(lamed), because, although popularly so called, it is not a Hebrew letter, but a Chaldee one. The recent discoveries, published in Layard's last work, demonstrate this fact; Mr. Layard falls into the mistake of calling the basin inscriptions Hebrew, although Mr. Ellis, who had translated them, says expressly that the language is Chaldee (Nineveh and Babylon, p. 510.), one of them only being Syriac (p. 521.). Chaldee and Syriac, indeed, differ from each other as little as Chaucer's and Shakspeare's English, although the written characters are wholly distinct.
Davis, in his Celtic Researches, has done all that was possible, taking a very limited view, however, in fixing upon certain linguistic resemblances in some ancient tongues to the Celtic; but a clear apprehension of the proper place which the Celtic language and its congeners hold in comparative philology, can only be learnt from such works as Adelung's Mithridates, and Adrien Balbi's Atlas Ethnographique du Globe.
T. J. Buckton.
Footnote 2:[(return)]
The accidental resemblances are curious. Thus, Nebucadnetzar is in Russian nebê kazenniy Tzar, "A Lord or Prince appointed by heaven;" or, nebu godnoi Tzar, "A Prince fit for heaven." Belshatzar is also in Russian bolszoi Tzar, "A great Prince;" and Belteshtzar, Daniel's Chaldean pagan name, is byl têsh Tzar, "he was also a Prince," i. e. "of the royal family."
The interpretation of Hessius (Geschichte der Patriarchen, i. 83.) is preferred by Rosenmüller:
"Ex hujus Doctissimi Viri sententia Lamechus sese jactat propter filios suos, qui artium adeo utilium essent inventores: Cainum progenitorem suum propter cædem non esse punitum, multo minus se posse puniri, si vel simile scelus commisisset. Verba enim non significant, cædam ab eo revera esse paratam, sed sunt verba hominis admodum insolentis et profani. Ceterum facile apparet, hæc verba a Mose ex quodam carmine antiquo inserta esse: tota enim oratio poeticam quandam sublimitatem spirat."
The sense of these two verses (Gen. iv. 23, 24.) is, according to Dathe:
"Si propter viri aut juvenis cædem vulnera et plagæ mihi intendantur, cum de Caino pœna septuplex statuta fuerit, in Lamecho id fiet septuagies septies."
Herder, in his Geist der ebräischen Poesie (i. 344.) says: