Shoshone journal. [volume] (Shoshone, Idaho) 1884-1931, 1917-01-05

rator since the beginning of the European war
when Dr. Arno Poebel left to join his regiment
at the German front. The EclIley B. Coke, Jrr
expeditions, which began operations in Egypt In
1889 and have carried them through various
years since, even finding localities of the war
ridden land where they still operate this year.
have sent back to the museum an incalculabe
trove, not only in tablets but in all kinds
of articles dug up from the dirt layers of Biblical
and pre-Biblical lands
All this accumulation has not had the attention
II deserved. Doctor Langdons labors will be bent
toward arranging the Babyonian 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
Babyonlan collection in the world. even though
II is not so large 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 decipher these
tablets which tell of the lives and histories of
peoples who lived many hundred years ago.
Younger men. like Poebel. at the front and
may never come back; other well-knOwn Egypto-
loglsts old men.
Not enough young men will be left TO carry on
the work of transatng the ancient cuneiform
writings. When the present scholars pass away
the achievement may die with them and Sumerian-
Akkadian become again dead language, for not
enough young college men are proposing to take
up archaeology.
There Is today no endowed seat of Assyrioogy
In any university. The University of Pennsy-
vania museum is exerting every effort to secure
such endowment. that other intellects of so
high order Doctor Langdon's may be en-
couraged and helped to carry a work similar
TO his.
Eckley q. Coke Jr.. died in Philadelphia in Sep
tember last and left endowment fund of $780,
O00 20 carry on the work he has been equipping
expeditions to do in Egypt many years. But
one expedition 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 Langdon sis to go back
TO Nippur again and again. and dig for them" En- |
dowments for these expeditions another of the |
crying needs of scholars The world at large win |
lose II archaeological excavations and research |
have TO be abandoned
There IS no doubt that the general public appre-
ciates the work done by museums and by scholars
To Biblical students alone there is inexhaustibe
pleasure and satisfaction to be derived from facts
unearthed OF Biblical and pre-Biblical peoples.
There Is complete agreement among arch
biologists that Hammurabl is that same Amraphel
OF Genesis 14:i. contemporary OF Abraham.
From chronological differences IL follows that
Abraham may well have attended school at the
temple In Nippur nay. that he studied these very
books that are now In the University of Pennsyl-
vanla museum. He may have read there the ac
count of the creation. Why not7 The dates dove
tail.
"let me take out and touch OF those tab
let's" said religious recently in the Uni
versity Of Pennsylvania museum. Il believe in
my heart that the hand OF Abraham must have
held amy or all OF them nearly 5000 years agoi"