CHAPTER III. THE DISTRIBUTION OF THE OX AND THE DISTRIBUTION OF GOLD.

were acquainted with gold from the remotest ages. The Egyptian word for gold is nub, from which the name Nubia, i.e. El Dorado, is commonly derived. Having fresh in our minds the interesting fact noticed above (p. 69) that the universal word for gold in use amongst the Turko-Tartaric races is probably derived from the Altai, the source from which they first got the metal, we are tempted to reverse the ordinary doctrine, and to derive the Egyptian name for gold from that of the region whence they first obtained it. The principle of naming products after the region or place from which they have been first brought is too well known to need illustration. Instances are familiar in all languages: Cappadocae, the Latin name for lettuce; Persica from which has come our peach, through the French; Indian corn, india-rubber, etc. are sufficient examples. The negroes of Eastern Africa call a certain kind of cloth Merikano, i.e. American. Perhaps, then, the name nub is rather a word of this class, and Nubia is not like Gold Coast, which belongs to the category of names formed by epithets applied in consequence of some article already well known having been found there.