a people of Abyssinia, of Jewish origin, described by Mr Bruce, who was at great pains to acquaint himself with their history by cultivating the friendship of the most learned persons among them he could meet with.

According to the accounts received from them, the Falasha are the descendants of those Jews who came from Palestine into Ethiopia, as attendants of Menilek, the son of the queen of Sheba or Saba by Solomon. They agree in the relation given by the Abyssinians of that princess, but deny that the posterity of those who came with Menilek ever embraced the Christian religion, as the Abyssinians say they did. They say, that at the decline of the Jewish commerce, when the ports of the Red sea fell into the hands of other nations, and no intercourse took place between them and Jerusalem, the Jewish inhabitants quitted the sea coasts and retired into the province of Dembea. While they remained in the cities on the Red sea, they exercised the trades of brick and tile making, pottery, thatching houses, &c. and after leaving those coasts, they chose the country of Dembea on account of the plenty of materials it afforded for exercising the trades they professed. Here they carried the art of pottery to a great degree of perfection, multiplied exceedingly, and became very numerous and powerful about the time that the Abyssinians were converted to Christianity. As this event was accounted by them an apostasy from the true religion, they now separated themselves from the Abyssinians, and declared one Phineas, of the line of Solomon, their king. Thus they say, they have still a prince of the house of Judah for their sovereign, though their attention is treated with contempt, and a nickname bestowed on the Falashan family by the other Abyssinians. About the year 960 the queen of this people, after extirpating the Abyssinian princes on the rock Damo, assumed the sovereignty of the whole empire, which they retained for some time; but their power being by degrees reduced, they were obliged to take up their residence among the rugged mountains of Samen; one of which they chose for their capital, and which has ever since been called the Jew's Rock. About the year 1600, they were almost entirely ruined by an overthrow from the Abyssinians, in which both their king and queen were slain; since which time they have been in subjection to the emperors of that country, but are still governed by their own princes. When Mr Bruce was in Abyssinia they were supposed to amount to about 100,000 effective men. Gideon and Judith were the names of the king and queen at that time; and these, according to our author, seem to be preferred to others for the royal family.

The language of this people is very different from the Hebrew, Samaritan, or any other which the Jews ever spoke in their own country. On being interrogated concerning it by Mr Bruce, they said, that it was probably one of those spoken by the nations on the Red sea, among whom they had settled at their first coming. They arrived in Abyssinia speaking Hebrew, and with the advantage of having books in that language; but had now forgot it, which indeed is not to be wondered at, as they had lost their Hebrew books, and were entirely ignorant of the art of writing. At the time of their leaving Jerusalem, they were in possession both of the Hebrew and Samaritan copies of the law; but when their fleet was destroyed in the Falasha time of Rehoboam, and no farther communication with Jerusalem took place, they were obliged to use translations of the Scriptures, or those copies which were in possession of the shepherds, who, they say, were all Jews before the time of Solomon. On being asked, however, where the shepherds got their copy, and being told, that, notwithstanding the invasion of Egypt by Nebuchadnezzar, there was still a communication with Jerusalem by means of the Ishmaelite Arabs through Arabia, they frankly acknowledged that they could not tell: neither had they any memorials of the history either of their own or any other country; all that they believed in this case being derived from mere tradition, their histories, if any existed, having been destroyed by the famous Moorish captain Gragne. They say that the first book of Scripture they received was that of Enoch; and they place that of Job immediately after it, supposing that patriarch to have lived soon after the flood. They have no copy of the Old Testament in the Falasha language, what they make use of being in that of Geez. This is told to them by the Abyssinian Christians, who are the only scribes in that country. No difference takes place about corruptions of the text; nor do the Falasha know anything of the Jewish Talmud, Targum, or Cabala. See Abyssinia.