The Idaho recorder. [volume] (Salmon City, Idaho) 1886-1927, 1917-01-12

Fator since the beginning of the European war,
when Or. ArnO POebel left to join his regiment
at the German front. The Eckley b. Coke, Jr.
expeditions, which began operations in Egypt in
1889 and have carried them through various
years since, finding localities of the war
ridden land where they still operate this year,
have sent back to the museum an incalcuable
treaSuretrOve not only in tablets but In all kinds
OF articles dug up from the dirt layers of Biblical
and pre-BibIica lands.
All this accumulation has not had the attention
It deserved. Doctor Langdons labors will be bent
toward arranging the Babylonian exhibit. The
collection is the largest in the world No other
museum has such quantity of sacred Sumerian
documents which make this the most important
Rabylonian collection in the world, even though
It Is not SO large as that in the British museum.
The war, which already has done so much dam
age, bids fair to rob us of this comparative re
cent achievement, the ability to decpher these
tablets which tell of the lives and histories or
peoples who lived many hundred years ago.
Younger men. Ike Poebel. at the front and
may never come back; other well-knOwn Egypto-
lOgsts old men.
Not enough young men will be left to carry on
the work of translating the ancient cuneform
writings. When the present scholars pass away
the achievement may die with them and Sumertan-
Akkadlnn become again dead language, for not
enough young college men proposing to take
up archaeology.
There Is today no endowed seat of AsSyrioOgy
In any university. The University Of Pennsyl-
vania museum Is eXcrting every effort to secure
such an endowment. that other intelleCts of so
high an order as Doctor Langdon's may he en-
couraged and helped 10 carry a work similar
10 his.
Ecklcy e. Coke. Jr, died In Philadelphia in Sep
temher last and left an endowment fund of $500
900 To carry the work he has been eQupping
expeditions to do In Egypt many years. But
one expedition can only scratch the surface of the
myriad hills there and the countless buried and
forgotten cities that lie beneath them.
"Our only hope of getting the rest Of the tablets
buried there" says Doctor Langlon. sis to go back
to Nippur again and again, and dtg for them" En-.
dowments Tor these expeditions nre another Of the
crying needs Of scholars. The world mt large will
lose II archaeological excavations and research
have TO be abandoned.
There is no doubt that the general public appre.
ctateS the work done by museums and by scholars
To Biblical students alone there is ineShaustible
pleasure ana satisfaction To he derived from facts
uncarthed Of Biblical and pre-BihlicOl peoples
There Is now complete agreement among arch
biologists that Hammurahi is that same Amraphe
NJ Genesis l+l a contemporary OF Abraham
From chronological differences IL follows thai
Abraham may well have attended school ut the
temple IN Ntppur; nay. that he studied these very
books that are I'm the University Of PeunsyI
vapla museum Tie may have read there the &C
count of fhe creation. Why not7 The dates dove
tail
Let me take out and touch one Of those tab
let's said 20 religious man recently in the Uni
vcrSify of Pennsylvania museum. II believe IN
my heart that the hand Of Abraham must have
held any or all Of them nearly 5000 years agoI"