acters, are found in certain zoological provinces where everything
conveys the idea of distinct centres of creation; and hence, we may
conclude that mankind only constitutes a link in Nature’s great
chain. pjH slfev
But many of our readers will doubtless he startled'at being told
that Ethnology was no new science even before the time of Moses. .
It is clear, and positive, that at that early day (fourteen or fifteen
centuries b . c.), the Egyptians not only recognized, and faithfully
represented on their monuments, many distinct races,, but that they
possessed their own ethnographic systems, and already had classified
humanity, as known to them, accordingly. They divided mankind
into four species: viz., the Bfed, Black, "White, and Yellow; and, what
is note-worthy, the same perplexing diversity existed in each of their
quadripartite divisions which still pervades our modern classifica- P
tions. Our divisions, such as the Caucasian, Mongol, Negro, &c., each
include many sub-types; and if different painter’s of the, present day
were called upon to select a pictorial type to represent a man of these
arbitrary divisions, they would doubtless select different human
heads. Thus with the Egyptians.: although the Bed, or Egyptian, type
was represented with considerable uniformity, the White, Yellow,
and Black, are often depicted, in their hieroglyphed drawings, with
different physiognomies; thus proving, that the same endless variety
of races existed at that ancient day that we observe in the' same
localities at the present hour. So far from there being a stronger
similarity among the most ancient races, the dissimilarity actually
augments as we ascend the stream of time; and tii h is naturally
explained by the obvious fact that existing remains of primitive types
are becoming more and more amalgamated every day.
There are several similar tableaux on the monmnents; but we shall
select the celebrated scene from the tomb of S e t i -M en e ph th a ,: I.
[generally called “ Belzoni’s Tomb,” at Thebes], of the XlXth
dynasty, about the year 1500 b . c., wherein the god H obus conducts
sixteen personages, each four of whom represent a distinct type of the
human race as known to the Egyptians; and it will be seen that
Egyptian ethnographers, like the writers of the Old and New Testaments,
have described and classified solely thgse races dwelling within
the geographical limits known to them. We eannot now say exactly
how far the maximum geographical boundaries of the ancient Egyptians
extended; for their language, the names of places and names
of races in Asia and Africa, have so changed with time that a margin
must be left to conjecture; although much of our knowledge is
positive, because the minimum extent of antique Egyptian geography
is. determined.
Fio.
The ancient Egyptian division of mankind
1
into four speoies—fifteenth
I o
century B. c.
YelloWi J > Black. White.
B
The above figures, which may be seen, in plates on a folio scale,,
in the great works of Belzoni, Champollion, Rosellini, Lepsius, and
others, are copied, with corrections, from the smaller work of Cham-
pollion-Figeac.27 They display the Rot, the Namu, the Nahsu, and
the Tamhu, as the hieroglyphical inscription^terms them; and although
the effigies we present are small, they'portray a specimen of
each type with sufficient accuracy to show that four races were very
distinct 3300 years ago. We have' here, positively, a scientific quadripartite
division of mankind into Red, JTellow, Black, and TV/iite,
antedating Moses; whereas, in the Xth chapter of Genesis, the symbolical
division of “ S h em , H am, and J a ph e t , ” is only tripartite—the
Black being entirely omitted, as proved in P a r t H . of this volume.
The appellative”'“ Rot” applies exclusively to one race, viz., the
Egyptian; but the other designations maybe somewhat generic, each
covering certain groups of races, .as do our terms Caucasian, Mongol,
&e.; also including a considerable variety oft types bearing general
resemblance to one another in each group, through shades of color,
features, and other peculiarities, to be discussed hereafter.28
E X P L A N A T IO N OF F IG . 1.
This figure, together with his three fac-simile associates, extant on the original
painted relievo, is, then, typical of the Egyptians; who are called in the hieroglyphics
“ Rat," or Race; meaning the Human race, par excellence. Like all other Eastern nations
of antiquity — like the Jews, Hindoos, Chinese, and others y -th e Egyptians regarded
themselves alone as the chosen people of God, and contemptuously looked down upon other
races, reputing such to he Gentiles or outside-barbarians. The above representation of the
Egyptian type is interesting, inasmuch as it is the work of an Egyptian artist, and must
therefore be regarded as the Egyptian ideal representation of their own type. Our con-