The rearing of horned cattle was encouraged by the people of Israel. These animals were protected in some cases by express provisions of the law; they were held clean, being the usual sacrifice of consideration, and the chief article of flesh diet of the population. Judging from Egyptian remains, there were two great breeds of straight-backed cattle, the long-horned and the short-horned; and in Upper Egypt at least, there was one without horns. Another hunched species existed, which served to draw chariots, yoked in the same manner as the Brahminee bulls of India are at present.
In Egypt the straight-backed or common cattle appear to have formed a very handsome breed with lunate horns. They were generally spotted black or red upon a white ground, and there were, besides, others white, red, or black. They all served for common use, but those without red were selected when new sacred bulls were to be supplied; for they alone had the colors which could show the marks made by chance or by art, and required to fit the animal for the purpose intended. There was, besides, a sacred cow; and a black bull was worshipped at Hermonthis.
In Palestine the breed of cattle was most likely in ancient times, as it still is, inferior in size to the Egyptian.
Unless the name be taken synonymously with that of other species, there is not in the Bible any indication of the buffalo. The Asiatic species was not known in Greece till the time of Aristotle. The indigenous buffaloes of Africa, amounting at least to two very distinct species, appear to have belonged to the south and west of that continent, and only at a later period to have approached Egypt as far as the present Bornou; for none are figured on any known monument in either Upper or Lower Egypt. With regard, however, to wild oxen of the true Taurine genus, some may, at a very remote period, have been found in Bashan, evidently the origin of the name—a region where mountain, wood, and water, all connecting the Syrian Libanus with Taurus, were favorable to their existence but the wild bulls of the district, mentioned in Psalms 22:12, and in various other passages, appear, nevertheless, to refer to domestic species, probably left to propagate without much human superintendence, except annually marking the increase, and selecting a portion for consumption, in the same manner as is still practiced in some parts of Europe.
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John Kitto was an English biblical scholar of Cornish descent.Born in Plymouth, John Kitto was a sickly child, son of a Cornish stonemason. The drunkenness of his father and the poverty of his family meant that much of his childhood was spent in the workhouse. He had no more than three years of erratic and interrupted education. At the age of twelve John Kitto fell on his head from a rooftop, and became totally and permanently deaf. As a young man he suffered further tragedies, disappointments and much loneliness. His height was 4 ft 8 in, and his accident left him with an impaired sense of balance. He found consolation in browsing at bookstalls and reading any books that came his way.
From these hardships he was rescued by friends who became aware of his mental abilities and encouraged him to write topical articles for local newspapers, arranging eventually for him to work as an assistant in a local library. Here he continued to educate himself.
One of his benefactors was the Exeter dentist Anthony Norris Groves, who in 1824 offered him employment as a dental assistant. Living with the Groves family, Kitto was profoundly influenced by the practical Christian faith of his employer. In 1829 he accompanied Groves on his pioneering mission to Baghdad and served as tutor to Groves's two sons. In 1833 Kitto returned to England via Constantinople, accompanied by another member of the Groves mission, Francis William Newman. Shortly afterwards he married, and in due course had several children.
A London publisher asked Kitto to write up his travel journals for a series of articles in the Penny Magazine, a publication read at that time by a million people in Britain, reprinted in America and translated into French, German and Dutch. Other writing projects followed as readers enquired about his experiences in the East amidst people living in circumstances closely resembling those of Bible times.
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