bust people of well-knit figure, with brown skins, black hair and
eyes, who belonged to that negritic race which inhabited a considerable
part of Asia in prehistoric times.*

* The connection of the negroid type of Susians with the
negritic races of India and Oceania, has been proved, in the
course of M. Dieulafoy's expedition to the Susian plains and
the ancient provinces of Elam.

[Illustration: 045.jpg MAP OF CHALDAEA AND ELAM.]

[Illustration: 046.jpg AN ANCIENT SUSIAN OF NEGRETIC RACE]

Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a bas-relief of Sargon II. in
the Louvre.

These prevailed in the lowlands and the valleys, where the warm, damp
climate favoured their development; but they also spread into the
mountain region, and had pushed their outposts as far as the first
slopes of the Iranian table-land. They there contact with white-skinned
of medium height, who were probably allied to the nations of Northern
and Central Asia--to the Scythians,* for instance, if it is permissible
to use a vague term employed by the Ancients.

* This last-mentioned people is, by some authors, for
reasons which, so far, can hardly be considered conclusive,
connected with the so-called Sumerian race, which we find
settled in Chaldaea. They are said to have been the first to
employ horses and chariots in warfare.

[Illustration: 047.jpg NATIVE OF MIXED NEGRITIC RACE FROM SUSIANA]

Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph furnished by
Marcel Dieulafoy.

Semites of the same stock as those of Chaldaea pushed forward as far as
the east bank of the Tigris, and settling mainly among the marshes led a
precarious life by fishing and pillaging.* The country of the plain
was called Anzan, or Anshan,** and the mountain region Numma, or Ilamma,
"the high lands:" these two names were subsequently used to denote the
whole country, and Ilamma has survived in the Hebrew word Elam.*** Susa,
the most important and flourishing town in the kingdom, was situated
between the Ulai and the Ididi, some twenty-five or thirty miles from
the nearest of the mountain ranges.

* From the earliest times we meet beyond the Tigris with
names like that of Durilu, a fact which proves the existence
of races speaking a Semitic dialect in the countries under
the suzerainty of the King of Elam: in the last days of the
Chaldaean empire they had assumed such importance that the
Heb