not be more than fix hundred thousand. And fo many CHAP. V. the inhabitants of Seleucia were esteemed to be in the days of Pliny, as he tells us. Nay, the inhabitants of London are esteemed fix hundred ninety-five thousand, seven hundred and eighteen, in the Philofophical Tranfactions, No. 185. 21. Nor was this noble city of less strength than greatness; the walls of it being an hundred feet high, and fo broad The ftrength of that three carts might go abreast on the top thereof; and Nineveh. along these walls there were fifteen hundred turrets, each of them two hundred feet high. So ftrong, that it was thought to have been impregnable, and that something perhaps in refpect to an old prediction concerning it; which fignified, that the town should never be taken, till the river became an enemy to it. A prediction, which induced Sardanapalus to make it the feat of his war against Belochus and Arbaces, then in arms againft him; who having befieged it three years without fuccefs, at last the river overflowing, carried before it twenty furlongs of the wall. Which accident fo terrified the effeminate king Sardanapalus, that he burnt himself in the midst of his treasures, and fo left the town to the befiegers. Deftruction being threatened to this city by the preaching of Jonas, it escaped then upon repentance. But the people going on in their wicked courses, it was destroyed by Aftyages king of the Medes, that it might no longer be an encouragement to the Affyrians to rebel against him, as formerly against some of his predeceffors. Upon and as it were out of the ruins hereof is fuppofed another city to have arisen, at no great distance from the fituation of the former, and called by the fame name, as has been before observed, and which was the Nineveh that was standing in the time of Amm. Marcellinus and Paulus Diaconus, and that on the east of the river Lycus, whereas old Nineveh was on the west. And thus much for Nineveh. 22. Proceed we now to the other cities, which Nimrod built in these parts, as well as Nineveh; and these having fuf- of the city fered much the fame fate with Nineveh, nothing can be A pro Rehoboth. PART I. produced concerning them, that will amount to more than 23. Another Rehoboth conjecture. The city mentioned by Mofes next to Nineveh is Rehoboth, which word, because in the Hebrew tongue it denotes alfo ftreets, hence the facred Historian feems to have added the word city; to fhew, that it was here to be taken as a proper name. Now there being no footsteps of the name itself in these parts, but there being here a city or town called Birtha by Ptolemy, and the faid name denoting in the Chaldee tongue the fame as Rehoboth does in the Hebrew, in an appellative or common acceptation; hence it is probably conjectured, that Rehoboth and Birtha are only two different names of one and the fame city. And it is not to be doubted, but the Birtha mentioned by Ptolemy is the fame which Ammianus Marcellinus calls Virta. It was feated on the Tigris, about the mouth of the river Lycus. There is mention made, Gen. xxxvi. 37. of a city Rehoboth, where Saul a king of Edom was born. But this is mentioned, thought to be the Rehoboth that lay on the Euphrates; Gen. xxxvi. whence Bochart tells us, that it is to this day diftin 37. 24. Of the city guished among the Arabs by the name of Rahabath-melic, i. e. Rehoboth-regis; as in Norfolk there is a town called for diftinction fake Lynn-regis. But whether this Rehoboth on the Euphrates was the birth-place of Saul the Idumean king, or no; it is in a manner certain, that it was at too great a distance from Affyria, properly fo called, to be built by Nimrod, together with Nineveh, and the other two that follow, viz. Calah, and Refen. As for Calah and Calach, fince we find in Strabo a country about the head of the river Lycus, called Calachene, it is very probable, that the faid country took this name from Calach, which was once the capital city of it. Ptolemy alfo mentions a country, called Calacine, in these parts. And whereas Pliny mentions a people called Claffitæ, through whofe country the Lycus runs, it is likely that Claffitæ is a corruption for Calachitæ. To this city and country it was, in all probability, that Salmanaffar transplanted some of the ten tribes of Ifrael, as we read 2 Kings 2 Kings xvii. 6. For though the word be there fomewhat CHAP. V. differently spelt, yet the faid two letters, wherein the difference lies, are frequently used one for the other; and what is in this laft place written in our Bible Halah, may be written agreeably to the Hebrew Chalaḥ or Chalach, and fo little differing from Calah or Calach. 25. Refen. We are come now to the last city mentioned by Mofes, as built by Nimrod; the name whereof was Refen. There of the city were two cities in Mefopotamia of somewhat like names, one being called Rhifina, between Edeffa and mount Mafius; the other, Rhefena, between the rivers Chaboras and Saocoras. But the fituation of neither of these agreeing to the description of Refen given by Mofes, therefore learned perfons have been induced to look on a city mentioned by Xenophon under the name of Lariffa, to be the fame with Refen built by Nimrod, and that for these three confiderations. Ift. That the fituation of this Lariffa lying on the Tigris well enough agrees with the fituation of Refen, as defcribed by Mofes, who tells us, that it was built between Nineveh and Calah, Gen. x. 12. over, 2dly, Moses observes in the fame text, that Resen was a great city. And fo Xenophon tells us, that Lariffa was a strong and great, but then ruinated city, being two parafangs, i. e. eight miles in compafs; and its walls an hundred feet high, and twenty-five feet broad. 3dly, and laftly, Lariffa was a Greek name; whence we find a city fo called in Theffaly, and faid to be the birth-place of Achilles. There was alfo another city of the same name in Syria, which the Syrians themselves called Sizara, as Stephanus obferves. But now there were no Greek cities in Affyria in the days of Xenophon, i. e. before Alexander the Great; and confequently no Lariffa: it is likely therefore that the Greeks afking, what city those were the ruins of, the Affyrians might answer Larefen, i. e. of Refen; which word Xenophon expreffed by Lariffa, a somewhat like name of feveral Greek cities. And thus much for the kingdom of Nimrod. CHAP. 1. of the fa CHAP. VI. Of Chaldea, Ur of the Chaldees, and Haran. THE facred Hiftorian having given us an account of the The feries attempt to build the tower of Babel, of the confusion of cred hiftory tongues, and difperfion of mankind ensuing thereupon, continued. and alfo of the kingdom erected by Nimrod; he then 2. the Chal. dees or whence fo tent com en. haftens to the hiftory of Abraham, giving us a genealogical account of his defcent from Shem, Gen. xi. 10-26. After which he informs us, that Terah the father of Abraham, taking this his fon with him, and Lot his grandfon by Haran, and Sarah Abraham's wife, left Ur of the Chaldees, for to go into Canaan; and that being come unto Haran, they dwelt there. We are then to fhew the fituation of these two places, Ur of the Chaldees and Haran. And in order to discover the fituation of the former, it is requifite to premise fomething of the country of the Chaldees, or Chaldea. It is certain, then, that by the name of Chaldea in The land of after-ages was denoted the country lying between Mefopotamia to the north, Sufiana to the east, the Perfian Bay Chaldea, to the south, and Arabia Deserta to the weft. Its capital called; and city was Babylonia, hence called by Isaiah the prophet, the in what ex- beauty of the Chaldees' excellency. From this its capital city, monly tak- the whole country of Chaldea came to be denoted by the name of Babylonia; and fo these two words to be frequently used promifcuously: though some writers make a diftinction between them, but not the fame. For fome make Chaldea in a restrained sense to be a province of Babylonia; others make Babylonia a province of Chaldea, namely, that part which lay about the city of Babylon. That Babylon was fo called by the Greeks, from its Hebrew name Babel, is not to be doubted: and that this city took the name of Babel, from its being built in or near the place where |