Page:Discovery and Decipherment of the Trilingual Cuneiform Inscriptions.djvu/419

390 unless its coiTespoiuleiit can l)e recognised in some Semitic tongue it is often impossiljle, owing to the employment in it of a polyphone character to fix its orthography ; and this uncertainty presses on the student with almost crushing seyerity.' ^ In addition to this, he had to contend with the dilliculty that besets all early decipherers — the inal)ility to distinguish between his own correct and incorrect yalues, where the latter often cause more confusion than if the sound were still regarded as doubtful. Notwithstanding all these obstacles, his transliteration was sufficient to aflbrd a considerable knowledge of the nature of the language ; and to enable the student to recognise the connection of the words that resulted with their Semitic relatives. In the forty years that elapsed l)etween the version we are now considering, and that given by Dr. Bezold, a whole army of scholars has been cease- lesslv at work upon the Babylonian and Assyrian inscrip- tions, and the point they have reached is naturally ftir hi ad\^ance of that in which it was placed l)y the first Essay of llawlinson. The comparison of a few passages, taken almost at random, will enable the reader to appreciate the position the study had reached in 1851.- The first lines of the inscription are rendered thus by Eawlinson, De Saulcv and liezold.

I*AKA GRAPH T.

liaw. X Ila Kba ma ui s a melek ^

Dc >S'. A Kh ni n s ah sar (!^)

liez. "' a lia ma ni is ' sarru

' J, It. A. S. xiv. .'^.

- For llawliiison sec »/. 11. A. .V. \n]. \iv. Clutc 1 ; for Do Saiilcy, Journal ^[aifrliffuo, I8r)4, ill.!).■) ; for J>fZ'»id, ])i(' Achiimc/ndi^ninarhnftcH, \). '2A.

The sign for 'king' was written 'melik,' after the Hebrew, till it was seen that the Assyrians prnounced it 'sarru' (Menant, Manuel, p. 265). In Rawlinson's analysis he points out that one of the terms for 'king' was certainly 'sarru,' as in the Window inscription of Darius at Persepolis and