Revelation 17:12

τὰ δέκα κέρατα. If the traditional view now supported by Lagarde be right, that the Fourth Beast in Daniel 7 is the Roman Empire, the ten horns, Daniel 7:24, probably, though the Little Horn is their successor, represent kingdoms related to the Roman Empire as the kingdoms of the Diadochi to that of Alexander. Such are the principal kingdoms of modern Europe: and in the recognition of this fact lies the key to mediaeval and to much of modern history. (See Sir F. Palgrave’s Normandy and England, Intr. c. 1, English Commonwealth, c. 10, 11, 17, 18, 19, and Dr Bryce’s Holy Roman Empire, passim.) The number ten is probably to be taken as exact, but we cannot yet point to it as being definitely realised. It is remarkable that the kingdoms of Europe have (as is pointed out by Elliott, Horae Apoc. Part IV. c. iv. § 2) tended at many periods to that number: but there are now more than ten sovereign states in Christendom, or even in Europe only. Judging from the analogy of the Macedonian kingdoms (see on Revelation 16:12) we may guess that only those are included which are of considerable size and power, and have some claim to continue the imperial tradition of the common predecessor. The existing states of Germany, France, Austria, and Russia have such a claim (which they assert, more or less constantly and more or less legitimately, by the use of the imperial title): so has our own country, which has claimed rank as an empire coordinate with continental ones since the days of Edgar the Peaceable: so (more doubtfully) have Spain and Portugal in virtue of their memories, and so have the new kingdoms of Greece and Italy in virtue of their hopes. A tenth can hardly be named, for Sweden though powerful was not imperial even under Gustavus Adolphus or Charles XII., and Turkey could hardly be thus coupled with the states of Christendom: but believers will watch the developement of “the Eastern Question” with a solemn interest.

St Hippolytus, who assumes that the ten horns here correspond exactly to the ten horns in Daniel, infers from Daniel 11:43 that Egypt, Libya and Aethiopia will be three of the ten kingdoms overthrown by the Little Horn, whom he identifies with the Beast and with Antichrist. As here all ten horns take part with the Beast in executing judgement upon the whore, the correspondence cannot be exact, not to mention that in Daniel 7:24 the Little Horn seems to be the successor of the Ten Horns, as here the Beast is the successor of the Seven Heads. It is therefore not impossible that here the Horns betoken the extension rather than the partition of the empire: ten new kings arise and join themselves to the Beast.

Many foreign interpreters explain this of the provincial governors who receive power as kings as soon as they throw off their allegiance to the Seventh Head and give the kingdom to the Beast on his return from the abyss. Apart from other considerations it is impossible to say which of the provincial governors are meant, and difficult to suppose that even a false prophet could employ such a figure without knowing what he meant by it. M. Renan’s theory (L’Antéchrist, pp. 433, 434), that the ten horns are the claimants of the Empire who appeared in the “long year” (Tac. Dial. 17) after the death of Nero, is less objectionable. It is possible to enumerate ten of these, but unfortunately not without including both Galba and Vespasian, one of whom must be reckoned among the heads, and therefore cannot be reckoned among the horns. Else, both Rome and the Roman Empire were so severely shaken in the civil wars between the rival emperors, and their actual fall in the fifth century was so nearly anticipated, that this interpretation harmonises well enough with Revelation 17:16. On the other hand, it fails to give meaning to Revelation 17:13, or to agree with the most probable meaning of the same symbol in Daniel.

οἵτινες. The pronoun introduces the explanation why they are symbolised by horns, not heads.

ἐξουσίαν ὡς βασιλεῖς. It is extraordinary that St Hippolytus (On Christ and Antichrist, ch. 27) inferred, apparently not from this passage, but from Daniel 2:42, that the ten powers of the last days, among which the Roman empire is partitioned, will pass from monarchies into democracies. Few things were humanly speaking less likely in his days, few more so in ours.

μίαν ὥραν λαμβάνουσιν μετὰ τοῦ θηρίου. Their dominion is for the same short term as that of the Beast: the end will be very near when the ten horns appear in their final and unmistakeable shape. If the correspondence between Daniel and this chapter be as exact as interpreters who attempt to identify the horns suppose, this only makes their inconsistency the greater.