[76] Sayce, _Races of the Old Testament_, Religious Tract Society.
Another unexpected acquisition is the solution of the mystery which has enshrouded that mysterious people known as Hyksos or shepherd kings, who invaded Egypt about the time of the Hebrew patriarchs, and, after keeping the Egyptians in subjection for centuries, were finally expelled by the predecessors of the Amunoph already referred to. They constitute a great feature in early Egyptian history, but disappear mysteriously, leaving no trace but a few sculptured heads, Turanian in aspect and markedly contrasting with those of the native Egyptians. It now appears that a people of Northern Syria and Mesopotamia, known to the Egyptians at a later time as Mitanni, and who were neighbours of and associated with the Northern Hittites, have the features of the Hyksos. It also seems from a letter in the Tel-el-Amarna tablets that they spoke a non-Semitic or Turanian language akin to that of the Hittites. Thus we have traced the shepherd kings to their origin, and, curiously enough, Cushanrish-athaim, who oppressed the Israelites in the days of Othniel, seems to represent a later inroad of the same people.
Such 'restitutions of decayed intelligence' now meet us on every hand as the results of modern exploration, and are enabling us to bridge over the gaps which have separated the geological ages from the prehistoric and historic human periods in those ancient countries where civilisation seems to have originated.
THE NEANTHROPIC DISPERSION AND ALLIED TOPICS
The remarkable record of the early distribution of the sons of Noah ('Toledoth' of the sons of Noah) in Genesis x. may be regarded, relatively to most of the nations it refers to, as a scrap of prehistoric lore of the most intensely interesting character. From the old 'Phaleg' of Bochart to the recent commentaries of Delitzsch and other German scholars, it has received a host of more or less conjectural explanations; and while all agree in extolling its value and importance as a 'Beginning of History,' nothing can be more various than the views taken of it. Only in the light of the recent discoveries and researches already referred to can we arrive at a clear conception of its import; but with these and some common sense we may hope to be more fortunate than the older interpreters. It is necessary, however, to explain here that, for want of a little scientific precision, many modern archæologists still fail in their interpretations. They tell us that the Toledoth are not properly 'ethnological,' but rather 'ethnographical,' and that we are to regard the document as referring, not to the genealogical affiliations of nations, but to their accidental geographical positions at the time of the record.