ACHBAR achbar; perhaps generically including aliarbai or jerboa, or 3,U parnh of the Arabs, Sept. gOs). The word occurs where, it seems, the nomenclature in modern zoology would point out two distinct genera or species (Lev. xi. 29Sam. vi. 4, ;, 1, IS ; Is. lxvi. 17). The radical meaning of the name, according to Bochart, designates a field ravager, one that devours the produce of agriculture, and therefore is applicable to several genera of Rodentia, etc., notwithstanding that the learned etymologist would confine it to the jerboa or jumping-mouse of Syria and Egypt, although that animal is not abundant in the first mentioned region, and even in the second is restricted almost exclusively to the desert, as it can live with out water. Bochart, it is true, cites examples of the ravages committed by murinc animals in divers localities ; but among them several are pointed out where the jerboa is rare, or not found at all; con sequently they apply not to that species, but to some other Rodent. It is likely that the Hebrews extended the acceptation of the word achbar, in the same manner as was the familiar custom of the Greeks, and still more of the Romans, who in cluded. within their term wits, insectivora of the genus sorex, that is shrews ;' carnivora, among which was the Ofustela ' stoat' or ermine,' their Mbs ponticra; and in the systematic order Rodentia, the murida• contain Illyames glis or fat dormouse ; Dip us jirculus or Egyptian jerboa ; Aim, rats and mice properly so called, constituting several modern genera ; and ericetus or hamster, which includes the marmot or Roman MU: Alpinus.
This was a natural result of the imperfect state of zoological science, where a somewhat similar ex ternal appearance was often held sufficient for bestowing a general name which, when more re markable particulars required further distinction, received some trivial addition of quality or native country, or a second local designation, as in the present case ; for, according to some biblical critics, the jerboa may have been known also by the name of iniv, shot.. In the above texts, all in I Sam. vi. apparently refer to the short-tailed field-mouse, which is still the most destructive animal to the harvests of Syria, and is most likely the species noticed in antiquity and during the crusades ; for, had they been jerboas in shape and resembled miniature kangaror,s, we would expect William of Tyre to have mentioned the peculiar form of the destroyers, which was then unknown to Western Europe ; whereas, they being of species or appear ance common to the Latin nations, no particulars were required. But in Leviticus and Isaiah, where the mouse is declared an unclean animal, the species most accessible and likely to invite the appetite of nations who, like the Arabs, were apt to covet all kinds of animals, even when expressly forbidden, were, no doubt, the hamster and the dormouse ; and both are still eaten in common with the jerboa, by the Bedouins, who are but too often driven to extremity by actual want of food. [Bochart, Hieroz I. iii. c. 34.]—C. H. S.