Killyleagh – 11th July 1862
My dear Sir,
I received your pamphlet yesterday & your letter today. I beg before it is very long to send you a pamphlet of about the same size or something larger. It is now in type but I can have no private copies of it till the volume of which it is to form a part is completed. I hope this will be very soon; but no time is yet named. It will give the plates combining those portions of Assyrian & Babylonian texts which are fully analysed in definite grammatical principals. This is by way of reply to the Sceptics.
As to the chronological question I have said all that I had to say in my letters to the Athenæum. Until the inscriptions in question be seen by one who is not so prejudiced in favour of a particular view as Rawlinson, it will be impossible to ascertain the truth. There are 3 opinions, as to the tablet of which I saw a piece in 1853 between which I am divided.
1 It was a portion of one of Rawlinson’s canons & different from what Oppert described
2 It was what Oppert described & not a portion of any of Rawlinson’s canons.
3 It was different from Oppert’s & from any of Rawlinsons
The only thing about which I am pressing claim is that it bore the names of several kings in succession and that there were a number of lines connected with each reign, apparently referring to the different years in it. If I saw Rawlinson’s canons I could tell at once whether what I saw was a part of one of them – or even if I had a sketch of its general appearance & size, I think I could tell the same.
I don’t see the form of your objection. If what Oppert described were an address naming of Tiglath Pileser – if it were like the annals in the historical scribe or third person, he would not be likely to say in what year of his predecessor he came to the throne. But if it were a list of [illegible], & if there were none in the reign of his predecessor, the compiler of the statement might very naturally state how many years there were of a gap.
The whole subject appears to me involved in obscurity, Rawlinson has committed himself to a synchronise of Tiglath Pileser & Nabonasar[?] (as to the beginning of their reigns) which appears to me perfectly absurd. The bringing down the first year of T. P’s [illegible] fm 745 to 742 which I think I have proved to be necessary [illegible] this [sy?] for he can scarcely [illegible] two 5 years of unsettled [illegible] intervened between T. P & his predecessor; & if he can be brought to abandon this error, he may be something new in the case which by throw further light on it. I hope Oppert will say something on the question & Rawlinson will probably reply.
If you remove fm Edinburgh I shd be glad to know your address as I mean to send you a copy of my paper when it comes out.
Believe me Yours vy truly
Edw Hincks
H. F. Talbot Esqre
[envelope:]
H. F. Talbot Esq
Millburn Tower
Edinburgh