THE KING’S BUSINESS
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followed the lead thus given, and they have been reiterating this view of the matter ever since. Thus Dr. Driver writes:— “The story told by Herodotus (1. 191) and Xenophon (Cyrop. vii. v. 15- 31) of the stratagem by which Baby lon was taken by Cyrus, the waters of the Euphrates being diverted, and the city entered during the night—accord ing to Xenophon, by Gobryas and Ga- datas—from the river-bed while the people were all celebrating a festival, —which has been supposed to fall in with the representation in Daniel 5 . . . is shown by the inscription to be unhistorical: Babylon it is clear of fered no resistance to. the conqueror” (Daniel, p. xxxi). The classical account then, with which the narrative in the Book of Daniel seemed to agree, was cheerfully set aside by the Critics and the con-, elusion was accepted, that Babylon opened her gates to Gobryas without any siege in the month Tammuz—and that after three months had elapsed Cyrus himself, on the 3rd Marchesvan, came to Babylon. But this conclusion was open to some strong objections:— To some it might seem passing strange, that when the capital of the Babylonian kingdom, and by far the most famous city in Western Asia, had come into his power, Cyrus should treat the matter with such cool dis dain as not to condescend to visit it, until three months had passed away. IT was not his way to treat the con quered peoples with discourtesy. And then too there was this other awkward circumstance that the mer chants of Babylon continued to date their contract tablets in the “17th year of the reign of Nabonidos, King of Babylon” for three months after the month of Tammuz, in which Gobryas and the soldiers of Cyrus had entered
Babylon. The only explanation—if it can be called an explanation—of this circumstance, so awkward for the the ory, which has been offered is—that the capture of the city caused so little excitement in the minds of the inhab itants that the merchants went on dat ing their contract tablets in the reign of Nabonidos, as if nothing particular had happened. It may well be asked, Is this likely? Is it likely that the merchants of Babylon would be so foolish as to flout their new master by thus ignoring his sovereignty? And if they were so silly would Gobryas have stood such nonsense? •«.no men tnere was a third point which seemed to require explanation. What did that mysterious passage in the Annalistic Tablet mean, where it is said that “On the 11th day of Mar chesvan”—that is to say, 8 days after Cyrus descended to Babylon—“dur ing the night Gubaru (Gobryas) made an assault ( ?.) and slew the king’s son ( ? ) ” ? Did not this look very like what the Book of Daniel says in the fifth chapter, “In that night was Belshazzar . . . slain” ? For do not the inscriptions say that.Belshaz zar was the king’s son and does not the Book of Daniel say that Belshazzar was slain at night? These three points then—however they might be ignored by thè Critics— always seemed to the present lecturer to constitute a definite problem to which an answer was required. The solution seems to have been af forded by the plans of the ruins of Babylon, showing the course of the walls, illustrating Weiszbach’s Stadt- bild von Babylon, published by Hin- richs, Leipzig, by whose permission they were reproduced in a book by the present lecturer. The plans referred to show that there was a not inconsid erable portion of the city, enclosed with walls, on the Western bank of the
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