perhaps, possessions here to which they returned with their great leader, a prince of Ephraim. It agrees well with this that the next name, Iashepal, appears to involve the name of Joseph, as T'aqbal (102) does that of Jacob. I will not repeat what I have said elsewhere, but I am glad to find that M. Maspero agrees in thinking that, whatever the personal or gentilic value of this name, there is no reason (as M. Groff thinks) against its being locally attached in Judæa. It seems to me that it may well enough represent the place anciently called Yusepheh, and now Yasûf, some four miles east of Kefr Hâris.

Professor Maspero goes to the far south for

(80),

but I cannot accompany him to the Gerar of Abraham, for I believe this place may be Dâr Jerîr, nine or ten miles S.S.E. of Yasûf, and that our list proceeds with names at no very great distance from one another.

The next place is called by the remarkable name Har-el, "Mountain of God," unless we read it Harar. Professor Sayce believes that we have here an ancient name of Jerusalem, and has given his reasons in the Athenæum of October 9, 1886, and in a letter printed in my paper on this list, to which I must refer for lack of time on the present occasion. I have thought that perhaps the place may be 'Arâra, an important site of ruins, with five sacred places, but I trust we may have more light on this very interesting name. At all events, the place must lie (I think) in the region around Jerusalem, rather than in that of Gerar, in the south.

The next name to be mentioned is Higrim (89), which I take to be a tribal name, n, the descendants of Hagar, and this would agree with the expression "all the unknown peoples of the frontiers of the Sati." We should expect to find the Hagarites among these. South-west of Hebron is a spring called 'Ain el Hejeri.

The two Abels which occur after Higrim (90 and 92) seem, not improbably, to be Abel-Shittim in the Jordan valley and the renowned Abel-Mizraïm, identified by Jerome with Beth-hogla, now 'Ain Hajla, between the Jordan and Jericho, and accordingly the Maqerput (No. 94) I hold to be Wâdy Makarfet el Qattûm, crossed by the pilgrim-road on the way from the great ford of Hajla to Jerusalem. In this case, 'Aina (95) may be the great spring 'Aines-Sultân, supposed to mark the site of the first Jericho, and the vineyard-name Qalman, or Qarman (96), may be the old Calamon, near Jericho (Mem. P. E. F., III., 194).

The remarkable name Iaqob-el occurs at No. 102, and has occasioned much speculation since M. de Rougé suggested the question whether "this local name preserves a memorial of the establishments of Jacob in Palestine." M. Groff, in a very interesting paper, with subsequent additions, earnestly denies the local element, while as strongly upholding the ethnic significance. To my mind, de Rouge's question is open to an affirmative answer, and Professor Maspero, holds this opinion. It seems to me that the locality may be fixed by the name Iqbâla, borne by a Wâdy and a ruin about six miles west of Jerusalem, near the road to Jaffa.

Then, I think, the name Magretu (106) may be Ma'arath, identified with Beit Ummar, north of Hebron, and 'Amequ (107) will be the 'Emeq Hebron, with which a group of places will agree, -viz., 108, Sertha, which I take to be the well of Sirah (2 Sam. iii. 26), which I would place at Siret el Bellâ'a, two and a half miles north of Hebron; Beth-Shar, the present Beit-Shar, six and a half miles north of Hebron; Beth-antha, perhaps Beit-'Ainûn; Khelqetu, perhaps Khůrbet el Katt, three miles from Beit 'Ainûn; 'An-qn'a, 'Ain el Qana, one mile north-west of Hebron, and formerly supplying it with water; and Qeb'au, nya, Jeb'a, ten miles north of Hebron, "possibly Gibeah of Judah.”

As to Zaftha (116), Mariette identified it with Ziph, now Tell ez Zîf, south of Hebron.

Bar-qna (117) may, I think, well be found at Khurbet Bîrein, close to Khurbet Yukîn, which has been identified with the city Kain (Josh. xv. 57), and reminds us of the Kenites.

I will not now touch the two remaining names, and I have only ventured (on the present occasion) slightly to sketch the additions which I have proposed of two considerable clusters of names, the one surrounding Jerusalem, the other enclosing Hebron. My treatment of this list in detail will be found in the forthcoming volume of the Transactions of the Society of Biblical Archæology.

It has been a labour of love to me to translate Professor Maspero's learned and highly valuable papers for the Victoria Institute; and, by the united efforts of many minds, it seems manifest that this celebrated list, which carries so many Biblical names farther back than the Mosaic record, is at last being, to an unexpected extent, explained and locally identified.

Captain FRANCIS PETRIE, F.G.S. (Hon. Sec.).-I have to state that among the letters received, the first two are from Sir George

Grove and Sir Richard Temple, both regretting their inability to
be present this evening. Before I read the communications that
have been sent in, I wish to state that M. Maspero's former paper,
upon the first portion of the Karnak lists, will be found in the
Victoria Institute's Journal, vol. xx., together with comments by
Sir Charles Wilson, K.C.B., Major Conder, R.E., the Rev. H. G.
Tomkins, the Rev. Dr. W. Wright, and others. As regards the
second portion of these lists, we have to-night the advantage of the
views of various critics of M. Maspero's paper, his final corrections
to which have now been made; the Council is, therefore, able to
place before the Members in a most complete form, with M. Maspero's
map, the last known results of investigations upon this subject.
Sir Charles Wilson, K.C.B., writes:—

"I regret very much that I am unable to get up to town on Monday to hear M. Maspero's paper. It is a very important contribution to the literature of the geography of the Holy Land, and I must congratulate the Institute on obtaining such a valuable addition to their Proceedings."

The Rev. Canon Liddon, D.D., calls attention to the great value of M. Maspero's paper, saying, "while the invasion of Palestine by Thothmes III. does not traverse (it really supports) the Bible history, his list of his conquests affords various indirect confirmations of the truth of the Bible narrative. And, moreover, it is an important contribution to the great fabric of Ancient Egyptian history, to which we may look with increasing confidence for the means of showing how mistaken are certain theories which for purely or mainly subjective reasons, would place the date of the earliest books of Holy Scripture so late as to be entirely inconsistent with belief in their general trustworthiness, to say nothing of their higher claims."

He adds, "I regret to observe that one of M. Maspero's identifications (on the third page of his paper) is obtained at the cost of deciding that Yazour is not Gezer.”

Mr. P. Le Page Renouf, writes:

"DEAR SIR,

"May 7th, 1888.

"It will not be possible for me to be present this evening at the meeting to which the President and Council have honoured me by their invitation. They would probably, however, like to know

1

that I agree generally with M. Mas pero in the interpretation of the document which forms the subject of the paper. M. Maspero differs from every other Egyptologist in transcribing as i a vowel which should, I think, be considered a, but this makes but littlè practical difference through the entire list of names.

'Although this list of Thothmes III. establishes the fact that what we now call 'Hebrew' was the language of Palestine for centuries before the children of Israel took possession of the country, some difficulty in identifying names arises from the difference between the consonantal systems of Hebrew and Egyptian. Each language used important sounds which the other had not. The Egyptian language had no medial consonants, nor anything corresponding to the Semitic (with its two sounds and ), and it made no distinction between 1 and r. In later times the Egyptians adopted a regular system of transcription of Semitic words, but no such system had yet come into operation at the time of Thothmes III.

ع

,(غ

"It would be satisfactory to feel assured that the syllable ar, which occurs at the end of certain names, is really a transcription of the Hebrew EL, signifying God. But, although this is highly probable, no true scholar would venture to assert it as absolutely certain.

"I find myself quite unable to agree with Professor Sayce when he tells us in his Hibbert Lectures that

Joseph was not only the father of the Israelitish tribes of Ephraim and Manasseh, he was also a deity worshipped by the older inhabitants of Canaan. More than two centuries before the date assigned by Egyptologists to the Exodus, the great Egyptian conqueror Thothmes III. inscribed upon the walls of the temple of Karnak the names of the cities conquered by him in Palestine. Among them are Yaqeb-el, "Jacob the God" and Iseph-el, "Joseph the God."'

"According to the same process of interpretation, Israel, Ishmael, Nathaniel, Jezreel, Bethel are evidence of the gods Isra, Ishma, Nathan, Jezre, Beth, and ever so many others!

"Even if the transcription adopted by Professor Sayce were indisputable, the first part of each word would not be a proper name but a verb, as in Ishma-el 'God will hear,' Jezre-el, • God has planted. No such names as Jacob or Joseph occur in these Karnak inscriptions, but (at the utmost) only the verbs from which the names are derived.

"As a matter of fact, Iāqabȧar is only one of three different readings; the other copies giving Iäqabåmre and Iāqabảm.

"The second name, written Išapar is fully preserved in only one of the copies of the list, so that there is but little check upon its orthography. M. Maspero's derivation of the word appears to me quite as doubtful as Mariette's. The Egyptians would have used another sign than III să to represent it. I am rather inclined to look for the first element of the name in (the unused root a quiver), according to the sense ascribed to it by Simonis and Gesenius, tegere, occultare, recondere. But all this is only guess-work.”

,אַשְׁפָּה of

The Rev. Dr. Edersheim writes:

"The list of Thothmes III. is not only of great intrinsic historical interest, but has, through recent theories, acquired the deepest importance for Biblical students. This monograph by M. Maspero will, in its elegant and excellent rendering by my learned friend, Mr. Tomkins, prove most helpful in various ways. No doubt some of these applications may be pointed out by speakers. I much regret that other engagements prevent my being present on this occasion."

Major C. R. Conder, R.E., is unable to be here this evening, but has kindly sent some comments, which I will ask Mr. Tomkins to read.

Remarks on the Geographical Lists of Karnak, by Major Conder, R.E." As regards M. Maspero's researches into the names of the celebrated Karnak list of towns in Palestine, I should not like to write off-hand on questions to which he has now for some time given so much attention. I first studied these lists in 1875-6, and came to the conclusion that the names, up to No. 119, are all to be sought in Galilee, Samaria, and the vicinity of the Philistine plain (except a section in Bashan, towards Damascus): Mariette had extended his researches over the whole of Palestine, and even sought for places east of the Dead Sea. It appeared to me more probable that the conquered towns would lie along the route taken by the army of Thothmes III.; and that it was impossible that Egyptian chariots, at least, should have scaled the mountain-walls which protect Jerusalem and Bethel, or crossed the deep Jordan valley, and passed up the yet steeper ridges of Moab and of Gilead.

"I am very glad to see that M. Maspero seeks in the same regions in which I then sought, and often accepts a site which I ventured to propose in opposition to the views of Mariette, to whom, however, we owe a most valuable monograph on the subject. I agree in