This Mr. Klein appears to have been completely ignored by M. Ganneau, who wrote from Jerusalem on the 16th of January, 1870, to the Journal Officiel of Paris:-'I had long known through reports of natives and of Bedouins that in Dibân (the ancient Dibon) on the other side of the Dead Sea there was a black stone covered with an inscription in Phoenician characters. I determined to procure at any cost, a squeeze from this precious monument, and I sent to Dibân an intelligent young Arab, Jacob Caravacca. He obtained with some difficulty from the Beni-Humaydah (the owners of the stone) permission to take an impression. Some quarrels having arisen during the operation, my men had only just time to galop off. . The squeeze was nevertheless saved, and the object of the expedition was so far attained. The copy, however, was very faint.' M. Ganneau procured some further squeezes of the inscription from Sheikh Djamil; he then offered 400 Turkish pounds if the stone were delivered up to him a fortnight later. The Sheikh to whom he had applied, informed him that the inscribed stone had been broken up in consequence of a quarrel which had arisen among the Bedouins. However Sheikh Djamil brought him, after a short time, two squeezes from large fragments of the stone, and also some impressions of smaller fragments containing the same characters. Details regarding the ultimate destruction of the stone, and disputes between the German and French savants in Jerusalem, mainly between Dr. Petermann and M. Ganneau, need not here be mentioned. The discussions that were carried on in various. public journals are set forth in Burton's and Drake's Unexplored Syria, Vol. II., p. 317 et seq.; also in Canon Tristram's valuable work, The Land of Moab; and in other publications, the bibliography of which is given in the guide to the Musée judaïque of the Louvre in Paris. Information reached the writer of this essay that, according to a rumour which had been current in the East, some of the Bedouins were at first desirous of conveying the stone block to Jerusalem, but as they found it too heavy for transport, they lighted a fire under the stone, and afterwards pouring water upon it, broke it up in fragments; thus they got rid of the diffi culty they had encountered in the transport of the one massive stone. The same informants affirmed that the Bedouins on the other side of the Jordan received frequent visits from Jerusalem traders, and from others who occasionally have dealings with them; consequently there were no obstacles in the way of a forger who, for purposes of his own, or for objects in which the Bedouins themselves might have had an advantage, chose to spend a short time in some deserted spot, in order to cut an inscription upon a suitable and carefully prepared stone. Dressed blocks dating from the times of the Romans abounded in different parts of the ancient land of Moab, and could easily be inscribed by a forger who was an adept in his art. The author or authors of a pseudograph had only to employ a sheet of tracing paper adapted to the surface of the stone. Such tracing paper would contain all the writing that was eventually to figure on the monument, and when once the paper was gummed on the facing which was to receive the inscription, the further operation could be completed within the space of a few days. A threecornered chisel was evidently employed in lightly and quickly engraving the Phoenician characters on the stone block. As in the inscription of Ashmunazar, the words run on without being separated from each other. The scribe, following some palæographic precedents, made use of separating stops. These stops were neatly drilled beneath each word, either to save space within the lines, or because the idea of introducing the dividing points only struck the writer when his work had been completed. The scribe inserted also vertical bars between short sentences, so as to make his text similar to a biblical section divided by verses. We have carefully examined the surface of the Moabite Stone in the Musée judaïque, and we made the following discovery: Whilst the surface of the stone is pitted and indented, in consequence of its exposure to varying influences extending perhaps over thousands of years, the characters inscribed on the stone have in no instance suffered from similar influences, because THE DRESSED SURFACE IS ANCIENT, WHEREAS THE INSCRIPTION ITSELF IS MODERN. Many scholars in England and abroad have published their versions accompanied by expositions of this apocryphal monument. Dr. Ginsburg, in his monograph, The Moabite Stone (London, 1871), has given a synopsis of twelve translations, but since that time several other scholars have published opinions upon the text and its meaning. All concur in the supposition that the Moabite Stone is more ancient than most books of the Bible, and all have condoned the solecisms of the 'Moabite' author, on the ground that in every point wherein he has deviated from the laws of the Hebrew language, he was justified by the circumstance that the Moabite dialect need not in every respect conform to the rules appertaining to the idiom of the Bible. An unbiassed re-examination of the Moabite text will perhaps convince some of the staunchest cultivators of Semitic literature that the inscription on the Stone of Moab was fabricated in modern times. The last reproduction of the inscription was prepared with great painstaking by Professors Smend and Socin under the title of Die Inschrift des Königs Mesa von Moab. In the following pages we present a triple text of the inscription in Hebrew, in a Romanised transliteration, and in an English word-for-word translation. Our transcript follows the text of Messrs. Smend and Socin. Where these professors differ from other editors, we have marked the difference by placing the Hebrew text in brackets, and in our English transcript we have italicised the divergent readings. In order to facilitate reference, we have placed a number before each line of the text, and have assigned a smaller figure to each word of the Hebrew and the Romanised texts, as also to the words in the corresponding English translation. The accompanying photo-lithographic facsimile of the Moabite Stone represents the original as preserved in the Louvre, together with the attempted restoration of the inscription. The concluding part of our investigation contains a critical analysis of the inscription. 4 1 י מלך • מאב 'הד 1 י אנך : משע יבן • כמש מלך : מלך 6 1.-1Anoch mesh'a ben chemoshmelech "melech "moab 'had 1.—1I am 2Mesh'a 'the son of "Chemosh . . . "king of “Moab ... 4 2.-1-ibani | 2abi 3malach 'al 5moab 6shloshin 'shath ®vaânoch malach 2.-1-ibonite 'My father reigned over "Moab "thirty years ®and I ®reign 3 3 יתי 2 אחר : אבי | : ואעש * הבמת ואעש * הבמת * זאת לכמש מ 3.-1-ti achar abi vaa'as "habamath "zoth 'lichemosh 8běkarchah "běmesh'a 10me 3.--ed after my father and I made 56this high place (or altar) unto Chemosh in Karchah for the sake of (?) "Me 3 י הראני הנמסלכן • וכי השעני • מכל • הנמולכן 4 י שע ? כי • שנאי | 10 עמר * בכל 4.--sh'a ki hoshi'ani miccol "hammělachin "věchi "herani 4.--sh'a for he saved me from all the kings and for (! sic) The made me look among all who hated me 10upon Omr 2 : מלך י ישראל • ויענו • את • מאב ' ימן • רבן 11 " כמש 12 באר * כי 10 [י]אנף 15 5.-1-i 'melech 3yisrael vajaănu "eth "moab yamin 3rabin "ki 10yeĕnaf "chěmosh- 12bear 5.—1-i 2king of Israel and he afflicted "Moab 78many days for 1011Chemosh was angry 12with his 6.-1zoh | vayachlefoh běnoh 'vayomer gam 'hu 'e'ěnu Seth 9moab 10běyamaï "amar 12caddabar 6.--land 23and his son succeeded him and he said "also "he 'I will afflict 89Moab 10in my days "he said 12such a thing 2 3 4 לי וארא : בה : ובבתה | • וישראל • אבד • אבד יעלם 19 12 • וירש • עמרי • את " [כל] 19 אר 7.-1Vaere 'boh 3uběbetoh | věyisrael abad ebed "'olam vayirash ''omri 10eth 11col 12ere 8 7.-1And I looked at him and at his house and Israel has been lost a loss everlasting * and Omri possessed 10 11all 12the land 2 3 : מהדבא | 8 וישב בה 5 [ימה] 6 [וחצי] י ימי • 5 9 10 שח 11 ו[יש] ר בנה * ארבען 8.—1-z mehdeba | 3vayesheb 'bah yameh (sic) ‘vachazi 'yěme běnoh 'arb'ain 10shath "vayish 8.-1of 'Medeba and he dwelt there in his days? and in half of the days of his son 'forty 10years "1and? |