[163] Since writing the above I have found the following note in Rawlinson's "Herodotus," i. 623, on Ninip:--"There is, however, another explanation of the name Bar-sam or Bur-shem, of which some notice must be taken. It has been already stated that if the _Noachid_ triad be compared with the Assyrian, Ana will correspond with Ham, Bel-Nimrod with Shem, and Hoa with Japhet." The following passage, also from Rawlinson's "Herodotus," i. 609, appears to me valuable in proof of the transition from ancestral to solar worship, or at least of their interfusion:--"The sun was probably named in Babylonia both San and Sanei, before his title took the definite _Semitic_ form of _Shamas_, by which he is known in Assyrian and _in all_ the languages of _that family_." Now, standing by itself, this might not appear very significant; but compare it with the following passages connecting _Ham_ with the sun:--"By the Syrians the sun and heat were called ... Chamba; by the Persians, Hama; and the temple of the sun, the temple of _Am_mon or _Ham_mon." Mr Bryant shows that Ham was esteemed the Zeus of Greece and the Jupiter of Latium. Mr G. Higgins' "Anacalypsis," p. 45. Bryant says, "the worship of Ham, _or the sun_, as it was the most ancient, so it was the most universal of any in the world." These passages may possibly be so interpreted as to support a solar theory, but is it not at least suspicious to see the name of the central luminary so apparently identified with historical characters whose memory is distinctly preserved _aliunde_ in the traditions of their descendants? Compare Nimrod, ch. viii. 164, _et seq._ It is true that the majority of the inscriptions, p. 169, assert that Nin was the son of Bel-Nimrod. This may be referred to that tendency, previously noted in ancient nations, to place the ancestor with whom they were themselves identified at the head of every genealogy. One inscription, however, "makes Bel-Nimrod the son of Nin instead of his father." Nin, in any case, is unquestionably brought into close historical relationship with Bel-Nimrod, an historical character, and we must, in fine, choose whether we shall admit him to be Noah--to whom all the epithets would apply--or whether, upon the more literal construction of the inscriptions, we shall believe him to be some nameless son or successor of Nimrod. There is one god more in whom I fancy I see a counterpart of Noah, or at least a counterpart of Hoa and Nin--viz. NEBO.