KIR cop, a wall ;' Cyrene), the place to which the inhabitants of Damascus were carried captive by the king of Assyria (2 Kings xvi. 9). It is worthy of note that in the four passages in which alone this word occurs in Scripture, the authors of the Septuagint mistook its meaning or omitted it. They omit it in 2 Kings xvi. 9 ; in Is. xxii. 6 they render it cruncyuryii, perhaps mistaking it for +p ; in Amos i. 5 they translate brirX7p-os, probably reading t....4-1p ; and in Amos ix. 7 they have p6Opos, deriving it from n'tp, to dig.' No indication is given of the geographical position.of Kir, nor can we learn from Scripture whether it was a city or district. Some suppose that Kir is identical with the Koiipva, or Curna, of Ptolemy, a city of Media on the river Mardus (Ptolemy, vi. 2 ; Bo chart, Opera, i. 294 ; Winer, R. iv., s. v.) Others think that Kir was a province or district along the banks of the river Cyrus, which flows down from the loftiest summits of the Caucasus range into the Caspian Sea (Pliny, H. N., vi. m ; Ptol. v. 12).
This river lies on the extreme northern frontier of ancient Assyria. It still retains its ancient name, .A7fir (Bonomi, Nineveh, pp. 47, 71). Isaiah men tions E/ant and Kir together V. e.), and hence Keil (on 2 Kings xvi. 9) thinks it more natural to identify the latter with Curna of Media, or with Xapin, also a city of Media (Ptol. vi. 2), now called Kerend (Ritter, Erdkeincle ix. 391). The latter supposition is adopted by Vitringa (apud Is. xxii. 6), and seems to be supported by the Targum, which has tstr1p ; it would also locate Elam and Kir close together, as the former lay along the southern border of Media, whereas the river Cyrus lies north of Media. It is now impossible satisfac torily to settle the question ; we cannot even state with certainty whether the Kir of 2 KingS is iden tical with that of Isaiah ; the latter may perhaps have been in Media near Elam, and the former on the banks of the Cyros.—J. L. P.