Girgashites.
This nation, descended from the fifth son of Canaan, seems to have inhabited the tract on the western bank of the Jordan, and on that account was not within easy reach of the Babylonians and Assyrians. The name, it is thought, is closely connected with that of Gergesa, where Christ healed the demoniac, and allowed the evil spirits to enter into the herd of swine which then ran down the slope into the sea. This Gergesa has, in its turn, been identified with Kersa, a ruined town near the mouth of the Wady [pg 325] Samakh. If this be the case, there is some probability that the Girgashites are the Kirkišāti of a tablet from Assyria which seemingly contains an early historical record, or an historical legend. Whether the Kirkišāti be identical with the Girgashites or not, the text is of sufficient importance to make it a valuable record, and a translation of the more perfect and interesting of the lines is given here—
“Gazzāni to the resting-place he has decided upon,[84]
to the fortress camp of Kirkišāti,
to Zakar-gimilli (king?) of the Siḫites,
to wide-spreading Kirkišāti,
to Ḫarri-si'iši, to Dûr-Dungi,
and the neighbourhood of Tengurgur (?) may he go forth, and
to the land of Ḫalman, the place to which his eyes are set, may he go.
By the command of the enemy, the Lullubite, may he accomplish (it)—
As for him, his horses, his soldiers, his chariots, in peace to the land of Ḫalman have approached, and the enemy, the Lullubite,
whether from before him, or from beside him, or from his right,
or from his left, did not cease (?) from him, and shall not destroy him,
shall not make him fail, shall not cause him to diminish.”
That the majority of the countries mentioned are near to Babylonia, is against the probability that Kirkišāti (if it be a country) is the land of the Girgashites, unless Ḫalman be Aleppo, and not the Mesopotamian tract of the same name; or unless, being a “numerous people,” they had sent out colonies to the neighbourhood [pg 326] of Babylonia, as did the Amorites; or emigrants, like the Jebusites. Whatever be the explanation, however, the above fragment is exceedingly interesting, the more so, that in the first line of the extract as given above, the person spoken of is to all appearance Gazzāni, which is possibly the completion of the name of the father of Tudḫula, and is written, as far as it is preserved, in the same way.[85]
It is noteworthy that the prefix for country is absent in every case, except that of Ḫalman.