tions of time, a history of the heaven, the earth, and the sea, of the birth of mankind, of kings, and of their memorable deeds."

The portion of these extracts which relates particularly to our present object, is that which professes to give the annals of an antediluvian Chaldean kingdom, of the flood, and of a long succession of the kings following through a period amounting in aggregate to 462,080 years. After this are enumerated five or six dynasties of Median, Chaldean, Assyrian, and Arabian monarchs, through a period of 1550 years, to Pul, the Assyrian king mentioned in 2 Kings xv. 19, 1 Chron. v. 26, B. C. 770. It devolves upon us, then, to inquire what historical value is to be attached to these supposed records.

The antediluvian kingdom of ten reigns is said to have extended through a duration of 120 sari. "The first king," says Eusebius, quoting Berosus,* "was Alorus, a Chaldean from Babylon. He reigned ten sari. Now, a sarus is 3600 years; he adds, "I know not how many neri and sossi." A nerus, he says, is 600 years, and a sossus 60 years.† Thus he reckons years in connection with the affairs of the ancients.

* Chron. Armen. I. chap. i.

Syncellus says (p. 17), "Berosus wrote in sari, neri, and sossi, of which a sarus is 3600 years, a nerus is 600, and a sossus 60 years."

"Having said these things, he goes on and enumerates the Assyrian kings, giving their names in order. There were ten kings from Alorus, the first, to Xisuthrus, in whose time happened that first great flood of which Moses speaks. Now, the sum of the years which these kings reigned is 120 sari, that is, forty-three myriads, and two thousand (432,000) years. He then writes in these express words. He says, 'Alorus being dead, his son Ala• parus reigned three sari; after Alaparus, Almelon, from the city of Pantibiblis, a Chaldean, thirteen sari; Ammenon, also from Pantibiblis, a Chaldean, succeeded Almenon, thirteen sari; then Amegala-, rus, of Pantibiblis, reigned eighteen sari; then Daonus, a Shepherd, from Pantibiblis, reigned ten sari; afterwards Edoranchus, a Pantibiblian, reigned eighteen sari; then Amempsimus, from Lancharis, a Chaldean, reigned ten sari; then Otiartes, from Lancharis, a Chaldean, took the kingdom, eight sari; Otiartes being dead, Xisuthrus ruled the kingdom eighteen sari. In his time happened the great flood. The sum is ten kings, and one hundred and twenty sari.' Now, they say that these one hundred and twenty sari amount to forty-three myriads and two thousand years (432,000), since a sarus is 3600 years. These things Alexander Polyhistor narrates in his books. Now, if any one yields confi

dence to these books, boasting of so many myriads of years, he must likewise believe many other manifestly incredible things which they contain."

It is very evident that this account, as it stands, is mythical. It is not history, and can afford us, therefore, no reliable chronology. No advocate of the extreme antiquity of the race, however sanguine, would, on the credit of this statement, pretend to date man's actual creation at 720,000, or 432,000 years B. C. These immense periods must be classed with those that meet us in the earliest Egyptian chronology, which were appropriately remitted to the reigns' of the gods and manes.

But if not historical, have they not historical elements in them? If they are not to be taken literally, do they not at least warrant the general conclusion that man has lived during a very long period; thus, in some sense, justifying such authors as Bunsen, and Rodier, and Lyell, in their assumptions, and countenancing the tendency of the age to set aside the Mosaic narrative of the creation as unsupported and unworthy of acceptance? To answer these inquiries satisfactorily, let us examine, with some care, the statement itself.

Various opinions have been held as to the measures of time named in it. Suidas regards the sarus as equal to 222 lunar months, or nearly 181

years,* so that the 120 sari, assigned to the antediluvian kings, amount, according to him, to 2222 years. This number he doubtless intended for 2242, the space of time between the creation and flood, as given in the Alexandrian Septuagint, thus making the Chaldean antediluvian period coextensive. with that related by Moses. Latham,† a distinguished chronologer, regards the sarus equal to 4 years and 340 days; Raske, a space of 23 months; and Ideler,‡ a lunar period which he can not define. But the most probable opinion is that of Alexander Polyhistor, that the sarus was a period of ten years, of 360 days each, which was the year of the most ancient times-an opinion held by the two learned monks Anianus and Polydorus (who flourished about A. D. 400); also by Africanus, || although regarded by many as a mere expedient to get rid of a difficulty. This interpretation is strongly

* Sari, a measure and number among the Chaldeans. They make 120 sari equal to 2222 years, since a sarus is 222 lunar months, which amount to eighteen years and six months. sub voce Σύροι.

† Latham's Chronographical Essays, pp. 81, 84.

Lex.

Ideler on the era of the Chaldeans, in "Recherche Historique sur les Observationes astronomiques des Anciens," in Halma's Almageste, vol. iv. p. 62.

§ Syncellus, p. 32, B.

See Jackson's Chron. Ant. vol. i. pp. 200-202.

corroborated by the probable etymology of the terms. Saros, or sar, as it is very properly Anglicized, seems to have been allied to the Hebrew word, asar, ten, and sossus, from shesh,* six, so that a sar would be 10 years or 3600 days, a soss a sixth of a year, or 60 days, and a nerus, or ner, of which the etymology is not apparent, a sixth of a sar, or 600 days. This view is further confirmed by the fact that in the Semitic languages the word to designate days was sometimes employed to signify years. Jackson asserts directly that in the Chaldee the word yōmim, as in Hebrew the corresponding yāmim, was employed to signify both days and years.† Indeed, the words denoting periods of time, in most ancient languages, etymologically mean a completed course or circuit, such as annus in Latin, ĕros, ĕvos, ėviaviòs, in Greek, in Hebrew, etc., and hence are sometimes applied to any revolution, whether of the sun or moon, so that the same word might denote the solar year, the lunar month, or the solar day. Hence it would be both easy and natural for Berosus, or any one translating ancient records, to make the mistake of calling days years, especially when influenced by the desire, so common among historians, of enhancing, as much as possible, the antiquity of their own nations.

* Latham's Essays, p. 84.

+ Chron. Ant. vol. i. p. 200.