A History of Science-4 [117]
largely solved the problem of the Persian alphabet independently. So the Persian portion of the Behistun inscription could be at least partially deciphered. This in itself, however, would have been no very great aid towards the restoration of the languages of the other portions had it not chanced, fortunately, that the inscription is sprinkled with proper names. Now proper names, generally speaking, are not translated from one language to another, but transliterated as nearly as the genius of the language will permit. It was the fact that the Greek word Ptolemaics was transliterated on the Rosetta Stone that gave the first clew to the sounds of the Egyptian characters. Had the upper part of the Rosetta Stone been preserved, on which, originally, there were several other names, Young would not have halted where he did in his decipherment.
But fortune, which had been at once so kind and so tantalizing in the case of the Rosetta Stone, had dealt more gently with the Behistun inscriptions; for no fewer than ninety proper names were preserved in the Persian portion and duplicated, in another character, in the Assyrian inscription. A study of these gave a clew to the sounds of the Assyrian characters. The decipherment of this character, however, even with this aid, proved enormously difficult, for it was soon evident that here it was no longer a question of a nearly perfect alphabet of a few characters, but of a syllabary of several hundred characters, including many homophones, or different forms for representing the same sound. But with the Persian translation for a guide on the one hand, and the Semitic languages, to which family the Assyrian belonged, on the other, the appalling task was gradually accomplished, the leading investigators being General Rawlinson, Professor Hincks, and Mr. Fox-Talbot, in England, Professor Jules Oppert, in Paris, and Professor Julian Schrader, in Germany, though a host of other scholars soon entered the field.
This great linguistic feat was accomplished about the middle of the nineteenth century. But so great a feat was it that many scholars of the highest standing, including Joseph Erneste Renan, in France, and Sir G. Cornewall Lewis, in England, declined at first to accept the results, contending that the Assyriologists had merely deceived themselves by creating an arbitrary language. The matter was put to a test in 1855 at the suggestion of Mr. Fox-Talbot, when four scholars, one being Mr. Talbot himself and the others General Rawlinson, Professor Hincks, and Professor Oppert, laid before the Royal Asiatic Society their independent interpretations of a hitherto untranslated Assyrian text. A committee of the society, including England's greatest historian of the century, George Grote, broke the seals of the four translations, and reported that they found them unequivocally in accord as regards their main purport, and even surprisingly uniform as regards the phraseology of certain passages--in short, as closely similar as translations from the obscure texts of any difficult language ever are. This decision gave the work of the Assyriologists official status, and the reliability of their method has never since been in question. Henceforth Assyriology was an established science.
APPENDIX
REFERENCE-LIST
CHAPTER I. MODERN DEVELOPMENT OF THE PHYSICAL SCIENCES
[1] Robert Boyle, Philosophical Works (3 vols.). London, 1738.
CHAPTER II. THE BEGINNINGS OF MODERN CHEMISTRY
[1] For a complete account of the controversy called the "Water Controversy," see The Life of the Hon. Henry Cavendish, by George Wilson, M.D., F.R.S.E. London, 1850.
[2] Henry Cavendish, in Phil. Trans. for 1784, P. 119.
[3] Lives of the Philosophers of the Time of George III., by Henry, Lord Brougham, F.R.S., p. 106. London, 1855.
[4] Experiments and Observations on Different Kinds of Air, by Joseph Priestley (3 vols.). Birmingham, 790, vol. II, pp. 103-107.
[5] Lectures on Experimental Philosophy, by Joseph Priestley, lecture IV., pp. 18, ig. J. Johnson, London, 1794.
[6] Translated
But fortune, which had been at once so kind and so tantalizing in the case of the Rosetta Stone, had dealt more gently with the Behistun inscriptions; for no fewer than ninety proper names were preserved in the Persian portion and duplicated, in another character, in the Assyrian inscription. A study of these gave a clew to the sounds of the Assyrian characters. The decipherment of this character, however, even with this aid, proved enormously difficult, for it was soon evident that here it was no longer a question of a nearly perfect alphabet of a few characters, but of a syllabary of several hundred characters, including many homophones, or different forms for representing the same sound. But with the Persian translation for a guide on the one hand, and the Semitic languages, to which family the Assyrian belonged, on the other, the appalling task was gradually accomplished, the leading investigators being General Rawlinson, Professor Hincks, and Mr. Fox-Talbot, in England, Professor Jules Oppert, in Paris, and Professor Julian Schrader, in Germany, though a host of other scholars soon entered the field.
This great linguistic feat was accomplished about the middle of the nineteenth century. But so great a feat was it that many scholars of the highest standing, including Joseph Erneste Renan, in France, and Sir G. Cornewall Lewis, in England, declined at first to accept the results, contending that the Assyriologists had merely deceived themselves by creating an arbitrary language. The matter was put to a test in 1855 at the suggestion of Mr. Fox-Talbot, when four scholars, one being Mr. Talbot himself and the others General Rawlinson, Professor Hincks, and Professor Oppert, laid before the Royal Asiatic Society their independent interpretations of a hitherto untranslated Assyrian text. A committee of the society, including England's greatest historian of the century, George Grote, broke the seals of the four translations, and reported that they found them unequivocally in accord as regards their main purport, and even surprisingly uniform as regards the phraseology of certain passages--in short, as closely similar as translations from the obscure texts of any difficult language ever are. This decision gave the work of the Assyriologists official status, and the reliability of their method has never since been in question. Henceforth Assyriology was an established science.
APPENDIX
REFERENCE-LIST
CHAPTER I. MODERN DEVELOPMENT OF THE PHYSICAL SCIENCES
[1] Robert Boyle, Philosophical Works (3 vols.). London, 1738.
CHAPTER II. THE BEGINNINGS OF MODERN CHEMISTRY
[1] For a complete account of the controversy called the "Water Controversy," see The Life of the Hon. Henry Cavendish, by George Wilson, M.D., F.R.S.E. London, 1850.
[2] Henry Cavendish, in Phil. Trans. for 1784, P. 119.
[3] Lives of the Philosophers of the Time of George III., by Henry, Lord Brougham, F.R.S., p. 106. London, 1855.
[4] Experiments and Observations on Different Kinds of Air, by Joseph Priestley (3 vols.). Birmingham, 790, vol. II, pp. 103-107.
[5] Lectures on Experimental Philosophy, by Joseph Priestley, lecture IV., pp. 18, ig. J. Johnson, London, 1794.
[6] Translated