The objections, made of late to the results of Assyrian researches, touch certain points only, in which over-hasty conclusions have prematurely declared the enigma to be solved. Whatever doubts may still remain, I have felt the more confidence in following the main results, because wherever Asshur and Israel come into contact the Hebrew Scriptures agree with the records of the kings of Asshur. Who could understand the meaning of the verses of Nahum (iii. 8-10), of the fate of "No-Ammon, to whose aid came Ethiopians, Arabians, and Libyans," till G. Smith discovered the document of Assurbanipal relating to the capture of Thebes? Who could explain the words of Ezekiel about the grave of Elam (xxxii. 27) till the tiles of Babylonia and Assyria told us of the ancient supremacy and power of this kingdom, and of its battles with the Assyrians, and subjugation by their arms? If, in chronology, I have given the preference to the tablets of the Assyrian Archons over the Books of Kings, I have done so, not because I hold the former to be infallible, but because the chronological dates in the Books of Kings prove, by more than one contradiction, that they have not come down to us intact. My narrative embraces those independent civilisations of the ancient East which came to exercise a mutual influence on each other. First we follow the realm on the Nile and the kingdoms of Hither Asia as far as the point where the nations of Iran began to influence their destinies. Then I attempt to set forth the peculiar development of the Aryan tribes in the valleys of the Indus and the Ganges, down to the times of Tshandragupta and Asoka. Then follows the history of the Bactrians, the Medes, and the Persians, until the period when the nations of the table-land of Iran were united by Cyrus and Darius with the countries of Western Asia, when Aryan life and Aryan civilisation gained the supremacy over the whole region from Ceylon to the Nile and the Hellespont. The forms of life at which the great empires of Asia had arrived are finally brought face to face with the more youthful civilisation attained by the Hellenes in their mountain cantons. This new development we follow down to the first great shock when East and West met in conflict, and the Achæmenids sought to crush the Hellenes under the weight of Asia. With the failure of this attempt my history of the ancient world concludes. MAX DUNCKER. BERLIN, _March_, 1877. CONTENTS. BOOK I. _EGYPT._ CHAPTER I. PAGE THE LAND AND THE PEOPLE 1 CHAPTER II. THE ANTIQUITY OF THE CIVILISATION IN THE VALLEY OF THE NILE 15 CHAPTER III. THE RELIGION OF THE EGYPTIANS 42 CHAPTER IV. THE KINGDOM OF MEMPHIS 84