Some have sought for another Cush in more north- rly regions of Asia, as in the Persian province of Imsistan or Susiana, in Cuthah, a district of Babylo- ia, etc. ; and as Nimrod, the youngest son (or de- cendant) of Cush, spread hb conquests in that direc- lon, it is no doubt possible that his fiither*s name night be preserved in the designation of some part of he territory or people. Bat here again the data are lot very satisfactory ; indeed, the chief thing which ed to the supposition is the mention, in the description if the site of PaHdise (Gen. ii, 18), of a land of Cush, »mpassed by tiie river Gihon. Yet, even though the lame of Cash were more variously applied in Scrip- ure than it really is, it would not be more so than ras the corresponding term Ethiopia among the [greeks and Bomans, which comprised a great many lations far distant, as well as wholly distinct from iBch other, and having nothing in common but their iwarthv, sun-burnt complexion — AlOiotj/ q. d. al9bg n}v w^tv, i. e. "burnt-black in the face." Homer [0dy8$. i, 22) speaks of them as "a divided race — the last of men — some of them at the extreme west, and others at the extreme east.'* Strabo (i, 60) describes them as a " two-fold people, lying extended in a long tract ftom the rising to tlie setting sun." Herodotus (vii, 69, 70) distinguishes the eastern Ethiopians in Asia f^m the western Ethiopians in Africa by the Btraight hair of the former and the curly hair of the latter. The ancients, in short, with the usual loose- ness of their geographical definitions, understood by Ethiopia the extreme south in all the earth's longitude, and which, lying, as they thought, close upon the fiery zone, exposed the inhabitants to the sun's scorching nys, which burned them black. It is the mistaken idea of the scriptural term " Cush" being used in the same vague and indeterminate manner that has led to so mnch confnsion on this subject ; and one writer (Buttmann, AUt. Erdk, d. Morgenl, p. 40, note), in his desbe to carry out the parallel between Ethiopia and Cush, derives the latter word from the root HID (kavk^ *««, fc«),"to bum;" but that is opposed to all the '^^ of etymological analogy in the formation of He- ^w proper names (oomp. Bitter's Erdkunde, i, 222 ; Heeren's African Nations, EngL transl. i, 289). See
CUTH.
1. The existence of an Aftican Cush cannot leason- ^hly be questioned, though the term is employed in ^^^'iptQTe with great latitude, sometimes denoting, an extensive but undefined country (Ethiopia), and at
other times one particular kingdom (Merofi). It is expressly described by Ezekiel as lying to the south of Egypt beyond Syene (xxix, 10 ; comp. xxx, 4-6. — Strabo, xvii, 817 ; Pliny, Hist, Nat. vi, 35 ; Joaephus, War^ iv, 10, 5). Its limits on the west and south were undefined ; but it was probably regarded as extending eastward as far as the Bed Sea, if not as including some of the islands in that sea, such as the famous Topaz Isle (Job xxviii, 19; Pliny, Hist. Nat. vi, 29; xxzvii, 8; Strab6, xvi, 4, 6; Diod. Sic. iii, 89). It thus corresponded, though only in a vague and gener- al sense, to the countries known to us as Nubia and Abyssinia, so fitmous for the Nfle and other great riv- en. Hence the allusions in Scripture (Isa. xviii, 1 ; Zeph. iii, 11) to the fu-distant *' riven of Ethbpia," a country which is also spoken of (Isa. xviii, 2) in our venion as the land " which the riven have spoiled^^' there being a supposed reference to the ravages com- mitted by inundations (Bruce's Travels, iii, 158, and Taylor's Calmet, iii, 598^) ; but recent translaton pre- fer to render MTS by "divide," q. d. "a land hiter- sected by streams.'* Isaiah likewise takes notice ^n the above passage) of the "bulrush"-boats, or vessels of papyrus, which the Ethiopians employed upon the waters, a flEict which is confirmed by HeUodorus in his jEthiopica (x, 460), and also by Bruce, who ^ states that the only kind of boat in Abyssinia is that called tancoa,' which is made of reeds, " a piece of the aca- cia-tree being put in the bottom to serve as a keel, to which the plants are joined, being first sewed togeth- er, then gathered up at stem and stem, and the ends of the plants tied fast there." It is to the swiftness of these papyrus vessek that Job ^x, 26) compares the rapid speed of his days. From its proximity to Egypt we find Mizraim and Cush (i> c* ^^YV^ ^nd Ethiopia) so often classed together by the prophets (e. g. Psa. Ixviii, 31; Isa. xi, 11; xx, 4; xliii, 8; xlv, 14; Nah. ill, 9). The inhabitants are elsewhere spoken of in connection with the Lubim and Sukkiim (2 Chron. xii, 8; xvi, 8; Jer. xlvi, 7 ; Dan. xi, 43), supposed to be the Libyans and Ethiopic Troglodytes, and certainly nations of Africa, for they belonged to the vast army with which Shishak, king of Egypt, ** came out" of that country against Behoboam, Idng of Judah. In these, and indeed in most other passages where **Cn8h" occurs, Arabia is not to be thought of; the Ethiopia of Africa b beyond all doubt exclusively intended. See Ethiopia.