History of the transmission of ancient books to modern times / together with the process of historical proof; or, a concise account of the means by which genuineness of ancient literature generally, and the authenticity of historical works especially are ascertained including incidental remarks upon the relative strength of the evidence usually adduced in behalf of the Holy Scriptures

by Isaac Taylor

FOOTNOTES:

[9] Some of these were named in the first edition of this book; but it would be a waste of space to bring them forward anew.

CHAPTER XX.
RECENT EXPLORATIONS, CONFIRMATORY OF THE TRUTH OF ANCIENT HISTORY: HERODOTUS AND BEROSUS.

What we are now doing is to adduce a few samples of the means that are available for establishing the truth of the more remote facts of ancient history, according to those general principles which have already been explained—taking Herodotus as our first, and Berosus as our second instance. In the tenth chapter ([p. 112]) a brief reference has been made to those statues, busts, monuments, inscriptions, whence ancient historians drew a portion of their materials. But more than a few of these solid vouchers for the truth of written history have come down to modern times, and are accessible, either on the sites of ancient cities, or in museums. In the twelfth chapter ([pp. 141-157]), these now-extant evidences are again, and more particularly referred to. In the fifteenth chapter a glance at the contents of the British Museum brings this species of evidence yet further into notice, and we there ([p. 219]) make a passing reference to Herodotus, as one amongst those writers—indeed, the foremost of them, whose testimony finds confirmation in the sculptures of the Grecian, the Assyrian, and the Egyptian saloons.

To this particular subject, therefore, we now return; but shall think it sufficient to name, at hazard, a few among the very many instances which might be adduced, of a similar kind, and which possess, in different degrees, the same historic value. The reader will understand that nothing more can be attempted within the limits of a volume like this, than to state the general principles of historic evidence, and to illustrate such statements by a few examples. This has been done at large, in the instance of Herodotus (as we have just now said) by several eminent writers of modern times, namely, the editors of the Greek Text; and still more effectively by some of later date—French and German. Among English writers we should mention Sir John Ker Porter, in his Travels in Persia; Major Rennell, in his Essay on the Geography of Herodotus; Mr. Layard, in his “Nineveh and its Remains,” and his later work, “Discoveries in the Ruins of Nineveh and Babylon.” To the same purpose much of illustrative and incidental discussion finds a place in Grote’s “History of Greece,” and in Mure’s “Critical History of the Language and Literature of Greece.” More specifically these subjects come forward in the Papers and Essays of Dr. Hincks, and of Sir H. Rawlinson, and in many of the elaborate notes, and the subjoined essays of the now forthcoming work, “The History of Herodotus: a New English Version,” by Mr. Rawlinson, Sir H. Rawlinson, and Sir J. G. Wilkinson. In these works—accessible to the English reader, and which are found in most libraries—ample and precise information may easily be obtained, of the same kind as that of which a few instances only are here adduced. Major Rennell’s Essay on the Geography of Herodotus, has already been referred to ([p. 312]), and it might here again be brought forward, for furnishing instances attesting the fact that the Greek historian, not content with collecting materials at second hand, and at home, had actually visited most of the countries of which he gives any particular account, and certainly Mesopotamia and Egypt, and to some extent Scythia, and Northern Africa also, beside the southern parts of Italy; and it may be affirmed, as to this great extent of lands, that, in their now actual natural features, their products—animal and vegetable, the customs and usages of the people, and especially in those enduring architectural monuments which attract the attention of modern travellers, these countries furnish visible and tangible vouchers in support of the reputation of Herodotus—giving evidence, as they do, of his industry, intelligence, and, generally, of the exactness of his reports and descriptions.

Sir Robert Ker Porter[10] finds frequent occasion to name this same authority in illustration of existing antiquities. “How faithfully,” he says, “do these vestiges agree with the method of building in Babylon, as described by Herodotus!... the bricks intended for the walls were formed of the clay dug from the great ditch that backed them; they were baked in large furnaces, and in order to join them together in building, warm bitumen was used; and between each course of thirty bricks, beds of reeds were laid interwoven together. The bitumen was drawn from pits near the Euphrates, which pits exist at this day.” Since the time (1821) of Sir R. Ker Porter’s explorations in Babylonia, so much has been done in these regions that we turn of course to more recent authorities: these, although they do not deprive his writings of all value, supersede them to a great extent. Chiefly within the last ten years, and entirely within these thirty years, unexpected progress has been made in deciphering the inscriptions that abound among the remains of this region; and it may now be affirmed that the dark unknown of remote Asiatic history stands revealed before us. This recent revelation—this solving of what had been regarded as inscrutable mysteries—has taken effect in various degrees, upon the existing written histories of Assyria, Babylonia, Persia, Scythia—confirming much—correcting much; and utterly demolishing the credit of some portions of this hitherto-accepted history. It is thus that the tangible and the visible remains of remote ages, as now interpreted, have effected an extensive reform in this department of human knowledge. If, in a few words, we were to state what has been the general result of these discoveries, it would be in this way—The recent interpretation of the inscriptions heretofore, or recently known, and which are found upon bricks, upon slabs and sculptured surfaces, and upon the face of rocks, has, in several remarkable instances, furnished evidence confirmatory of Hebrew Scripture history; it has given a general support to the statements of Herodotus, as well as to those of Diodorus the Sicilian; at the same time correcting those statements in various particulars; it has irrecoverably annihilated the testimony of Ctesias—the rival and the bitter enemy of Herodotus; and on the other hand it has, to a great extent, given authentication to what is extant of the Chaldæan writer—Berosus. To this last instance we must presently revert.

In mentioning ([Chapter XI.]) the exceptions to which the testimony of ancient historians may be open—without impugning their veracity, we have of course claimed indulgence for them in relation to events remote, both in time and place from themselves, and for a knowledge of which they must have been dependent upon precarious sources of information. Nevertheless there are many instances of this very sort which have received from the industry of modern travellers very remarkable confirmation. One such instance comes before us in an early, or, as we may call it, the preliminary portion of the history of Herodotus. In speaking of Lydia and of its people, he says that it contains little worthy of note—less, indeed, than other countries—yet it has one structure of enormous size, to which nothing is comparable, after we have excepted the buildings of Egypt and of Babylon:—this is the tomb of Halyattes, the father of Crœsus, the foundation of which consists of immense blocks of stone, and otherwise of a mound of earth. This structure has now outlasted the revolutions of two thousand four hundred years, or more, and lately it has, with sufficient certainty, been identified by modern travellers. It is found upon the northern bank of the river Hermus, in the plain between Mounts Temnus and Siphylus. Mr. Hamilton thus describes the principal tumulus, generally designated as the tomb of Halyattes:—“It took us about ten minutes to ride round its base, which would give it a circumference of nearly half a mile. Toward the north it consists of the natural rock, a white, horizontally stratified, earthy limestone, cut away so as to appear as part of the structure. The upper portion is sand and gravel, apparently brought from the bed of the Hermus. Several deep ravines have been worn by time and weather in its sides, particularly on that to the south; we followed one of these as affording a better footing than the smooth grass, as we ascended to the summit. Here we found the remains of a foundation nearly eighteen feet square, on the north of which was a huge circular stone, ten feet in diameter, with a flat bottom, and a raised lip or edge, evidently placed there as an ornament on the apex of the tumulus.”

The Prussian consul at Smyrna, M. Spiegenthal, has examined this monument with more care, and has explored the interior. He gives the average diameter of the mound as 281 yards, which would require a circumference of about half a mile, as roughly estimated by Mr. Hamilton. “Carrying a tunnel into the interior of the mound, he discovered a sepulchral chamber composed of large blocks of white marble, highly polished, situated almost in the centre of the tumulus. The chamber measured about 11 feet by 8, and was 7 feet in height. It was empty, and contained no inscription or sarcophagus. This chamber, no doubt, had been entered and ransacked in remote times, and its treasures, whatever they may have been, carried off. There can be little doubt that this marble chamber was the actual resting-place of the Lydian king, who died according to our chronologies, B.C. 568.” This structure, when seen by Herodotus, was a recent work—say about 130 years had passed over it: it is now a mound, crumbling into a formless mass:—meantime the description of it—even this page of Greek—in my view—is, as to its historic and its literary integrity, as fresh and as perfect as it was two thousand years ago—yes, and it is as imperishable as anything mundane can be. This Greek text will cease to exist—never—unless a deluge of water, of fire, or of universal barbarism shall come to wrap this planet in its pall.

As nothing is attempted in this volume beyond the illustration of the method or process of historical evidence, we take only a glance at those visible confirmations of our author’s testimony, which are now directing the curiosity of the learned men of Europe, toward the levels of Mesopotamia—the banks of the Tigris and Euphrates. The mounds, the basement works, the gigantic sculptures, the inscriptions, combine to give evidence concerning Nineveh, and Babylon, and Persepolis, and in doing so shed a light upon remote antiquity, which, while it extends the limits of what is called “the historic period,” avails also at once to correct and to corroborate the extant written materials of history. Heretofore the existence of very many contradictions in these literary materials, and the suspicious aspect of portions of it, had thrown a vague uncertainty over the whole. But the course of inquiry, at this time, has a discriminative tendency, and it will, in its results, undoubtedly enable those who shall be competent to the task, to set off the true and certain, from the false and the doubtful, throughout the entire range of ancient history. Far more important than the determination of any particular problems in the Assyrian, or Babylonish, or Persian history, such as the disputed date of wars, or the succession of monarchs, is the exclusion of those loose modes of thinking and of writing, the aim and intention of which has been to bring all history under suspicion, and thus to divert attention from the past universally, and to fix the thoughts of men upon the things of the day, and the objects of sense.

Between the written history which has reached modern times, in the modes that have been mentioned in the preceding chapters, and the now extant substantial monuments of the same times, there is a correspondence which can in no way be accounted for, otherwise than by assuming the genuineness and the authenticity of the former.

“The great temple of Babylon, regarding which the Greeks have left so many notices, is beyond all doubt to be identified with the enormous mound which is named Mujellibêh by Rich, but to which the Arabs universally apply the title of Bábil. In the description, however, which Herodotus gives of this famous building, he would seem to have blended architectural details which applied in reality to two different sites; his measurement of a stade square, answering pretty well to the circumference of Babil, and his notices, also, of the chapels and altars of the god, being in close agreement with the accounts preserved in the inscriptions of Nebuchadnezzar, of the high place of Merodach at Babylon; while, on the other hand, the elevation of seven stages, one above the other, and the construction of a shrine for the divinity at the summit of the pile, must necessarily refer to the temple of the Planets of the Seven Spheres at Borsippa, now represented by the ruins of Birs-Nimrud.”—Sir H. Rawlinson: Herodotus, vol. i. p. 321.

“On the whole, we may conclude with tolerable confidence, that in the great northern mound of Babylon, we have the remains of that famous temple which Herodotus describes so graphically, and which ancient writers so generally declare to have been one of the chief marvels of the eastern world. Its bricks bear the name of Nebuchadnezzar, who relates that he thoroughly repaired the building; and it is the only ruin which seems to be that of a temple, among all the remains of ancient Babylon.”—Idem.

In the course of these recent explorations, an instance has presented itself which, in a very peculiar manner, illustrates our proper subject in this volume, namely—the trustworthiness of that mode of transmission which has brought ancient books into our hands.

Berosus, or Ber Oseas, a Chaldean priest and historian, flourished and wrote at Babylon in the times of Alexander’s immediate successors. His work—the History of Babylonia, has failed to come down to modern times; but it was extant in the early centuries of the Christian era; and it was very frequently mentioned, and cited at length, by writers of those times. This history is confidently appealed to, and is quoted by Josephus; and passages drawn from it are found in Tatian, Eusebius, Clemens Alexandrinus, Athenæus, Agathias, and others. Altogether, when these variously derived quotations are brought together, they form a mass—broken indeed into fragments, but yet sufficient for subserving highly important purposes in clearing up the ancient history of the East. In converting this remarkable instance to our purpose in this argument, we have first to point out the illustration it affords of the reality, and the truthfulness of that system of quotation to which, again and again, we have directed the reader’s attention. Here we have before us a case in which fragmentary citations, and incidental references—made by a number of writers, are found so to consist, and to agree one with another, as to authenticate at once the writer who is quoted, and the writers who quote: it is a mutually corroborative testimony. But in the next place, these fragments have lately received a kind of authentication that was little looked for, and which indeed deserves peculiar regard. What we here refer to is the trilingual Rock-Inscription which recently has received its interpretation. In referring to this instance, and in converting it to our present purpose, we must be understood to assume, what we believe ought not to be doubted, namely, the validity of that system of interpretation which has at length given us the English of these inscriptions. A few passages we now quote are from Rawlinson’s Herodotus. The following (vol. ii. p. 590) describes the Rock-Inscriptions of Behistun.

“Behistun is situated on the western frontier of the ancient Media, upon the road from Babylon to the southern Ecbatana, the great thoroughfare between the eastern and the western provinces of the ancient Persia. The precipitous rock, 1,700 feet high, on which the writing is inscribed, forms a portion of the great chain of Zagros, which separates the high plateau of Iran from the vast plain watered by the two streams of the Tigris and Euphrates. The inscription is engraved at the height of 300 feet from the base of the rock, and can only be reached with much exertion and difficulty. It is trilingual: one transcript is in the ancient Persian, one in Babylonian, the other in a Scythic or Tatar dialect. Col. Rawlinson gathers from the monument itself that it was executed in the fifth year of the reign of Darius, B. C. 516.”

In these inscriptions, covering a large surface of the native rock, Darius, the great king, tells the world who he is, what he has done, what wars he has waged, what countries he has conquered, and what structures he has raised:—

“I (am) Darius, the great king, the king of kings, the king of Persia, the king of the (dependent) provinces, the son of Hystaspes, the grandson of Arsames the Achæmenian.”

We have mentioned ([p. 256]) what was the usage of the copyists in commending their labours to the care of the men of after times, and in attaching tremendous anathemas to the crime of destroying, or of alienating the book. Here, now, a curious coincidence presents itself; for this great king, in bringing this sculptured record of his reign to a close, thus utters his will:—

“Darius the king says,—If seeing this tablet, and these images, thou injurest them, and preservest them not as long as my seed endures, (then) may Ormazd be thy enemy, and mayest thou have no offspring; and whatever thou doest, may Ormazd curse it for thee.”

As to the available value of these inscriptions, Mr. Rawlinson thus writes (vol. i. p. 432):—

“Until quite recently the most obscure chapter in the world’s history was that which related to ancient Babylonia. With the exception of the Biblical notices regarding the kingdom of Nimrod, and the confederates of Chedor-laomer, there was nothing authentic to satisfy, or even to guide research.... The materials accumulated during the last few years, in consequence of the excavations which have been made upon the sites of the ruined cities of Babylonia and Chaldæa, have gone far to clear up doubts upon the general question. Each succeeding discovery has tended to authenticate the chronology of Berosus, and to throw discredit upon the tales of Ctesias and his followers.... The chronology which we obtain from the cuneiform inscriptions in this early empire, harmonises perfectly with the numbers given in the scheme of Berosus.... It is evident that the chronological scheme of Berosus ... is, in a general way, remarkably supported and confirmed.... As to the chronology of Ctesias, it is irreconcileable with Scripture, at variance with the monuments, and contradictory to the native historian, Berosus, whose chronological statements have recently received such abundant confirmation from the course of cuneiform discovery.... It may therefore be discarded as a pure and absolute fiction; and the shorter chronology of Herodotus and Berosus may be followed. The scheme of these writers is in tolerable harmony with the Jewish records, and agrees also sufficiently well with the results at present derivable from the inscriptions.”

Our object here is not to determine disputable points in ancient history, but merely to exhibit, in its several parts, the method, or process, of historic proof. With this view, only, before us, we need not do more than bring forward these samples of this method, in its several kinds. It would be easy, if useful, to go on—from book to book of the History of Herodotus—finding confirmations or corrections of his narratives and descriptions, and much that would be pertinent, derived from the pages of modern travellers, or from the contents of museums. But to do so would lead us far, and indeed would fill bulky volumes. The facts, thus far briefly adduced, furnish the intelligent and studious reader with suggestions for prosecuting inquiries, on this ground, to any extent to which his taste or his purposes may lead him onward.