The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1907-02-17

fourteen clay vessels, copper poWl.
and an inschibed cylinder, pahu oA
pure gold about an inch broad. four
statuettes, cats-eye stone, ana q
white stone seal. Thus the people OF
| Abraham in Ur were inferred.
During my recent Babylonian excava-
tions at Bismya we opened number
| of such graves. The walls of mud brick
| had so perfectly resisted the efforts or
| time that all within had been preserved
| as If in an air-tight case. No moisture
had ever penetrated; and. as we dug
away the bricks of the walls, there
/ came from within an odor so offensive
that the workmen were obliged to with
= draw until fresh air could be intro
duced.
1t is from these early houses and
graves that we learn how the people OF
Abraham lived and dressed.
| Imagine a tall, broad man, with head
bare save for the long black hair, with
a full black beard, barefooted, for san
/ daIs were then not commonly used IN
Babylonia, with great square cloth OF
goats hair, perhaps embroidered along
the edge, thrown about the body, con-
| cealing the left arm. but leaving the
right arm free; and we have picture
! of Abraham as the ruins OF his city
/ present him.
His herds, for he was a shepherd,
were in the care of keepers who grazed
them in the valley of the Euphrates,
or, as the winter rains permitted,
further in the interior. We may see
him going from flock to flock counting
the animals. and taking from the shep-
herds little receipts recorded in wedge
;. i-t,a al9 rarHiDtS
are now fossld among the ruins.
The picfSfk which we have OF hi,
wife,.-bis. esffu5s FER and his sisters is4ot
less vivid. - -
Even in tslose days it was not proper
for a woman in the Orient to reveal her
face to the stranger in public; therefore
she is seldom represented upon sculp-
ture. Her outer garment resembled
that of her husband, though more rich
iy embroidered. Her heavy black hair
was knotted upon the head and held IN
place by means of a single long bronze
pin.
She was proud, and sought to in
crease her natural charms by tattoo
marks upon her face and body; and she
even colored her cheeks and darkened
her eyelids A marble cosmetic case
with TWO cells, one containing henna,
the rouge of the Orient and the other
the black kohl, was found in one grave.
She was exceedingly tond of jewelry.
Her most striking adornment was
vide band of gold about ner forehead.
Her nose and ears which We're pierced,
were decorated with rings of bronze
or silver, sometimes set with stones or
shells. Her fingers and thumbs bore
rings of bronze, silver, or gold.
ny
bands were among her jewels, but the
most common adornment of all was the
beads about her neck. Some were of
brightly colored stone cut into every
imaginable shape and highly polished;
others were of gold spread over a.
filing of bitumen.
She was not the slave that the woman
OF a later date in the Orient became.
Generally, the only wife of her hus-
band, she ground the barley meal in
the stone mortar; she brought the wa
ter from the canal; and sometimes she
wandered over the desert gathering the
roots of the shrubs for fuel. The more
prosperous families hau servants and
even slaves to perform the more diff
cult labor.
ABRAHAM AS A BOY.
III the early CfllO Oh OT the ruins
have given US picture. There was
the rattle of clay for the infant days,
and the clay dolls and animals of fam
tastic shapes when the rattle was out
grown. At Bismya we found game
board of clay, showing mat the boy OF
Abraham's time knew a game similar
to chess.
he was fond of the chase, and then
game was more plentiful than now
about Ur. Mounted upon the horse
which he had learned 10 ride when
wee child, he hunted the elephant and
the lion, and the ostrich, but now they
have all disappeared from the valley.
With the greyhounds he chased the