Page:EB1911 - Volume 19.djvu/982

 § Antiquities) now stand, still form the greater part of the population.

OAXACA, (from Aztec Huaxyacac), or  (official title), capital of the Mexican state of Oaxaca, in the central part of the state 288 m. S.E. of the City of Mexico, and about 153 m. from Puerto Angel on the Pacific; in lat. 17° 3′ N., long. 96° 40′ W. Pop. (1900) 35,049, largely Indians, most of whom are Mixtecas and Zapotecas. Oaxaca is connected with Puebla (211 m.) by the Mexican Southern railway. The city lies in a broad, picturesque valley 5085 ft. above sea-level, and has a mild temperate climate; annual rainfall about 33 in.; mean annual temperature 68° F. It forms the see of a bishopric dating from 1535, and has a fine old cathedral (occupying the north side of the plaza mayor), built in the Spanish Renaissance style and dating from 1553; rebuilt in 1702.

According to tradition the Aztec military post and town of Huaxyacac was founded in 1486. The date of the first Spanish settlement is uncertain, but it was probably between 1522 and 1528. The Oaxaca Valley, including several native towns, had been given to Cortés, together with the title marquez del Valle de Oaxaca. To injure him, the audiencia then administering the government, founded the villa of Antequera in close proximity to Huaxyacac and on lands belonging to Cortés in 1529, though a settlement had been made at the Indian town at an earlier date. Antequera was made a city in 1532 and the see of a bishopric in 1535, though it had but few Spanish inhabitants and no opportunity to expand. This anomalous state of affairs was eventually settled, Antequera was absorbed by Huaxyacac, and the Spanish corrupted the pronunciation to Oaxaca. The city suffered severely in the earthquakes of 1727 and 1787, the cathedral being greatly damaged in the former. It had a chequered career in the War of Independence, being captured by Morelos in 1812, reoccupied by the royalists in 1814, and recaptured by Antonio Leon in 1821. In 1823 it was again captured by Nicolas Bravo in the revolution against Iturbide. In 1865 it was besieged by the French under Bazaine and surrendered by General Diaz (4th Feb.) but was recaptured by him on the 1st of November 1866, after his escape from Puebla. In the revolution promoted by Diaz in 1871–1872 the city was captured by the Juarist general Alatorre on the 4th of January 1872, and in a second revolution of 1876 it was captured by the friends of Diaz on the 27th of January of that year.

OB, or, a river of West Siberia, known to the Ostiaks as the As, Yag, Kolta and Yema; to the Samoyedes as the Kolta or Kuay; and to the Tatars as the Omar or Umar. It is formed, 8 m. S.W. of Biysk in the government of Tomsk, by the confluence of the Biya and the Katun. Both these streams have their origin in the Altai (Sailughem) Mountains, the former issuing from Lake Teletskoye, the latter, 400 m. long, bursting out of a glacier on Mount Byelukha. The Ob zigzags W. and N. until it reaches 55° N.; thence it curves round to the N.W., and again N., wheeling finally eastwards into the Gulf of Ob, a deep (600 m.) bay of the Arctic Ocean. The river splits up into more than one arm, especially after receiving the large river Irtysh (from the left) in 69° E. Other noteworthy tributaries are: on the right, the Tom, the Chulym, the Ket, the Tym and the Vakh; and, on the left, the Vasyugan, the Irtysh (with the Ishim and the Tobol) and the Sosva. The navigable waters within its basin reach a total length of 9300 m. By means of the Tura, an affluent of the Tobol, it secures connexion with the Ekaterinburg-Perm railway at Tyumen, and thus is linked on to the rivers Kama and Volga in the heart of Russia. Its own length is 2260 m., and the area of its basin 1,125,200 sq. m. A system of canals, utilizing the Ket river, 560 m. long in all, connects the Ob with the Yenisei. The Ob is ice-bound at Barnaul from early in November to near the end of April, and at Obdursk, 100 m. above its mouth, from the end of October to the beginning of June. Its middle reaches have been navigated by steamboats since 1845.

OBADIAH, the name prefixed to the fourth of the Old Testament “minor prophets,” meaning “servant” or “worshipper” of Yahweh; of a type common in Semitic proper names; cf. the Arabic ʽAbdallāh, Taimallāt, ʽAbd Manāt, &c., the Hebrew Abdiel and Obed Edom, and many Phoenician forms. “The vision of Obadiah” bears no date, or other historical note, nor can we connect Obadiah the prophet with any other Obadiah of the Old Testament, and our only clue to the date and composition of the book lies in internal evidence.

The prophecy is directed against Edom. Yahweh has sent a messenger forth among the nations to stir them up to battle against the proud inhabitants of Mount Seir, to bring them down from the rocky fastnesses which they deem impregnable. Edom shall be not only plundered but utterly undone and expelled from his borders, and this he shall suffer (through his own folly) at the hand of trusted allies (vers. 1-9). The cause of this judgment is his cruelty to his brother Jacob. In the day of Jerusalem’s overthrow the Edomites rejoiced over the calamity, grasped at a share of the spoil, lay in wait to cut off the fugitives (vers. 10-14). But now the day of Yahweh is near upon all nations, Esau and all the heathen shall drink full retribution for their banquet of carnage and plunder on Yahweh’s holy mountain. A rescued Israel shall dwell in Mount Zion in restored holiness; the house of Jacob shall regain their old possessions; Edom shall be burned up before them as chaff before the flame; they shall spread over all Canaan, over the mountain of Esau and the south of Judah, as well as over Gilead and the Philistine and Phoenician coast. The victorious Israelites shall come up on Mount Zion to rule the mountain of Esau, and the kingdom shall be Yahweh’s (vers. 15-21).

The most obvious evidence of date lies in the cause assigned for the judgment on Edom (vers. 10-14). The calamity of Jerusalem can only be the sack of the city by Nebuchadrezzar (586 ); the malevolence and cruelty of Edom on this occasion are characterized in similar terms by several writers of the exile or subsequent periods, but by none with the same circumstance and vividness of detail as here (Ezek. xxv. 8, 12 f., xxxv.; Lam. iv. 21; Psalm cxxxvii. 7). The prominence given to Edom, and the fact that Chaldea is not mentioned at all, make it probable that the passage was not written in Babylonia. On this evidence, taken alone, we should be justified in saying that the prophecy was written at some time after 586, at a period when misfortunes incurred by Edom were interpreted as a Divine judgment on its unforgotten treachery in that year of tragedy.

The critical problem is, however, complicated by certain phenomena of literary relationship. Obad. 1-6, 8 agree so closely and in part verbally with Jer. xlix. 14-16, 9, 10, 7 that the two passages cannot be independent; nor does it seem possible that Obadiah quotes from Jeremiah, for Obad. 1-8 is a well-connected whole, while the parallel verses in Jeremiah appear in different order, interspersed with other matter, and in a much less lucid connexion. In Jeremiah the picture is vague, and Edom’s unwisdom (ver. 7) stands without proof. In Obadiah the conception is quite definite. Edom is attacked by his own allies, and his folly appears in that he exposes himself to such treachery. Again, the probability that the passage in Jeremiah incorporates disjointed fragments of an older oracle is greatly increased by the fact that the prophecy against Moab in the preceding chapter uses, in the same way, Isa. xv., xvi., and the prophecy of Balaam. Scholars who assign the passage in Jeremiah to 604 (e.g. Driver, L.O.T. chap. vi. § 4), explain this relationship by assuming with Ewald (Propheten, i. 489 f.), Graf (Jeremia, p. 558 f.), Robertson Smith. and others, that Jeremiah and our book of Obadiah alike quote from an older oracle. Others, however, who do not regard Jer. xlix. as Jeremianic, explain the relationship as one of dependence on Obadiah. This explanation, simpler in itself, is not discredited by the fact that in some details (cf. Obad. 2 and Jer. xlix. 15) the text