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Show 130 TilE ART OF TilE BilEMITES. and tho Peloponnesus, though rich in silver-mi.nos, possessed ncit~or colonies nor extensive and uninterrupted formgn co~morco,. wh10h n.lono can have given rise to tho desire o~ a circulatm.g medmm.of currency. Lydia, equally devoid of colomes and formgn extens1ve comm reo had not even a supply of gold before the conquest of l~luygia. 'The :first money could not have been struck by a~y but a merchant nation. Neither Pharaonic Egypt, nor the ompnes of Assyria and Babylon, nor the llcbrow kingdoms, knew the use o! coi us. They weighed tho gold and silver as the ~r~ce ~or .commodities bought and sold; but they never tried to divide 1t mto equal pice s, or to mark it according to its w~ight and value. It was at.a comparatively late period, scarcely pnor to tho sovo~th c nt~IY before our ora, that gold and silver wore struck by pub~1c authonty, to bo tho circulating medium. Alcidamas, the Atheman rhotor of the fourth century B. o., tells us, that "coins were invented by the Phamicians, they being the wisest and most cunning of the Barbarians ·-out of the ingot they took equal portions and stamped them with 'a sign, according to the weight, the heav1. er an d t h e l"1 g htc r. " l(XJ -'Ooucrcrsu' xcxora '~~'pooocria> nat..cxp.~oou>.- (See Alcid.) Such arc the lasting benefits mankind owes to the Shcmitic race, which, besides, was in antiquity the forerunner of Indo-European civilization on tho Mediterranean, and along the Eastern shores of tho Atlantic, and subsequently again in llindostan and Java during the middle ao-os. Even now it paves tho way for European culture and commcr;e in the Soodan, and central Mrioa. These highly gifted carriers of civilization never rose, notwithstanding, to any eminence in imitative arts, and were unable to invent or establish a national slylc of painting or sculpture. As to the llcbrews and the Arabs, this deficiency is often attributed to the prohibitions of tho Pentateuch and the Kur'an: but it will probably be safer to derive the prohibition from the want of artistical feeling among the nations for whom the law was framed. Besides, the Arabs, even before Mohammed, had few or no idols of human form, no plastical art and no pictures; at the same time that the Kur'an could not prevent the 100 1'ho st11ndnrd weights of Nimrood, in tho Dri tish Museum, carry now oven tho D11byloni11n t11lent further bnck, to Assyria, and it is not unimportant that their inscriptions are either JlUI'Illy Phoonici11n, or bilingn11l-As to coino.ge, it is overywhoro originally connected with the standard of weights: it is ils result, its most praoticol11pplic11tion to silvor and gold as meo.sures of value. Tho standard of measures must havo preceded tho stand11rd of coino.go, aud cannot be 11 contemporary invention. Pheidon may indood have been tho first who struck coin in Greece, and havo introduced coinage together with tho Babylonin.n sto.nd11rd of mon.smos and weights from Phoonicia; but tho Greek tr11dition which attributes to him the invention both of the st11ndo.rd of weights n.nd of coinage, is 11s illogical 11s regards ooins, as it is hi8torioo.lly false as regards weights. TITE ART OF TilE SIIEMITES. 1~1 Perso-Aflghan Mussulmans, both the Shccft and the Sunnco, to continue drawing and painting, and even sculpturing relief~;. Down to tho present day, portraits are painted at Delhi and Cabool and Teheran by true believers, without any religious scruples; whereas the Arab envoy of tho Sultan of Morocco to Queen Victoria, whose clagnerrcotypo was taken without his knowledge at Claudet's in Reg nt Stroot, felt himself both insulted and defiled for having had his form "stolen from him," as he expressed himself. With the polytheistic branch of tho Shomitos, sculpture and painting were not prohibited by religion; and still no nalional style of art ever dcvolopcd itself among the Syrians ancl Phcnnicians, notwithstanding their wealth and industry, and love of display. The extent and number of the monuments of art in Syria, Phoonicia, Palestine, and Idumroa, and of those remains which, by their Phcooi.cian or Punic inscription, are designated as Shomitic, is not at all in igni-fi.cant; although, measured by the standard of Egyptian, Greek, or Etruscan antiquities, they arc, indeed, comparatively small. Still, these monuments form together no homogeneous cla s, characterized by certain peculiarities common to them all. Nothing but tho place where they were found, or tho Phami.cian characters with which they are inscribed, designates them as Shcmitic. They might all have been made by foreigners: Egyptians, Assyrians, Greeks, Etruscans, or barbarians. Of tho ruins still extant, Petra, tho rocktown of tho N abatroans, exhibits late Greek; Baalbck (Hcliopolis) and Palmyra, late Roman forms of architectur-e. The rock-tombs of J crusalcm wore evidently excavated by artists perfectly conversant with tho Dorian column, who remained faithful to tho IIcllenic spirit of art, notwithstanding that they introduced grapes and palm-trees, and some oriental forms, into tho decoration of their rock-structtll'os. As to Shemitic statues and reliefs, the most important among them ·.mdoubtcdly is the black basalt-sarcophagus of EsnMUNAZAit, king of Sidon, discovered in February, 1855, ncar Bayda, the old Sidon. The Frepch Consul, M. Porcti6, acquired it, and sent it to Franco, where it has been deposited in tho Louvre, as a worthy companion to the kingly monuments of Egyptian Pharaohs and Assyrian monarchs. The Phcnnician inscription of the sarcophagus, read and analyzed by tho Due do Luynes,101 is one of the most striking expressions of Shemitic feelings. It runs as follows : 10• Mr. Dietrich of Mo.rburg, Dr. ltUdigor, Prof. L11noi, and others, likewise published transltLtions of, and obsorvo.tions on, this inscription, independently of tho French Dtlko, whoso translation, howovor, was ren.d at tho Institute previously to the publications of the lo11rnod Germans. Desidos, his Momoir, published in 1866, is by flU· more complete as regards tho analysis of tho inscription, and the geographical, pbilologioal, and bistoric11l |
