The real question at issue concerns the language, not of the whole Hamitic family, but of the Canaanites and ("ushites. \\'ith regard to the former, various explana- tions have been offered — such as Knobel's, that they acquired a Shemitic language from a prior population, represented by the Kephaim, Zuzim, Zamzummim, etc. {Vijlkert. p.31.^) ; or Bunsen's, that they were a Shemitic
race who had long sojourned in Egypt {Phil, of [list. i, li)l ) — neither of which is satisfactory. With re- gard to the latter, the only explanation to be ottered is that a Joktanid immigration supervened on the origi- nal Hamitic population, the result being a combination of Cushitic civilization with a Shemitic language (Ke- nan, //i.sV. 6'««. i, 322). Nor is it unimportant to mention that peculiarities have been discovered in the Cushite Shemitic of .Southern Arabia which suggest a close affin- ity with the Phoenician forms (ibid. i,318 ). We are not, however, without expectation that time and research will clear up much of the mystery that now enwraps the subject. There are two directions to which we inay hopefully turn for light, namely, Egypt and Babylonia, with regard to each of which we make a few remarks.
1. That the Egyjitian language exhildts many strik- ing points of resemblance to the Shemitic type is ac- knowledged on all sides. It is also allowed that the resemblances are of a valuable character, being observa- ble in the pronouns, numerals, in agglutinative forms, in the treatment of vowels, and other such points (Kenan, Hist. (Jen. i,84, 85). There is not, however, an equal de- gree of agreement among scholars as to the deductions to be drawn from these resemblances. While many rec- ognise in them the proofs of a substantial identity, and hence regard Hamitism as an early stage of Shemitism, others deny, either on general or on special grounds, the probability of such a connection. When we find such high authorities as Bunsen on the former side {Phil, of Hist, i, 186-189 ; ii, 3), and Kenan (^llist. Gen. i, m) on the other, not to mention a long array of scholars who have adopted each view, it woidd be presumption dogmati- cally to assert the correctness or incorrectness of either. We can oidy point to the possibility of the identity being established, and to the further possibility that connect- ing-links may be discovered between the two extreines, which may serve to bridge over the gulf, and to render the use of a Shemitic language by a Hamitic race less of an anomaly than it at present ajipears to be.
2. Turning eastward to the banks of the Tigris and Euphrates, and the adjacent countries, we find ample materials for research in the inscriptions recently dis- covered, the examination of which has not yet yielded undisputed results. The jMosaic table places a Shemitic population in Assyria and Elam, and a Cushitic one in Babylon. The probability of this being ethnically (as opposed to geographically) true depends partly on the age assigned to the table. There can be no question that at a late period Assyria and Elam were held by non-Shemitie, probably Aryan, conquerors. But if we carry the table back to the age of Abraham, the case may have been different ; for though Elam is regarded as etymologically identical with Iran (Kenan, ///*■/. Gen. i, 41), this is not conclusive as to the Iranian character of the language in early times. Sufficient eviilence is afforded by language that the basis of the population in Assyria was Shemitic {^ibid. 1,70; Knobel, p. 154-1.56); and it is by no means improbable that the inscriptions belonging more especially to the neighborhood of Susa may ultimately establish the fact of a Shemitic popu- lation in Elam. The presence of a Cushitic population in Babylon is an opinion very generally held on lin- guistic grounds; and a close identity is said to exist between the old Babylonian and the Mahri language, a Shemitic tongue of an ancient type still living in a district of Hadramatit, in Southern Arabia (Kenan. Hist. Gen. i, 60). In addition to the Cushitic and Shemitic elements in the population of Babylonia and the ad- jacent districts, the presence of a Turanian element has been inferred from the linguistic character of the early inscriptions. We must here express our conviction that the ethnology of the countries in question is con- siderably clouded by the undefined use of the terms Turanian, Scythic, and the like. It is frequently diffi- cidt to decide whether these terms are used in a lin- guistic sense, as equivalent to agfjlutinative, or in an ethnic sense. The presence of a certain amount of
TONGUES, CONFUSION OF 475 TONGUES, CONFUSION OF
Tiiranianism in the former does not involve its pres- ence in the latter sense. Tlie old Babylonian and Susi- anian inscriptions may be more agglutinative than the later ones, but this is only a proof of their belonging to an earlier stage of the language, and does not of itself indicate a foreign population ; and if these early Baby- lonian inscriptions graduate into the Shcmific, as is as- serted even by the advocates of the 'i'uranian theory (Kawlinson, Herod, i, 442, 446), the presence of an ethnic 'i'uranianism cannot possibly be inferred. Added to this, it is inexplicable how the presence of a large Scythic population in the Achaimenian period, to which many of the Susianian inscriptions belong, could escape the notice of historians. The only Scytiiic tribes noticed by Herodotus in his review of the Per- sian empire are the Parthians anil the Saca^, the former of \Vhom are known to have lived in the north, while the latter probably lived in the extreme east, where a memorial of them is still supposed to exist in the name Seistan, representing the ancient Sacastene. Even with regard to these, Scythic may not mean Turanian : for they inay have belonged to the Scythians of history (the Skolots"), for whom an Indo-European origin is claimed {ibid, iii, 197). The impression conveyed by the supposed detection of so many heterogeneous ele- ments in the old Babylonian tongue {ibid, i, 442, 444, <)46, notes) is not favorable to the general results of the researches.