Page:Biblical Libraries (Richardson).djvu/115

 through the Egyptian frontier to Syria, and some at least of these governors of Tyre seem to have been native princes.

The fact that the princes of Palestine sent letters and made treaties, or even the fact that they received communications does not in itself prove that archives were kept, nor does the fact that all the nations around, Egypt and Babylon, Hittites and Mitannians, had such archives, itself prove that Palestine had. It is however, prima facie evidence and it does not wholly lack corroborative evidence. The annals of Thutmose III e.g. (Breasted 2:204 sq. § 483), speak of annual contracts with the chiefs of Lebanon as to imposts and similar agreements with all the harbor towns of Syria and Palestine as to supplies (Breasted §§ 510, 519, 535, 557, cf. 596). A part of the endowment of some of the temples were these annual imposts from Palestinian cities which give a regular specified