II. THE DYNASTY OF ISIN

Ibi-Sin, the last king of the dynasty of Ur, can hardly have been slow to see that, caught between Elam and Amurru, Sumer would suffer badly. He turned to meet his north-western foe, the Semitic hordes, and neither the rampart built by Shu-Sin nor his own Sumerian warriors could stay the sturdy invaders. The very contracts of Drehem mark the lull before the storm; for, hitherto numerous, they suddenly come to an end in an ominous manner after the beginning of his reign. The last year of Ibi-Sin is a definite landmark in the history of Mesopotamia, for it heralds the end of Sumerian hopes of hegemony.

THE OVERTHROW OF IBI-SIN

It was the young king of Maer (Mari), Ishbi-Girra, vigorous with thirty-two years of reign yet before him, who joined hands with Elam and swept down about 2357 B.C. upon Ur, gathering adherents doubtless from the Semitic occupants of the northern cities, whose friendly presence allowed him to penetrate so far unchallenged. A hint in the annals of the Assyrian king Ashurbanipal, written in the seventh century, shows who was probably the king of Elam at this time. He states that in one of his campaigns in Elam, he recaptured the statue of the goddess Nana of Erech, which, says he, had been carried off by Kutur-nakhkhunte, the Elamite, sixteen hundred and thirty-five years previously, and this gives us the date for the Elamite's devastation of Akkad about 2282 B.C. If we were to connect the year 2282 with some event coinciding with our present dating we should find it agreeing more nearly with the overthrow of the end of Ibi-Sin's line by Ur-Ninurta and the Amurru; and it is a question of probabilities, therefore, whether we should assign Kutur-nakhkhunte's raid to the fall of Ur in 2357 B.C., or to the less important episode of Ur-Ninurta in 2263. As will be seen, however, Ur-Ninurta calls himself “lord of Erech” and there is a presumption therefore, that if Ur-Ninurta were a Sumerian, as he well may have been, he would hardly assent to his ally carrying away the goddess of Erech. Moreover, we are definitely told in texts relating to the fall of the Ur dynasty that Ibi-Sin was carried off in captivity to Elam, which is strong evidence in favour of this being the date of Kutur-nakhkhunte's rape of Nana.

Ibi-Sin met the foe and failed; he was captured and taken as a prisoner to Elam. The debacle was complete, and so terrible was it that for hundreds of years the record of the event survived in the Chaldean Books of Fate. The gods had spoken with no uncertain voice; the stars in their courses had warned the priesthood whose comment on a heavenly omen still survives, recording it as connected with Ibi-Sin by name. Nay, some rumour of a monstrous birth had spread abroad (such as appears in the later times of the Graeco-Persian wars), that a sheep brought forth an ox with two tails, and this the augurs handed down to posterity as marking the omen of Ishbi-Girra, “who had no rival”. The Omen of Ibi-Sin, so a liver-observation showed, was synonymous with calamity; Sumer was dead, and curt is the entry of the ancient chronicler of four thousand years ago: “As for Ur, its reign (?) was overthrown: Isin took its kingdom; Ishbi-Girra, the man of Mari, devastated the land as far as Ur; Ibi-Sin, King of Ur, went in fetters to Elam and wept and fell”.

Bitter was the lamentation in the temples, and the priests of Ur and their choirs bewailed the fate of the land to the accompaniment of votive drums, of twanging harps and shrilling pipes. It was Nannar, the patron deity, they had worshipped so readily and so long, who had allowed this catastrophe to overwhelm the city; he failed the inhabitants of Ur in their hour of need, as another text says:

(Then) on the city he sent a spirit of wrath, and the city

Wailed; (yea), upon the city of craftsmen did Nannar, the father,

Send it, so that the people lamented.

The chants redoubled in sorrow for the rape of Ishtar, torn from her shrine in Erech; they were couched as though she herself were the mournful singer, and there can be little doubt that they were shrilled by her temple-women:

Me the foe hath ravished, yea, with hands unwashen,

Me his hands have ravished, me in exile driven,

(Yea), his hands have ravished, made me die of terror,

Oh, but I am wretched, nought of reverence hath he!

Stripped me of my robes and clothed therein his consort,

Tore my jewels from me, therewith decked his daughter,

(Now) I tread his courts my very person sought he

In the shrines (alas) the day, when to go forth feared I.

He pursued me in my temple, (Oh) he made me quake with terror,

There within my walls; (and) like a dove that fluttereth perch I

On a rafter, like a flitting owlet in a cavern hidden,

Birdlike from my shrine he chased me -me, a queen!- yet he did chase me

From my city like a bird -(and) sighing Far behind, behind me,

Is my temple!-I, a queen- (and yet) my dwelling is far distant,

Isin's walls are far behind me, (yea) too, is my temple Gal-makh.

Hear the lamentation over the looted temple of Irmini, Queen of E-anna:

How long or ever the ruined fane unto its place be restored?

Unto a foreign land the fair wife was ravished -(so also)

Unto the foreign land the fair child was ravished -(the temple),

Uncelebrated its festivals splendid, its rituals solemn

Cease from the shrine.

There is a curious reference In the legend of Girra, the plaguegod, to an attack on Babylon, when a governor despatches his army, with the words

Men, In that city whither I despatch you.

Oh, have no fear of troops (?) nor dread of men,

Slay indiscriminate both great and small.

Spare no one, (neither) babe (nor) sucking child.

And ravish Babel's hoarded treasuries.

So the army sets forth and enters the city, and fights with the defenders. Girra, the plague-god takes part: “like water in a sluice, didst make the city-squares run with their blood”. Herein Ishtar, too, is angry against Erech, and assembles the enemy against it. Although it is in part a mythological text about Girra, the Plaguegod, there are persistent suggestions throughout that it refers to actual events. It is curious, too, that Ishbi-Girra's name should be compounded with the name of this god to whom the myth is dedicated. Ishbi-Girra thus becomes the father of the new dynasty at Isin in 2357 B.C. Equally fortunate at the same date was the Semite Naplanum at Larsa, the city which was to be the counterpoise to Isin in the struggle for the rule over Babylonia. Whence Naplanum came we do not know, but he is a western Semite from his name, and he founded a new line of kings.

Thus after the overthrow of the Sumerians at Ur the two dominant states in Babylonia were the Semitic settlements of Isin and Larsa. None were to threaten real opposition to their power until the rise of the 1st Dynasty at Babylon in 2225 B. C., and we may divide the period from 2357 to the time of Hammurabi into five sections. The First is from 2357 to 2263, when the two lines of kings remained on their respective thrones and maintained perfect harmony between the two states. In the Second, 2263 to 2214, Sumer made a bid again for the rule, and persistent quarrels broke the peace. The year 2214 marked the beginning of the Third Section lasting until 2167; the 1st Dynasty of Babylon was then rising, and the rulers at Isin again had Semitic names, although a few years later its dynasty was again to be changed. Elam was to challenge Larsa, and finally, in 2167, under Kutur-mabuk, to establish itself there in southern Babylonia. The Fourth Section, 2167-21265 culminated in the final overthrow of Isin by the Elamite stock in Larsa, and the Fifth with the merging of Larsa and its conquests into the Babylonian empire under Hammurabi (2123-2081),

The First Section, then, opened with the two parallel lines of Isin and Larsa on their respective thrones in amicable relation. Isin showed a succession of heirs after Ishbi-Girra –(Gimil-ilishu, Idin-Dagan, Ishme-Dagan and Lipit-Ishtar)- while Larsa showed as contemporaries of these, Emisum, Samum and Zabaia. The Isin names are more easily comparable with those of Semitic Babylonia (save in their use of the national god Dagan) than with those of the middle Euphrates valley: the Larsa names appear, on the other hand, to be west Semitic. These kings in their two lines were content to build their temples, maintain the divine worship, and gradually adopt the native custom of emperor-worship. The very founder of the dynasty of Isin saw to it that the sutummu (storehouse?) of the temple of Ninlil, E-kurra-igi-galla, was founded or restored, apparently a part of the Tummal, a quarter of Nippur.

Gimi-ilishu, the next king, reigned ten years (2325-2316). Idin-Dagan, his son (2315-2295), seems to have extended th power of Isin over Sippar and Nippur, for in the ruins of the former was discovered a hymn to this monarch. His son, Ishme- Dagan (2294-2275), went still further, using the vaunting title “King of Sumer and Akkad”, adding it to that of Isin, and including in his sway Nippur, Ur, Eridu, Erech and Isin.

Some faint echo reaches us of the less martial side of their character. Deeply religious like all Semites, they seem to have striven after something more than mere conquest, as is indicated by a liturgy of the cult of Ishme-Dagan, describing the sun-god:

That the rich man do not whatsoever be his desire.

That one man to another do nought disgraceful.

Wickedness and hostility he destroyed,

Justice he instituted.

The hymn praises Babbar, the sun-god, “the son whom Ningal bore”, and still more curiously identifies Ishme-Dagan as Tammuz, husband of Innini (Ishtar): Inini, queen of heaven and earth, “as her beloved spouse hath chosen me”. The pantheon In this hymn Includes Enki, Ninki, En-ul and Nin-uI, the Anunnaki, and himself, for he has now been deified: “Divine Ishme-Dagan, son of Dagan art thou”. The assimilation to Tammuz is well in accord with the creed of mortal kings becoming gods after death, for Tammuz, the god of earthly vegetation, descends to the underworld like an ordinary human being, albeit he does so each year. A festival song to Ishtar for the entry of the king Ishme-Dagan into E-anna bears out his claim to be king of Erech, where the temple to Ishtar bore this name:

O Lady, whose largesse doth fill the land. .

Thy guardian Ishme-Dagan to thee cometh.

With Lipit-Ishtar, the next king (2274-2264), the son either of Ishme-Dagan or of Idin-Dagan, we find that the central shrine of Babylon was within the jurisdiction of Isin. Again comes the echo of this seeking for righteousness in a hymn to this king: “If thou (O Lipit-Ishtar) dost righteousness In Sumer and Akkad, then will the land prosper”. Ur, too, with its shrine to the moon, was now definitely bound by religious ties to Isin, for Enannatum, the brother of Lipit-Ishtar, had become high-priest of the great temple. He ministered to Sin beneath the towering four-sided ziggurrat, which still thrusts its brick peak to heaven like a mountain top, shimmering in the heat-haze as a beacon to guide caravans over the flat deserts and reedy margins of the swamps, visible even at far Eridu itself. It was a wealthy temple, and so rich was this priest Enannatum, so powerful, and so mindful of the ancient friendship with Larsa and his kinship to the inhabitants, that he rebuilt as an act of grace the splendid temple of the sun at Larsa for the salvation in this world of himself and of Gungunum, the new king of Larsa. Not only did Lipit-Ishtar's brother act thus diplomatically, but his son was made “high-priest of Ninsunzi, high-priest of Nin- ...(?) at Ur”, and was not replaced until 2252, doubtless after his death. Relations between the two cities were never more cordial, and yet the upheaval which appears to be essential in these eastern states at periodic intervals was at hand.

With the end of Lipit-Ishtar's reign at Isin, almost within a year of the rebuilding of the temple at Larsa, begins the Second Section of this period, 2263 to 2214. Lipit-Ishtar's family did not inherit the kingdom: two kings of a different race, father and son, Ur-Ninurta, son of Ishkur (22632236) and Shu-Sin (2235-2215), uncompromisingly Sumerian in name, occupied the throne of Isin. More than this, after the first-named king came to the throne, he claimed to be king of the four quarters of the world, and king of Isin, Sumer and Akkad, lord of Erech, and In some way the benefactor of Nippur, Ur and Eridu. The mention of the place-names Erech, Ur and Eridu shows how all Ur-Ninurta's interests lay in the south; Indeed, Erech is so rarely mentioned at this period that we might have assumed It to have struggled back to independence, as it did under Warad-Nene subsequently. It is conceivable that Ur-Ninurta was a Sumerian king of Erech, and we might presume that he absorbed Ur and the religious foundation of Eridu and attempted to re-establish the old Sumerian domination. He marched against the Su tribes, who had been subject to Lagash In the time of Arad-Nannar; and as the Su are probably the Suti, who were closely connectedwith Erech to the west of Babylonia, it is likely that Erech was his home. That he should have raided Zabshali on the east was probably one of the usual royal diversions; it can hardly have any reference to the relations formed by the marriage of one of the daughters of a king of Ur with the patesi of this land.

A strange entry among the dates of Lipit-Ishtar's reign “the year when the Amurru drove out Liplt-Ishtar” can refer only to the end of his rule; but how are the Amurru to be connected with an obvious Sumerian like Ur-Ninurta? Did the scribe make a mistake in calling the enemy Amurru or is one to believe that the Amurru would drive out their own kin? Or, presuming that such was the fact, did Amurru make an alliance with Sumer against the dominant race at Isin ? It may be that, just as Kutur-Mabuk, king of Elam in the time of Abil-Sin (2161-44), called himself adda (father) of Amurru, perhaps his predecessor also may have claimed some similar connection.

Lipit-Ishtar's rule came to an end in 2264, and, with the arrival of these presumed Sumerians in Isin, although this was only a brief outbreak of the old fire, the friendship of Larsa towards Isin vanished, and throughout this interval the two cities glared at each other with brooding suspicion which burst out from time to time in raids and razzias. Yet the very offspring of Ur-Ninurta, Bur-Sin, who built up the wall of Isin against his foes, could not resist the Semitic influence, for he appears to have called his two sons by Semitic names, Iter-pi-sha and Girra-imitti, and after these two had come to the throne in Isin, the succession was disputed by Semites.

AN AMORITE RAID, GUNGUNUM'S WARS

The king of Larsa, Gungunum (c. 2264-38), before challenging the usurpers had first to deal with the hostility of Bashimi (probably the same as Basime, not far from Sippar, Lagash and Cuthah, which in Manishtusu's time was ruled by a patesi). Two years later he defeated Anshan, and from that date (2260) onwards until 2246 there was a peaceful interval,

We are in great debt to one Sin-uselli, a scribe of Hammurabi’ s period, for our knowledge of the history of Babylonia from Gungunum onwards almost to his own date. Doubtless with the intention of commemorating the great year of Hammurabi’ s victory over the enemies arrayed against Babylonia, he set himself to copy out a list of the events which happened to Larsa after which the years were named. He completed his document as he tells us with an amusingly precious pomposity “on the morning of the fourteenth of Tebet” of the great year, doubtless congratulating himself that his work kept him indoors on that wintry day, and that it was not his duty to make muddy dams or to clear canals.

Towards the end of fourteen peaceful years earned by Gungunum’ s victory over his foe, rumours of war were again in the air. Gungunum shows us his preparation by building a fort for his troops in 2246, and in the following two years he put a great gate and a city-wall in order. It is to this year doubtless that we must refer the building of the great wall of Larsa, called “the Sun-god is the spoiler of hostile lands”, a direct challenge to his foe. It is possible that in 2243 he attacked a strong city of Isin called Dunnum (which is known also by the Sumerian name Sag-an-na); but death -probably a violent one, since it is actually recorded- ended his dreams of conquering Isin. Again the clash of the two opposing forces of Larsa and Isin came in 2229 in the reign of Abi-sari of Larsa: what happened is uncertain, but it is quite probable that there was no result at all. The Arabs of the present day regard a razzia as a bloody massacre if a man is killed; and from the top of the stout walls of unburnt brick Sumerian could laugh at Semite. The Babylonian does not seem to have had the ferocious qualities of the later Assyrian who doubtless intermarried with the wild highlanders of the Kurdish hills.

These intertribal bickerings represent the military exploits of the two states from 2264 to 2226. Campaigning was not really to the taste of these Babylonian kings, for the crops occupied their time in the late spring and early summer, the summer was far too hot for war until October, and winter was bleak, wet and muddy. They much preferred an ostentatious piety, a due devotion to the temples and gods; if any fighting had to be done, unless it were a war of extermination or self-defence, it ought only to be in the nature of a raid, an opportunity snatched after the harvest, when labourers were no longer wanted in the fields, or between the date-picking at the end of summer and the first rains.

The records are full of evidence of the royal worship. Almost the first deed of Gungunum was to dedicate to the Sun-temple of Larsa two copper palm-trees (such as are represented at an earlier period on a Telloh plaque), and, a few years later, a great copper statue. In his sixth year (2259) the high-priest of this temple was chosen by omens, and three years later was elevated to his full functions: it was the custom to elect thus to this office after the death of each priest, as we may infer from the fact that no similar installation at the Sun-temple took place again until 2228. Gungunum displayed no less solicitude for the minor shrines, now dedicating a statue of copper and another of silver to the temple of the moon, now building the Temple of Ishtar (in Larsa) or of Lugal-kiburna, now repairing the sacred store-house attached to the moon-temple. The same pious duties were performed by his successor Abi-sari, who formally presented the old silver statue, which had been begun by Gungunum, to the temple of the moon, and another of cornelian and lapis lazuli (2230).

Like other rulers, the kings of Larsa occupied themselves with increasing the fertility of their lands, because thereby the treasuries were filled. In a country like Mesopotamia the sun which can scorch the waterless soil to dust will bring all seeds to maturity with speed, if only water be led through the fields by canals. A Babylonian town of this period, like those of the present day, would be set either on a river bank or along a broad canal in a forest of date palms, amid which would grow pomegranates, grapes and figs. Beyond the date-orchards would lie the fields of wheat and barley, spreading probably for five or six miles outwards from the larger cities as they do to-day at Nasriyeh. The harvest depends first on the rains for its growth, and then, for its gathering, on the people who are as dependent as the crops on water; the vegetables and the dates, the cattle and the asses all draw their life from the rivers or canals: the mud-brick houses with palm-wood rafters and doors, and the reed huts, all take their origin in water, and demand no niggard supply. Away from the rivers, canals are essential: the security which a large settled vigorous population provides, the wealth borne to the king by taxation, the priestly dues and offerings to the gods which bring to the city the divine protection, all are drawn from water. It is these canals which disperse the river-waters over the land in the dry season that man may increase and multiply as was well

known by the Semitic kings in Babylonia, now more dependent on artificial water-channels than their ancestors had been higher up the Euphrates, where tributaries and a better rainfall took their place. Gungunum of Larsa from his fifteenth year onwards,(2250) excavated vigorously, first the Anipada canal, then that called Imgur-Sin two years later, and then three more during his last ten years. Abi-sari dug the Anipada canal again in his fourth year, and two more, all in eleven years, and this continuous canal digging was regularly recorded.

THE FIRST DYNASTY OF BABYLON

With the year 2226 Sumu-ilum came to the throne of Larsa, and the following year Babylon entered the political arena with the birth of its 1st Dynasty under Sumu-abum (2225-2212). Instead of a duel between Larsa and Isin, the contest developed into a triangular fight with Babylon as the third participant. Larsa during this period challenged Kazallu twice; Sumu-ilum, its king, first laid waste Akus (a district where Adad was worshipped) and fought Kazallu in 2223. Kazallu may be the same as the Kazalla which revolted against Sargon of Agade, when Kashtubila was its king. As it is mentioned between Marad and Ulmash it may have formed part of the dominion of Ur. There is a stray date-formula, which may be attributed to some year of the Larsa dynasty, which describes how an unknown king made (statues of) Numushda (known as far back as Manishtusu's time as a god), Namrat and Lugal-Awak, and brought them into Kazallu. The last are written with the single wedge denoting a person as well as the sign for god, and it may be that they represent the names of two dead kings of Kazallu. The second is probably Semitic, and when we reach 2194 B.C. the name of its king, Yakhzir-ilu, is that of a Semite, which the earlier king Kashtubila certainly was not.

Four years later (2219) Sumu-ilum added to the Larsa dominion the town of Ka-ida, which from its name, “the mouth of the Rivers”, may have been at the junction of the Euphrates and Tigris (near Nasriyeh). It is a little-known town, and the presumed position is so near Larsa that this would not appear to have been a heroic exploit. By 2219 B.C. the real interest of the political relations was centring further north round Sumu-abum, the first king of Babylon. Before Sumu-abum's time Babylon probably owed fealty to some city-state, since it was governed by a patesi (in Shulgi’ s time by name Arshikh), and the office of patesi, as we shall see later, had by now sunk far beneath its early importance.

With the end of the reign of Bur-Sin at Isin in 2215 our Third Section begins with the advance to power of Babylon and extends to the capture of Larsa by Elam in 2167. Like all western Semites Sumu-abum of Babylon was hardly a fighter, and was far more anxious about his gardens for his gods, his temples for Ninsinna and his cedar-wood doors for Nannar. Yet it was a period of unrest which called for deeds of warlike action, for the Assyrian babe in the north, who was to develop into a giant, was now stirring.

As for Kish, the neighbour of Babylon, there can be little doubt that it was to Babylon’s advantage to be on good terms with it, and Sumu-abum, alert to the threat of his cousins in the north and the hostility of Kazallu on the east, honoured Kish, as a good diplomatist should, with an offering which took the form of a crown to the temple of Anu. It is perhaps because of these very pourparlers that Larsa grew fearful of its old ally Kish, for in 2216 the two states fell out and fought, but we do not know why, nor what happened. Two years later a new king, Iter-pi-sha, the son of Bur-Sin (2214-2210), came to the throne of Isin, of which place little can be said at this period. The same year saw trouble between Babylon and Kazallu which, ever irreconcilable and hostile equally to Larsa or Babylon, was now to be 'laid waste' by Sumu-abum.

Sumu-abum of Babylon was followed by Sumu-la-ilum (2211-2176), while Sumu-ilum was still the latter's contemporary at Larsa. The hostility between Babylon and Larsa now became more pronounced, although the Babylonian king's reign began peaceably enough with the digging of the Shamash-khegallu canal. The third and fourth years are dated by the slaying of a certain otherwise unknown Khalambu, But the gathering clouds were now big on the political horizon, and uneasiness was clearly shown by the building, in Sumu-la-ilu's fifth year, of a great protecting wall for Babylon, an essential to any city in these flat lands. So great was the undertaking that the next year was also dated by this event.

THE FORTUNES OF LARSA AND ISIN

Meanwhile, a new ruler, Girra-Imitti, brother of Iter-pi-sha, had come to the throne of Isin (2209-2203). He restored Nippur to its place presumably attaching it to his rule. It is very probable that Nippur was tossed from Isin to Larsa and back again, inasmuch as many tablets of the Larsa dynasty period were found there by the American expedition. Larsa had done little since Sumu-ilum's fight with Kish in 2216, except to dig the Euphrates and act piously towards the temple of Nannar; she had fought with Kazallu in 2205, but thenceforth Sumu-ilum of Larsa had no more interest in fighting. He ceased to reign about 2198, having reckoned his last seven years by the civil and peaceful episode of the investiture of the high-priest of Nannar in his duties.

Sumu-la-ilum of Babylon had a brief interval of ease during which he rebuilt the temple of Adad and dug a canal called by his name. Then Kish, his near neighbour and ally, finding perhaps that its encounter with Larsa in 2216 had serious consequences, which the friendship of Babylon was not practical enough to stay, became impatient, so that Babylon turned upon and  devastated  her in 2199. So complete a political volte-face of Babylon as to march against its erstwhile friend Kish was a marked epoch to Sumu-la-ilum, and for four years afterwards the yearly date was reckoned from the Kish expedition. But he was to have his hands full enough presently.

The throne of Larsa went to Nur-Adad, who for sixteen years (2197-2182) had, as far as we know, an uneventful reign. At home he offered a golden throne to Shamash, and invested the high-priest of the god with due authority; he built the temple of E-nunmakh of Nannar and Ningal in Ur, and, as the present writer found in the British Museum diggings at Eridu in 1918, he carried on a small restoration of the ziggurat of Enki's temple there. It may be that this piety towards cities in the extreme south, particularly Eridu, whose glory was departing, shows the trend of his thoughts: Larsa might easily become untenable if Kazallu repeated its thrusts. We are allowed to infer what we please from his sudden gratitude to this moribund city sacred to Enki, a compliment such as no Semite had ever shown it; indeed, it had received no builder's homage since the time when Bur-Sin of Ur faced its ziggurat with bricks.

But there was good cause for Nur-Adad of Larsa to be afraid. With the change of dynasties in the east the political friendships change: for where the clan-feeling is strong, the personal element of a ruler is a powerful factor for peace or war. The kingly family at Isin about 2202, five years before Nur-Adad's accession, had come to an end in a curious way, and the cuneiform chronicles agree closely, as L. W. King pointed out, with the story of Beleous and Beletaras related by the Greek historian Agathias (sixth century A,D.), on the authority of Bion and Alexander Polyhistor. Now, according to the Babylonian Chronicle, “Girra-imitti, the king, set Enlil-ibni, the gardener, on his throne as a substitute (?), (and) placed the crown of his sovereignty upon hishead”; Girra-imitti then died, and Enlil-ibni was established on the throne. We also know from a king-list that a king whose name begins with the first part of a sign which may be “Enlil”, reigned for six months after Girra-imitti (the ninth king of Isin) before Enlil-ibni came to the throne, and it may be that the Chronicle has omitted him. None the less, if his name be “Enlil ,(i.e. Bel)...”, we may, despite the discrepancy, see some agreement with the story as told by Agathias, where Beleous, the son of Derketadas, is said to have been displaced by a certain man Beletaras, a gardener, who, having gained the throne in an unexpected manner, established his own race upon the throne. Beletaras must, of course, be Enlil-ibni, whose name would be read by late translators as Bel-ibni. Beleous may equally represent the tenth name of the king-list, Bel (Enlil) ... , and if so, we may possibly see in Derketadas some corruption of Girra-imitti.

In this way was the dynasty displaced at Isin in 2202. An ingenuous date explains that Enlil-bani “disclosed light to all the land and the people of the sons of Isin” -doubtless a clear exposition of his title to the throne. Elsewhere was turmoil on the political horizon. Kazallu was threatening Babylon; and Sumu-la-ilum, in 2194, in expectation of trouble, drove out Yakhzir-ilu, the Semitic ruler of Kazallu. Next year, in order that Kish might be well aware that he had revoked any previous goodwill shown by dedicating a crown to its god Anu, Sumu-la-ilum pulled down the temple walls of that same god, and in 2192 he demolished the ramparts of Kazallu and fought its inhabitants, finally killing Yakhzir-ilu himself in 2187. Sumu-la-ilum spent his declining years in making images for Ishtar and Nana, in building walls, in digging out the canal called by his name, and in killing two recalcitrant chiefs.

It is never safe to say that peace reigned in Babylonia for any long period. New contract-tablets appear from time to time dated in a year in which some campaign hitherto unknown has taken place. At Larsa Nur-Adad's uneventful reign was replaced by that of his son Sin-idinnam (2181-76), the benefactor of Ur, and king of Larsa, Sumer and Akkad, who prided himself on his restoration of the temple of Shamash, his clearing out of part of the Tigris bed, his building-works at Dur-gurgurri (Tell Sifr) and the wall of Mashkan-shabra (probably near Adab), which doubtless helped him to ensure “peace to his people” and be a “shepherd of justice”. Yet he must needs fight Elam, who was in alliance with Zambia, the king who succeeded Enlil-bani at Isin, in 2177. Zambia lived on, but Sin-idinnam was replaced by Sin-iribam at Larsa in 2175, and it may be that Sin-idinnam was killed; in the same year Sumu-la-i-um was succeeded at Babylon by Zabium or Zabum (2175-62).

ELAM DEFEATS LARSA

But the chronicles tell us little at this juncture of Sin-iribam of Larsa (2175-4); however, there is a weight of one talent, which is described as coming from his palace. As for his contemporary, the king of Isin, who came to the throne in 2174, we do not even know the name, or that of his successor, although Langdon thinks it may be Ur-azag (2169-6). At Larsa Sin-ikisham, who succeeded Sin-iribam (2173-69), paid his usual devotion to the gods, dedicating eleven statues to the great temple of the sun-god, parading the riches of his country by making many of his votive images of gold. It was a foolish display for which the country paid dearly, for his successor Silli-Adad was deposed by the Elamite conquerors within the year of his accession (2168). The Semites of Larsa had lost their vigour; Elam was spoiling their temples and sitting on their throne, and Babylon in the first flush or its youth was presently to overthrow Larsa and its usurping dynasty, and oust the Semitic ruler from Isin.

The year 2167 culminated in the success of Elam over Larsa; this marks our Fourth Section, which ends in 2126 with the final overthrow of Isin by the Elamitic stock in Larsa. In Sin-idinnam's time Ur had belonged to Larsa but a bare ten years before this date; it passed in this brief interval into Elamite hands. The southern cities Ur, Eridu, and their district, had been Elamite in prehistoric times, having probably owed their foundation to Susian migrants, and it was therefore no strange thing that they should turn Elamite on slight provocation. It was Kutur-mabuk, the son of Simti-Shilkhak, obviously an Elamite, who burst in on the decadent king of Larsa, Silli-Adad about 2167 B.C.; there must have been a tremendous Elamite incursion, for we find Kutur-mabuk's son, Warad-Sin, on the throne of Larsa in 2167, whence Silli-Adad had been deposed. Elam had at last succeeded in capturing Larsa.

This success was probably not due to her own efforts alone, but in alliance with Isin and Babylon; such is the inference which may be drawn from the trifling evidence which we have. That Babylon was swayed in some measure by Elam at this juncture is shown by the dating of Zabum’s twelfth year (2164), when the wall of Kazallu was destroyed; it does not say by whom, but the reference must surely be to the latter part of Kutur-mabuk's exploit, when he avenged E-Babbara (the temple of the Sun in Larsa), destroyed the army of Kazallu and Mutiabal in Larsa and Emutbal, and beat down the walls of Kazallu. If so, it is significant that the record of this event is adopted by Zabum as a date. But Ism also has left some trace of her friendship or alliance with Babylon, for the new king of Isin, Sin-magir (2165-55), who called himself king of Sumer and Akkad, dedicated a cone to the temple of E-patutila in Babylon, claiming thereby some act of devotion to Enlil. While his father doubtless continuedto rule in Elam, Warad-Sin, although in nominal control of Larsa during his father's lifetime, would almost appear to have made Ur his royal city. Kutur-mabuk tells us that he dedicated E-nunmakh to the moon-god in Ur, on behalf of his son, whose Semitic name Warad-Sin, “the servant of the moon-god”, points perhaps also to diplomatic necessity. Warad-Sin’s pious works indicate Ur as the object of his homage, for during his reign he built the lofty platform of the temple of Nannar, brought into the shrine two golden thrones, and restored E-nunmakh, while his sister En-an-e-ul was invested as the high-priestess of the moon in Ur. His one building for defence was the great rampart of Ur itself.

How far his father maintained control is not easy to say. He called himself adda or “father” of the west land, and was so far catholic as to dedicate a cone to Nergal and build the temple E-mete-Girra for his life and that of his son. It is certainly peculiar

hat during Warad-Sin’s reign over Larsa a king of Erech should be named Sin-iribam, the same as that of a previous king of Larsa (c. 2175-74) only a few years before Warad-Sin. It may be that they are one and the same king.

Kutur-mabuk probably died during his son's reign, for a statue of him was devoted to the temple of Babbar in Larsa. We may take it that, though Ur was in the eyes of Warad-Sin a more defensible capital, Larsa was still in high repute. The king shows the extent of his rule by his religious devotion to Ishtar of Khallab, and his inclusion of Nippur, Eridu and Lagash in his domain. In fact, under Elam, possibly with Isin and Babylon as subservient allies, there was a temporary recrudescence of Larsa as a power. Everything was working up to a climax: the three kingdoms, Larsa, Isin and Babylon, are being welded into one by force of circumstances.

RIM-SIN'S SUCCESSES AGAINST ISIN

With the advent of Rim-Sin, the brother of Warad-Sin, to the throne of Larsa in 2155 began the final phase, the disappearance of Isin and Larsa. Rim-Sin undoubtedly inherited Ur with Larsa, as was only natural. He was able to dedicate four copper figures of Kutur-mabuk to the temple of the moon in his third year, and build a shrine to Enki in Ur in his ninth. For the first thirteen or fourteen years of his reign Rim-Sin lived at peace, consolidating his position and making himself popular. Besides his piety towards Larsa agd Ur, he extended his favours to Adab, Zarbilum, Mashgan-shabra, Ishkun-Shamash (a city on the bank of the Euphrates), and Ishkun-Nergal, fortifying the two latter; but it is most striking that his beneficiaries did not include Isin, Erech or Babylon.

Isin under Damik-ilishu (2154), son of Sin-magir (2165-55), was preparing for the storm. He, the last king of Isin who was to see the end of her pride, was at one with Babylon, where he built a temple to Shamash; his rule was acknowledged at Nippur; and at some date in his reign, perhaps before the storm burst, he built the wall of Isin, called Damik-ilishu-migir-Ninurta. Erech, under the king Warad-nene, was friendly, and along with Erech, which lay on the desert borders, might be reckoned from time to time the ephemeral support of the bedouin Suti, doubtless, like the modern representatives, an uncertain factor and certainly untrustworthy allies in a defeat. Isin and Babylon under the leadership of Warad-nene, with his following of wild bedouins, and the small city of Rapikum, allied themselves against Larsa and Ur under Rim-Sin. This Rapikum can hardly be the Rapikum mentioned by Tukulti-Ninurta, three days’ march north of Sippar, and in all probability there was another of the name. In fact, it seems to have been reasonably near Larsa, to judge from a Larsa letter in which the writer reminds the addressee of the latter’s promise to give him ten shekels when he went to Rapikum: “Five days hence I shall be en route to Rapikum: I send herewith Shamash-rabi to thee: send the ten shekels of silver”.

The result does not appear to be in doubt. Rim-Sin speaks of his success with pride, and for many years continued to capture city after city, Sin-muballit of Babylon (214324) discreetly makes no mention of anything of the kind, and there is as yet no trace of the battle recorded in Damik-ilishu’ s chronicles. Larsa in 2141 had won an indubitable victory.

From now onwards Rim-Sin continued a policy of nibbling, setting himself to swallow up the towns round his enemies piecemeal. First it was Ka-ida, “the mouth of the rivers” (which had been absorbed by the Larsa king Sumu-ilum in 2219 into Larsa empire, but had evidently reverted to the foe), then Nazarum, both in 2140. The two cities may have lain near the modern Nasriyeh, and nothing but the certainty that Nasriyeh takes its name from Nasir Pasha who built it not so many years ago, would prevent its identification with Nazarum. Next, in 2138, it was Imgur-Gibil and Zibnatum; then in 2137 Bit-Gimil-Sin and Uzarpara, and in 2136 Kisurra and Durum; and finally, in 2134, having thus swept away the outliers, he took the very stronghold of Erech itself. The Isin coalition was hard hit, for by 2130 Larsa had invaded the lands of Isin and captured the city of Damik-ilishu, its king. But Babylon then came to the aid of its old ally Isin, and delivered battle to the “army of Ur” (or “Larsa” as the duplicates have it) in 2130, and in 2127 it would appear that Babylon recaptured Isin. Rim-Sin leaves out all mention of this, thus tacitly admitting a temporary set-back; in one of his letters to a commander called Nuria, which refers to a defeat, he upbraids him. for not having sent the barges necessary for the troops. Ten had apparently been wanted but they did not arrive and the result was disastrous; whether they were for carrying men up-river, or supplying them with provisions we do not, of course, know; but Rim-Sin is definite in fixing the blame: “Thy life be for the soldiers who were killed: and as for those soldiers who are left, fill up (the rations) to twenty ka of grain each (?)”.'

Whether we should assign this letter to this or some later year of Rim-Sin is doubtful; but it is an admirable illustration of what happens in Irak when transport is limited, as anyone who went through the earlier stages of the recent campaign up the Tigris will remember.

In expectation of some further set-back Rim-Sin fortified Zarbilum in 2127. He then continued his “nibbling”, capturing Dunnum, the strong city of Isin in 2126, although he allowed its people to dwell there. Finally in 2125 he succeeded in his great effort. Isin fell to him, and so triumphant was Rim-Sin over it that he dated the remaining thirty-one years of his reign by it. The people of Isin were scattered until Hammurabi's time (as the great king says), and it was not until his reign that they were reassembled; it was Rim-Sin's crowning achievement, and he was well satisfied. One of his inscriptions from Lagash, doubtless late in his reign, dedicated to the god Nin-shubur, defines his empire as including Nippur, Eridu, Ur, Lagash, Larsa, “Sumer and Akkad”, and Uruk. We know very little of his private life: he wedded Si…Innina, the daughter of (W)arad-Nannar and alsoa daughter of Sin-Magir (king of Isin?) named Rim-Sin-shala-bashtashu, and one of his daughters was named Lirish-gamlum. His sister En-an-e-ul has already been mentioned.

Thus ends the Fourth Section. Old Sin-muballit of Babylon, whose reign is reckoned by one chronicle at twenty years, and by the Kings List at thirty, sat on the throne supine and powrless before the sweeping victories of Rim-Sin. But his son Hammurabi was of a different stamp.