the Irish, yet the languages are very different; I mean the languages spoken by the mountaineers of Africa at this day, and that of the Irish the pronouns, inflexions of nouns, and conjugations of verbs, have no affinity with the Irish, yet there is great reafon to think, the languages were once the fame; at least, that the ancient Scythians, or Perfians, were the inhabitants of that country: We have fhewn that Fogra, the ancient name of Tangier, is Irifh; this is fituated at one extremity of the mountains inhabited by these Shilha or Bre ber at the other extremity is Mount Atlas formerly called Dyrim. Extra Columnarum fretum procedenti, ita ut ad finiftram fit Africa, Mons eft, quem Græci Atlantem (Atlas) nominant, barbari Dyrim. (Strabo, L. 17.) Direme in Irish fignifies impaffable, and Ath-los, the fharp, or conical point, and this mountain was remarkable for both. Bochart derives Dyreme from the Phænician Addir, great or mighty; Dr. Shawe from the He brew, Derom fouth; neither of thefe correfpond with the description of the ancient Geographers: it was steep and inacceffible. Mons nomine Atlas, qui anguftus & undique teres eft. (Herodotus.) And then he adds, & adeo celfus (ut fertur) ut ejus cacumen nequeat cerni, quod a nubibus nunquam relinquatur, neque æftate neque hyeme: quem effe columnam coeli indigenæ aiunt. Ab hoc monte cognominantur (Atlantes fcil.) hi homines. This defcription of Herodotus perfectly corre= fponds with our Irish Direme and Athlos. CHAP. CHA P. V. The Fir Bolg, Fir D'Omnann, or Fir Galeon. HE Records from which Keating formed this Chapter, inform us, that these Scythians were named Fir D'Omnann, or the Men of Oman; that they were called Fir-bolg and Firbolo, because, do gnitis baris do bolgaib, they made boats of the hides of beafts, and thefe boats being round, they were named Fir-Galeon but Keating in the Sequel has followed an idle childish Story, unworthy of the hiftorian. Simon Breac, Son of Sdarn, Son of Numed, landed in Greece: The Grecians jealous of their numbers, as they multiplied, oppreffed them ; forcing them to fink deep pits (domhnan, fignifies deep) and to dig clay, and to carry it in leathern bags (bolg is a bag or a belly or paunch, or any thing fwoln out). The Numidians groaning under the Græcian yoke, refolved to quit the Country, and feizing upon fome Græcian Shipping, 5000 of them, under Simon Breac, put to Sea, and failed till they reached Ireland. The last Prince of this race, married Tailte, daughter of Maghmor, a Prince of Spain; fhe is buried in a place, called from her Tailtean at this day. The Rem Rioghre or Book of Kings, places their arrival in Ireland A. M. 3266, but the Liber Lecanus fays, fome of them came in the Reign of Ballafter, that King who faw the hand writing on the Wall, and from whom Cyrus Son of Darius took Babylon; and that they landed in the North Weft of Conacht, at a place called Inbher Dombnan, from these Fir D'Ombnann (or Men of Oman). REMARK. We are told that this people were called Bolg or Bolo, from being the conftructers of wicker boats covered with bolg or hidest. It appears to have been a Veffel common to the Celts or Gomerites, as well as to the Magogians or Scythians, feated on the Euxine and Cafpian Seas. We have already treated of their conftruction and fhewn from Herodotus, that the Armenians came down the Euphrates to Babylon in this kind of Boat in (†) In a fimilar manner the Afiatics paffed the Rivers in the days of Moses: viz. by Rafts buoyed up with inflated Skins. Quomodo autem maximos & rapidiffimos fluvios trajecerint, & hodiè trajiciant, in Oriente artem habent facillimam per Rates quæ in S. Bibliis vocantur fata, quæ conftant ex plurimis colligatis Lignis, margini applicatis inflatis pellibus að inftar Veficarum. Hac arte fit ut nullus fluvius eis obftet, & magna mercium onera per Tigrim & Euphratem facili negotio deportent, Hyde.) K.Bapaga vel potiús Keßrapaçoad. רפסדות Chibbel Ha Raphioda Et חבל הרבסדה Hebraice dicitur pro dias 2d. Paral. 2. 15. i. e. tumultuanæ navis genere, quarum prima inventio debetur Phænicibus, (Bochart Geog. Sacr. L. 1. C. 27.) Καλά τέτον τον χρόνον, οἱ ἀπὸ των Διοσ χώρων σχεδίας και πλοῖα συνθέντες έπλευσαν (Sanchoniathan the principal materials of thefe old Veffels were the Bolo or Bolg the hides that covered the timbers, for a Raft of timbers required no other machine to float them. These Rates or Rafts were made of the trunks of Trees, which in the Scythian Dialeft are named Bol.-Bol, truncus, unde Bola est diffindere & Bolwerk, opus ex truncis arborum confectum (Ihre. Lex SuivoGoth.) So that the name was applicable to these Scythians, if they conftructed their Veffels, either of Trees, or Wicker covered with hides. Baol Corium bovinum (Verelius Scytho Scandice Lex). Baelg, Saccus (id) Bulke Onus Navis (id). his time. The Gomerites who traced the Danube and the Borufthenes out of the Euxine, and the Bolga or Volga out of the Cafpian, might have taken the name of Bolgi or Belgi, for the fame reafon; and carried that name with them into Germany and Gaul, as they did that of Brigantes, from Brigantin, a Celtic name for a Ship. This appears probable; because we find from Cæfar, that the Belgi, Veneti and Aquitani, on the Coast of Gaul oppofite to Britain, differed in their manners, customs and language, from the Gauls, or Celtes, which would not have been the cafe, if the Belgi of the Coaft had defcended from the Belgee of Germany: therefore the Belgi of the Coast must have been the Fir-bolg of the Irish. Lazius derives the name Belgæ, Celtæ, Galatæ, all from the Hebrew galim, i. e. inundatus. Galim, hoc eft Galli, Walli, unde nimirum ob varias locorum pronunciationes, Celta, Galata, Guelga, Belga, vocabula prodiere: (a) these names he confines to the defcendants of Japhet only, becaufe he was faved from the flood; why then were not thefe names common to Sem and Ham alfo? From the words of Cæfar and from ancient history, there appears to have been two nations ofthe name of Belge, migrated from Afia into Europe, and both feated at length in Gaul. The first, I take to be the Belgae of Germany who proceeded along the Danube, and the Volga; who afterwards took the name of Brigantes from Brig, a kind of Ship used by the Celts: (See Introduction) formed the Celtic Nation, and were the Sons of Gomer, who took on them the fynonimous pame (a) Lazius de Gentium migrat. p. 12. 1 2 Bri Brigantes, i. e. Ship men, (See Introduction), The fecond, the Fir-Bolg or Viri-Belga we are now treating of, who took a contrary route down the Euphrates and feated themselves in Oman, a'skirt of Country extending Coaftways from the Perfic Gulph to the Arabian Gulph, and who were the Phænicians of the Red Sea, the Phen-Oice of Irish history: "les peuples anciens, Chinois, Indiens, "Chaldeèns & Perfans ètaient freres: on voit clairement quils ont une origine commune, "(Bailly fur l'Atlantide", p. 448). Mofes Choronenfis, an Armenian, has cleared up this part of our Hiftory. The Bolg or Bolo, or Bullarii, fays he, under the name of Acrad defcended the Euphrates and Tigris; this he takes from Armenian traditions: Acrad is the plural of Curd, a particular nation fo called, originally from the Gordian Mountains, which feparate Armenia from Media: The ancients named thefe mountains and its inhabitants, Cordueni, Carduchi; they spread into Affyria along the Euphrates and Tigris, and gave name to the Country called Kurdiftan; it was late before they received Mahohomedifm, and were always enemies to the Muffulmans. This nation established a Principality in the Country of Lor; they alfo peopled many fettlements of the Chaldean Irak, about the Nabathaan Fens. Some Authors have thought they were Chaldæans. Lar, gives name to a Country called Laristan, between Khufiftan and Kerman, Provinces which extend to the Perfian Gulph. This I take was formerly governed by their own Princes, who faid they were defcended from Siroes Son of Cofrocs, who were of the profeffion of the |