[35] Amphion, in Greek Ἀμφίων, comes from the Phœnician words אמ (am), a mother-nation, a metropolis, פי (phi), a mouth, a voice, and יון (Jôn), Greece. Thence the Greeks have derived Ὀμφή, a mother-voice, that is, orthodox, legal, upon which all should be regulated.
Thamyris, in Greek Θάμυρις, is composed of the Phœnician words תאמ (tham), twin, אור (aur), light, יש (ish), of the being.
[36] Plut., De Music.
[37] Diod. Sicul., l. iii., 35. Pausan., In Bœot., p. 585.
[38] Bibliotheca Græca, p. 4.
[39] Duhalde, t. iv., in-fol., p. 65. These Tartars had no idea of poetry before their conquest of China; also they imagined that it was only in China where the rules of this science had been formulated, and that the rest of the world resembled them.
[40] Kien-long, one of the descendants of Kang-hi, has made good verse in Chinese. This prince has composed an historical poem on the conquest of the Eleuth, or Oloth people, who, after having been a long time tributary to China, revolted. (Mém. concernant les Chin., t. i., p. 329.)
[41] The commencement of the Indian Kali-youg is placed 3101 or 3102 years before our era. Fréret has fixed it, in his chronological researches, at January 16, 3102, a half hour before the winter solstice, in the colure of which was then found the first star of Aries. The Brahmans say that this age of darkness and uncleanness must endure 432,000 years. Kali signifies in Sanskrit, all that which is black, shadowy, material, bad. From there, the Latin word caligo; and the French word (galimatias); the last part of this word comes from the Greek word μῦθος, a discourse, which is itself derived from the Phœnician מוט (mot or myt), which expresses all that moves, stirs up; a motion, a word, etc.
[42] Asiat. Research., t. ii., p. 140. The Brahmans say that their imperial dynasties, pontifical as well as laic, or solar and lunar, became extinguished a thousand years after the beginning of the Kali-youg, about 2000 B.C. It was at this epoch that India was divided into many independent sovereignties and that a powerful reformer of the cult appeared in Magadha, who took the surname of Buddha.
[43] Herod., l. ii. This historian said that in the early times all Egypt was a morass, with the exception of the country of Thebes; that nothing was seen of the land, which one saw there at the epoch in which he was writing, beyond Lake Mœris; and that going up the river, during a seven days’ journey, all seemed a vast sea. This same writer said in the beginning of book i., and this is very remarkable, that the Phœnicians had entered from the Red Sea into the Mediterranean, to establish themselves upon its shores, which they would have been unable to do if the Isthmus of Suez had existed. See what Aristotle says on this subject, Meteorolog., l. i., c. 14.