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Rh Euphrates valley, while the Aramaic of Palmyra and of Palestine hardly differed from it more than Lowland 'Scots' differs from the standard English. Edessa, in one word, was situated on the confines of two great civilisations, the Greek and the Persian, while at the same time it had not been robbed of its own Semitic culture. The extant remains of Syriac literature are almost wholly the product of later ages and less fortunate conditions; it is the misfortune of Edessa, not her fault, that she was unable to maintain her intellectual freedom through the shock of the Persian wars. But, the ease and vigour of the earliest surviving literature of the Syriac-speaking Church, whether prose, poetry, or philosophical discussion, unmistakably reflect the glory of Edessa's three hundred years of honourable independence.

Christianity appears to have reached the Euphrates valley about the middle of the second century. The Bishops of Edessa trace their succession to, Bishop of Antioch from 190 to 203, and there is all the more reason for