CHAP. 14. EGYPTIAN FARMING. 19 but the husbandman waits till the river has of its own accord spread itself over the fields and withdrawn retiring of the waters, this was not the universal custom among the Egyptians, and the plough is always repre sented in the agricultural scenes, both in Upper Egypt and on the monuments about Memphis. The 20 TREADING IN THE GRAIN BOOK II. again to its bed, and then sows his plot of ground, and after sowing turns his swine into it-the swine tread in the corn-after which he has only to await the har fields. When the Nile was low, the water was raised by the pole and bucket, the shadóof of modern Egypt, and by other means; and this attention to artificial irrigation, instead of depending for it on rain, is alluded to in Deuteronomy xi. 10. There is one instance, and one only, of men drawing the plough in Egypt. The painting, which is from a tomb at Thebes, is preserved in the Louvre. Two men are at the end of the pole, and two others pull a rope attached to the base where the handle, pole, and share unite; another holds the plough as usual, and the rest of the scene is like that in other agricultural scenes, with the hoeing, sowing broadcast, and the harvest operations.-[G. W. Plutarch, Elian ( Nat. Animal. x. 16, on the authority of Eudoxus), and Pliny, mention this custom of treading in the grain "with pigs" in Egypt; but no instance occurs of it in the tombs, though goats are sometimes so represented in the paintings. It is indeed more probable that pigs were turned in upon the land to 22 NOTIONS OF THE IONIANS BOOK II. vest. The swine serve him also to thrash the grain,3 which is then carried to the garner. 15. If then we choose to adopt the views of the The paintings show that oxen were commonly used to tread out the grain from the ear at harvest-time, and occasionally, though rarely, asses were so employed; but pigs not being sufficiently heavy for the purpose, are not likely to have been substituted for oxen. This process was performed, as it is still in Italy, Spain, and other countries, by driving the oxen (horses or mules) over the corn strewed upon threshing instrument having teeth is found in Isaiah (xli. 15), which calls to mind the Nóreg, or corn-drag, of modern Egypt, a name closely re the ground, or upon a paved area near sembling the Hebrew Moreg, applied to the threshing instruments of Ornan (as in Isaiah), and the oxen he offered to David were doubtless those that had been yoked to it. The modern CHAP. 15. CONCERNING EGYPT. 23 Ionians concerning Egypt, we must come to the conclusion that the Egyptians had formerly no country at all. For the Ionians say that nothing is really Egypt Egyptian Noreg is drawn by two oxen, and consists of a wooden frame, with three axles, on which are fixed circular iron plates, the first and last having each four, the centre one three plates; and these not only force out the grain but chop the straw as the machine is dragged over it. It appears to be very similar to the tribulum of the Romans mentioned by Varro (de Re rusticâ, i. 52), who describes it as 66 a frame made rough by stones, or pieces of iron, on which the driver or a weight was placed, and this being drawn by beasts yoked to it pressed out the grain." The "plostemum Panicum " was doubtless introduced into Spain by the Phœnicians.-G. W.] Under the general expression of "Ionians" in this passage, Herodotus has been thought to mean principally, if not solely, Hecataus. (Müller ad Hecat. Fragm. Fr. 295 and 296.) Col. Mure shows satisfactorily (Literature of Greece, vol. iv. p. 148, note ') that this is not the case, since the persons here spoken of divided the world into three parts (infrà, ch. 16), Hecatæus into two. (See the map, note to Book iv. ch. 36.) Perhaps the allusion is to Anaximander, who as a geographer had preceded Hecatæus. (Strab. i. p. 10; Agathemer. i. 1.) There is no appearance of the name “Egypt” on the ancient monuments, where the country is called "Chemi," represented in hieroglyphics by the tail of a crocodile. Chemi," the black land," "the land of Ham," or of Khem (the Egyptian God Pan, or the Generative principle of Nature) is said by Plutarch to have been so called from the "blackness of the soil." Khem is singularly like the Greek xapai. Ham (Kham), the Hebrew name of the patriarch, signifies also "soot," and is like the Arabic hem, hami, "hot ;" | and the Hebrew hôm (or khôn), signifying brown (or black), as in Gen. xxx. 32, 40, is also "burnt up." Egyptus was in old times the name of the Nile, which was so called by Homer (Odys. iv. 477; xiv. 257); and Strabo (xvii. p. 691) says the same was the opinion of Nearchus. Manetho pretends that the country received the name from Egyptus, a surname of King Sethos (or Sethi). Aristotle thinks that "Egypt was formerly called Thebes," and Herodotus states, in opposition to the opinion of the "Ionians," that "Thebes (i.e. the Thebaid) had of old the name of Egypt." And if this is not confirmed by the monuments, the word “Egypt" was at all events connected with Coptos, a city of the Thebaid. From Kebt, Koft, or Coptos the modern inhabitants have been called Copts: its ancient name in hieroglyphics was Kebt-hor; and Mr. Poole is evidently right in supposing this to be the same as the Biblical Caphtor. He thinks the name to be composed of Ala, “land,” and Fúñτos ; and to be traced in the Ai-Caphtor, "land (or coast) of Caphtor," in Jeremiah (xlvii. 4). The word Coptitic is found in a Gnostic papyrus, supposed to be of the second century (see note on ch. 83). Egypt is said to have been called originally Aetia, and the Nile Aetos and Siris. Upper Egypt, or the Thebaid, has even been confounded with, and called, Ethiopia; perhaps too by Pliny (vi. 35; see note on ch. 110): Nahum (iii. 9) calls Ethiopia and Egypt the strength of No (Thebes); and Strabo says (i. p. 57) that Menelaus' journey to Ethiopia really meant to Thebes. The modern name Musr or Misr is the same as the Biblical Mizraim, i. e. "the two Misrs" applied to Egypt, which corresponds to "the two regions" of the sculptures; but the word Misr does not occur on the monuments. Mr. Poole notices the meaning of the Arabic Misr, "red mud," and the name Rahab, "the proud," given to Egypt in the Bible. Of Caphtor, see Deut. ii. 23; Amos ix. 7. See note on ch. 106.-[G. W.] 3 6 5 |