=1.= The promise that in his seed should all the nations of the earth be blessed renders the history of Abram one of great interest, especially as recent discoveries of the monuments and literature of ancient Chaldæa have given us more correct knowledge of those early ages than had been acquired for more than 3,000 years. In the eleventh chapter of Genesis, beginning at the tenth verse, is given the =ancestry of Abraham=, the father of the Hebrews. Abram, afterward called Abraham, for reasons stated in chapter 17:5, was the ninth from Shem. Until the birth of Abram his ancestors appear to have lived in the region known as Chaldæa. Abram’s birthplace was Ur, 150 miles southeast of Babylon and a few miles west of the Euphrates. The ruins of Ur include, at the present day, a part of an ancient temple dedicated to the moon. This temple seems to have been erected many years before the days of Abram. A vast number of tombs surround it and the city, in the times of Abram, must have been a place for burial and considered sacred. Eupolemus, a Greek writer who is quoted by Eusebius, speaks of it in his time, about 446 B. C., as “the place of the Chaldees.”[43] Its ruins on a vast mound are so largely cemented with bitumen that this fact has given rise to its present name, Mugheir, which means “bitumen.” The tablets and bricks bear the ancient name of Ur as well as the names of its earliest kings and the builder of its temples.
=2.= Although at the present day the Persian Gulf is about 140 miles distant from Ur, only the deposits from the rivers Euphrates and Tigris have removed the waters of the gulf to this distance. Certain coast marks show that the sea must have sent its waters up the river to a distance of nearly, if not quite, 124 miles, and in the time of Abram Ur must have been a maritime city.
=3. From this city Terah=, Abram’s father, removed with his family to Haran. This city was 580 miles northwest of Ur on the banks of a small tributary stream which runs seventy miles southward before it joins the Euphrates. Both Ur and Haran were the seats of the Moon-god, called “Sin” in the Chaldee language. This deity was masculine in the same language and the Sun-god was feminine, as is apparent from the omens of that day as seen in the following translations of certain priestly utterances and directions by Prof. Sayce.[44]