IN THE LAND OF THE AMORITES. 65 CHIEF SLAIN BY SETHOS. pierced with an arrow; the rest are either supplicating the mercy of the victor, or precipitating themselves over the rampart. The inscription on the fort records the name of the country in which it was situated. It is written 15 the land of auop Amor, which being a literal transcription of the name of , the fourth son of Canaan (Gen. x. 16), we have no difficulty in at once identifying it as the land of the Amorites, one of the most powerful of the tribes that inhabited Canaan, who at first peopled the mountains west of the dead sea, but afterwards extended their limits over the whole of the country beyond Jordan, from Lebanon to the wilderness. The herd of buffaloes agrees perfectly with the habits of the Amorites. The district of Bashan belonged to them, which was noted for the breeding of cattle (Ps. xxii. 12). The name of the fort or city itself is also written in the same inscription. The first character represents the letter or 2, the other two, T and respectively. In that portion of the land of the Amorites which fell to the tribe of Judah, we find enumerated among "the uttermost cities towards the coast of Edom southward" (that is, in the part nearest to Egypt), one which is named Hadashah (Josh. xv. 21, 37). The hieroglyphic name reads ry, which repeats exactly the letters of the Hebrew transcription leaving out only the , which is the feminine. afformant in that language. The position of the city Hadashah is greatly in favor of the identification.* The inscription over this picture is so much mutilated by the falling of the wall that very little of it is legible. The conqueror is said to make bare [manifest] his right arm, "to [overcome] the chiefs of many walled cities, and to have subdued the shepherds." The Amorites, therefore, were included in this general appellation. The next picture represents Sethos still pursuing his career of conquest. He has now met with a people apparently more refined than his former adversaries. They wear metal skull-caps of a peculiar, but not ungraceful form, in which the Grecian helmet may be supposed to have originated. The skull-caps of the chiefs are decorated with one or two ostrich feathers, according to their rank. Two actions are represented in the picture. In the first of them Sethos has alighted from his chariot, and, standing with his * Or it may have been the city on Mount Moriah, where Jerusalem was afterwards built, which was known, in the times of Herodotus, in Egypt by the name of Καδυτις. This word is the Hellenic mode of spelling the Al-kouds of the Arab, or the Kadatha of the Syriac dialect, i. e. the holy place, the universal epithet of Jerusalem in the East. See Larcher in loco, 1. 3. c. 5. † M. R. pl. 54. BATTLE, AND DEATH OF A CHIEF. 67 foot upon the neck of one chief who is pierced with a javelin and writhing in the agonies of death, he seizes another, who is also wounded in the arm, and is about to give him the coup de grace with his uplifted javelin. In the next picture the enemy is in full flight, and Sethos has leapt into his chariot and is pursuing them at full speed; having raised up the dying chief upon whom he had been trampling, with the string of his bow thrown round his neck like a noose, he is about to strike off his head with his uplifted scymitar or ୨୬. SETHOS IN PURSUIT OF HIS ENEMIES. But little of the inscription is legible, and that little not instructive, being a string of boastful epithets :— "He alarms all nations: "He makes them to tremble. "His name is victorious. "He is 1 vigilant [perhaps skilful] with his scymitar. "A chief shall not stand before him." PRESENTATION OF SPOILS AND PRISONERS. 69 torious. His chariot is adorned with the heads of his vanquished foes. In his left hand he holds the reins and his bow, in his right the scymitar, the flagellum, and the cords which bind two lines of captives. Nothing can surpass the regal grace with which he manages them all. The inscription is as usual:— "He grants their petitions [of the captives]. "The chiefs of the shepherds shall bear bows no more. "He brings them low in their quarters. "He makes them flee like hares from hyænas." The next scene is laid at Thebes, and doubtless in the palace at Karnak where the picture occurs.— Sethos stands before the magnificent shrine of the Theban triad and presents a meat offering of bread, flesh and herbs, a drink offering of wine and milk, and the fruits of his campaign consisting of the spoils of three peoples or cities, which are as usual, in three separate rows. He conducts two lines of captives, over whom is an inscription somewhat mutilated— * "The return of his majesty from the lands he hath conquered, "Confirming the words of the Arvadites.t "The words of the captive chiefs [to] "The youth whose vengeance burns like the sun in his manifestation:— "The Jebusites could not pass over their waters. * These consist of vessels, etc. † It appears from hence that he had formed a league with this nation. This appears to be the word for an ape in the ritual. It evidently means vengeance, judgments, in many places. The same group as before (see p. 59). |