BABEL  , the native name of the

city called Babylon (q.v.) by the Greeks, the modern Hillah . It means "gate of the god," not"gate of the gods," corresponding to the Assyrian Bab-ili . According to Gen. xi, 1-9 (J), mankind, after the deluge, travelled from the mountain of the East, where the ark had rested, and settled in Shinar . Here they attempted to build a city and a tower whose top might reach unto heaven, but were miraculously prevented by their language being confounded . In this way the diversity of human speech and the dispersion of mankind were accounted for; and in Gen. xi . 9 (J) an etymology was found for the name of Babylon in the Hebrew verb halal, " to confuse or confound," Babel being regarded as a contraction of Balbel . In Gen. x . 10 it is said to have formed part of the kingdom of Nimrod . The origin of the story has not been found in Babylonia . The tower was no doubt suggested by one of the temple towers of Babylon . W . A .

Bennet (

Genesis, p . 169; cf . Hommel in Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible) suggests E-Saggila, the great temple of Merodach (Marduk) . The variety of languages and the dispersion of mankind were regarded as a curse, and it is probable that, as Prof . Cheyne (Encyclopaedia Biblica, col . 411) says, there was an ancient North Semitic myth to explain it . The event was afterwards localized in Babylon . The myth, as it appears in Genesis, is quite polytheistic and anthropomorphic . According to Cornelius Alexander (frag . 1o) and Abydenus (frags . 5 and 6) the tower was overthrown by the winds; according to Yaqut (i . 448 f.) and the Lisan el-'Arab (xiii .

72) mankind were swept together by winds into the

plain afterwards called " Babil," and were scattered again in the same way (see further D . B . Macdonald in the Jewish Encyclopaedia) . A tradition similar to that of the tower of Babel is found in Central America . Xelhua, one of the seven giants rescued from the deluge, built the great pyramid of Cholula in order to storm heaven . The gods, how-ever, destroyed it with fire and confounded the language of the builders . Traces of a somewhat similar story have also been met with among the Mongolian Tharus in northern India (Report of the Census of Bengal, 1872, p . 16o), and, according to Dr Livingstone, among the Africans of Lake Ngami . The Esthonian myth of " the Cooking of Languages " (Kohl, Reisen in die .Ostseeprovinzen, ii . 251-255) may also be compared, as well as the Australian legend of the origin of the diversity of speech (Gerstacker, Reisen, vol. iv. pp . 381 seq.) . BAB-EL-MANDEB (Arab. for" The Gate of Tears "), the strait between Arabia and Africa which connects the Red Sea (q.v.) with the Indian Ocean .

It derives its name from the dangers attending its

navigation, or, according to an Arabic legend, from the numbers who were drowned by the earthquake which separated Asia and Africa . The distance across is about 20 M. from Ras Menheli on the Arabian coast to Ras Siyan on the African . The island of Perim (q.v.), a British possession, divides the strait into two channels, of which the eastern, known as the Bab Iskender (Alexander's Strait), is 2 M. wide and 16 fathoms deep, while the western, or Dact-el-Mayun, has a width of about 16 m. and a depth of 170 fathoms . Near the African coast lies a group of smaller islands known as the " Seven Brothers." There is a surface current inwards in the eastern channel, but a strong under-current outwards in the western channel .