Seventy peoples are born from Noach’s three sons: 14 + 30 + 26 (ד"הס).1
When the Eternal will confuse the language of people as a punishment for the construction of the Tower of Bovel, there will be seventy languages corresponding to the seventy peoples. According to others (ש"לי), in reality the Torah mentions seventy-four peoples: 15 + 32 + 27. However, as Shem, Arpachshad and Ever are tzaddikim, they are not counted together with the others.1
The seventy peoples correspond to the seventy members of Yaakov’s family who will descend to Mitzrayim (א"יש וניזאה ירפס; cf. Shemos 1:5, Devorim 10:22): the Bnai Yisroel are as dear to the Eternal as the seventy peoples together, cf. „...he set the bounds of the people according to the number of the people of Israel”
(Devorim 32:8; רקי ילכ). However, the Talmud (ח"כ תוכרב ;ד ,ד םידי) draws the attention to the fact, that Sancherib, the king of Assyria mixed up the peoples and, consequently, the people are not necessarily identical with those mentioned in the Torah.
With the Eternal’s blessing, six children are born of one birth.
Shem’s descendants are dark-skinned and beautiful, they inherit the liveable lands; Chom’s descendants are black like the raven, they inherit sea-shores;
Yefes’ descendants are white and beautiful, their inheritance are deserts and fields (ד"כ א"רדפ).
1 The total number conserved by the tradition of Hungarian Medieval chroniclers is 72: 15 from Yefes, 30 from Chom, 27 from Shem, in opposition to the numbers given by the Torah: 14, 30, 26.
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After the Flood, and until the Dispersion, people live exclusively in the Land of Shinear (רענש ץרא), cf. „And the whole earth was of one language, and of one speech.” (Beraishis 11:1). There they built the Tower, and it was from there that the Eternal dispersed them after having distroyed the Tower (י תבש י"שר).
According to certain opinions, Noach had a fourth son born after the Flood, Yoniko (וקינוי),2 the great astrologer (’star-gazer’). When he is driven away by his brothers, he goes to Nimrod whom he teaches the art of war ( םשב ד"הס
הש
"
ק ). Some say (ק"הש םשב ד"הס), after the Flood Noach goes from Armenia to Italy, where he learns wisdom.
In the list below, peoples counted in the number seventy, are marked with an * after the Hebrew names in brackets.
1 However 74 – 3 are still 71 !
2 Yoniko: Hebr. yanik (קיני) ’small child’. However cf. Enki (see nelow, year 2.000) of the Shumerian mythology; also Oannes, mentioned by BEROSSOS, the half-human, half-fish who, emerging from the sea, brings wisdom to humanity, and whose „...name and figure is authentically Mesopotamian:
originating from the traditions about the apkallus and, finally, from the cult in Eridu, from the mythology of Enki-Ea”. KOMORÓCZY, Bérósos és a mezopotámiai irodalom. [Berossos and Mesopotamian Litterature] p. 139.
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1 The descendants of Yefes are primarily the Indo-European peoples. However, later the Turkish peoples are also ranged among his descendants, see below. Modern opinions identify Yefes with the Greek Iapotes, the father of Atlas and Prometheus, one of the Titans whom Zeus throw down to the underworld.
2 Gomer: according to JOSEPHUS, the inhabitants of Galatia (1:6:1), originally a part of ancient Phrygia, i.e. the Celts, the Galls. The Talmud’s rendering can mean Germanicia in Commagene, or Garamnea near Armenia. According to modern opinions, Cappadocia, cf. Armenian Gamir, Ass. gimirrai.
According to „Jubilees” (9:8), they live east of the river Tina, the Halys.
3 Germamia/Germania: the Latin name of Celtic origin but of not clear etymology (earlier rendered as
’neighbour’), Germani was originally the name of tribes living on the West bank of the Rhine-river (Germani Cisrhenani). However, HERODOTE (I:125) mentions the germanoi who live in Eastern Persia.
The Targum renders several times (Yechezkel 27:14, 38:6) Togarmoh as Germamia. It is also well possible that Germania here means Cimmeria (KOHUT, Aruch haSholem), cf. Ass. Gimmerai.
4 Francus: the Franks. Their name comes from a Proto-German *franka ’audacious’. However, it is also possible, that here it is rather question of the ancient inhabitants of France, the Celts and not the Franks.
It has also to be remebered that R. SAADYAH gaon renders Rifas/Difas as Franjah, what means that what is said in the „Sefer haYoshor” about Gomer himself, the gaon says it about his son, Rifas/Difas.
5 Franza: France; Lat. Francia ’France, Northern-Gallia’, from Lat. Franci ’the Francs’.
6 Sina: the French river Seine, from Lat. Sequana, of possibly Pre-Indo-European origin.
7 Africa: Lat. Afer (pl. Afri) ’African, Punic’, originally ’member of one of the Berber tribes allied to the Punics’. Terra Africa: Karthago on the actual territory of Tunis. See 2.329, the Punic wars.
However, it is also possible that Africa here does not mean the continent, but a distorted form of the name of the ancient people, the Phrygians, which settle in Asia Minor on the Southern shores of the Black Sea, destroying the Hettite Empire, in connection with the apparition of the so called „peoples of the sea” (cf. Indo-European ∗bhrug ’fruit; to eat, enjoy sg’; Lat. frux ’fruit’, frui ’to enjoy sg’).
According to HERODOTE (VII:73), living still in Europe their name was Brigos. In the 8th century BCE, the Cimmerians, escaping from the Steppes of Southern Russia because of the Scythian invasion, push them to the Northern shores of the Black Sea (IV:11, I:6, I:103).
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144 because it sounds like the German name of Saxony (Sachsen). The „Sefer haYoshor” does not mention the settlement of Ashkenaz when speaking about the dispersion after the construction and destruction of the Tower of Bovel, possibly because of the abovementioned identification of Gomer with Germania (Ashkenaz).
The identification of Yefes’ grandson, Ashkenaz, with Germany is even more interesting when we take in consideration what IBN EZRA and also the REDAK write (to Ovadiah 1:20), that the Canaanis (the descendants of Chom) escaping from the Jewish invasion of Eretz Canaan, settle in Germany, in Alemania (ה-יינמלא, Ibn Ezra) or Ashkelonia (ה-ינולקשא, REDAK). Almania/Alemania: from Germ. Alamann latinized to Alamannus, from the name of the German tribe living the nearest to France (see the footnote to Elishoh). Ashkelonia here can be a combination of Köln / Colonia (its Latin name meaning ’colony’ given after the Roman Colonia established on the territory of the German tribe called Ubius) and of the Philistine town Ashkelon. However, R. SAADYAH gaon renders Ashkenaz as Elzcalvonah. In this case, we have to render it as Esclavonia, the land of Slavonic peoples, an allusion to Jewish slave-traders bringing mainly Slavonic slaves from Eastern Europe.
According to JOSEPHUS, Ashkenaz is Reginia what, in connection with Germany, can be an allusion to the river Rennus (’Rhine’); or Rhegion in Southern-Italy (HERODOTE I:167); or Regnum Polemonis South-East of the Black Sea. Modern opinions identify it with the Armenian form of the name of a Bithynian tribe, the Askanios.
2 Asia: the name is supposed to take its origin from the Hettite name of Lydia, Hett. assuwa ’a land with good soil’. The Phenicians could connect it through popular etymology to the Assyrian word ashu
’West’. It is also possible, however, that the Asia mentioned by the Targum means Amasia.
3 Rifas: according to JOSEPHUS, the inhabitants of Paphlagonia. According to modern identifications, the river Rhebas flowing on the European side of the Bosphoros, mentioned by PLINY (Hist. Nat. VI:4).
4 Bartons: the Bretons. The name, of Celtic origin, is supposed to mean ’warrior’.
5 Bartonia: Brittany. In 1604, King James I of England (1603-1625) takes the title King of Great-Britain.
Bartonia in our text is presumabely Small-Britain, the French Bretagne, where the Celtic British withdrew from England.
6 Lira: the French river Loire, from Lat. Liger of Pre-Indo-European origin, but of unclean etymology.
My exemplar of the „Sefer haYosor” has Lida: a copist’s error (םירפס תועט), a דדדד instead of a רררר.
7 Parkvi, Parsaveh: possibly Parkvi, in Northern Ariana. One of the two forms is surely a copist’s error
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1 Chadiev / Hadias: is thought to be Hadijv, the Assyrian province of Adiabene.
2 Togarmoh: according to JOSEPHUS, the Phrygians, according to ABRABANEL, the Turkish peoples. Here ONKELOS conserves the name Togarmoh, while elsewhere (Yechezkel 38:6) he renders it as the Land Germamia (איממרג תנידמ), what can be simply an identification with Gomer, or a copist’s error.
The identification of the Turkish peoples living North of the Caucasus with Togarmoh is rather problematic if we follow the identification Gomer-Germania! When we render Germamia not as Germania but as Cimmeria, we immediately arrive to the North of the Caucasus, independently however of etnicity. On the other hand, it is also true, however, that the Ottoman Empire is called in Medieval Hebrew Malchus Togar (רגת תוכלמ). See e. g. YOSSEF HAKOHEN’s book entitled Divrai haYomim leMalchai Tzarfat uleMalchai Bait Ottoman haTogar (Sabionetta 1554, Amsterdam 1733).
Hettite sources mention a town between Charran and Karkemish, called Tagaramah or Takaramah.
Modern identifications place it to the South-Western part of Armenia (Fr. DELITZSCH, cf. Akk. exchange of letters between R. CHASDAI ibn Shaprut and Yossef, the khan of the Chasars.
4 Pitznak/Partzinach (in Samuel KOHN, Héber kútforrások és adatok Magyarország történetéhez.
[Hebrew Sources and Data Relating to the History of Hungary] Budapest: Akadémiai Kiadó, 19902, p.
4.): the Pechenegs. Their name (in Greek Πατζινακος, in Arab Pačanak, KOHN, p. 7), is supposed to take its origin from an Old-Turkish person’s name *Bäčä. They ruled over the steppe-region North of the Black Sea in the 10-11th centuries CE.
5 Alan/Alicanus: HARKAVY, in his work about the Khazars (quoted by KOHN, ibid.), emends Alicanus to Allanos; Gr. Αλανός ’Alans’ (KOHN p. 7). Their name comes from Old-Iranian *aryana ’arya’. The bellicous nomad tribal confederation belonging to the Western Saka (Scythian-Sarmatha) peoples, appears on the steppe between the Don and the Caucasus in the 1-4th centuries CE. A part of them goes toward the West together with the Vandals and Visigoths; their Eastern group settle on the outskirts of the Caucasus (their state will be annihilated by the Mongols, the Ossethians are their descendants), the third part stays, and will be dissolved.
6 Bulgar: their name is supposed to come from an Old-Turkish word meaning ’mixture’. Originally it was the name of the Bulgarian Turcs who established an autonomous state after 681 South of the lower
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146 haYoshor” and also KOHN’S exemplar of the „Sefer Yosippon” has Ragbinah. According to KOHN (p. 7), it is possible that the correct reading is metathetically Barginah, Gr. Βαράγγες ’the Varegs’. This tribe of Scandinavian (Viking) origin, entering Russia in the 9th century, and they soon function as the commercial intermediary between the Baltic region and the Black and Caspi Seas. They will give the body-guards of the Byzantinian emperors. They even give the name to the Russians: it is from the name of these Scandinavian peoples that the leading group of the Russian State of Kiev is called Rus ’Russian’
’North-German, Scandinavian’.
2 Turk/Turki: the Uigurs. Turk was the name of a Turkish-speaking tribe and empire near China in the 6-8th centuries CE. The word is supposed to mean originally ’force’.
3 Kuz/Buz: One of the two forms can be considered as a copist’s error. According to KOHN (p. 8), they are the Uzs / Oguzs, in Byzantine sources Ουζοι, in the Russians Tork, in the Islamic ones Guzz. This Turkish-speaking people establishes an important empire East of the Ural between the 8-11th centuries CE. In the 10th century, they convert to Islam; a part of them moves to the South where, around the middle of the 11th century, they establish the Seljuc-Empire. It is also possible that they are the Cumans, a Turkish-speaking people of the Kipchak-group (together with the Kimeks and Mameluks [Arab mamluk
’slave’, the rulers of Egypt 1250-1517]) who, in the 11th century – during the migration of peoples provoked by the westward expansion of the Kitays -, overthrow the Uz-Pecheneg rule over the steppe-region. Cf. Beraishis 22:21, Yirmeyoh 25:23, Iyov 32:2, 1.Divrai haYomim 5:14.
4 Zakuch/Zabuch: One of the two forms is necessarily a copist’s error. According to KOHN (p. 8) they are the Σαβωκοι, Σαβυκοι mentioned in Byzantine sources.
5 Ungar: ’Hungarian’. The word takes its origins from the people’s name onog(und)ur; on ’ten’ (an allusion to the confederation of ten tribes), the second part of the name is not yet correctly clarified.
Certain sources call with this name the Bulgarians who settle South of the Danube. For the enlisting of the Ungars among the Turkish peoples, cf. the Byzantine sources which mention the Hungarians as Turkoi or Hunnoi or Ungroi.
6 Tolmatz or Tilmatz: According to KOHN (p. 8) they are the Τουλµαζοι mentioned in Byzantine sources, one of the Pecheneg tribes, living East of the Dnieper, in the neighbourhood of the Khazars.
According to Gy. MORAVCSIK (Byzantinoturcica II. Sprachreste der Türkvölker in den Byzantinishen Quellen. Budapest, 1943. pp. 267-68), the Byzantine imperial bodyguards of Turkish origin. In chapter 37 of CONSTANTINE VII Porphyrogennetos’ (913-959) De Administrando Imperii (DAI), they are called Boro-Tolmač. According to a modern edition of the „Sefer Yossippon” (Jerusalem: Oraysoh, 1999. p.
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1 In: SPITZER, Shlomo J. and KOMORÓCZY Géza, Héber Kútforrások Magyarország és a magyarországi zsidóság történetéhez a kezdetektıl 1686-ig. [Hebrew Sources Relating to the History of Hungary and (defective) Latin translations published by the younger Johannes BUXTORF (1599-1664) in the preface of his edition of R. YUDAH Halevi’s Kuzari (Liber Cosri. Basiliae 1660). A modern edition has been prepared by KOKOVCOV, Pavel K., Evreysko-kazarskaya perepiska v X veke. Leningrad: Izdatel’stvo Akademii Nauk SSSR 1932 pp. 19-32.
2 Agiur: the Uigurs. See the precedent page, footnote no. 3, Turk/Turki.
3 Tirosh: one of the possibilties of identification can be the ancient Tauris, the Crimean Peninsula.
4 Avvar: the Avars.
5 Oguz: the Oguzs/Uzs. See footnote no. 4 on the precedent page: Kuz/Buz.
6 Savir: the Turkish Savirs play an important part in the first half of the 6th century on the Northern side of the Caucasus. Around 558, they are defeated by the Avars coming from the East. Their name figures also as the denomination of the Khazars. They are also said to be related to the Savard Hungarians: i.e.
with the first element of the expression sabartoi asphaloi what KONSTANTINOS VII Porphyrogennetos gives as the ancient name of the Turcs, i.e. the Hungarians (the second element of the expression is generally rendered as a Greek adjective meaning ’firm, staunch’). According to the Emperor, a part of the people settled near Persia, and conserved this name there.
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Khosar, Unor (רונו)1, Belkar (רקלב)2, Savir.
Following the dispersion, they move toward the North, settle alongside the river Hetal (לתיה רהנ), i.e. the Altach (ךטלא),3 with the exception of Ungar, presumabely due to copist’s and/or printer’s errors. Interesting is, however the totally different form given by the „Seder haDoros”: Unor instead of Zagud / Zagur. It is also interesting to remark that,
According to the chronicle, Menroth, a descendant of Yafet’s sons (!), settles, after the destruction of the Tower of Bovel, in the province of Evilath, later called Persia (cf. Chaviloh, the son of Cush).
2 Belkar: the Bulgars. See footnote no. 1 on p. 59.
3 Hetal, Altach: in the „Sefer haYoshor” ךטלא אוה לתיה רהנ לע; in the „Sefer Yosippon” לע לתיה ירהנ
ךאלטא אוה ’alongside the river Yetel, the Atloch’. According to KOHN (pp. 8-9), the river Yetel is the Etil, the latter being the Turkish name of the Volga, and the text speaks or about its affluents or about the region named after the river. The text continues after the second name רגנו ךא, and from this Kohn comes to the conclusion that the word ךא had been repeated following a copist’s error, and the correct text is supposed to be simply לטאלטאלטאלטא ’Etil = Volga’. The same solution is offered by Flusser. The Turkish name of the Volga river, Etil (the etymology of its Russian name is not clarified), appears for the first time in Byzantine sources of the 7th century; certain sources call by this name the capital of the Khazar Empire also.
4 Donobi: the Danube river. Its name is of Celtic origin: Celtic *Danuvia. In the Antiquity its lower course was called in Greek Istros, and the upper course Danuvius.
5 Barberayoh: Barbaria. Originally, the Greek word βάρβαρος was used onomatopeically for a foreign and thus „uncomprehensible” language. It came to the European languages through the Latin.
6 Magog: according to JOSEPHUS (I:6:1), the Scythians. According to HERODOTE (IV:11), the Scythians (of Iranian origin) had been pushed by the Massagets (cf. Meshech) in the neighbourhood of the Cimmerians. Others say, the name of the Mongols and, through this, the denomination (Grand)Mogul of the Islamic rulers of Central-Asian origin of India between the years 1526-1858 comes also from the name Magog. The first Mogul, Babur (1483-1530), was a descendant of Timur Lenk (1336-1405). Arab writers call the Great Chinese Wall the wall of „al Magog”. According to modern identifications, it is the mountainous region between Cappadocia and Media, or some part of Armenia. According to the Encyclopaedia Judaica, Gog is Gyges, the king of Lydia (c. 680-645 BCE) who asks for the help of Assurbanipal against the Cimmerians (see Rassam cylinder 2:95). Cf. Ass. Gagu ’head of a tribe living
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text). According to Yechezkel’s prophecy (Yechezkel 38) Gog, the chief prince of Meshech’s and Tuvol’s sons from the land Magog will attack Yerusholayim, but the Eternal will take revenge of him. Thus, Magog can simply mean the
1 Candia: the Arab name of Crete (Ar. handaq ’ditch’), taken into the European languages through the Italian. The name has originally been given to the town of Herakleion (today Megalokastron). The Greek name of the island, Crete, comes from its Pelasgian inhabitants, the *Kaptores, the word is supposed to mean ’hunters, fishers’. Cf. Chom’s son Kaftor (see below). It has to be remembered that the word Kan-dia of Arab origin, could not figure in the original text of the Talmud Bovli, redacted in the year 500 CE, it has to be considered being an interpolation of a later date, or that the word of ancient and unknown origin has been taken by the Arab conquerors through popular etymology in the above sense.
The early Minoan civilization existed in the second half of the 3rd millennium, the middle-Minoan civilization is characterized by the coexistence of autonomous kingdoms - Knossos, Phaistos, Mallia, Zakro – around 2000 BCE. A Knossos-centered united kingdom is existing from 1700 BCE until the explosion of the Santorin volcano on the island Thera around 1500 BCE. Around the year 1450 Mycenean conquest. Three types of writing had been identified: the linear A (of the indigenous population, originating presumabely from Asia Minor), the linear B (of the Greek-speaking Achaian invadors of Crete), and the hyerogliphic writing of the plate discovered in the Phaistos palace. The Greek – Ionic – Abc has been taken in the 9th century BCE from the Phenicians: the forms of the letters and also their place in the Abc (this latter is already attested by a cuneiform tablet from Ugarit of the 14th century BCE).
In the Greek mythological tradition, Kronos’ wife, Rhea (cf. in Roman tradition the mother of Romulus and Remus is also called Rhea Sylvia) gives life to her youngest son, Zeus, on the Mount Ida, on the island Crete. Consequently, she hides him because of her husband’s anger into the cave Dikte of the Mount-Aigaion. It is into the same cave, that Zeus takes Europe, after having her kidnapped, and it is from this cave that their son, Minos brings forth the laws of his „heavenly” father.
2 Narmania: the name of the North-French province here is almost certainly also a copist’s error; the correct reading is supposed to be Germania:גגגג instead of ננננ. Besides, it seems that in the current text of the „Targum Yonassan” Africa and Narmania/Germania are interchanged due to a copist’s error. The correct order is thus Gomer’s dwelling place is Narmania/Germania = Cimmeria; and that of Magog is (North-)Africa; even if all the identifications seem to indicate some part of Asia.
3 Gitayoh: presumabely the correct form of the above Gumta/Ginsoh, however, we have to read with a different vocalization as it is showed by the form given in the Talmud Yerushalmi: Gothia. Thus all the
3 Gitayoh: presumabely the correct form of the above Gumta/Ginsoh, however, we have to read with a different vocalization as it is showed by the form given in the Talmud Yerushalmi: Gothia. Thus all the