The literature

This page exists so that nobody has to take the article on trust.  Every source it rests on is listed here with what it actually measured, who wrote it, and which way it cuts.

A catalogue of every source worked up in the four research dossiers behind the article, identifications.md, horizon-and-tests.md, tests.md and reception-and-residue.md, plus three young-earth responses to the ancient-DNA papers found while writing.  Each source is either cited in the article or marked used: no with the reason.

How to read an entry

Measurement or model.  An Assyrian annal that names Tabal is an observation.  A count of names by century is a model built on observations, and it inherits their gaps.  A commentator's identification is an argument.  The tags keep these apart.

Direction.  Whether the source supports, undercuts or complicates the young-earth reading of Genesis 10 as a record of the post-Babel world and of descent from Noah's three sons.  Assigned by what the source shows, not by what its author believes.  Several conservative and creationist sources are tagged undercuts, and several critical ones supports.

Verified.  full means the text was read directly for this project;  abstract means only its abstract or record;  citation means only its bibliographic entry or a summary by another author.  Nothing is quoted verbatim in the article unless it is marked full.

Reference works on Genesis 10

Genesis 1-11: A Commentary

Westermann, Claus.  Translated by John J. Scullion.  Minneapolis:  Augsburg, 1984 (German 1974).  Genesis 10 at pp. 495-530.

key: westermann-1984 camp: critical method: commentary direction: complicates verified: full

The standard critical commentary.  Divides the chapter into a Priestly list and Yahwistic insertions, grades every name by its attestation, and reads the "sons" as peoples:  "Only Japheth is a person" (p. 504).  Dates the Japhethite list to the seventh century because Israel only then knew the northern peoples (p. 503), and the Phoenician and Joktanite lists to Solomon's commercial chancery (pp. 502-503).  His weakness, used in When Was the Table of Nations Written?:  he gives no reason why Israel must have learned the names when Assyria first wrote them.  Also the source for the uniqueness of the chapter (p. 501) and the count of seventy "with a little assistance" (p. 529).

Genesis 1-15

Wenham, Gordon J.  Word Biblical Commentary 1.  Waco:  Word, 1987.  Genesis 10 at pp. 213-231.

key: wenham-1987 camp: conservative method: commentary direction: complicates verified: full

An evangelical commentary, the most even-handed of the reference works.  Gives four reasons not to read every name as a person, including "sonship" as treaty relationship (p. 215), while keeping descent of all mankind from one stock.  Reports that "The majority of scholars prefer a first-millennium date" (p. 214).  Counts seventy by leaving out the Philistines and reads seventy as Israel's microcosm (pp. 213-214).  Supplies most of the cautions on the contested names in Genesis 10 Name by Name.

On the Reliability of the Old Testament

Kitchen, K. A.  Grand Rapids:  Eerdmans, 2003.  Chapter 9 section B, pp. 430-438;  notes pp. 590-596;  summary p. 447.

key: kitchen-2003 camp: conservative method: count direction: complicates verified: full

The conservative Egyptologist's count of every name by the century of its first outside attestation:  11 third-millennium, 17 early second, 34 late second, 35 early first, 39 unattested (p. 435).  From the count he builds a three-phase history with an update "about the seventh century or in two subphases" (p. 436), which is the model the article adopts.  His Levantine-viewpoint sentence (p. 436), his "stratified" explanation of the repeated names (p. 438) and his note on the omitted Ammon, Moab, Edom, Midian and Amalek (p. 438) are all used.  He concedes the final form is first-millennium.  His counts measure partly which archives survived, a limit the article states.

Genesis: Introduction, Translation, and Notes

Speiser, E. A.  Anchor Bible 1.  Garden City:  Doubleday, 1964.  Section 11, pp. 64-73.

key: speiser-1964 camp: critical method: commentary direction: complicates verified: full

A Penn Assyriologist.  The mainstream witness that the Table uses several criteria at once and so cannot match language families (p. 71), stated case by case for Canaan (p. 67), the Philistines (p. 69) and Elam (p. 70).  Also concedes that Japheth's line is mostly Indo-European "in effect" (pp. 65-66), the strongest linguistic point for the chapter.  Gives P's Japheth a ceiling of the seventh century (p. 71) and the Babylonian material a Kassite-period source (p. 72).  Proposes Tukulti-Ninurta I for Nimrod.

The Book of Genesis: Chapters 1-17

Hamilton, Victor P.  New International Commentary on the Old Testament.  Grand Rapids:  Eerdmans, 1990.  Pp. 330-347.

key: hamilton-1990 camp: conservative method: commentary direction: complicates verified: full

An evangelical commentary.  Calls the chapter "a segmented genealogy" (p. 330), explains Speiser's point on gôy against 'am (p. 334), and reads the Japhethites as maritime peoples after Oded.  Reports Gomer's late first appearance without drawing a dating conclusion.  Cited in Part 1 of The Table of Nations and Genesis 10 Name by Name.

Studies in the Book of Genesis Part 2: The Table of Nations in Genesis 10, Its Structure

Ross, Allen P.  Bibliotheca Sacra 137:548 (1980):  340-353.

key: ross-1980 camp: conservative method: commentary direction: complicates verified: abstract

Only the opening pages were read.  They carry Ross's concession that putting the Hittites and Amorites among Canaan's descendants is "a connection that cannot be supported by archaeology or history" (p. 340), which the article quotes in Genesis 10 Name by Name and Part 1 of Testing the Table of Nations.  The full text should be read before the article is final.

Studies in the Book of Genesis Part 3: The Table of Nations in Genesis 10, Its Content

Ross, Allen P.  Bibliotheca Sacra 138:549 (1981):  22-34.

key: ross-1981 camp: conservative method: commentary direction: complicates verified: abstract used: no

Only the free first pages were read, and they add nothing the 1988 book does not say.  Considered and not used;  Ross 1988 is cited instead, since it reworks both articles.

Creation and Blessing: A Guide to the Study and Exposition of Genesis

Ross, Allen P.  Grand Rapids:  Baker, 1988.  Pp. 221-235.

key: ross-1988 camp: conservative method: commentary direction: complicates verified: full

Dallas Seminary.  Reads the Table as a segmented genealogy in which "a son was a dependent tribe, brothers were allies" (p. 224), counts seventy, and in note 12 (p. 33) allows that Moses "used the old skeleton list" and added the Nimrod and Canaan material.  That footnote is the conservative updating model in its simplest form and is used in Part 1 of The Table of Nations, in When Was the Table of Nations Written? and in the objections.  The same footnote assigns the source formulae the wrong way round, so it is not quoted for the source division.

Genealogy and History in the Biblical World

Wilson, Robert R.  Yale Near Eastern Researches 7.  New Haven:  Yale University Press, 1977.

key: wilson-1977 camp: critical method: review direction: complicates verified: full

A comparison of oral lineage genealogies from African and Arab fieldwork with Mesopotamian king lists and the biblical genealogies.  Segmented genealogies are fluid and change to mirror current political ties (pp. 27, 31), yet "may contain accurate information" (p. 200).  Wilson does not analyse Genesis 10;  the article cites him for the theory only and Ross for the application.

The Table of Nations (Genesis 10): A Socio-cultural Approach

Oded, Bustenay.  Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft 98 (1986):  14-31.

key: oded-1986 camp: critical method: model direction: complicates verified: abstract

Proposes that the three lines began as a division by way of life:  nomads under Shem, city-dwellers under Ham, seafarers under Japheth.  Stated in Part 1 of The Table of Nations from the abstract and from Wenham's and Hamilton's summaries;  none of Oded's own sentences is quoted.  Tested there against Elam, Asshur and Lud under Shem, which are not nomads.

Genesis 10: Some Archaeological Considerations

Wiseman, D. J.  Journal of the Transactions of the Victoria Institute 87 (1955):  13-24.

key: wiseman-1955 camp: conservative method: review direction: supports verified: full

The British Museum Assyriologist's case for compilation "c. 1500 B.C. or earlier" (p. 14) and for the Egyptian court of Moses as its setting (p. 24).  Two of its arguments fail:  Tyre was not founded in the thirteenth century, since its king writes in the Amarna letters;  and its four-name list of attested Canaanites undercounts the Table's support.  It concedes the language point outright (p. 16).  Cited in Genesis 10 Name by Name, When Was the Table of Nations Written? and Parts 1 and 3 of Testing the Table of Nations.

A Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament

Metzger, Bruce M.  2nd edition.  United Bible Societies, 1994.

key: metzger-1994 camp: critical method: reference direction: background verified: full

Explains the seventy or seventy-two of Luke 10:1 by the Hebrew and Greek counts of the Table, with a slip of "Genesis 11" for Genesis 10.  Cited in Part 1 of The Table of Nations.

A New English Translation of the Septuagint: Genesis

Hiebert, Robert J. V.  In A New English Translation of the Septuagint.  Oxford:  Oxford University Press, 2007.

key: hiebert-2007 camp: critical method: primary-text direction: background verified: full

The Septuagint's Genesis 10 in English:  Elisa added to Japheth's sons and Kainan to Shem's line, giving seventy-two.  Cited in Part 1 of The Table of Nations.

The Biblical Qumran Scrolls: Transcriptions and Textual Variants

Ulrich, Eugene.  Supplements to Vetus Testamentum 134.  Leiden:  Brill, 2010.

key: ulrich-2010 camp: critical method: primary-text direction: background verified: full

The Qumran reading of Deuteronomy 32:8, "sons of God", against the Masoretic "sons of Israel", with both words on the leather.  Cited in Part 1 of The Table of Nations for the earliest echo of a counted Table.

The seventy nations in rabbinic sources

Sefaria.  Targum Jonathan on Deuteronomy 32:8;  Sukkah 55b;  Shabbat 88b.  2026.

key: sefaria-2026i camp: reception method: primary-text direction: background verified: full

The rabbinic seventy nations and seventy languages, and the Targum's fusion of seventy angels with the seventy souls of Israel.  Cited in Part 1 of The Table of Nations.

Primary texts: the Assyrian, Egyptian, Amarna and Persian records

Assyrian Rulers of the Early First Millennium BC I (1114-859 BC)

Grayson, A. Kirk.  Royal Inscriptions of Mesopotamia, Assyrian Periods 2.  Toronto:  University of Toronto Press, 1991.

key: grayson-1991 camp: primary method: primary-text direction: supports verified: full

Tiglath-pileser I's annals:  the Mushku in his accession year, about 1114 BC (p. 14), the earliest Assyrian mention of any Japhethite name;  Byblos, Sidon, Arvad and Sumur about 1100 BC (p. 37);  the Arameans about 1110 BC.  Supports the second-millennium core of the Table.

Assyrian Rulers of the Early First Millennium BC II (858-745 BC)

Grayson, A. Kirk.  Royal Inscriptions of Mesopotamia, Assyrian Periods 3.  Toronto:  University of Toronto Press, 1996.

key: grayson-1996 camp: primary method: primary-text direction: complicates verified: full

The Black Obelisk of Shalmaneser III:  Tabal in his 22nd year, 837 BC, and the Medes and Parsua in his 24th, 835 BC (pp. 67-68).  These are the first attestations of Tubal and Madai, and part of the late Japhethite horizon of When Was the Table of Nations Written?.

Royal Inscriptions of Assyria online: Ashurnasirpal II no. 1, Annals A

Grayson, A. Kirk, adapted by Jamie Novotny.  Oracc RIAo, 2016.  RIMA 2 A.0.101.1.

key: oracc-riao-q004455-ashurnasirpal-ii-annals-a camp: primary method: primary-text direction: complicates verified: full

The first mention of Chaldea (KUR.kal-du, iii 24) in the narrative after the eponym year 878 BC.  Used in When Was the Table of Nations Written? for a people the Table omits.  Its account of rebuilding Kalhu is noted in the source footnote.

Royal Inscriptions of Assyria online: Ashurnasirpal II no. 30, the Banquet Stele

Grayson, A. Kirk, adapted by Jamie Novotny.  Oracc RIAo, 2016.  RIMA 2 A.0.101.30.

key: oracc-riao-q004484-ashurnasirpal-ii-banquet-stele camp: primary method: primary-text direction: background verified: full used: no

Records the consecration of the palace at Kalhu, with envoys of Tyre and Sidon among the guests.  The stele carries no year, so the usual 879 BC for Calah's inauguration could not be checked from it.  Considered and not used;  the Table's Calah is dated in Genesis 10 Name by Name from the Middle Assyrian texts.

Royal Inscriptions of Assyria online: Shalmaneser III no. 2, the Kurkh Monolith

Grayson, A. Kirk, adapted by Jamie Novotny.  Oracc RIAo, 2016.  RIMA 3 A.0.102.2.

key: oracc-riao-q004607-shalmaneser-iii-kurkh-monolith camp: primary method: primary-text direction: supports verified: full

The Qarqar coalition of 853 BC, which lists the Arkites, Arvadites and Sinites of 10:17-18 together and gives the first mention of the Arabs;  and Urartu in the accession-year campaign of 858 BC.  Supports the Phoenician core and supplies two of the omissions in When Was the Table of Nations Written?.

Royal Inscriptions of Assyria online: Shalmaneser III no. 6, annals on clay tablets from Assur

Grayson, A. Kirk, adapted by Jamie Novotny.  Oracc RIAo, 2016.  RIMA 3 A.0.102.6.

key: oracc-riao-q004611-shalmaneser-iii-annals-assur-tablets camp: primary method: primary-text direction: complicates verified: full used: no

A second record of the sixteenth-year campaign of 843 BC that reaches Parsua.  Considered and not used, because the stone-tablet annals below give the same attestation in one sentence.

Royal Inscriptions of Assyria online: Shalmaneser III no. 10, annals on a stone tablet from Assur

Grayson, A. Kirk, adapted by Jamie Novotny.  Oracc RIAo, 2016.  RIMA 3 A.0.102.10.

key: oracc-riao-q004615-shalmaneser-iii-annals-assur-stone-tablet camp: primary method: primary-text direction: complicates verified: full

Written in 839 BC.  Its account of the sixteenth year, 843 BC, names Parsua, the earliest mention of the name later borne by the Persians.  Used in When Was the Table of Nations Written?, with the caution that this Parsua is in the central Zagros.

Royal Inscriptions of Assyria online: Shalmaneser III no. 14, the Black Obelisk

Grayson, A. Kirk, adapted by Jamie Novotny.  Oracc RIAo, 2016.  RIMA 3 A.0.102.14.

key: oracc-riao-q004619-shalmaneser-iii-black-obelisk camp: primary method: primary-text direction: complicates verified: full used: no

The online edition of the Black Obelisk.  Considered and not used, because the article cites the same text from the printed RIMA 3 edition above.

SAA 1 30, 31 and 32: letters of crown prince Sennacherib on the Cimmerians

Parpola, Simo.  The Correspondence of Sargon II, Part I, State Archives of Assyria 1.  Helsinki, 1987.  Oracc SAAo edition.

key: oracc-saao-saa01-030-032-cimmerian-letters camp: primary method: primary-text direction: complicates verified: full

Three letters reporting the Urartian king's defeat "on his expedition against the Cimmerians", one writing the land as KUR.ga-mir, Gamir.  Dated by their editors to about 715-714 BC from their place before Sargon's eighth campaign.  The first attestation of Gomer.

Esarhaddon 001 (Nineveh A prism)

Leichty, Erle.  The Royal Inscriptions of Esarhaddon, RINAP 4.  Winona Lake:  Eisenbrauns, 2011.  Oracc edition.

key: leichty-2011 camp: primary method: primary-text direction: supports verified: full

The prism of 673 BC:  the Cimmerian Teušpâ, and the Scythian Išpakāia beside the Manneans, the grouping Jeremiah 51:27 gives as Ashkenaz and Minni.  First royal mention of Gomer and first mention of Ashkenaz.

Esarhaddon 060

Leichty, Erle.  The Royal Inscriptions of Esarhaddon, RINAP 4.  Winona Lake:  Eisenbrauns, 2011.  Oracc edition.

key: leichty-2011b camp: primary method: primary-text direction: supports verified: full

A fragment of 671-669 BC naming Egypt, Upper Egypt, Kush, Cyprus, Ionia and Tarsisi in one passage.  The editor translates Tarsisi as Tarsus, the only cuneiform Tarshish.

Sargon II 001 (Khorsabad annals) and Sargon II 007 (Great Display Inscription)

Frame, Grant.  The Royal Inscriptions of Sargon II, RINAP 2.  University Park:  Eisenbrauns, 2021.  Oracc edition.

key: frame-2021 key: frame-2021b camp: primary method: primary-text direction: supports verified: full

The Ionians in a restored line, Itʾamar the Sabaean in 715 BC, Hamath in 720 BC, "Mitâ of the land Musku" and the land Hatti as Syria-Palestine.  Used in Genesis 10 Name by Name for Javan, Sheba, Meshech, Heth and Hamath.

Tiglath-pileser III 14 (Calah annals) and 42

Tadmor, Hayim, and Shigeo Yamada.  The Royal Inscriptions of Tiglath-pileser III and Shalmaneser V, RINAP 1.  Winona Lake:  Eisenbrauns, 2011.  Oracc edition.

key: tadmor-2011b key: tadmor-2011c camp: primary method: primary-text direction: supports verified: full

Ṣimirra, Arqâ, Usnû and Siʾannu, "(cities) on the seacoast", after the campaign of 738 BC;  and the Sabaeans after 733 BC.  The Phoenician coast cities of 10:17-18 in their eighth-century setting.

Sennacherib 017

Grayson, A. Kirk, and Jamie Novotny.  The Royal Inscriptions of Sennacherib, Part 1, RINAP 3/1.  Winona Lake:  Eisenbrauns, 2012.  Oracc edition.

key: grayson-2012 camp: primary method: primary-text direction: supports verified: full

The campaign of 695 BC against Tīl-garimmu, "a city on the border of the land Tabal".  Places Togarmah beside Tubal, as Ezekiel does.

Ashurbanipal 003 (Prism B) and 011 (Prism A)

Novotny, Jamie, and Joshua Jeffers.  The Royal Inscriptions of Ashurbanipal, Part 1, RINAP 5/1.  University Park:  Eisenbrauns, 2018.  Oracc edition.

key: novotny-2018 key: novotny-2018b camp: primary method: primary-text direction: complicates verified: full

Gyges of Lydia, "the mention of whose name none of the kings, my ancestors, had (ever) heard", in copies dated 649-648 BC (Prism B) and 644-642 BC (Prism A), with the Cimmerians overrunning Lydia.  The first attestation of Lud if Lud is Lydia, and Assyria's own statement that the name was new.

The Amarna Letters

Moran, William L., editor and translator.  Baltimore:  Johns Hopkins University Press, 1992.

key: moran-1992 camp: primary method: primary-text direction: supports verified: full

The diplomatic archive of about 1360-1332 BC.  Alashiya, Šanhar (Shinar), Canaan, the Danuna, Kashi and the Phoenician coast cities are all here, and Abi-Milku of Tyre writes letters EA 146-155, which refutes Wiseman's thirteenth-century founding of Tyre.  Cited by letter and line.

Ancient Records of Egypt, Volumes III and IV

Breasted, James Henry.  Chicago:  University of Chicago Press, 1906.

key: breasted-1906c camp: primary method: primary-text direction: complicates verified: full

Merneptah's year-5 record naming the Teresh, about 1208 BC, the only candidate for Tiras.

Ancient Near Eastern Texts Relating to the Old Testament

Pritchard, James B., editor.  3rd edition.  Princeton:  Princeton University Press, 1969.

key: pritchard-1969 camp: primary method: primary-text direction: complicates verified: full

The Medinet Habu record of the Philistines, about 1177 BC (Genesis 10 Name by Name), and Oppenheim's translation of Sargon of Akkad's ships from Meluhha, Magan and Tilmun at the wharf of Agade (p. 268), the Gulf names the Table lacks (Part 3 of Testing the Table of Nations).

Old Persian: Grammar, Texts, Lexicon

Kent, Roland G.  American Oriental Series 33.  New Haven:  American Oriental Society, 1950.

key: kent-1950 camp: primary method: primary-text direction: supports verified: full

Darius's inscription at Naqsh-i Rustam (DNa 30) naming the Putaya, "Libyans", which supports Put as Libya.  Cited in the master table.

Nimrod

Identifying Nimrod of Genesis 10 with Sargon of Akkad by Exegetical and Archaeological Means

Petrovich, Douglas.  Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 56 (2013):  273-305.

key: petrovich-2013 camp: conservative method: model direction: undercuts verified: full

The best-developed conservative identification:  Nimrod is Sargon of Akkad, with Eridu read for Babel, about 2320-2265 BC.  It places Nimrod's empire before Ussher's dispersion and fails the text's naming of Babel.  Cited in Genesis 10 Name by Name.

Re: [b-hebrew] Kush (2007) and Re: [b-hebrew] Nimrod? (2008)

Levin, Yigal.  b-hebrew mailing list, 2007 and 2008.

key: levin-2007 key: levin-2008 camp: critical method: model direction: complicates verified: full

Levin's own summaries of his 2002 Vetus Testamentum article:  Nimrod as a composite memory of Sargon and Naram-Sin, and Cush as the city of Kish.  Cited in Genesis 10 Name by Name in place of the article, which was not obtained.

Reception: how the chapter was read

Antiquities of the Jews, book 1

Josephus.  Greek text of Benedikt Niese, 1890;  English of William Whiston.

key: niese-1890 camp: reception method: primary-text direction: background verified: full

Antiquities 1.122-147, the oldest surviving name-by-name identification.  Right where a name stayed in use, wrong where he matched sounds to the Roman map:  11 of the 23 names Josephus identifies survive in the table in Part 1 of How the Table of Nations Has Been Read.

The Book of Jubilees, or The Little Genesis

Charles, R. H.  London:  A. and C. Black, 1902.

key: charles-1902 camp: reception method: primary-text direction: background verified: full

Jubilees 8-9, the earth divided by lot, with Charles's notes placing the lots on the classical map.

The Dead Sea Genesis Apocryphon

Machiela, Daniel A.  Studies on the Texts of the Desert of Judah 79.  Leiden:  Brill, 2009.

key: machiela-2009-dead-sea-genesis-apocryphon camp: reception method: primary-text direction: background verified: full

The scroll's columns 16-17 and Machiela's analysis:  the Apocryphon and Jubilees give each son a continent, Japheth Europe, Shem Asia, Ham Libya, on a "Hellenistic, Ionian world map" (p. 107).  The source of the continent scheme that Carter rejects.

Die Chronik des Hippolytos im Matritensis graecus 121

Bauer, Adolf.  Texte und Untersuchungen 29.1.  Leipzig:  J. C. Hinrichs, 1905.

key: bauer-1905 camp: reception method: primary-text direction: background verified: full

Hippolytus's Chronicle of AD 234, with its seventy-two languages and seventy nations and its identifications of each name with a people of the Roman world.  Cited in Part 1 of The Table of Nations, Genesis 10 Name by Name and Part 1 of How the Table of Nations Has Been Read.

Etymologiae, book 9

Isidore of Seville.  Lindsay's Latin text on LacusCurtius.

key: isidore-etymologiae-9 camp: reception method: primary-text direction: background verified: full

Etymologies 9.2, about 630:  Josephus's identifications with the Goths added to Magog and the Spaniards to Tubal, and Isidore's own warning that scarcely the most learned men could find the origins "not of all, but of some".

Historia Brittonum cum additamentis Nennii

Mommsen, Theodor, editor.  Chronica minora vol. 3, Monumenta Germaniae Historica, Auctores antiquissimi 13.  Berlin, 1898.

key: mommsen-1898 camp: reception method: primary-text direction: undercuts verified: full

The history of about 829-830 that first hangs Europe's peoples on Japheth through Alanus, on Tacitus's three sons of Mannus, and stops the English kings at Geta, "one of their idols".  Undercuts Cooper's claim of independent pagan pedigrees.

Germania

Tacitus.  AD 98.  Latin text on The Latin Library.

key: tacitus-latinlibrary-germania camp: primary method: primary-text direction: undercuts verified: full

Chapter 2, the three sons of Mannus whose names give the Ingaevones, Herminones and Istaevones, the source of the Historia Brittonum's Negue, Armenon and Hessitio.

Lebor Gabála Érenn, Part I

Macalister, R. A. Stewart, editor and translator.  Irish Texts Society 34.  Dublin, 1938.

key: macalister-1938 camp: reception method: primary-text direction: undercuts verified: full

The Irish origin legend tracing the Gaels from Magog, which its editor called "a slavish copy" of the Exodus story and which copies the Historia Brittonum's Alanus list.  Shared names in dependent texts are one witness.

Anglo-Saxon Royal Genealogies

Sisam, Kenneth.  Proceedings of the British Academy 39 (1953):  287-348;  reprinted in E. G. Stanley, editor, British Academy Papers on Anglo-Saxon England (Oxford, 1990), pp. 145-204.

key: sisam-1953-anglo-saxon-royal-genealogies camp: critical method: review direction: undercuts verified: full

The stage-by-stage dating of the West Saxon pedigree from the manuscripts:  Woden by 731-812, Geat by about 830, Sceaf and Noah first in the Chronicle of about 892 and Asser in 893.  "The remotest names represent the latest accretions" (p. 179).  The decisive source against Cooper's genealogy argument.  Cited by the 1990 reprint's pages.

The Prose Edda

Snorri Sturluson.  Translated by Arthur Gilchrist Brodeur.  New York:  American-Scandinavian Foundation, 1916.

key: brodeur-1916 camp: reception method: primary-text direction: undercuts verified: full

Snorri's Prologue, which opens with Genesis and traces Odin from Troy through Seskef, a misreading of the English "se Scef", and the West Saxon names.  Answers Cooper's "Icelandic list" argument.

The young-earth and creationist uses

Noah's Three Sons: Human History in Three Dimensions, Part II

Custance, Arthur C.  The Doorway Papers 1.  Grand Rapids:  Zondervan, 1975.  custance.org.

key: custance-1975 camp: creationist method: commentary direction: undercuts verified: full

The source of most popular identifications:  Gomer to Gaul, Cumberland and Germany, Ashkenaz to Lake Iznik and the Saxons, Meshech and Tubal to Moscow and Tobolsk, the Sinites to China, all by consonant skeletons with no documentary chain.  Gets the Assyrian Mushku and Tabal right and admits "very little certainty".  Concedes the lines are not language families and answers that the evidence comes "too late", which fails on the Masoretic dates.  Custance held the gap theory.

The Genesis Record

Morris, Henry M.  San Diego:  Creation-Life;  Grand Rapids:  Baker, 1976.  Chapter 10, pp. 244-267.

key: morris-1976c camp: young-earth method: commentary direction: undercuts verified: full

The founder of the Institute for Creation Research.  Moscow "clearly" from Meshech, Tobolsk from Tubal, Russia from Rosh, Cathay from Heth and China from Sin, and a "Hamitic (Babylonian) ... language".  Right on Cimmeria and Alashiya.  Its language model, that Shem's line kept the original Semitic speech, fails the distribution of the oldest Semitic texts (Part 1 of Testing the Table of Nations).

The Early History of Man: Part 1. The Table of Nations

Cooper, Bill.  Ex Nihilo Technical Journal 4 (1990):  67-92.

key: cooper-1990 camp: young-earth method: commentary direction: undercuts verified: full

The journal version of Cooper's study, more cautious than the book:  it concedes that secular records are silent on the Anamim and puts the Scythians in the seventh century.  Its introduction promises an "overwhelming richness" of corroboration.

After the Flood: The Early Post-Flood History of Europe Traced Back to Noah

Cooper, Bill.  Chichester:  New Wine Press, 1995.

key: cooper-1995 camp: young-earth method: commentary direction: undercuts verified: full

Claims that "every one of their names is found" in the ancient records and that the European royal pedigrees are "quite independent of the Genesis record".  The first is contradicted by Cooper's own appendices (pp. 173-192) and by three errors of fact found in Genesis 10 Name by Name;  the second fails on Sisam's manuscript dates (Part 1 of How the Table of Nations Has Been Read).  Still endorsed by CMI and used by Answers in Genesis.

The sixteen grandsons of Noah

Grigg, Russell M.  Creation 20(4) (1998):  22-25;  CMI website.

key: grigg-1998b camp: young-earth method: popular direction: undercuts verified: full

The most widely read version of the popular list:  Meshech as "the ancient name for Moscow", Tubal as Tbilisi and Tobolsk, Gomer as Gaul.  Its statement that Tiglath-pileser I named the Tabali is wrong;  his annals name the Mushku.

The Tug of War Between Genetics and Archaeology

Lacey, Troy.  Answers in Genesis, 5 May 2018.

key: lacey-2018b camp: young-earth method: popular direction: undercuts verified: full

Reads Bronze Age European ancient DNA as post-Babel migration using Bodie Hodge's maps, and is the only route by which this article knows Hodge's 2013 book.  Cited in Part 2 of How the Table of Nations Has Been Read.

Denisovan Fossil Found in Tibet

Lacey, Troy.  Answers in Genesis, 17 May 2019.

key: lacey-2019c camp: young-earth method: popular direction: undercuts verified: full

Proposes the Denisovans as descendants of Togarmah who intermarried with the Sinites and spread to Melanesia.  Every attested Togarmah is in eastern Anatolia;  the route is drawn to fit the genetic result.

A Better Model for the Stone Age, Part 2

Osgood, A. J. M.  Ex Nihilo Technical Journal, 1988;  creation.com.

key: osgood-1988 camp: young-earth method: model direction: undercuts verified: full

The Table as "a photo start" of the nations and languages "at the time of Babel", with up to 46 initial cultures and languages, and Halaf as Aram and Ubaid as Arpachshad's Chaldeans.  Read for this article from the stored web page.  The snapshot reading fails the horizon and the map (When Was the Table of Nations Written? and Part 3 of Testing the Table of Nations), and the Chaldean equation rests on a name first attested about 878 BC.  Its Stone Age model is priced in the Neolithic article.

An overview of the independent histories of the human Y chromosome and the human mitochondrial chromosome

Carter, Robert W., Stephen S. Lee and John C. Sanford.  Proceedings of the Eighth International Conference on Creationism (2018):  133-151.

key: carter-2018 camp: young-earth method: review direction: complicates verified: full

The source of "a one-off documentation of the early post-Flood world" (p. 147), which is the authors' sentence, not Eric's;  his notes copy it for its misprint "4,0000".  The same paper declines to map the Y tree onto Noah's sixteen grandsons (p. 144).

The promises and pitfalls of correlating Y chromosome genetics to human history

Carter, Robert W.  Journal of Creation 36(2) (2022):  34-39.

key: carter-2022 camp: young-earth method: review direction: complicates verified: full

A review of Jeanson's Traced that objects to assigning Y-chromosome lineages to Table peoples and to restricting Japheth to the Middle East.  Shows the young-earth geneticists disagree among themselves.

Can we place the sons of Noah on the Y chromosome tree?

Carter, Robert W.  Creation Ministries International, 29 October 2024.

key: carter-2024 camp: young-earth method: popular direction: complicates verified: full

The Table as "a record of Y chromosome descent", the continent map "entirely wrong", the lines "overlapping across most of their range", and a closing caution against pegging lineages to places.  The best young-earth position, and the one with the fewest testable claims.

Who were the Philistines?

Carter, Robert W.  Creation Ministries International, 21 November 2023.

key: carter-2023g camp: young-earth method: popular direction: complicates verified: full

Found while writing.  Accepts the Ashkelon genomes as fitting a Cretan migration, proposes an earlier and a later Philistine group, uses the Dan-for-Laish updating argument, and states in its second note that descent from Ham means only that "the men in leadership carried his Y chromosome".  Cited in Part 2 of Testing the Table of Nations and in its issues list.

Remembering Bill Cooper (1947-2021)

Sibley, Andrew.  Creation Ministries International, 6 April 2021.

key: sibley-2021 camp: young-earth method: popular direction: background verified: full

CMI's obituary, which endorses After the Flood as evidence for the biblical history of Europe.  Shows that Cooper's claims stand uncorrected.

Forgotten history

Gascoigne, Mike.  TJ 16(3) (2002):  79-83.

key: gascoigne-2002 camp: young-earth method: commentary direction: background verified: full

A viewpoint article in CMI's journal that builds on Cooper's genealogy argument.  Cited in Part 1 of How the Table of Nations Has Been Read to show the argument's reception.

Canaanite DNA disproves the Bible?

Doyle, Shaun.  Creation Ministries International, 3 August 2017.

key: doyle-2017 camp: young-earth method: popular direction: background verified: full

Found while writing.  Answers the press claim that the Sidon genomes contradict the conquest narrative, and accepts both the genetic result and the skeletons' date.  Does not discuss the admixture dates.

Ancient Canaanite DNA Confirms Biblical Accuracy

Tomkins, Jeffrey P.  Institute for Creation Research, 14 August 2017.

key: tomkins-2017c camp: young-earth method: popular direction: background verified: full

Found while writing.  Reads the Sidon genomes as confirming the biblical record of Canaanite survival.  Does not discuss the admixture dates.

Etymologies of the later names

These are the sources for the real origins of the modern names that young-earth writers match to Genesis 10 by sound, used in Part 2 of How the Table of Nations Has Been Read.

Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th edition: Nicaea, Cumberland, Moscow, Tobolsk, China, Cathay, Russia

Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th edition.  Cambridge:  Cambridge University Press, 1911.  Vol. 19 p. 640 (Nicaea);  vol. 7 p. 626 (Cumberland);  vol. 18 p. 893 (Moscow, by Kropotkin and Bealby);  vol. 26 pp. 1042-1043 (Tobolsk);  vol. 6 p. 188 (China, history);  vol. 5 p. 517 (Cathay);  vol. 23 p. 869 (Russia).  Read in the Wikisource page transcriptions.

key: britannica-1911h britannica-1911f britannica-1911g britannica-1911j britannica-1911e britannica-1911d britannica-1911i camp: reference method: encyclopaedia direction: undercuts verified: full

Iznik is "mod. Isnick, i.e. εἰς Νικαίαν", from Greek "to Nicaea".  The Cumbri are first named as a kingdom in 875 and Cumberland as an area in 945.  Moscow is first mentioned in the Russian annals in 1147, and Tobolsk "was founded in 1587 by Cossacks".  Cathay is from Khitai, the kingdom of the Khitan in north China "about A.D. 907", and Russia from Slavonic Rus, "a name first given to the Scandinavians who founded a principality on the Dnieper in the 9th century".  On China the encyclopaedia is cautious:  the name "has been supposed (doubtfully)" to come from the Tsʽin dynasty, and whether Isaiah's Sinim are the Chinese "is probably not susceptible of any decision".  Each later name has an origin of its own, one to two thousand years after the Assyrian records of the Table's peoples.

Excavations at Tepe Gawra, volume 1

Speiser, E. A.  Philadelphia:  University of Pennsylvania Press for the American Schools of Oriental Research, 1935.

key: speiser-1935 camp: critical method: excavation report direction: undercuts verified: full

The excavator's report.  The mound "was named by neighboring villagers Tepe Gawra, 'The Great Mound'", while the Arabs of Mosul call it Tell Ali Beg (p. 2).  The name is a modern local description, not a survival of Gomer.

A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language

Skeat, Walter W.  New edition.  Oxford:  Clarendon Press, 1911.

key: skeat-1911 camp: reference method: dictionary direction: undercuts verified: full

Derives Saxon from Old English Seaxan, "because armed with a short sword", from "seax, a knife, lit. 'cutter'" (p. 465).  Against Custance's Ashkenaz-Sachsen match.

Etimologicheskii slovar russkogo yazyka

Vasmer, Max.  Translated and enlarged by O. N. Trubachev.  Moscow, 1964-1973;  read in the lexicography.online text.

key: vasmer-1964 camp: reference method: dictionary direction: undercuts verified: full

Moskva is "название реки и города", the name of the river and the city, recorded in the chronicles from the 1170s.  Used only for that sentence.

The Iliad, translated by A. T. Murray

Homer.  Loeb Classical Library.  Cambridge, Massachusetts:  Harvard University Press, 1924.  Read in the Perseus TEI text.

key: homer-1924 camp: primary method: text direction: undercuts verified: full

Iliad 2.681-684 names Hellas beside Phthia, Trachis and Pelasgian Argos among the lands of Achilles' men, a district, not yet all Greece.  Against the Elishah-Hellas match of Custance and Morris.

A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament

Brown, Francis, S. R. Driver and Charles A. Briggs.  Oxford:  Clarendon Press, 1906.

key: brown-1906 camp: reference method: lexicon direction: complicates verified: full

Lists four words spelled rosh.  It takes the one in Ezekiel 38:2-3 and 39:1 as a people's name, Rôsh, with the Septuagint's Ρως, against "chief" (Ewald, Smend and others), and calls it "not identified".  This cuts against the article's first draft, which treated rosh as "head" alone, and leaves Morris's Russia link to fail on the Rus' etymology instead.

Language

Glottolog 5.3

Hammarström, Harald, Robert Forkel, Martin Haspelmath and Sebastian Bank.  Leipzig:  Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, 2026.

key: hammarstrom-2026 camp: mainstream-science method: reference direction: complicates verified: full

The classification of every ancient language in the language table of Part 1 of Testing the Table of Nations, read from its data files:  Phoenician, Hebrew and Aramaic Northwest Semitic, Akkadian and Eblaite East Semitic, Elamite, Sumerian, Hattic and Meroitic isolates, Hittite, Luwian and Lydian Anatolian Indo-European.  238 families and 183 isolates.

The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the World's Ancient Languages

Woodard, Roger D., editor.  Cambridge:  Cambridge University Press, 2004.

key: woodard-2004 camp: mainstream-science method: reference direction: complicates verified: full

The chapters by Michalowski (Sumerian), Stolper (Elamite), Huehnergard (Afro-Asiatic), Huehnergard and Woods (Akkadian and Eblaite), Hackett (Phoenician), Melchert (Lydian) and Schmitt (Old Persian) supply each family placement and its reasons.  Huehnergard's note that "Hamitic" is not a family and Hackett's that Phoenician's closest relative is Hebrew are the two points the article leans on most.  Melchert's Luwian page is not cited, because its page number could not be anchored firmly.

Ancient DNA

Ancient DNA sheds light on the genetic origins of early Iron Age Philistines

Feldman, Michal, et al.  Science Advances 5(7) (2019):  eaax0061.

key: feldman-2019 camp: mainstream-science method: genome direction: supports verified: full

Ten people from Ashkelon:  the early Iron Age four carry European-related ancestry, best modelled as about 43% Bronze Age Crete, which is gone within two centuries.  Supports the Philistines' arrival from Caphtor at the start of the Iron Age.  Four individuals, with a large error on the proportion.

Continuity and Admixture in the Last Five Millennia of Levantine History

Haber, Marc, et al.  American Journal of Human Genetics 101 (2017):  274-282.

key: haber-2017 camp: mainstream-science method: genome direction: complicates verified: full

Five Bronze Age Sidonians and 99 present-day Lebanese, 93% continuity, and an admixture of 181 ± 54 generations that contains every young-earth dispersion date.

The Genomic History of the Bronze Age Southern Levant

Agranat-Tamir, Lily, et al.  Cell 181(5) (2020):  1146-1157.

key: agranat-tamir-2020 camp: mainstream-science method: genome direction: complicates verified: full

Seventy-three Bronze Age people:  the Canaanite sites form one population, and present-day Jewish and Arabic-speaking groups share the same Levantine ancestry.  Supports the ethnography;  shows no Ham-Shem signal.

Ancient Egyptian mummy genomes suggest an increase of Sub-Saharan African ancestry in post-Roman periods

Schuenemann, Verena J., et al.  Nature Communications 8 (2017):  15694.

key: schuenemann-2017 camp: mainstream-science method: genome direction: background verified: full

Egyptians of 1388 BC to AD 426 closer to Near Easterners than today's Egyptians.  Late, one site;  tests nothing about the Table's date.

Whole-genome ancestry of an Old Kingdom Egyptian

Morez Jacobs, Adeline, et al.  Nature 644 (2025):  714-721.

key: morez-jacobs-2025 camp: mainstream-science method: genome direction: complicates verified: full

One man of 2855-2570 BC, about four-fifths North African Neolithic and one-fifth Mesopotamian Neolithic ancestry, with no admixture date.  Its bearing on chronology runs through the radiocarbon date, which the Egypt article owns.

Genetic origins of the Minoans and Mycenaeans

Lazaridis, Iosif, et al.  Nature 548 (2017):  214-218.

key: lazaridis-2017 camp: mainstream-science method: genome direction: undercuts verified: full

Minoans and Mycenaeans "genetically similar".  Undercuts any biological reading that puts Crete under Ham and Greece under Japheth.

The genetic history of the Southern Arc

Lazaridis, Iosif, et al.  Science 377(6609) (2022):  eabm4247.

key: lazaridis-2022 camp: mainstream-science method: genome direction: undercuts verified: full

727 ancient people.  Language and genes decouple, in the authors' words;  and an Armenian admixture 52.2 ± 8.0 generations before 1119 BC that reaches the Masoretic dispersion only at the young edge of its range and fits the Septuagint.  The generation length is checked against radiocarbon in the same paper.

Punic people were genetically diverse with almost no Levantine ancestors

Ringbauer, Harald, et al.  Nature 643 (2025):  139-147.

key: ringbauer-2025 camp: mainstream-science method: genome direction: complicates verified: full

196 Phoenician and Punic people with almost no Levantine ancestry.  The clearest case of a Canaanite language and identity without Canaanite descent.  The Augustine "Chanani" passage that the dossier mentions in connection with it was not verified and is not used.

Genomic insights into the origin of farming in the ancient Near East

Lazaridis, Iosif, et al.  Nature 536 (2016):  419-424.

key: lazaridis-2016 camp: mainstream-science method: genome direction: undercuts verified: full

Levant and Zagros first farmers differed by F_ST 0.08-0.15 and were mixed by the Bronze Age.  The basis of the drift budget in Part 2 of Testing the Table of Nations, which on Ussher's dates needs founder groups of about 30 to 60.

Ancient genomes illuminate Eastern Arabian population history and adaptation against malaria

Martiniano, Rui, et al.  Cell Genomics 4(3) (2024):  100507.

key: martiniano-2024 camp: mainstream-science method: genome direction: background verified: full

Four genomes from Bahrain, about 300 BC to AD 600, the only Arabian ancient DNA found.  Too late to test anything;  records the gap.

Social stratification without genetic differentiation at the site of Kulubnarti in Christian Period Nubia

Sirak, Kendra A., et al.  Nature Communications 12 (2021):  7283.

key: sirak-2021 camp: mainstream-science method: genome direction: background verified: full

Medieval Nubians with Levant-like ancestry brought through Egypt.  Fits Mizraim and Cush as neighbours;  too late to test the Table's date.

Other copies and parts considered and not used

Ancient Records of Egypt, Volume IV

Breasted, James Henry.  Chicago:  University of Chicago Press, 1906.

key: breasted-1906b camp: primary method: primary-text direction: complicates verified: full used: no

Ramesses III's record of the Peleset in his eighth year.  Not used because the article cites the same text in Wilson's translation in ANET.

Antiquities of the Jews, book 1, in Whiston's English on LacusCurtius

Josephus.  Translated by William Whiston.

key: josephus-antiquities-1 camp: reception method: primary-text direction: background verified: full used: no

The same text as the Niese edition cited in the article, in a second copy.  Not used, to keep one citation for Josephus.

The Book of Jubilees, 1917 edition

Charles, R. H.  London:  SPCK, 1917.

key: charles-1917 camp: reception method: primary-text direction: background verified: citation used: no

The later, shorter edition of Charles's translation.  Not used;  the 1902 edition with its notes is cited.

Continuity and Admixture in the Last Five Millennia of Levantine History, second extraction

Haber, Marc, et al.  2017.

key: haber-2017b camp: mainstream-science method: genome direction: complicates verified: full used: no

A duplicate text extraction of the Haber paper cited above.  Not a separate source.

The Early History of Man, Part 5

Cooper, Bill.  CEN Technical Journal 7(2) (1993):  108-121.

camp: young-earth method: commentary direction: undercuts verified: abstract used: no

The last part of Cooper's journal series, checked only to confirm that it repeats the book's Woden-to-Noah argument.  Not used;  the book is cited.

Considered and not obtained

Each of these was sought and not read.  None is cited in the article.

• J. Simons, "The 'Table of Nations' (Gen. X): Its General Structure and Meaning", Oudtestamentische Studiën 10 (1954): 155-184, and The Geographical and Topographical Texts of the Old Testament (Leiden, 1959). The 1959 book is on archive.org as a printdisabled item and is readable by search-inside; it was not reached. used: no
• D. J. Wiseman, editor, Peoples of Old Testament Times (Oxford, 1973). Printdisabled on archive.org; not reached. used: no
• Kenneth A. Mathews, Genesis 1-11:26, New American Commentary 1A (1996). No copy found. used: no
• Edward Lipiński, "Les Japhétites selon Gen 10,2-4 et 1 Chr 1,5-7", Zeitschrift für Althebraistik 3 (1990), and "Les Chamites selon Gen 10,6-20 et 1 Chr 1,8-16", ZAH 5 (1992). Not found. used: no
• Yigal Levin, "Nimrod the Mighty, King of Kish, King of Sumer and Akkad", Vetus Testamentum 52 (2002): 350-366. Known through his own summaries, cited instead. used: no
• Bodie Hodge, Tower of Babel: The Cultural History of Our Ancestors (2013). Not on archive.org or in a library found; known through Lacey 2018. used: no
• Nathaniel T. Jeanson, Traced: Human DNA's Big Surprise (2022). Known through Carter 2022. used: no
• Harald Ringbauer, John Novembre and Matthias Steinrücken, "Parental relatedness through time revealed by runs of homozygosity in ancient DNA", Nature Communications 12 (2021): 5425. Needed for the drift test; not read. used: no
• Lazaridis et al. 2022, the two companion papers in Science 377 on Mesopotamia and on Southern Europe, and Skourtanioti et al. 2020, Cell 181, on Anatolia, the northern Levant and the Caucasus. Not reached. used: no
• Goren et al. 2003 on the clay of the Alashiya tablets. Not read; the Alashiya-Cyprus equation is cited through the reference works. used: no