ROSH, or Ros, Son of Benjamin, Gen. xlvi. 21.
We find in the Hebrew of Ezekiel xxxviii. 2, 3. a People call’d Rosh, which is not found in the Vulgate. St. Jerome has taken it in an appellative Sense, to signify the Head, or the Prince.1 Principem capitis Mosoch & Thubal. Whereas the Hebrew reads, b Principem Rosh, Mesech & Thubal. In Genesis,2 where mention is made of Tubal and Meshech, we find also Tiras, which has some Relation to Rosh. The Septuagint have follow’d the Hebrew in Ezekiel, and the best Interpreters make no Question, but that Rosh is the Name of a People. But they are not agreed about the Country they inhabit, nor the Name they are known by now.
D’Herbelot. Bibl. Orient. p. 722.The Orientals hold, that Japheth had an eighth Son call’d Rous, who is not men-tion’d in Moses, and who peopled the Russia we now call Moscovy. They add, that Rous was of a very uneasy and turbulent Disposition. He possess’d the Country be-yond the Esel, or the Volga, and often made Inroads into his Brother’s Territories, call’d Khozar, who to live in Peace with him was forced to make a Cession of all the Islands of this great River, which empties itself into the Caspian Sea. In all these Islands Rous caused to be sown Turkey Wheat, which the Turks to this Day in their own Tongue, call Wheat of Rous, or of Bulgaria; and in all his Dominions he caus’d very unjust Laws to be proclaim’d, to which he forc’d all his Subjects to sub-mit. One amongst others there was, which excluded the Male Heirs from succeeding to their Fathers Estates, and made them devolve intirely to the Females. He like-wise introduced the Custom, of putting a Sword into the Hands of the Boys, as soon as they were able to manage it, with these Words; This is your Inheritance.
Idem, p. 795.The same Authors relate, that Japheth had a Son call’d Seclab, who chiefly turn’d his Mind to building of Houses and Cities, because of the Number of his Children. When these were increased to a great Multitude, they desired Lands for Cultivation, of their Brethren the Children of Rous, but they would not grant their Request. They afterwards address’d themselves to the Descendants of Khozar and Gomari, their Brethren also, but not with better Success; so that they thought themselves obliged to take Possession by Force. But then all their Neighbours enter’d into a Confederacy against them, so that they were obliged to desist from their Enterprize, and to retire into a very cold Country, be-yond the seventh Climate. Mirkond says, that the Seclabs inhabit the Country of the Hyperboreans even to this Day, where they are forced to live under Ground during the Winter Season. M. D’Herbelot thinks, that these are the Samoiedes, or the Laplanders.
The same Mirkond says, that Seclab had a Son, whose Mother died when she brought him into the World; so that they were obliged to feed him with the Milk of a Hare. And this was the Reason, that when the Child grew up, he could leap and run with an incredible Nimbleness and Swiftness, which Qualities continued hereditary in the whole Family. The Name of Se-clab has so much Relation to that of Sclaves, or Sclavonians, and to what M. D’Herbelot says elsewhere of the Sclaves, that I am much inclined to think it is of these that Mirkond speaks. See Bibl. Orient. p. 470.
To return to Rosh, or Ros, mentioned by Ezekiel: We question not but it signi-fies Russia, or the People that dwell upon the Araxes, call’d Rosch by the Inhabi-tants, and which is the antient Habitation of the Scythians.
Read this article in its place on the printed pages