e first, a theory full of difficulty. The mention of the Chaldaeans in
Job, and even in Genesis, as a well-known people, was in contradiction to
the supposed recent origin of the race. The explanation of the obscure
passage in the 23d chapter of Isaiah, on which the theory was mainly
based, was at variance with other clearer passages of the same prophet.
Babylon is called by Isaiah the "_daughter_ of the Chaldaeans," and is
spoken of as an ancient city, long "the glory of kingdoms," the oppressor
of nations, the power that "smote the people in wrath with a continual
stroke." She is "the lady of kingdoms," and "the beauty of the Chaldees'
excellency." The Chaldaeans are thus in Isaiah, as elsewhere generally
in Scripture, the people of Babylonia, the term "Babylonians" not being
used by him; Babylon is their chief city, not one which they have
conquered and occupied, but their "daughter"--"the beauty of their
excellency;" and so all the antiquity and glory which is assigned to
Babylon belong necessarily in Isaiah's mind to the Chaldaeans. The
verse, therefore, in the 23d chapter, on which so much has been built,
can at most refer to some temporary depression of the Chaldaeans, which
made it a greater disgrace to Tyre that she should be conquered by them.
Again, the theory of Gesenius took no account of the native historian,
who is (next to Scripture) the best literary authority for the facts of
Babylonian history. Berosus not only said nothing of any influx of an
alien race into Babylonia shortly before the time of Nebuchadnezzar, but
pointedly identified the Chaldaeans of that period with the primitive
people of the country. Nor can it be said that he would do this from
national vanity, to avoid the confession of a conquest, for he admits no
fewer than three conquests of Babylon, a "Midian, an Arabian, and an
Assyrian." Thus, even apart from the monuments, the theory in question
would be untenable. It really originated in linguistic speculations,
which turn out to have been altogether mistaken.

The joint authority of Scripture and of Berosus will probably be accepted
as sufficient to justify the adoption of a term which, if not strictly
correct, is yet familiar to us, and which will conveniently serve to
distinguish the primitive monarchy, whose chief seats were in Chaldaea
Proper (or the tract immediately bordering upon the Persian Gulf), from
the later Babylonian Empire, which had its head-quarters further to