Page 272 - Records of Bahrain (2)(ii)_Neat

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598 Records of Bahrain

TIIE ISLANDS OF BAHREIN. 217

herein wo probably sco the origin and explanation of tho
Greek stories about King Erythras and the Erythraean Sea.
It is quite certain that tho colossal tumuli discovered and
partially opened by Capt. Durand on the larger island of
Bahrein represent the tomb of Erythras on the island of
Tyrinc, or Ogyris, which attracted the notice ot Alexander’s
officers. Tho geographical evidenco of identity is quite com­
plete, and the description of the spot given by Orthagoras,
11 on a lofty mound covered with wild palms,” would suit tho
locality at the present day.'1 The only point which is difficult
of decision seems to be whether tho far-famed tomb of
Erythras, “ the red king,” was a temple of Inzak (or Mer­
cury, “ tho dusky God ”), or whether thcro may not have
been a real sepulchre on the island of some early king of the
“black-heads,” whose name was used as the eponym of his
rucc. It was the dusky or swarthy colour of the primitive

colonists which the Greeks translated by Erythraean, and
which probably led the islanders to take “the dusky God” as
tlioir tutelar divinity ; for the monogram S^yy^ by which

Nobo of Nidnk/ci was distinguished is explained in one of
tho Cuneiform syllabaries as Sagga-gunu, that is, “head-
colour,” or “reddish brown”;3 and curiously enough the
character in question has also the two syllabic values of Sur
and Kus, the one value having possibly suggested that con­
nexion with the Syrians of tho Mediterranean which so sorely
puzzled the Greeks, while the other pointed less obscurely to

. Fpr tho identification of tho Fire God with tho
lightning, birku, see li.M.I. vol. iii. p. CG, col. 2, 1. 20, and col. 7, 1. 10.
1 Strabo, p. 7GG.
2 Artenjidonis, as quoted by Strabo, p. 770, alludes to this eponymous character
of Erythras, when ho says that some of the natives called him a son of Pcrscs, who
formerly reigned in these parts.
3 Syllabary 483 and JJ.M.I. vol. ii. p. 21, 1. 41. In tho latter passago fur is
tho gloss for Inzu, J-Xc ‘the red-brown goat,’ or *pyy| (Capricorn'or
Tcboth), which Sayco calls ‘ the double ship ’! Assyriologists do not seem to
hnvo discovered that tho gunu of tho lists is everywhere ‘colour’ (Chald'.
|D), and that the ideographic representative was usually tho prefix as in
‘a fish,’ ‘fish-colour,’ ‘a bond,’ E^YY^- ‘ head-colour,’
gTTTpI ‘mud-colour’ (?), , etc.

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