Samaritan Pentateuch, a recension of the Hebrew text of the Pentateuch, in use with the Samaritans, and accepted by them as canonical to the exclusion of the other Old Testament writings. That such a recension had once existed had always been known from certain allusions in Origen, Jerome, and Eusebius, and also in the Talmud; but Julius Scaliger was the first modern scholar to suggest that it might still be recoverable, and to point out its possible importance if obtained. Early in the 17th century the famous traveller Pietro della Valle succeeded after much inquiry in procuring at Damascus a copy not only of the original of this Pentateuch of the Samaritans, but also of the ancient translation, or Targum, of this in the Samaritan dialect; both documents passed in 1623 into the hands of the Oratorians in Paris, and were published in 1631 in the Paris Polyglott by J. Morinus. In his Exercitationes Ecclesiasticæ, with which Morinus accompanied the Pentateuch of the Samaritans, he placed it far above the received Hebrew text, a view which had a polemical bearing on current theological discussions between Protestants and Catholics about the 'rule of faith,' and led accordingly to prolonged controversy, the principal disputant on the Protestant side being the Zurich theologian, J. H. Hottinger. Both the Samaritan Pentateuch and the Samaritan Targum of Morinus were afterwards printed by Brian Walton in the London Polyglott (1657), with a collation of the various readings of the Massoretic and Samaritan Hebrew texts. Through Ussher and others a number of additional Samaritan codices were brought to Europe in the course of the 17th century, so that Kennicott was able to use for his Hebrew Bible sixteen MSS. more or less complete. The first to arrange the variants in a systematic way, and to determine with any scientific accuracy the kind and amount of authority that can be claimed for the Samaritan recension of the Pentateuch was Gesenius (De Pent. Sam. origine, indole, et autoritate, 1815). Its various readings are most of them of a quite trifling nature and do not at all affect the sense, representing merely a different fashion in spelling or grammatical expression; and perhaps the only one that would seem to indicate an essentially different point of view from that of the Massoretic text is the substitution of Gerizim for Ebal in Dent. xxvii. 4. As is well known, the Samaritan Pentateuch varies from the received text in the figures it gives in Gen. v. and xi. and also in Exod. xii. 40, thus presenting a scheme of chronology materially different both from the Massoretic and from that of the LXX. Of the MSS. that have reached Europe none are older than the 10th century. All are written in a peculiar modification of the old Semitic character which used to be spoken of as Samaritan or Phoenician (see ALPHABET), but is now known to have been at one time common to the entire Semitic domain, and also to have constituted the basis of the Greek alphabet. There is no ground, either external or internal, for assigning to the Samaritan Pentateuch an age earlier than the 4th century B.C., though, from its use in northern Palestine, it was formerly argued that it must have originated before the fall of the northern kingdom, or even before the revolt of
Jeroboam. The Samaritan Targum, a translation of the Hebrew Samaritan Pentateuch into Samaritan Aramaic, is hardly older than the 4th Christian century. It was printed in a very corrupt form in the Paris and London Polyglotts, and there is a critical edition by Petermann and Vollers (Pentateuchus Samaritanus, ad fidem librorum Manuscriptorum apud Nablusianos repertorum, 1872-91); see also Nutt, Fragments of a Samaritan Targum (1874). The Samaritan Targum of Genesis, in Hebrew characters, is given in Heidenheim's Bibliotheca Samaritana (1884). There is also an Arabic translation of the Samaritan Pentateuch, made in the 11th or 12th century by Abu Said, based on the work of Saadia. The Samaritan Pentateuch itself can be read in the Paris and London Polyglotts, or in the separate edition, in square Hebrew characters, by Blayney (Oxford, 1790).
Śamaveda. See VEDA.
Śambhal, an Indian town in the N.W. Provinces, 23 miles SW. of Moradabad; pop. 37,000.
Śambor, a town in Austrian Galicia, on the Dniester, 41 miles SW. of Lemberg. Pop. 13,586.
Śaubourne, EDWARD LINLEY, cartoonist, born in London, 4th January 1845, at sixteen was apprenticed to marine engineer works at Greenwich, but in April 1867 began his connection with Punch. He has also illustrated Kingsley's Water-babies, Andersen's Fairy Tales, &c.
Śambre, a tributary of the Meuse or Maas, rises in the French dept. of Aisne, flows 112 miles in a north-easterly direction, and at Namur in Belgium joins the Meuse from the left. It is navigable up to Landrecies, 90 miles, and is connected with the Oise by a canal 40 miles long. Valuable prehistoric remains have been discovered in caves in the Sambre valley, and are now preserved in the neighbouring museums of Charleroi, Florefe, and Namur.
Śambul. See MUSK-PLANTS.
Śambur (Cervus aristotelis), a species of stag abundant in the forest-land of some parts of India, Burma, and China. It stands about five feet high, is a powerful animal, and is much hunted. The colour is dark brown; the antlers are rounded, and belong to a type known as Rusine.
Śamlaud, a district of the province of East Prussia, stretching between the Frisches Haff and the Kurisches Haff. Its western coast is known as the Amber (Bernstein) coast. This district gave title to a bishopric from 1249 to 1525.
Śamnites, an ancient Italian people of Sabine origin, who occupied an extensive and mountainous region in the interior of Southern Italy. They were surrounded on the north by the Peligni, Marsi, and Marrucini; on the west and south-west by the Latins, Volscians, Sidicini, and Campanians; on the south by the Lucanians; and on the east by the Apulians and Frentani. It was not till after a long series of wars (of which the first began in 343 B.C., and the third did not conclude till 272 B.C.) that the Romans conquered the Śamnites, ultimately making them allies; see ROME, Vol. VIII. p. 788. It was in the second Śamnite war that the Romans endured the humiliation of the Caudine Forks (q.v.).
Śamoa. The Samoa or Navigators' Islands are a group of islands in the Western Pacific, lying in 13½° to 14½° S. lat. and 168° to 173° W. long. They are some 350 miles N. of Tonga, and between 400 and 500 miles NE. of Fiji. From Auckland in New Zealand their sailing distance is 1580 miles, and from Sydney in New South Wales 2570. The group consists of nine islands, in addition to rocks and islets. They are all, with the exception of Rose Island, of volcanic formation, and are for the most part surrounded with coral-reefs. They are very mountainous, but at the same time well wooded, for the decomposition of the volcanic rock has resulted in a very rich soil, which produces a most luxuriant vegetation. Four islands alone are of any size, Savaii, Upolu, Tutuila, and Manua (Manua really consisting of three islands, the largest of which bears the name of Tau Island). These four lie in order of size from west and north-west to east and south-east. Savaii, the westernmost and largest, is about 40 miles in length by 20 in breadth, and has an estimated area of 700 sq. m. Its centre is filled up with rocky mountains, one peak of which, the highest in the group, is said to rise to a height of from 4500 to 5000 feet. Upolu, about 8 miles SE. of Savaii, is a rich and fertile though mountainous island, with an area of between 550 and 600 sq. m. On its northern side is the bay and harbour of Apia, entered between coral-reefs; and along the shore of the bay is built the town of Apia, which is 'the centre of political and commercial life in the Samoan group.' In 1889 R. L. Stevenson settled at Vailima near Apia, and here in 1894 he was buried. Thirty-six miles SE. of Upolu is Tutuila, much smaller than Savaii or Upolu, but possessing a good harbour in Pango Pango, a deep indentation in the southern coast, which nearly cuts the island in two. The climate of Samoa is very moist and variable; the pleasantest time of the year is from May to November, when the south-east trade-winds prevails; during the rest of the year heavy gales and rains are frequent, and occasionally, especially from January to the middle of April, the most disastrous hurricanes occur. One of these storms, on the 16th of March 1889, was signalised by a memorable feat of British seamanship, H.M.S. Calliope, which was lying in Apia harbour, side by side with American and German men-of-war, having been taken safely out to sea by Captain Kane and his crew, while all the other ships were lost or stranded. The products of Samoa are almost entirely vegetable, consisting of tropical trees and plants. Cocoa-nut trees take the first place in importance, copra, the dried kernel of the cocoa-nut, being the chief article of export; cotton and coffee are grown and exported to a small extent, tobacco is cultivated, and the sugar-cane grows wild throughout the islands. Fruit is plentiful, and bananas and citrons are exported to New Zealand and Australia. There are rich pastures, upon which imported live-stock thrive; almost the only indigenous mammal being a kind of bat. Among birds there is or was to be found on the island of Upolu a very rare species of ground pigeon, the didunculus or little dodo (a near relation of the dodo), which, nearly extinct, changed its habits to be out of the way of pigs, took to nesting in trees, and is now increasing. The exports and imports in 1883 were respectively £52,074 and £93,607, fell to £20,509 and £43,629, and by 1895 had risen again to £51,351 and £83,768 (£53,196 from Britain and British colonies). Nearly half of the shipping is British, the American coming next in tonnage; trade is mainly in the hands of German and British firms, German imports having a greater value than British. There is regular steam communication with San Francisco, Auckland, and Sydney.
The Samoans belong to the brown Polynesian race, and are therefore akin to the New Zealand Maoris. Samoa is by tradition the birthplace of the race, and the Samoans are perhaps the lightest in colour of all the Pacific islanders. They are a well-formed and prepossessing race, but decreasing in numbers, the population being, it is said, about 35,000. The islands were visited by Bougainville in 1768, and from him they received the name of
Îles des Navigateurs, as a tribute to the skill of the native boatmen. In 1787 some members of a French exploring expedition under La Pérouse were killed in a quarrel with the natives at Massacre Bay in Tutuila. The Christian religion was first introduced in 1830, and the result of over sixty years of missionary enterprise is that the Samoans are now nearly all Christians. For many years Samoa, like other groups of Pacific islands, suffered from the want of a stable government, able to control at once the native inhabitants and the European settlers. In 1889 a conference was held at Berlin between representatives of Britain, Germany, and the United States, and an act signed under which the three powers recognised the independence of the Samoan government and the right of the natives to elect their king and make their own laws, but at the same time made provision for a supreme court of justice and certain regulative restrictions (as on land claims, firearms, and intoxicants). In 1892 and 1899 there was again civil war and foreign intervention, followed by the abolition of the monarchy; and by a treaty between Britain and Germany, agreed to by the United States, it was settled that thenceforth Upolu and Savaii and the adjoining small isles should belong to Germany, Tutuila and its islets to the United States.
See Miss Fraser, Stevenson's Samoa (1895); R. L. Stevenson, A Footnote to History: Eight Years of Trouble in Samoa (1892); G. Turner, Samoa a Hundred Years Ago (1884); Findlay's South Pacific Ocean Directory; W. B. Churchward, My Consulate in Samoa (1887); O. Finsch, Samoafahrten (1888); Von Werner, Ein Deutsches Kriegsschiff in der Sudsee (1889); the Rev. Charles Phillips, Samoa, Past and Present (1890); and a paper by Dr G. A. Turner in Scot. Geog. Mag. for 1889.