THE MOUNTAIN OF YAHWEH IN ISRAEL

 

 Elsewhere I have reported the discovery of an ancient Hebrew document that gives an eyewitness report on the encounter between David the shepherd-boy and Goliath the giant of Gath (1 Samuel 17 in the Bible).  It was found in a fortress on a hill, Khirbet Qeiyafa, ancient Sha`arayim, overlooking the Valley of Elah. There are five lines of writing on a piece of a broken pot (an ostracon), and they record that the giant Goliath cursed David the servant of God, but he has been judged, and executed. My analysis of the inscription is here.

    I have now realized that the name of God is hiding up in the top right hand corner, in the form YH. The general opinion is that there are no vowels in the Hebrew text, only letters for consonants; but this inscription is written syllabically, using the Neo-syllabary of the time of the Judges in ancient Israel, and it says YAHU. This is equivalent to YHWH (Yahweh), and it is the same as Yah in Hallelu-Yah (“Praise Yahweh”), and Yahu in modern Israeli names, such as Netanyahu and Eliyahu. This name Eliyahu means “Yahweh is my God” (it is mangled in English as Elijah), and it originally belonged to a famous prophet in ancient Israel (1 Kings 17–18).
    

    In the story of Eliyahu, after this man of God had defeated the prophets of Baal on Mount Carmel, Queen Jezebel sought to kill him; and so he fled into the wilderness, “to Horeb, the mountain of God”, which would be the Mount Horeb or Mount Sinai where Moses met Yahweh (Exodus 3). In this cave Eliyahu had an epiphany, with earthquake, wind, fire, and the voice of Yahweh speaking to him in the ensuing stillness (1 Kings 19:9-13).

    Through the ages, Christians have gone to Gebel Musa alias Jabal Musa (Moses Mountain) in the south of the Sinai Peninsula, in the belief that this is the holy Horeb. The famous Greek monastery of Saint Catherine stands below it. I myself have climbed that mountain, but I can not recall seeing a cave on top of it, though a chapel has been built there for “Elias”. Nevertheless, in his book containing a new proposal for identifying Mount Sinai, Robert Feather (Where Moses Stood, London 2014, p. 92) reports that there is a Moses cave on the summit. In Chapter 10, "Alternative Mount Sinais" (90-111) he examines several possible places for the holy mount, and dismisses them all in favour of Har Timna in the copper mining region of the Wadi Arabah, near the Gulf of Aqaba.
    HAR KARKOM

    However, there is a mountain in the desert inside the borders of Israel, which does have a cave on top. Its Hebrew name is Har Karkom (“Mount Saffron”); it has obviously been a sacred site since the Stone Age, as is shown by thousands of petroglyphs on its rocks. Emmanuel Anati of Milan has devoted his life to studying this area, and he is convinced that this is the Biblical Mount Sinai, also known as Mount Horeb. His first book on the subject was published in Italian in 1984, followed by a French translation in 1986, and best of all the large English version, THE MOUNTAIN OF GOD (1986) with the addition of a couple of hundred coloured pictures. He announced his theory in the press all round the world in 1986. The most recent publication on the subject is: La riscoperta del Monte Sinai (2010), "The rediscovery of Mount Sinai". 

    Besides the cave on the summit, there are other possible indications that it is the mountain where Moses took the children of Israel to meet Yahweh and to make their covenant (Exodus 19–24): a cleared space (for the Tabernacle?); an altar (site HK52) with twelve standing stones  (Exodus 24:4, twelve pillars representing the tribes); a drawing of the two tablets (HK126b, Exodus 24:12-18). But what confirms it for me (as a mountain where Yahu was worshiped) is the sequence of stones along the trail leading to the mountain, which have a human stick figure and a stick inscribed on them. This is usually understood as a person worshiping a pillar (a forbidden practice!). No, it is writing, and in fact the original alphabet (or the proto-alphabet) from the Bronze Age: the stick represents a human arm (Hebrew yad, hence Y); the person is rejoicing, and the word for jubilating and praising is hallel (as in Hallelu-Yah) hence H.  

    This is the example (from site 2) that Emmanuel Anati showed on the cover of his book in 1984:
 

The arms and head (which will become E in the Greek and Roman alphabets, when the body has been discarded) are at the bottom, and so it probably should be inverted when viewing, though the H figure is sometimes found upside down (standing on his hands) in other places, in Egypt and Canaan in the  Bronze Age.
   The next one (HK3d) apparently has the same word YH, with the person's arms raised, showing the E part of the figure (which will be all that survives in the Greek and Roman alphabets, as the letter E):



    Here is yet another from the same sequence of marker-stones (HK3a), which would also  say YH (the arm has a hand but the H is not tidy, having one arm up and the other down); alternatively the single stroke might be an arm (Y), the middle character a simplified exulter (H), and a hook (W), hence YHW (Yahwe):-



    From a different site (HK15b) we see three signs joined together in a circle: Y (arm) H (exulter) W (a hook, waw), as a monogram of YHW (Yahwe); the marks below might be a single letter H  (or perhaps an ox-head and a crook, 'L, El, God):-



A few such inscriptions have an additional H, and this could stand for the masculine pronoun "he" (hu), hence "He is Yahu"; or it could be functioning as the whole word HLL (without the vowels); thus it would be saying Hallelu Yah! However, YHH is known as a form of the divine name in the Aramaic documents of the Jewish community of Elephantine in southern Egypt, in the 5th century BCE. We find YH and YHW and YHWH in the Bible, but not YHH.

    This Saffron ("Crocus") Mountain, Har Karkom,  is certainly a mountain of Yahweh, since his name YH is written all over it! But is it Mount Horeb? Is it the true Mount Sinai? If we have to make a choice, I would sugest that the children of Israel could have visited all three or four of these possible mountains at some time (apologies to anyone who thinks they never set foot in Sinai or made an exodus from Egypt). But which one did the prophet Eliyahu go to?

   An annual pilgrimage to this mountain is now established, at the winter solstice, when the sun produces flames at the entrance of a cave. This may have been associated with a real bush in the distant past; it would not have been consumed by these "flames".

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/31/world/middleeast/israel-mount-sinai-burning-bush.html

For more information and pictures of Har Karkom, go to
http://www.harkarkom.com/Gallery.php

If this hypothesis of Deborah Hurn is right, then it seems that Israel had not forgotten that Har Karkom was Mount Sinai; the prophet Eliyahu certainly knew where it was (1 Kings 19:1-19); I presume that the forty days plus one, after he left Beersheba (19:3, 4, 8) refers to his whole time spent there and his return journey to meet Elisha in Northern Israel (19).
https://www.academia.edu/45386848/KUNTILLET_%CA%BFAJRUD_PILGRIM_S_ROADHOUSE_TO_MOUNT_SINAI_HAR_KARKOM_?email_work_card=title

https://www.academia.edu/video/1qyvm1

   MOUNT EBAL
On a higher eminence in Israel, namely Mount Ebal, the twin of Mount Gerizim, near the ancient city Shekem (Shechem, now Nablus), a small document made of lead, with inscriptions engraved on it,  has been excavated, and  the divine name YHW appears (apparently!) in its minuscule text. 
https://cryptcracker.blogspot.com/2023/12/ebal-curse-tablet.html

 

 MOUNTAINS OF GOD IN SINAI

 https://www.academia.edu/129465676/Proto_Thesis

In this thesis-summary (May 20, 2025, Appendix 2, 173-181) Michael S. Bar-Ron (supported by Pieter Gert van der Veen and Walter Mattfe;d), makes a case for identifying these two mountains as the original Mount Sinai and Mount Horeb, since one of them is Jebel Saniyah and the other is Jebel Ghorabi, and this certainly invites us to pause and ponder. Notice in passing, on page 174, the name appears as Ghorabi, but also as Ghoriba, and the caption to the picture on page 181, reproduced above, has "Jebel Saniyah and Ghroiba  from Serabit el-Khadim". We are looking at one of the Sinai turquoise mines, in the foreground, and this region has yielded a host of proto-alphabetic inscriptions, which I have been studying intensely throughout my long life, in my search for the origin of the alphabet.
https://www.academia.edu/12894458/The_origin_of_the_alphabet

Ronald Stewart (Academia) rejects an Arabian Horeb in favour of  Jabal Musa in Sinai, and also takes up the twin peak idea. The plain at that site is part of the case for Israel having camped there.

    THE MOUNTAIN OF YAHWEH IN ARABIA

    JABAL MAQLA 

    There are other candidates for Mount Horeb, most notably Jabal Maqla (Burnt Mountain) in the Jabal al- Lawz mountain range (Jebel el-Lawz) in NW Saudi Arabia (Feather, 99-102); this has the enticing feature of being volcanic, with a blackened peak, to go with the smoke and fire in the Exodus story (Exodus 19:17-19); but it is somewhat difficult to apply the name Sinai to it, as it is in Arabia.
    However, this place has inscriptions that include the divine name YHW. Ron Van Brenk in Canada has highlighted the important graffiti that have survived in this area, and he argues that they testify to the presence of the children of Israel, who had migrated here after their exodus from Egypt.  He points to a niche in the rock-face where Moses could have sat in judgement (Ex 18:13); and a location for  an altar for the "golden calf" episode (Ex 32:1-6).
    In approaching ancient inscriptions we must always keep in mind that the writers knew what the intended meanings were, but we are prone to misinterpret them. Van Brenk has made valiant attempts to interpret the inscriptions, but I will transcribe and translate them in accordance with my paradigm of signs and sounds of the West Semitic "Quadrinity", the four forms of the Proto-alphabet in the Bronze Age.
https://cryptcracker.blogspot.com/2021/04/another-lakish-inscription.html

    (1) Rock tableau
This is embedded in :the "petroglyph panel", which depicts an assortment of animals and humans.
Photographs are from Ron Van Brenk's presentation of the document.
https://www.academia.edu/100674894/The_Petroglyph_Panel

The presumed (not to say "putative") written text is discernible (faintly highlighted in yellow for the purpose of this interpretation) at the bottom of the picture.
Here is a relevant extract:

 

 

The two words that I am proposing are YHW H.Y, so the sequence could say:
"Living YHW"
YHWH is a "living God, speaking out of the fire" (Deuteronomy 5:23); "a living God in in your midst", (Joshua 3:10)

 The less likely alternative is H.Y YHW, "YHW lives"
"YHWH is alive" (Psalm 18:47,  Samuel 22:47).

There are two instances of Yod (yad, forearm with hand).
H is a stick figure of a person rejoicing (>-E).
W is a circle on a stem, representing waw, nail (--o).
H. (Hh, H.et) is a mansion with a round courtyard, h.az.ir (in proper conventional transcription, the dot I am placing after a letter will be positioned under it!).

 

However, if the figure to the left of the H.Y is a cross, and thus T (taw, mark, signature), then the word H.YT emerges, meaning "animals", and so "YHW of animals", or "YHW and animals", if the Waw is having a double function.
Furthermore, to the right of the YHW is a bovine head (with horns and an eye) for 'Alep, and a rejoicing human for H, and a tiny Waw, perhaps producing 'HW, which could be the Bronze Age form of Hebrew 'ehye, saying "I am". Looking at the sentence literally, we see "I am he is living".
At this point we may think of the theophany that Moses experienced at a mountain in the land of Midian (as this one is) when he was with his flocks, and conversed with the great God named 'I AM" (Exodus 3:14).
   Now, although a reading "I am YHW" may be a consummation devoutly to be wished, I must ponder whether this is what the writer intended. The 'Alep I am invoking is merely the horns of one of the beasts, facing left towards the small human I am relying on for the aspiration in 'HW; the same sort of horns are on another large animal, facing right towards a human figure. The He for YHW is not upright, and it could be a quadruped.
   Possibly this is a Stone-Age work, and a Bronze-Age artist or scribe has cryptically inserted some written words into the picture, possibly "YHW alive" or "YHW and animals", but it may be only an amazing coincidence that has sparked the imagination of this viewer, to see things that are not there.

   Never mind, I think I will have success with the next graffito, and eventually I will return to this one with increased confidence.

   (2) Rock inscription 'HW YHW 'LHK
https://www.academia.edu/123774718/A_Pictograph_Mt_Sinai
My proposal is that these two monograms say:
"I am YHW "

Each set of signs has a human figure jumping for joy (notice the legs leaping up). 
Next, both have a Waw (o--) crossing their middle line. This combination would produce the sequence HW. The larger image has a circular head, and upraised forearms and hands; the one on the left has a bovine head, which could represent the glottal-stop letter 'Alep, and combine with HW to produce the word I was seeking on the animal tableau, 'HW, "I am".
   The other collection of signs would serendipitously provide YHW, "he is", and thus the divine name YHW, if I could find a Yod. On the far right (above a trace of Ron's hair, which indicates his former presence in this photograph) is a short vertical stroke which might be part of a character depicting forearm and hand (=|), but it is rather remote. Below the hand on the right side (the left hand, presumably) is a diagonal mark which could readily serve as a Yod (elbow, forearm, hand); but the other hand seems to have an eroded line running down from it to the head of the Waw. So I accept  that we have now established this sequence: 'HW YHW, "I am YHW".

  

 

 Furthermore, there is a vertical line below the legs of YHW, which must be taken into account: it has a curl at the bottom, and could represent a shepherd's crook, and function as Lamed; and combining it  with the indistinct ox-head beside it, the whole character emerges as YHW 'L, "YHW God"; moreover, amid the disintegrating shapes below this a hand stands out, with fingers and palm, denoting Kap, and permitting 'LK. "your God", and even 'LHK, "your God", if the adjacent head, neck, and arms can find a fragmentary body in the wreckage. The outcome is then:
'HW YHW 'LHK "I am YHW thy God".
Compare this with the beginning of the Ten Commandments document (Exodus 20:2):

'NKY YHWH 'LHK "I (am) YHW thy God".
    That weather-worn splatter must have been a legible text originally. Perhaps it said:
"I am YHW thy God, who brought thee out of the land of Egypt, away from the home of slaves. Thou shalt have no other gods beside me" (20:2-3). 
    (Coincidentally, in the essay that Ron Van Brenk has devoted to these stupendous pictures, "A Pictograph @ Mt. Sinai: The Very First Commandment", he relates this inscription to the "no other gods" injunction, but he fails to see that this is writing, not pictures, and the two clusters of letters are monograms, not pictographs.)
   

   Regarding the presumed correspondence between 'HW (in the inscription) and 'HYH (in the Scripture), it is possible that the name YHW is based on the archaic root HWY ("be"), and likewise the 'HW here, whereas the Scriptural 'HY(H) ("I am") reflects the later form of the root, HY(H), and this was either recorded as 'HY by Moses at the time of the theophany,  or else altered by later editors of the Pentateuch, such as Ezra, to update the linguistic change (HWY > HYY).
    When Moses asks God what name he shall tell to his people, "God said to Moses, I AM THAT I AM ('HYH 'ShR 'HYH) ... say I AM has sent me to you" (3:14). Subsequently, "I am YHWH", who appeared to the forefathers "as 'El Shadday, but by my name YHWH I was not known to them" (6:2-3).
And here now is a mountain that was associated with the name YHW, and it is in a part of Arabia that was anciently the land of Midian, where Moses took refuge for many years (2:15-16, 3:1-2, 4:19).

(3) Inscribed stones YHW 'LHM
https://www.academia.edu/126795857/The_Third_Commandment_Observed_our_earliest_YHWH_discovered_to_date_

These two stones have proto-alphabetic inscriptions, and they seem to be related.
They are not the two stone tablets on which the Law of YHW was engraved, but there is a reference to that lawcode in the text, which is addressed to YHW. The sentence begins with the name YHW and continues in boustrophedon fashion (top line sinistrograde, L<-R, bottom line dextrograde, L->R). However, there are actually five lines proceeding in alternating directions (boustrophedon, "as an ox turns in ploughing").
We begin here:

The first and longest letter is Yod (elbow, forearm, hand).
The second character is an unusual form of He; not a stick figure, but a complete image of a person with arms raised in jubilation.
The next sign is a blob but the nail of Waw (--o) is discernible.
So we have YHW (the H of the four-letter Tetragrammaton YHWH was added later in time as an indication of a vowel, a or e).

Now, there is another set of signs running parallel with YHW, but in the opposite direction.
First find the 'Alep, the ox-head with two horns, a much fainter image; its snout is pointing to its accompanying characters.
Below it is a crook, for L /l/; it is lying horizontally with its hook at the right-hand end of the staff (it is clear to me on the large image of this photograph on my big screen).
Next is a jubilating person, again for H, but not upright, though not upside down, a stance that  sometimes occurs.
And then I would expect a wavy M, and I think that is possible.
Accordingly, we have the word 'LHM ('elohim), and we are addressing "Yahwe God".
Returning to the top line (the section now recognized as line 3), in fourth position from the right is the mansion-sign for /h./. 
Then Qaw, "measuring line", a cord wound on a stick (--o-), sometimes with the end of the string poking out, and that is what we see here, but the circle of the cord has faded.
The last letter in this top line is K, a hand (kap) depicted with three fingers.
H.Q could be h.oq, "statute, law", and K is -ka, 2nd person suffix, thus producing: 
"Thy law".
The first letter on the left of the lower line (line 4) is H, it is a hank of thread  (hayt.) in the form of a double helix. The presence of these two consonantograms (H. and H) in this inscription shows that the script is the "Protoconsonantary" (the original longer version of the proto-alphabet) since these two letters were omitted from the Neoconsonantary (reduced to 22 letters).
Next we have a character made of two parallel strokes, to be identified as D (Dh, as in "this", which should be written as "dhis", in dhis thing). Dhis is another indicator of the Protoconsonantary.
Now another Q (Qaw, cord wound on a stick); the identification of this letter was an original discovery of mine (1990) but it is heartlessly rejected or blithely ignored by the other scholars in this field.
This sequence provides us with the West Semitic root H.ZQ, but as older HDQ, "be strong". This could be the adjective, "powerful".
   YHW 'LHM, thy law is powerful
The following letter is B (bayt) "house".
The last letter in the line is unclear, but I  take it to be another bovine head with horns: 'Alep.
The final letter of the text has the bottom line (line 5) to itself; it is a sun-symbol, with two serpents, one on each side; it goes with the word shimsh, "sun", and represents Sh; yet again the establishmentarians have thrust my identification aside.
The sequence that emerges is B'Sh. There is such a root, but it means bad, rotten. If the B is the preposition, basically meaning "in", then 'Sh could be "fire" or "man".
   YHW God, thy law is powerful in a man.
   YHW God, thy law is powerful in/as fire.


   The letters on another stone are a hand and a H.et, and as KH. they render the Hebrew word koh., meaning "power"; this reading is not certain, but "power" certainly fits with the word "powerful" in the other text, and it may be a heading or a summary. Actually, the white stroke might be another letter, as the stem of a Q, but it could be the wrist of the hand; the orange line higher up has a wound cord, with its upper stem and protruding string (look carefully for these details), and this familiar combination produces H.QK, "Thy Law".
    There is a field of stones at this site, and I am waiting for Ron Van Brenk and others to bring more inscriptions to light.
    Meanwhile, here is something surprising with which I have been personally involved.

  (4) Menorah of YH 'LHM

 The complete picture is available in the first minute here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KfGauUpw87w 

This is an inscription that I was personally involved with, as the man who discovered it sent pictures of it to me. and asked for my opinion. I accept that this is a drawing of a menora (lampstand, with seven branches, as in the Tabernacle, Exodus. 25:31-40). At that time I was overawed by all the Arabic writing, and I did not notice the proto-alphabetic letters accompanying it: Y (forearm with hand) H (person exulting) 'Alep (ox-head) L (crook). This could be read as Yahu 'El, "Yahu God", and compared with YHW 'L in another rock inscription (see 2 above).  Below the L is a cross, which could be T, and 'LT would say "goddess" (!); but it seems to be another H (with upraised forearm, hence 'LH "God"; and if a Mem is lurking there (and I can se two possible candidates), it would make 'LHM "God". This set of marks would have been placed there in the Bronze Age, and the Arabian writing came later.

https://www.ancientpages.com/2019/11/21/ancient-hebrew-inscription-reveals-location-of-biblical-mount-sinai/

   (5) Eyes of YHW 

 

 

     

 

 

 

 A photograph of this object (from the Jabal al-Lawz area) was sent to me by Brad Sparks in 2009, and I ventured to say that the divine name might be present on the rear of the stone; if so, it seems strange to find it on a "graven image" of a bearded male. The clear exulting figure is a Bronze-Age H, with a Waw next to it on the left. Where is the expected Yad arm? Possibly it is obscured in the bottom right corner; or the hand is there (notice two parallel lines), and the forearm is the oblique line running up to the H, and even the elbow, joined to the body of the H; note that the other H (on the face side) has a short body; but this is apparently a circular text, and it would be better to find a horizontal Yod at the bottom, possibly preceded by a sun-sign, Sh, "of". On the left side. the dot might be the pupil of an eye, with its upper and lower eyelids (arcs, not a circle) faintly surviving.  Below it there is perhaps a snake, hence `N, "eye" or "eyes", and thus: `N (Sh) YHW, "The eyes of YHW" (as depicted on the face: large and denoting "all-seeing eyes").
    The two letters on the face could be a short version of Yad (representing hand and wrist only), and in combination with H denoting Yahu (though there might be a Waw squeezed in between the the H and the nose, but the writer's intention remains obscure. 
    At this point we shall note some connections between these "phenomena" and related Biblical ideas about "The eyes of YHWH".
    

 

 (6) Agents of YHW

 This is my rough sketch of a rock tableau included in Ryan Mauro's presentation of the evidence from Jabal Maqla (at 18.04 of 24.50). The arm says Y (yad) and the human figure is H, of course; apparently a o-- (waw) is there (but a better one is to the left of the feet of the H, not shown here), and that would make another YHW. Around the drawing of three onlookers, perhaps  Moses, Aaron, and Joshua (or Miriam) there are other human figures and many marks that could be writing. The person on the left seems to be holding a rod in his right hand; there is a large eye with pupil next to it; below this presumed `ayin is a sun-sign with two serpents for Sh; and then possibly H and Y, producing the name YHSh`, and if so it might not belong to the man with the rod. At the bottom I see an ox-head, a little jubilater, a human head, and possibly a snake, and this could be the signature of Aharon the High Priest, who is depicted with his bejeweled breastplate, and holding a censer. To the right of the third man is a vertical wavy line and a sun-sign, and this would yield MSh, Moshe, Moses. The man in the middle is H.R. This company are all registered as being engaged in the battle against `Amaleq (Exodus 17). Miryam is also here, with her timbrel (Exodus 15).
   All these Bible characters have suddenly and unexpectedly become authentic historical people. Retreat into denial by sceptics is no longer an option.
   We now know that Moshe wrote using the full proto-alphabet, the Proto-consonantary constructed out of the West Semitic Proto-syllabary by his ancestors, Ya`qob and sons.
 "God alone knows the truth."

https://www.ancientpages.com/2019/11/21/ancient-hebrew-inscription-reveals-location-of-biblical-mount-sinai/

For comparison, this tableau depicts a variety of animals, including four human figures, three male and one female, according to Ron Van Brenk, who has published this picture (p.12 of 57)

No writing is detectable here, but we may ask whether Miriam is the woman, and above her Moses, Aaron, and Joshua (Hoshea`, who was given the YHW-name Yehoshua`by Moses, Numbers 13:8, 16, and he was apparently the first of the children of Israel to have a YHW-name). 

(7) Midian YHW

This inscription might be read as YHW'LHM
equivalent to Hebraic Yahwe 'Elohim, Yahwe God.
   It is visible on a stone in "the caves of Jethro" at al-Bad' in the ancient land of Midian, and this seems to indicate that the people of that area worshiped YHW.
   I have copied the letters from picture No 52 at the website "Mount Sinai - A selection of images"

   Moses was living in the land of Midian in Arabia, and with the flock belonging to his father-in-law Jethro he came to the mountain  of revelation (the one with the burning bush); he was told by God that he was to bring the people Israel to this very mountain (Exodus 3:12), It is unlikely that Moses had taken the animals to a place in the Sinai Peninsula.
   The presence of so many YHW inscriptions at this location seems to confirm its identity as the special mountain of YHW God.
    But as they moved around in their nomadic wanderings in Arabia and Sinai, they may have communed with YHW (who was leading them) at other mountains.
   However, Jabal Maqla has many instances of the name YHW and a reference to the law of YHW, and a menora, and a congregation of famous children of Israel (pictured and named) and all these distinguishing features are unique and cogent.

MOUNTAINS OF GOD IN SINAI

 https://www.academia.edu/129465676/Proto_Thesis

In this thesis-summary (May 20, 2025, Appendix 2, 173-181) Michael S. Bar-Ron (supported by Pieter Gert van der Veen and Walter Mattfe;d), makes a case for identifying these two mountains as the original Mount Sinai and Mount Horeb, since one of them is Jebel Saniyah and the other is Jebel Ghorabi, and this certainly invites us to pause and ponder. Notice in passing, on page 174, the name appears as Ghorabi, but also as Ghoriba, and the caption to the picture on page 181, reproduced above, has "Jebel Saniyah and Ghroiba  from Serabit el-Khadim". We are looking at one of the Sinai turquoise mines, in the foreground, and this region has yielded a host of proto-alphabetic inscriptions, which I have been studying intensely throughout my long life, in my search for the origin of the alphabet.
https://www.academia.edu/12894458/The_origin_of_the_alphabet

A

Ronald Stewart (Academia) rejects an Arabian Horeb in favour of  Jabal Musa in Sinai, and also takes up the twin peak idea. The plain at thiat site is part of the case for Israel having camped there.
 

 

666 AND ALL THAT

In Dan Brown's mystery novel, The Da Vinci Code (2003, Corgi pb, p. 40) we are told that the modern pyramid at the Louvre art museum in Paris has exactly "666 panes of glass", and according to "conspiracy buffs" this happens to be "the number of Satan".
   What is the origin of this idea that "six hundred and sixty-six" is an inauspicious number? Well, as with so many answers to mysterious questions, "it's in the Book", and in the very last book of the Christian Bible, namely The Apocalypse, or The Revelation (please don't show your ignorance by "misnoming" it "Revelations").
   In Chapter 13 (yes, and I am not making this up) in the last verse (number 18, which is 3 times 6, I have noticed for the first time in my life,  but, don't get me wrong,  of course I have known that 3 x 6 = 18 for most of my life), we are told that the number of the Beast is "six hundred and sixty-six", that is, 6-6-6 (Revelation 13:18). Incidentally, interestingly, but not significantly, the Greek word for six is hex (be a witch or bewitch).
    My interpretation of the visions and predictions in that chapter will be presented for your consideration here. Basically, I regard it as an updating of the prophecies of the Book of Daniel (chapters 7 to 12) for first-century Christians.
    John the Seer (1.1-2) sees a monster, a "beast" (therion) coming up out of the sea (the place where evil lurks); it has seven heads with ten horns and each horn has a diadem on it (13.1)   The beast was a composite creature, with body parts taken from a leopard, a bear, and a lion, and these were the three animals Daniel saw in a vision (Dn 7:1-8); they represent ancient world empires, and their rulers. The lion was Babylon and Nebukadressar (Nebuchadnezzar); the bear was the Median kingdom under Astyages the Mede; the leopard was the Persian empire under Cyrus the Great and his successors; and there was a fourth monster, with iron teeth and ten horns, representing Alexander the Great and his successors in the Grecian or Hellenistic empire; and a small horn (Dn 7.19-22) sprang up and made war on the saints (Israel), clearly Antiokhos IV (Antiokhos Epiphanes), who saw himself as a divine manifestation (an 'epiphany') and actively persecuted Jews. In this regard he was a model for Nero Caesar, who was also a Hellenist with a belief in his own divinity, and who likewise persecuted "the saints".
(Note that my unraveling of the web of mystery spun by the author of the Book of Daniel is set forth in detail in Colless 1992.)
    My proposition is that Nero Caesar was the beast whose number was 666.
    I am not the first one to notice this, but here is how it works: if you write the name in Hebrew letters (without vowels, as is the custom in Semitic languages) it is NRWN QSR; the letters were also used as numerals and if we give this set their numerical value it does add up to 666. That is according to the ancient occult art of "numerology".
   Here is the "algebraic" equation:
   N (50) + R (200) +W (6) + N (50) + Q (100) + S (60) + R (200) = 666 (DCLXVI)
   I put some Roman numerals in there to lead on to the next point, to show that the Roman alphabet offers similar possibilities. The role of the apocalyptic "beast" is always persecution of the "saints", and this could apply to King Louis XIV, the Sun King, who slaughtered protestants.
   Taking the name as LVDOVICVS we have:
   L (50) + V (5) +  D (500) + O (0) + V (5) + I (1) + C (100) + V (5) S (summa, total) = 666

(But wait, there's more)

> The Beast's fire from heaven (13:13) was Nero's burning of Rome to make way for his Neropolis, particularly his Golden House (Domus Aurea. which has now been excavated), equivalent to 

the new Jerusalem, the golden city (21:10, 21).

> The miracles of the beast (great signs ,13:13) were Nero's spectacular entertainments.

> The harp-players singing a new song before the throne of the Lamb (14:2-3) 

are in contrast to Nero, who harped and sang while Rome burned.

> The beast is burned in a lake of fire and sulphur, along with the devil and the false prophet (20:10), as retribution for Nero's using Christians aflame with sulphur for candles at his feasts.

Brian E. Colless, Cyrus the Persian as Darius the Mede in the Book of Daniel, Journal for the Study of the Old Testament 56 (1992) 113-126.

AMULET FROM DEIR RIFA

 Gordon Hamilton has issued a personal account of eleven West Semitic inscriptions discovered in recent times,  including a button-sized disc from Deir Rifa (Petrie Museum  UC 51354) on the website "The Bible and Interpretation" (http://bibleinterp.com). His article is available on a pdf :

http://bibleinterp.com/PDFs/SealOfASeer.pdf
(But it is not there now, March 2012)

GJH had already published (http://jss.oxfordjournals.org/)"A proposal to read the legend of a seal-amulet from Deir Rifa, Egypt as an early West Semitic alphabetic inscription" (Journal of Semitic Studies, 54, 2009, 51-79, with a photograph, plate 2, p. 53).

First, I notice Gordon does not mention me, though I  refer (though not defer) to him in my websites, and it can not simply be because I report my research in progress on the internet, since he has a lot of web addresses in his footnotes; and he did quote me in his book (mostly dismissively), but  it would appear that after my review of it, the Albrightians (I am still an adherent of the Albright school, but not a believer of all the tenets, particularly with regard to West Semitic scripts) have ostracized me (as you do, with ostraca). They do not rank me as one of their 'peers', apparently, and therefore do not need to give peer reviews of my work. It may be noted that F.M. Cross (the dean of the Albright school) had been consulted in the process of interpreting the legend (p. 73), and he had insisted that the word for 'seer' (h.z) was present; hence Hamilton's idea that it was the seal of a seer.

The basic defect in Hamilton's whole case for identifying the original  Proto-Canaanite letters is that he has not taken into account the six documents published by W. F. Petrie in 1912: one of them provides a paradigm of the consonantal proto-alphabet; two others, taken together, offer another copy of the consonantary; one of them has a text using the syllabic script. Every speculatively constructed paradigm has to be tested alongside these two original prototypes, but this exercise has not been done by anyone else. I have presented my results in my critique of Hamilton's conjectural table of Proto-Canaanite consonantal signs.

Turning now to the  inscription, we are told that Rifeh (Deir Rifa) is situated in the extreme south of Middle  Egypt and it was a border-post between the Hyksos and Theban sectors of the Two Lands.
For our own examination of the object, we can see a drawing (fig. 2, on p. 4 of the pdf) and a photograph (plate 2, p. 53, of the JSS article).   Hamilton's interpretation has it as a seal-amulet bearing a name and a title in alphabetic script, and he reads it as:

L QN H.Z  Belonging to Cain (qn) the seer.

With his characteristic confidence (which seems insufficiently critical and 'scientific') he draws all kinds of conclusions from this, and boldly declares: "Only the first letter is ambiguous paleographically";  because 'Hamilton' (as he calls himself third-personally and objectively) says so. He is referring to the proposed L; but I think he is tearing off one of the bull's horns, making it Lamed instead of 'Aleph (ox).

Coincidentally, I have already put on this website a seal with a Canaanite inscription (apparently from a Hyksos set of scarabs).


http://cryptcracker.blogspot.com/2010/03/inscribed-west-semitic-stone-seal-this.html

This one employs the West Semitic syllabary, not the consonantary (proto-alphabet), as does the signet ring from Megiddo (acknowledged by Giovanni Garbini and myself, but treated as consonantal by Hamilton):

http://sites.google.com/view/collesseum/megiddoring

Accordingly, the possibility has to be faced that the Deir Rifa inscription is likewise logo-syllabic (the Megiddo ring has one logogram in my interpretation: "Sealed, the SCEPTRE of Megiddo").

This is one form of ambiguity which has to be considered, and I suggest that the Rifeh text has two logograms, among the scroll-decorations (note that I have omitted the scrolling from my drawings, leaving only the script). GJH sees them as two Egyptian `ankh symbols, denoting 'life' (p. 56). However, they are possibly different signs; this is clear on Petrie's drawing (fig. 1, p. 55) and Hamilton's (fig. 2, p. 55) . The one with O and T (so to speak) as its constituent parts is the `ankh; the other is the nefer sign (O+), symbolizing goodness and beauty.  Accordingly, these signs are saying "good life". Also, the nefer sign is T. (Tet) in the consonantary and T.A in the syllabary (both derived acrophonically from t.abu 'good'); but the `ankh is only used in the syllabary (as H.I and h.iwatu 'life').

A fundamental question is whether the Deir Rifa text is consonantal or syllabic. Hamilton simply chooses to read it consonantally, ignoring the syllabic option. Of course, since one-quarter of the syllabic signs are found in the consonantary, we can easily start off on the wrong track.

The way the object should be held and viewed is another source of conclusion-confusion. GJH has it so that an ax-head and a fence are upright at the bottom, hence ZH., but he (following F. M. Cross) wants it to be H.Z 'seer', another point of ambiguity. I am sure the fence is not the origin of H., and I doubt that Z is an ax, preferring to see a manacle (ziqq). At the top he sees L (coil of rope?) with an extra stroke attaching it to the 8-sign (Q on the Albrightian table, but actually S., Tsadey). Then comes a snake for N.

Holding the object so that there is a horizontal line of writing (with the # sign sitting on the ingot), not a vertical column, the plausible snake sign (NA or N) becomes a  face-profile, PA (panu). The # is presumably attached to the base, to form a complete SA (or S, Samek), the Egyptian Djed column, representing the backbone.  At the left end I now  see 'Alep, ox-head with horns (alphabetic ', or  syllabic 'A). The 8 could be DU (dudu, jar).

So, if I had to read it alphabetically it would come out thus: ' S. N S

But syllabically it would be 'A DU PA SA, or SA PA DU 'A.

The sequence du'a suggests the common Semitic root dw(h) "be sick", noting Arabic da'a.

The common Semitic root sph can be transitive (sweep away, vanish) or intransitive (be swept away, vanish); but it is sometimes indistinguishable from swp (cease, end).

SA PA DU 'A "Vanish sickness. Good life"

This interpretation seems appropriate if the object is a talisman with an apotropaic function.

(*Do the beads indicate a woman?)

THE ELGAR REGAL ENIGMA

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The Elgar regal enigma

Brian Edric Colless

In 1899 Edward Elgar published his orchestral masterpiece known as Enigma Variations, or Variations on an Original Theme (Enigma), bearing the inscription "Dedicated to my friends pictured within".1 The "enigma" of the title apparently refers to the theme itself, and of it Elgar said: "The enigma I will not explain - its 'dark saying' must be left unguessed." And he added: "further, through and over the set another and larger theme 'goes' but is not played.... So the principal theme never appears, even as in some late dramas ... the chief character is never on the stage".2  Elgar has thus disclosed the existence of another theme running through his theme and variations; and it has been widely assumed that the enigma theme was created as a counterpoint to this mysterious melody. Tradition has it that Elgar also confessed that it was a tune everybody knew.

            The composer may also be telling us, I suggest, that the unplayed theme represents "the chief character" among the "friends pictured within", to whom the work is dedicated. I have long suspected that Elgar had a member of the royal family in mind, someone he could not with propriety claim as a friend, but a noble personage for whom he nonetheless felt admiration and affection. This person could have been Prince Albert Edward (1841-1910), who was to become King Edward VII in 1901, and who classed Elgar as his favourite composer. In this case "God bless the Prince of Wales" might be the tune we are seeking. However, I think we should "look higher", to use Elizabeth Barrett Browning's words, in Elgar's Sea Pictures, Opus 37.

            The Enigma Variations were composed between October 1898 and February1899, as Opus 36. Elgar's Opus 35 was Caractacus (1898), written in the wake of Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee (1897), and fervently dedicated to her. Elgar was thus aspiring to be purveyor of music to the Sovereign, long before he was officially appointed, in 1924, as Master of the King's Musick.

            The case to be argued here is that the additional, unplayed, familiar theme is "God save the Queen", and "the chief character" among the portraits is Victoria Regina. A commonly held view is that the Enigma theme represents Elgar himself. However, it is firmly established that the final (fourteenth) variation is his self-portrait; it is designated "E.D.U.", a cryptogram for "Edu" or "Edoo", the nickname his wife Alice gave him. Hers is the first variation, "C.A.E.", "Caroline Alice Elgar", and she was present at the birth of the theme, when her husband was improvising at his piano. This theme is clearly stated in the C.A.E. and E.D.U. variations, and it seems to belong to both of them, Edward and Alice alike.

            The first four notes of the enigma theme (2 quavers, 2 crotchets) would certainly allow the name "Edward Elgar" to be sung to them, as Michael Kennedy has noted.3  (As a possible analogy, I  think Rakhmaninov puts his signature, a four-note motif, at the end of some of the movements in his symphonies and concertos.) "Alice Elgar" would also fit here, but "Queen Victoria" is equally possible, as well as an innumerable host of other names.

            Many tunes have been proposed as candidates for the companion theme. "Auld Lang Syne", with its plea that old acquaintance(s) should not be forgotten, is a seductive siren in this regard, but Elgar specifically rejected this solution. "Rule, Britannia" and the National Anthem have also been proposed, but not generally accepted. Nevertheless, I consider that from historical and musical points of view "God save the Queen" is a reasonable choice. It has regularly provided a basis for variations. For example, in the pianistic duel between Sigismond Thalberg and Franz Liszt, in 1837, Thalberg performed a fourteen-minute "Fantasia on God Save The Queen" (Opus 27). More significantly, on one occasion Elgar set it as counterpoint to the 5/4 melody (second movement) in Tchaikovsky's Symphonie Pathétique. In June 1897 Elgar had found difficulty in playing the bass part of the 5/4 movement in a piano duet; and when Frederick George Edwards (editor of Novello's Musical Times) printed several skits on the National Anthem for the Queen's Jubilee year, Elgar sent him this humorous exercise, setting the anthem against the Tchaikovsky 5/4 tune.4  The plaintive Enigma theme seems to belong to the world of the Pathétique symphony, just as the Nimrod variation is closely associated with Beethoven's Pathétique sonata, and this could well be a vital clue. When Elgar used the Enigma theme again, in The Music Makers (Opus 69), he avowed that in both settings it "expressed" and "embodied" his "sense of the loneliness of the artist"5. So we must accept that something of Elgar the person is contained in the Enigma theme. Brian Trowell contrasts the melancholic Edward Elgar of the theme with "the almost military determination of the Finale" (the confident, vigorous E.D.U.). 6

            Trowell has adumbrated a solution to the enigma along those lines.7 He believes that Elgar would originally have written the theme ("the me?", Trowell speculates) in the key of E minor (which Elgar elsewhere used for depicting himself); the companion theme would simply be six bars of octave EE semibreves, if the Enigma theme is transposed down to E minor (from G minor). Elgar often employed an octave E as a rebus. His publisher Jaeger (of Nimrod fame) called Elgar "the octave" and "a teazer yclept E.E.". Dora Penny (Dorabella, Variation X) also recorded the fact that Elgar was known as E.E., and Elgar had said to her that she "of all people" should have guessed the solution; Jaeger declined to reveal the secret to her, because "the dear E.E. did make me promise not to tell you".

            Another person is brought into the picture in Trowell's reconstruction, namely Helen Weaver, Elgar's first fiancée, now thought to be the subject of the heart-rending Romanza (Variation XIII, entitled * * * and commonly understood as representing Lady Mary Lygon).8  Trowell points out that if the Enigma theme is played in E major (E for Elgar), the first two bars will have an octave EE in the bass, while the second two bars have a B, that is, H (in German notation), presumably standing for Helen. Variation XIII transposed into E major would begin E, H (Edward, Helen); the Finale would have EHE HEH EHE HEH EHE, and Trowell cites the illuminating analogy of HEEC in a letter of Elgar (Harriet Cohen embracing Edward Elgar).9 

            In discussing the place of Helen Weaver in the Enigma theme and variations, Trowell considers the use of a quotation from Mendelssohn's "Calm Sea and Prosperous Voyage".10  This motif would depict the sea voyage made by Helen Weaver when she emigrated to New Zealand (though ostensibly representing Lady Mary's trip to Australia), and also Elgar's longing for his distant beloved. Significantly, it recurs in the Finale, where it plays a dominant role. Elgar converted it into a new triumphant figure by adding an extra note and displacing the rhythm; he disguised it (after its first appearance) by crossing the parts among the upper strings (as Tchaikovsky did in the last movement of his Pathétique symphony, a work which we have already mentioned in connection with Elgar's 1897 parody of the National Anthem). I will argue here that Elgar followed the same procedure so as to incorporate "God Save the Queen" into his Enigma theme. It should be noted that if this theme is transposed into E minor, according to Trowell's prescription, we see a key signature of one sharp (F#), as for G major, the key in which "God Save the Queen" is usually sung.

            I proceed further on my quest, comforted and inspired by the words of Trowell himself: "there is rarely a single, simple solution to any Elgarian mystery".11 If (as Trowell postulates) the Violin Concerto can enshrine the soul of not only Elgar himself but also Helen Weaver, Alice Stuart Wortley, and Julia Worthington, then the Enigma theme can encompass Edward Elgar, Alice Elgar, Helen Weaver, and even Queen Victoria, as important parts of the composer's life. And while the supposed six bars of octave EE may well have been in Elgar's mind (apparently he teasingly disclosed this detail to Jaeger), we are still at liberty to seek, in his own words, "another and larger theme"

            Does the National Anthem match the structure of Elgar's enigmatic theme? The normal form for a tune is sixteen bars, in two sections of eight bars, or four sections of four bars. Elgar's theme has six bars in G minor, followed by an interlude of four bars in G major, six bars of restatement in G minor, and a final bar in the major (a total of seventeen bars, in ABA form). Rosa Burley, a confidante of the composer, was not given the answer (though she once jokingly claimed to be the theme itself, when asked by one of the 'variants' whether she too was one of the variations).12  She declares that to find a solution one would need to "discover another tune based on the same bizarre scheme" (six plus four plus six).13 The British national anthem certainly has a different shape: six bars, then eight, making fourteen bars in all, normally in the key of G major. However, Ian Parrott points out that Elgar originally had eight bars for the middle section, but reduced it to four.14  Parrott likewise regards the six bars of the first part (for some reason followed by a double bar line) as an unusual number. Could it be that Elgar decided to reduce the eight bars to four because his mystery would be too easily solved, with a combination of six bars and eight bars, exactly as in the national anthem?

            A notable difference between the two pieces is the time: Elgar's theme is 4/4, while the anthem is 3/4. Yet it is striking that Elgar's tune is made up of six fragments, each having three beats, stretching over six bars (the first violins are silent on the first beat of each bar). Nevertheless, I submit that if we are to find the royal hymn hidden here, we must also look in the gaps, which are filled  by the lower strings (viola and violoncello).

            One more piece of circumstantial evidence can be adduced here. In 1902, early in the reign of King Edward VII, Novello published a choral version of "God save the King", "arranged by Edward Elgar". For the key signature, instead of one sharp indicating the expected G major, we find two flats, precisely as in the Enigma theme, though this time the key is obviously not G minor but B flat major. In my opinion, Elgar has inserted the sequence of notes (with only one exception and with a few intrusions) which make up the first part of "God save the Queen" (in B flat major) into the score of the first section of his Enigma theme (in G minor).

            I will now attempt to describe the situation diagrammatically and verbally (the reader may also wish to refer to the score at this point). The following diagram shows the correspondences between Elgar's version of the anthem (3/4) and the enigma theme (4/4):

3/4    
1             2                    3            4              5                         6

Bb Bb C | A   Bb   C  | D D Eb  | D  C Bb |           C  Bb   A | Bb

4/4    
1                 2             3             4                5        6               7

     Bb C A  |              |    D        |( )       Bb  |(D)   |     Bb - A |  B

Bb      C      | Bb - C -| D    Eb -| - - C         |         |  C

            The opening phrase ("God save our gracious Queen") emerges as follows: the first Bb ('God') is sounded on the violas; the second Bb ('save') is with the first violins (followed by an intrusive quaver G); the C ('our') is given out by the first violins and the violas; the A ('gra-'), first beat in the second bar, is provided by the first violins as the fourth beat in bar one; the Bb ('‑cious') is heard in the cellos, on the first beat in the second bar; the C ('Queen') appears in the cello line on the third beat of the second bar, and also as the final quaver in that bar (first violins)

            The second phrase ("long live our noble Queen") has one note missing, and this may be taken as verification of Elgar's assertion that the underlying theme is never played: the first D ('long'), at the commencement of bar three in each case, is in the second violin and cello parts; the second D ('live') is sounded by the first violins, as a quaver at the end of the second beat in bar three; the Eb ('our') is down with the violoncelli on the third beat; the D ('no‑') does not occur, either on the last beat of bar three or on the first beat of bar four (though in the fifth bar, which simply "marks time" in the progression of the overriding theme, there are three D's on the third beat); the C ('‑ble') is in the cello line (third beat); the Bb ('Queen') is in the first violins at the end of bar four.

            The third line ("God save the Queen") is in the sixth and seventh bars (bar five adds nothing here): the C ('God') is in the viola part; the Bb ('save') is the first violins' first note in bar six, on the second beat; the A ('the') is on the fourth beat, in the first violins; the Bb ('Queen') is modified to B natural, on the first beat of bar seven.

            The origin of the interlude, which consists of four bars in G major, can be found in the run of four quavers on the second and third beats of the sixth bar of the anthem: the very same sequence (GABC in the G major setting) is played by the second violins, and the strings vamp on this motif. The first flute has a D in the second bar of this section (the expected note for "Send her victor‑"), but I cannot detect the rest of the anthem here. The words could, however, be fitted to the constant crotchet-quaver-quaver pattern (eight times).

            The second statement of the theme (again in G minor) has some different harmonies, and the initial Bb ('God') is missing (the bass lines have G, for God?). The bassi now have the notes missing from the top line in bars 2-4 (previously provided by the violoncelli), though the D for 'no(-ble)' at the beginning of bar four (here bar fourteen) is lacking again. There is a new feature in bar sixteen of the theme: while the first violins (assisted by the cellos) are playing "God save the" of the original's bar five (C Bb A), the second violins have exactly the right notes (Bb major) for the final "God save the" (bar thirteen of the original), that is, GFEb ('God') D ('save') C ('the'). For the word "Queen" in both cases the Bb becomes B natural, as occurred previously, in bar seven.

            The question now needs to be asked, whether this solution is compatible with one proposed by Ian Parrott, or whether the two are mutually exclusive. Parrott has offered an intriguing explanation of the title "Enigma", and also of the larger theme that "goes".15 "The enigma I will not explain - its 'dark saying' must be left unguessed", Elgar said. The word "enigma" (Greek ainigma, Latin aenigma), which means "a riddle, a dark saying", occurs in the New Testament once, in a mystical utterance of Saint Paul (1 Corinthians 13:12): "We now see in a mirror, in an enigma (or: enigmatically, dimly), but then face to face" (my translation). Parrott has confirmed that Elgar went to a Catholic church on the Sunday when this Epistle would have been read out (12 February 1899), and Elgar completed the orchestration in that month. For Parrott this means that the friends would see themselves through these variations, but enigmatically. And it is an interesting coincidence, Parrott notes, that there are thirteen friends, and 1 Corinthians 13 has thirteen verses.

            Parrott's explanation of Elgar's words to Dora Penny (Dorabella, Variation X),  "I thought you of all people would guess it", is that her father being a clergyman she should recognize the Bible reference. Yet  Dora was convinced that "the Enigma was concerned with a tune", and when it was revealed it would be obvious.16 Michael Kennedy suggests Doh-ray (from Dora) as a possibility for Elgar's meaning.17  If this were so, then "God save the Queen" would be a suitable candidate, since it begins Do-Do-Re, with the very stutter that is supposed to characterize Dorabella in her variation. (Another idea that is gaining ground is that the name 'Penny' directs our attention to the Victorian penny-coin, which had Britannia depicted on it, and hence the theme is Rule Britannia. With Elgar's multi-layered encryption scheme, that could be right, too.)

            For the mystery of the "larger theme", Parrott directs our attention to variation XI (G.R.S.), representing George Robertson Sinclair, an organist who had the reputation of never playing a wrong pedal note. The second and third bars are consigned solely to bassoons and double basses, and this was immediately taken as representing Sinclair's skill on the pedal-board (the tempo is allegro di molto). To this Elgar retorted that the variation "has nothing to do with organists or cathedrals", but simply portrays Sinclair's bulldog falling into the river (bar 1), "paddling upstream" (2-3), and "his rejoicing bark on landing" (second half of bar 5). Sinclair had challenged Elgar to set this incident to music, and this was the result. Nevertheless, Parrott insists that the two bass bars, which have the first sixteen notes of the theme on sixteen successive staccato quavers, do refer to organ pedaling. Moreover, he cites a number of examples of G minor works by Bach, which anticipate the style of Elgar's motif. Parrott concludes that Bach was the inspiration behind the theme for the variations.

            Parrott reminds us that Elgar went out of his way to visit Bach's birthplace in 1902; and Elgar and Sinclair were both enthusiasts for his music. It should be added that Jerrold Northrop Moore tells of a musical pun devised by Elgar in 1866 (aged 8): four staves, each with a different clef, their middle notes spelling out BACH.18 Consequently, we should ask here whether Dan the bulldog's "bark" was a verbal pun on the name Bach. I suspect that we have a reference not only to a dog "paddling" and a "bark", but also to an organist "pedaling" and playing "Bach". 

            However, Bach is not the theme that "goes". If we allow that Nimrod (Variation IX) carries an allusion to a conversation Elgar had with A. J. Jaeger on Beethoven's slow movements, and that Nimrod's first thee bars are based on the Adagio cantabile theme of the Pathétique Sonata (as acknowledged by Elgar himself),19 then it is possible that Elgar is here not only paying homage to his friend Jaeger but also to Beethoven.
         (Note 13/11/2024: The statement of Elgar's main theme may also allude to the Pathétique Sonata, with a progression of chords interspersed with successions of notes forming phrases.)
        Similarly, G. R. S. (Variation XI) not only memorializes G. R. Sinclair and his dog Dan, but also Bach. By the same token, the Enigma theme, including its harmonies, pays tribute to Queen Victoria, being a variation on "God save the Queen".

There is also an allusion to Mendelssohn in Variation XIII, as we have seen, and he was a musician to whom Queen Victoria never had occasion to say: "We are not amused".

            My thesis is, therefore, that "the chief character" among the "friends pictured within", who "is never on the stage", and whose theme "is not played", is Victoria Regina. The anthem is certainly "not played", in its entirety, but it is presented in a distorted, fractured, and dislocated state. Distorted, having its time changed from 3/4 to 4/4; fractured, being broken into pieces; dislocated, with the fragments distributed among the orchestral parts.

            Unfortunately, my solution is in conflict with Elgar's reply to Arthur Troyte Griffith (Troyte, Variation VII), when asked whether it was "God save the King": "No, of course not; but it is so well known that it is extraordinary that no one has spotted it".20 (In responding to this, we must remember that we are dealing with the man who denied that the Sinclair Variation had anything to do with organists.) The first part can easily be countered: not God save the King, but God save the Queen. The second statement could belong to the category of protesting too much, or else Elgar is deliberately muddying the waters, covering his traces, speaking in riddles, talking enigmatically: "The National Anthem is so familiar that it is surprising that no one has recognized it (except you, Troyte, and you are only guessing, without giving musicological evidence)". So this "dark saying" may actually strengthen my case: in Elgar's day the world's best-known tune was the anthem of the British Empire, functioning also as the melody for a patriotic song in America.

            Percy M. Young characterizes Edward Elgar as a man who was firmly convinced that the Monarchy and the Empire were admirable and necessary. He compares Elgar to a friend of Leigh Hunt, who was considered capable, even as a spirit in the afterlife, of taking off his hat at the sound of "God save the Queen". 21 In the Enigma theme, then, the soul of Edward Elgar bows in reverence to God and the Queen.22

NOTES

            1. For information on this work and its many enigmas, I have consulted Rosa Burley and Frank C. Carruthers, Edward Elgar: the record of a friendship, London, Barrie and Jenkins, 1972 (pp. 116-129); Edward Elgar, Enigma Variations, Opus 36, Novello, 1899; Michael Kennedy, Portrait of Elgar, London, Oxford University Press, 1968 (pp. 55-71); Michael Kennedy, Elgar Orchestral Music, London, B. B. C., 1970 (pp. 21-26); Raymond Monk (Ed.), Elgar Studies, Aldershot, Scolar Press, 1990 (Percy Young, Friends pictured within, pp. 81-106); Raymond Monk (Ed.), Edward Elgar: Music and Literature, Aldershot, Scolar Press, 1993 (Brian Trowell, Elgar's use of literature, pp. 182-326); Jerrold Northrop Moore, Edward Elgar: a creative life, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1984 (pp. 247-274); Ian Parrott, Elgar, London, J. M. Dent, 1971 (pp. 37-49); Percy M. Young, Elgar O.M. A Study of a Musician, 2nd edn, London, Purnell Book Services, 1973 (pp. 278-284).

            2. Cited by Parrott, Elgar, p. 39. See Trowell's treatment of this utterance, in Raymond Monk (Ed.), Edward Elgar: Music and Literature, pp. 216-217.

            3. Kennedy, Portrait, p. 59.

            4. Moore, Edward Elgar, p. 223.

            5. Trowell, p. 215.

            6. Trowell, p. 215.

            7. Trowell, n. 147, pp. 306-307.

            8. Trowell, pp. 207, 215-224.

            9. Trowell, p. 307.

            10. Trowell, p. 221.

            11. Trowell, p. 244.

            12. Burley, Edward Elgar, p. 131.

            13. Burley, p. 119.

            14. Parrott, Elgar, p. 38; Young, Elgar, p. 279, and facing p. 113 (he incorrectly says p. 145) a photograph of the first draft of the theme, with four bars crossed out, though only one note had been written on the two staves (a B natural above the bass stave).

            15. Parrott, Elgar, pp. 46-49.

            16. Kennedy, Portrait, p. 58 ("Elgar made it perfectly clear to us when the work was being written that the Enigma was concerned with a tune"); Burley, Edward Elgar, p. 120 (Dorabella rejected Auld Lang Syne, the suggestion of her husband Richard Powell, as the solution, but she believed that "when it has been found, there will be no room for any doubt that it is the right one").

            17. Kennedy, Elgar, p. 22.

            18. Moore, Edward Elgar, p. 29.

            19. Kennedy, Portrait, p. 65.

            20. Ibid., p. 58.

            21. Young, Elgar, p. 78.

            22. In homage to Elgar the inveterate punster and violinist, I have made one four-letter word in this sentence intentionally ambiguous (homographically, not homophonically); like Dan the bulldog he might also bow-wow to Bach. Similarly, the word "regal" in the title of this essay is an anagram of the name of a renowned English composer. It seems to me that Elgar's Enigma theme is actually a variation on the National Anthem. My last word is this: whether Elgar knew it or not, "God Save the Queen" is embedded in his Enigma theme, albeit transmogrified. 

27/12/2023
With regard to this transmogrification, and in the light of Elgar's fascination for Tchaikovsky, today I have seen a statement about the dance of Hop-o-my thumb in the Sleeping Beauty ballet, which Shostakivich admired for the way in which "the theme is broken up and scattered among various instruments at wide intervals of the register". (BBC Music Magazine, February 2007, p. 32)
13/11/2024
Other allusions to fellow-composers:
Wagner's  Parsifal (Elgar had attended two performances in 1892) also begins with a set of six bars; it has the ascending Dresden Amen; and its hero has a triumphant theme, like Elgar's E.D.U.

Schumann, was much admired by Elgar; his Etudes Symphoniques, opus 13, for his Ernestine, has an opening Thema that is similar to Elgar's theme, and his Carnaval, with references to people, and showing the two aspects of the composer (Eusebius and Florestan).
Brahms should be there somewhere, and I would invoke the Saint Antony Variations, and the 3rd movement of his 3rd symphony (1883, the year Wagner died).

Other theories (excluding mine) are outlined in Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enigma_Variations

An intriguing theory:
http://enigmathemeunmasked.blogspot.com/
Robert Padgett makes many interesting connections: with Martin Luther, the hymn Ein' feste Burg and musical ciphers, Jesus Christ, the Holy Shroud of Turin, and Nimrod in the Inferno. Here is a striking sample:

"Elgar makes multiple references to Dante’s epic poem in the Enigma Variations. One example is the title Nimrod for Variation IX, a movement that concludes with a dramatic blast from the brass section. In the Inferno Dante portrays Nimrod as a babbling giant imprisoned in the ninth circle of hell who blows a piercing blast from his horn to draw attention to himself. In Dante’s hell Nimrod is cursed with confused speech because he built the Tower of BabelConfusion of Tongues. In imitation of that famous biblical narrative, Elgar follows Nimrod with Variation X, a movement that pokes fun at Dora Penny’s stutter – a speech impediment."

Brian Edric Colless MA PhD Th.D, an Australian, born in Sydney in 1936, formerly Senior Lecturer in Religious Studies at Massey University, Palmerston North, New Zealand.

This essay was originally published in:

 Research Chronicle: New Zealand Musicological Society, Volume 6 (1999) 58-67
Editors: Alan Bradley and Robert Hoskins (who kindly added  the first three pages of the score, with the significant details highlighted.

Another of Elgar's enigmas is the coded message he sent to Dora Penny on the 14th of July 1897.
It is included in Richard Belfield, Can you crack the Enigma Code (2006). It has apparently been deciphered by Tim S. Roberts, Solving the Dorabella Cipher. The message is about gardening and composing.