- ment. This species of bird is common Bittern,
only in fenny countries, where it is met with skulking about the reeds and sedge; and its sitting posture is with the head and neck erect, and the beak pointed di- rectly upward. It permits persons to approach near to it without rising. It flies principally toward the dusk of the evening, and then rises in a very singular manner, by a spiral ascent, till quite out of sight. It makes a curious noise when among the reeds, and a very different, though sufficiently singular one, as it rises on the wing in the night. (See Penny Cyclopcedia, s. v.) See Porcupine.
Bitumen is doubtless denoted by the Heb. term ^n, chemar' (Auth. Vers, "slime," only occurs in Gen. xi, 3; xiv, 10; Exod. ii, 3), so called from its boiling up as an earth-resin from subterranean foun- tains not far from Babylon, also anciently in the vale of Siddim, and occasionally from the bottom of the Dead Sea, which is thence called Lacus Asphaltites — the lake of bitumen. There are two or three kinds, hut each have nearly the same component parts. It is usually of a blackish or brown hue, and hardens more or less on exposure to the air. In its most fluid state it forms naphtha ; when of the consistence of oil, it be- comes petroleum; at the next stage of induration it be- comes elastic bitumen ; then maliha ,• and so on until it becomes a compact mass, and is then called asphaltum. All these substances are remarkable for their inflamma- ble character; the bituminous oils are of late extensive- ly used for illumination and lubrication, that naturally produced being commonly called " petroleum," while that manufactured from this is termed "kerosene." Neither the inventions of art nor the researches of science have discovered any other substance so well adapted to exclude water and to repel the injuries of worms as the mineral pitch or bitumen. According to Gen. xi, 3, bitumen was used instead of lime or ce- ment for the building of the tower of Babel. Hit, the ancient Is, upon the Euphrates, says Mr. Ainsworth, " has been celebrated from all antiquity for its never- failing fountains of bitumen, and they furnished the imperishable mortar of the Babylonian structures" (Resea?rhes, p. 89). Prof. Eobinson, in 183S', examined the shores of the Dead Sea. He says: " In the same plain were slime-pits, that is to say, wells of bitumen or asphaltum, the Hebrew word being the same as the