TAM M UZ (tIvrt ; Sept. O eau,u0t5i), a Syrian deity, for whom the Hebrew idolatresses were ac customed to hold an annual lamentation (Ezek. viii. 14). This idol was the same with the Phce nician Adon or Adonis, and the feast itself such as they celebrated. Silvestre de Sacy thinks that the name Tammuz was of foreign origin, and probably Egyptian, as weli as the god by whom it was borne. In fact, it would probably not be difficult to identify him with Osiris, from whose worship his differed only in accessories. The feast held in honour of Tammuz was solstitial, and commenced with the new moon of July, in the month also called Tam muz ; it consisted of two parts, the one consecrated to lamentation, and the other to joy ; in the days of grief they mourned the disappearance of the god, and in the days of gladness celebrated his discovery and return. Tammuz appears to have been a sort or incarnation of the sun, regarded principally as in a state of passion and sufferance, in connection with the apparent vicissitudes in its celestial position, and with respect to the terrestrial metamorphoses produced, under its influence, upon vegetation in advancing to maturity. See Lucian,
De Dea Syra, sec. vii. 19 ; Selden, De Diis Syris, ii. 3r ; Creuzer, Symbolik, iv. 3 ; Fickenscher, Erkliir. d. .111yethus Adonis.—J. K.
TAN on), used only in the pl. 1:411-) or pn . _ (Lam. iv. 3, where the Q'ri has inn), a mammal (/. c.) dwelling in deserts (Is. xiii. 22 ; XXXLV. 13 ; XXXV. 7 ; xliii. 20 ; Ps. XliV. 20 ; Jer. ix. ; X. 22; XIIX. 33), and distinguished by a wailing cry like that of a child ( Job xxx. 29 ; Mic. i. 8). The LXX. (confounding the word with rn) give 5pdicovres, rret pijvcs, lxivot, as the equivalent term, and the Vulg. Sirenes & dracones (but in Lam. iv. 3, /amia). Bochart 429) follows this, understanding by the word huge serpents. Much more in accord ance, however, with the usage of the word is the opinion which Gesenius and Fiirst adduce from Tanchum and Bar Bahlul, that it is the jackal that is thus designated. Or it maybe the hyana.—W. L. A.