by wmfinck » Wed May 19, 2010 3:40 pm
I am not going to go into too much length here, but I will offer a few scattered thoughts.
The Israelites indeed kept meticulous genealogical records, but not all in one book. It was the charge of the Levites in each of the towns to keep the records for the tribes to which they were assigned. That is part of how they were supposed to earn their ten percent. because we still have a part of the royal records, the king lines were (incompletely) preserved.
Blue and grey eyes were mentioned in ancient writings, however, because they are only on occasion mentioned in Greek writings, the way in which they were mentioned tells me that they were not predominant. For instance, Athena is often referred to as "Gray-eyed Athena". I have read at least one Mesopotamian inscription describing someone with eyes "like lapis lazuli", a blue mineral stone used for decorative purposes. Solomon's eyes are described as being like "pools of water", which may be blue or green, or even maybe grey.
The mosaics and other artworks of the Greeks and Romans shows a predominance of brown-eyed people long before any arab hordes invaded southern Europe.
And as an aside, my own eyes are bright blue, along with the eyes of everyone in my family whom I can remember, so I have no personal axe to grind in this matter.
It is apparent to me that the Old Testament Israelites could pretty much recognize what tribe their fellows were from on sight. Was this by dress? I do not think that archeology supports that (but that does not mean much, since there is so little good archeology). Perhaps it was by appearance. It is fully apparent that there were blonde Greeks and blonde Phoenicians, but also that there were red-haired Greeks and red-haired Phoenicians. Yet both King Solomon and Hector Prince of Troy were described as having raven hair.
Are Danaans red-heads? Was Asher blonde? Did Judah have raven hair? Arguments can be made, but then again, a few examples are not necessarily an entire tribe.
I know, this does not help much, but one day we will know all of these things!
Bill (and here's looking at you! LOL:)
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If a jew is moving his lips, he's lying. If you see a rabbi, there has already been a crime!