[191] Mr Max Müller, in his “Lectures on the Science of Language,” first series, says of “Man”:—“The Latin word ‘homo,’ the French ‘l’homme’ ... is derived from the same root, which we have in ‘humus,’ soil, ‘humilis,’ humble. Homo, therefore, would express the idea of being made of the dust of the earth.... There is a third name for man.... ‘Ma,’ in the Sanscrit, means to measure.... ‘Man,’ a derivative root, means to think. From this we have the Sanscrit ‘Manu,’ originally thinker, then man. In the later Sanscrit we find derivations such as ‘Mânava, Mânasha, Manushya,’ all expressing man. In Gothic we find both ‘man,’ and ‘Maunisk,’ the modern German ‘maun,’ and ‘mensch.’ There were many more names for man, as there were many names for all things in ancient language.” As an instance of the correspondence of Old Egyptian and Welsh, Bunsen’s “Philosophy of Univ. Hist.,” i. 169, gives “Egyptian, ‘man’ = rockstone; Welsh, ‘maen;’ Irish, ‘main’ (coll. Latin, ‘mœnia;’ Hebrew, ‘e-ben’).” And (p. 78) Bunsen says—“The divine Mannus, the ancestor of the Germans, is absolutely identical with Manus, who, according to ancient Indian mythology, is the God who created man anew after the Deluge, just as Deucalion did.”
[192] The Saturday Review, Nov. 14, 1868 (reviewing “The Indian Tribes of Guiana,” by the Rev. W. Brett), says of the Indian traditions:—“The ‘old people’s stories’ of the creation and the deluge are highly characteristic.... Under the rule of Sigu, son of Maikonaima, the tree of life was planted, in whose stem were pent up the whole of the waters which were to be let forth by measure to stock every river and lake with fish. Twarrika, the mischievous monkey, forced open the magic cover which kept down the waters, and the next minute was swept away with all things living by the bursting flood. The re-peopling of the world, as described by the Tamanacs of the Orinoco recalls the legend of Deucalion. One man and one woman took refuge on the mountain Tamanacu. They then threw over their heads the fruits of the Mauritia (or Ita) palm, from the kernel of which sprang men and women who once more peopled the earth.”
[193] “Essay on Primæval History.”
[194] “According to the calculations of Varro, the deluge of Ogyges occurred 400 years before Inachus, i.e. 1600 years before the first Olympiad, which would bring it to 2376 years before the Christian era; now, according to the Hebrew text, the Deluge of Noah took place 2349 B.C., which makes only a difference of 27 years. It is true that many other authors have reconciled these epochs.” Hesiod and Homer are silent on the subject of both Deucalion and Ogyges.... “It results from these considerations that the traditions of the ancient nations of the world confirm the narrative of Genesis, not only as to the existence, but even as to the epoch, of this catastrophe as fixed by Moses. Mersius (apud Gronovium, iv. 1023) cites more than twenty ancient authors who speak of Ogyges as appertaining in their eyes to what was most primitive in Greece. He is son of Neptune. He is the first founder of the kingdom of Thebes. Servius represents him as coming immediately after Saturn and the golden age [which directly connects Noah with Saturn, and the golden age with Noah]. Hesychius says of Ogyges that he represented all that was most ancient in Greece. That, indeed, passed into a proverb; they said, ‘old as Ogyges,’ as if they said, ‘old as Adam’” (Gainet, i. 229).
[195] In the same way we find “Mentuhotep,” or “Sesortasen I.” named, “when all other ancestors are omitted, as the sole connecting link between Amosis (xviii. dynasty) and Menes.” Vide Palmer’s “Egyptian Chronicles,” i. 385.
So, too, are Fohi (whom I believe to be Adam) and Shin-nong (Noah) connected and linked together in Chinese chronology. “I. Fohi the great Brilliant (Tai-hao), cultivation of astronomy and religion as well as writing. He reigned 110 years. Then came fifteen reigns. II. Shin-nong (divine husbandman). Institution of agriculture [compare ante, [ch. x.]] The knowledge of simples applied as the art of medicine.”—Bunsen’s “Egypt,” iii. 383, chap. on Chinese Chronology. Vide ante, [61]; chap. on Tradition, [p. 129]; Prometheus.
[196] Kenrick (p. 37) says:—“The fact of traces of the action of water at a higher level in ancient times on these shores is unquestionable; under the name of raised beaches such phenomena are familiar to geologists on many coasts; but that the tradition (in Samothrace) was produced by speculation on its cause, not by an obscure recollection of its occurrence, is also clear; for it has been shown by physical proofs that a discharge of the waters of the Euxine (Black Sea) would not cause such a deluge as the tradition supposed” (Cuvier, Disc. sur les Revolutions du Globe, ed. 1826).
If these speculations were made at the commencement of Grecian history, and the speculations had reference to evidence of diluvian disruption along the highway by which they passed into Greece, should we not expect that theories of the violent rather than the gentler and gradual action of water would dominate in their geological tradition? Colonel George Greenwood, in “Rain and Rivers,” p. 2, says on the contrary—(“with reference to the theory that valleys are formed by ‘rain and rivers’”)—“There is, perhaps, no creed of man which, like this, can be traced up to the most remote antiquity, and traced down from the most remote antiquity to the present day. Lyell has himself quoted Pythagoras for it, through the medium of Ovid:—
‘Eluvie mons est deductus in æquor
Quodquo fuit campus vallem decursus aquarum