The World's Progress Part 25

The territory between the Tigris and Euphrates the Greeks called Mesopotamia, meaning "between two rivers," but they applied the name to the northern portion of the district--the home of the a.s.syrians. As generally used today, the term Mesopotamia signifies the whole region.

The southern portion, bordering on the Persian Gulf, has a deep alluvial soil, built up by the yearly deposit of the rivers. Like the valley of the Nile, it has been the repository of fine silt. This portion from its capital city Babylon was called Babylonia. As we might expect, this was the country first settled because it was the more accessible. Its wide, monotonous plains, enriched with the fertile mountain loam, afforded the most productive farm lands in the world. Herodotus told of their prodigious yield of grain: "This territory is of all that we know the best by far for producing grain; as to trees, it does not attempt to bear them, either fig, or vine or olive, but for producing grain it is so good that it returns as much as two-hundred-fold for the average, and, when it bears its best, it produces three-hundred-fold. The blades of the wheat and barley there grew to be four fingers broad; and from millet and sesame seed, how large a tree grows, I know myself, but shall not record, being well aware that even what has already been said relating to the crops produced has been enough to cause disbelief in those who have not visited Babylonia." Theophrastus wrote: "In Babylon the wheat fields are regularly mown twice, and then fed off with beasts to keep down the luxuriance of the leaf; otherwise the plant does not run to ear. When this is done the return in lands that are badly cultivated is fiftyfold, while in those that are well farmed it is a hundredfold."

The land of Babylonia has been happily compared with the southern half of our state of Louisiana, which it resembles in marshy districts. Again it might be likened to the Egyptian Delta, being of course, larger,--something like Denmark in point of area. Possessing no rocks or mountains, the country seemed at first to be devoid of building material. It has been supposed that its primitive people first sheltered themselves in huts built of reeds which grew abundantly along the river banks. After awhile it was discovered that clay mud furnished a fair material when shaped into bricks and dried in the sun. A more enduring brick was later made by baking the brick in ovens. This oven-baked brick as well as the sun-dried brick const.i.tuted the great building material of Babylonia for all subsequent time.

The district north of the alluvial line, enclosed by rivers and mountains, in time became the kingdom of a.s.syria. This region differed greatly from the southern land. It was made up of low ranges on the north, rolled gently to the south, and supplied excellent pasturage.

Stone and material suitable to building purposes were available, but the people, accustomed to the clay bricks of their old home in Babylonia, never made use of the more substantial building stuff. Indeed the a.s.syrians were not at all of an inventive mind, as another ill.u.s.tration will plainly show. In Babylonia, because the ground was low and level, the people were obliged to construct artificial heights for building sites, thus to escape marshy exhalations and troublesome insects. They erected huge piles of sun-dried brick and crowned these with their palaces and temples.

Now the a.s.syrians were in the beginning colonists who had gone out of the mother state to find less populated regions farther north. There were hills and elevations in abundance in a.s.syria, but holding to the custom they had so long followed, they continued to construct great foundations of bricks for their buildings. It is curious indeed to find them, throughout their history, expending time, labor and resources to produce what nature had already provided.

a.s.syria was somewhat larger than Babylonia, and has been compared to the state of Illinois in size. While the northern mountains and the Gulf afforded definite boundaries, the limits to the east and west were never certain and both Babylonians and a.s.syrians pushed out in each direction as they became more powerful, contracting again if their strength weakened. On the west a desert separated them from the Mediterranean, and while various tribes held the country east of the Tigris in early times, the Medes later conquered the region east of a.s.syria, and Persia reached away to the southeast.

There are two seasons in these valleys--the rainy period, lasting from November to March, and the dry season, filling out the remainder of the year. Babylonia was never subject to the cold storms of a.s.syria, and the kings of the latter country, after they conquered Babylonia, frequently maintained winter palaces in the old capital, Babylon. Summer is intensely hot near the Gulf. In recent years this has been a serious obstacle to confront those carrying on excavations here.

In ancient times an extensive system of ca.n.a.ls and ditches made it possible to keep the land under constant cultivation, thus preventing in a large measure the sand storms that now spread over the country, causing much suffering and even death. Under Turkish rule at present, the whole region is left desolate.

In spite of Herodotus to the contrary, certain kinds of trees grew in Babylonia. The fig, apple, almond and walnut were native. The date palm ministered to the wants of the people in manifold ways. An old Persian poem sung of its 360 uses, while the Greeks claimed that it supplied the Babylonians with bread, wine, vinegar, honey, rope, fuel, wood for furniture, and food for cattle. A wide variety of grains and vegetables were produced.

Wild animals were plentiful. The Mesopotamian lion was thought milder than its jungle cousin. Buffaloes were domesticated. Leopards, hyaenas, wild boars, gazelles, foxes and hares were found, while birds and fishes abounded.

Altogether this was a spot where life was favorable for man, and it was natural that wandering tribes that came thither should soon abandon their roving habits for the surer livelihood promised by a fixed home.

[Ill.u.s.tration: SARGON'S STANDARD (WITH FIGURE OF a.s.sHUR).]

CHAPTER III.

PREHISTORIC CHALDEA.

We have already noted that prehistoric periods are those preceding written records. Uncertainty enters into all attempts to reconstruct such a period for any people, and especially has this been true of Babylonia. However, when the library of Nineveh was unearthed, tablets were discovered which shed some light on those remote ages.

The land we call Babylonia was once called Chaldea. So we shall call it during its prehistoric age--as we call the British Island Britain in the beginning of its history, and later, England. By the term Chaldea we are to understand that portion of the valleys which extended around the Persian Gulf. It was inhabited at the earliest period known. Probably its first settlers were a branch of the Turanian or Yellow Race, to which the Chinese, j.a.panese, Monguls and present-day Turks belong. That the Chaldeans came from some other locality into this land is not doubted, but from whence they came is not known.

The southern part of Chaldea was called Shumir--the Hebrews writing it _Shinar_; the land immediately north they called Accad. The dwellers in both districts came from the same stock and spoke practically the same language. The name _Accad_ means mountains, or highlands, and it has been surmised that it may have attached to the inhabitants from some earlier home.

These early people may have migrated to Chaldea five or six thousand years before the Christian era. Of their coming and first settlements, nothing is known. When we first learn of them, they had reached quite a degree of civilization, having ca.n.a.ls for irrigating the lands unreached by the river; they had also devised the cuneiform system of writing--an advance on the picture system, earlier in use.

The history of their strange symbols was probably this: in ages bygone they had invented a system of picture writing, as all primitive people seem to have done. As they advanced, too much time was required to copy the elaborate pictures in their entirety, and so the princ.i.p.al outlines were used to represent the pictures themselves. When these people migrated to Chaldea, and were reduced to clay tablets on which to write, it was easier to make straight lines than curved ones. In this way the written language continued to undergo changes until it was eventually made up of wedge-shaped symbols, one of the clear results of the use of the clay tablets.

Our princ.i.p.al knowledge concerning the Chaldeans pertains to their religion, which is believed to have been one of the earliest religions of the world.

The religious instinct seems to have been inborn with man. Some form and degree of worship has been found among all primitive people and is cruder or more elevated according to the stage of development. Primitive man felt himself able to cope with many of the conditions around him, but he soon found that the very agencies which helped might also injure him. The sun, whose light and warmth gave life to his growing crops, might also wither them with its intense heat. The rain which renewed and refreshed the fields, might come in torrents and lay them low. Gradually all these agencies were regarded as _Beings_, which must be importuned.

The religion of the Chaldeans taught man how to guard himself against the harmful forces in the world, and every animate and inanimate thing was endowed with a spirit.

A series of tablets treating of this ancient religion was recovered by Ra.s.sam, and they fall into three divisions: those treating of "Evil Spirits," others concerning diseases, and last, those devoted to prayers and hymns of praise.

The Accadian conceived of the earth as resembling a huge, inverted bowl.

The thickness represented the earth's crust; the hollow beneath was thought of as a bottomless pit, destined to be the final dwelling place of man, and was the abode of demons. Above the earth were two heavens; the higher, supported by a lofty mountain; the lower containing seven kind and friendly planets, which wandered at will through its wide domains. Opposed to these were seven fiery phantoms. Over all dwelt the great Spirit Ana.

"Between the lower heaven and the surface of the earth is the atmospheric region, the realm of Mermer, the Wind, where he drives the clouds, rouses the storms, and whence he pours down the rain, which is stored in the great reservoir of Ana, in the heavenly Ocean. As to the earthly Ocean, it is fancied as a broad river, flowing all around the edge of the imaginary inverted bowl; in its waters dwells Ea, the great Spirit of the Earth and Waters, either in the form of a fish, whence he is frequently called "Ea the fish," or "the exalted fish," or on a magnificent ship, with which he travels around the earth, guarding and protecting it.

"The minor spirits of the earth are not much spoken of except in a body, a sort of host or legion. All the more terrible are the seven spirits of the abyss, the Maskim, of whom it is said that, although their seat is in the depths of the earth, yet their voice resounds on the heights also; they reside at will in the immensity of s.p.a.ce, 'not enjoying a good name either in heaven or on earth.' Their greatest delight is to subvert the orderly course of nature, to cause earthquakes, inundations, ravaging tempests."[1]

The Maskim were ever feared and hated as is shown by the following, translated from one of the tablets:

"They are seven! they are seven!--Seven are they in the depths of Ocean,--seven they are, disturbers of the face of Heaven.--They arise from the depths of Ocean, from hidden lurking-places.--They spread like snares.--Male they are not, female they are not. Wives they have not, children are not born to them.--Order they know not, nor beneficence;--prayers and supplications they hear not. Horses grown in the bowels of the mountains--foes of EA--they are throne-bearers of the G.o.ds--they sit in the roads and make them unsafe.--The fiends! The fiends! They are seven, they are seven, seven are they!

"Spirit of Heaven, be they conjured! Spirit of Earth, be they conjured!"

A CHARM.

Seven are they, they are seven; In the caverns of ocean they dwell, They are clothed in the lightnings of heaven, Of their growth the deep waters can tell; Seven are they, they are seven.

Broad is their way and their course is wide, Where the seeds of destruction they sow, O'er the tops of the hills where they stride, To lay waste the smooth highways below,-- Broad is their way and their course is wide.

Man they are not, nor womankind, For in fury they sweep from the main, And have wedded no wife but the wind, And no child have begotten but pain,-- Man they are not, nor womankind.

Fear is not in them, nor awe; Supplication they heed not, nor prayer, For they know no compa.s.sion nor law, And are deaf to the cries of despair,-- Fear is not in them, nor awe.

Cursed they are, they are cursed, They are foes to wise EA'S name; By the whirlwind are all things dispersed On the paths of the flash of their flame,-- Cursed are they, they are cursed.

Spirit of Heaven, oh help! Help, oh Spirit of Earth!

They are seven, thrice said they are seven; For the G.o.ds they are Bearers of Thrones, But for men they are Breeders of Dearth And the authors of sorrows and moans.

They are seven, thrice said they are seven.

Spirit of Heaven, oh help! Help, oh Spirit of Earth!

--_Rendered into verse by Dyer._

Besides these seven hated ones, there were numberless demons who could work all manner of evil for man. They were invisible and brought sickness, sorrow, insanity, and grief. No house was secure against them, and no bolt strong enough to keep them out.

To contend against so much evil, it was necessary to employ conjurers and those skilled in magic, who by incantations and mixtures of herbs might discover the demons and put them to flight. Like the Egyptians, the Chaldeans believed that when one was ill, a demon had taken possession of his body, which must be driven out before recovery would be possible. As a result of this belief, the science of medicine never developed in Babylonia. Even in its advanced period, magicians treated the sick.

Charms and talismans were in great demand to ward off demons. They were worn by the living and adorned the dead. Many articles of furniture were made to serve two purposes--as household conveniences or ornaments, and talismans. Thus the winged bulls which have been found guarding the portals of royal palaces were placed there to keep out demons who would manage in some way to creep in unless prevented by eternal vigilance.

It was believed that certain of these demons were so forbidding in aspect that should they but catch sight of their own faces, they would be frightened away. Therefore a most dreadful demon was fashioned, as terrible and fierce as human ingenuity could conceive. This impersonated the south-west wind--the wind which brought burning heat and drought in its wake. An image thus made was placed in southwest windows, with the hope that the approaching demon might look upon himself and flee in terror.

As time went on, the Chaldeans progressed in their religious beliefs, and the third series of tablets record prayers and hymns of adoration.

Nothing was more natural than that they should worship the sun, as a manifestation of divinity which provided heat, light and life itself, for the children of the earth. Some of these hymns are beautiful in their conception.

"O Sun, I have called unto thee in the bright heavens. In the shadow of the cedar art thou; Thy feet are on the summits--The countries have wished for thee, they have longed for thy coming, O Lord! Thy radiant light illumines all countries. Thou makest lies to vanish, thou destroyest the noxious influence of portents, omens, spells, dreams and evil apparitions; thou turnest wicked plots to a happy issue.

"O Sun! thou hast stepped forth from the background of heaven, thou hast pushed back the bolts of the brilliant heaven,--yea, the gate of heaven.

O Sun! above the land thou hast raised thy head! O Sun! thou hast covered the immeasurable s.p.a.ce of heaven and countries!"