The History of the Ancient Civilizations. Duncker Max

not much below the year 3000 B.C. Life must have become richer in Babylonia before the tribes of the Iranian uplands were roused to obtain the sovereignty of that country. Still it remains a remarkable fact that the history of Babylonia begins with the dominion of strangers, and that the native tradition, as we can show from the fragments of it remaining to our times, had nothing to place before the strangers, except the two mythical dynasties of Babylonian princes before and after the flood. In the fragments the first native dynasty of historical times, the dynasty of the Chaldæan princes, comes in the fifth place; according to the calculation given above, their supremacy began in the year 1976 B.C., and already in 1518 B.C. it gave place first to the nine Arabian, and then to the Assyrian kings. The statement of the fragments, that forty-nine native kings reigned, in the 458 years from 1976 B.C. to 1518 B.C., is also remarkable, since it allows for the reign of each of the kings of this dynasty the brief average of a little more than nine years.

But perhaps the Scriptures of the Hebrews, and the monuments of Babylonia and Assyria, present sufficient material to supplement these meagre results in the way of confirmation or contradiction? According to Genesis, the sons of Shem, the eldest son of Noah, were "Elam and Asshur, and Arphaxad, and Lud, and Aram." And the eldest son of Ham, Noah's second son, was Cush, and Cush begat Nimrod; the same "began to be a mighty one in the earth, and the beginning of his kingdom was Babel, and Erech, and Accad, and Calneh, in the land of Shinar."[328] From this we see not only the close relationship between the Hebrews and the population of Mesopotamia, but also the precedence in high antiquity allowed by the Hebrews to the tribes of the Tigris and Euphrates. The Hebrews derived their own origin from Noah, Shem, and Arphaxad; but before Arphaxad they place the two elder sons of Shem, Elam and Asshur. The first is the representative of the nation and land of Elam on the lower Tigris, while Asshur represents the Assyrians of the upper Tigris. But, strangely enough, the Babylonians were not reckoned in the generations of Shem, although, as we know perfectly well, the Chaldæans were Semitic, and spoke a Semitic language closely resembling Hebrew. On the contrary, the founding of the kingdom of Babylon is ascribed to another stock, the eldest son of Cush, and grandson of Ham. As Genesis, like the Hebrews of later date, includes under the name of Cush the nations dwelling to the south, the Nubians, Ethiopians, and tribes of South Arabia, we may here take the son of Cush, who founded Babylon, to represent a southern tribe, dwelling perhaps on the shore of the Persian Gulf. Thus as the fragments of Berosus derive the civilisation of Babylon from the south sea and the south, so also does Genesis point to a southern origin for Babylonia. And at the same time Genesis calls a tribe dwelling on the lower Tigris, between the river and the mountains of Iran, the Elamites, the oldest son of Shem. Among the Greeks the land of the Elamites was known as Kissia, and afterwards as Susiana, from the name of the capital. It was also called Elymais, and, in the inscriptions of the Achæmenids, Uwazha. The Greeks describe this district as a hot but very fruitful plain, well watered by the tributaries of the Tigris from the mountains of Persia. There the land brought forth two or even three hundredfold. According to Strabo the land was inhabited by two tribes, the Kissians and Elymæans. The chief city, Susa, lay between the Shapur and Dizful.[329] With the Greeks it passed as the fortress of Memnon, the son of the Dawn, who came to the aid of the Trojans in their distress—"the ancient mighty city," as Æschylus calls it.[330] The inscriptions of the Assyrian kings give us some information of the fortunes of the kingdom of Elam, which is not contradicted by such isolated indications as we can gather from the inscriptions of Babylonia. This evidence shows that in Elam from the year 2500 B.C. a political constitution was in existence, and that the kings of Elam invaded Babylonia before the year 2000 B.C., and about this time ruled over Babylonia and Mesopotamia as far as Syria. Hence before the year 2000 B.C. there was some kind of constitution in Babylonia, and, as we shall see, it was accompanied by a certain amount of culture. The dominion of Elam over Babylon was of short duration, and Babylon soon recovered her independence. When, about the year 1500 B.C., Assyria rose into an independent state, and her power, after 900 B.C., became dangerous to the neighbouring states—when Babylonia, after the middle of the eighth century B.C., was no longer a match for Assyria—Elam continued to maintain her independence in spite of numerous attacks from the Assyrians.

It was not till the subjection of Babylonia was complete that the Assyrian king Assurbanipal succeeded in reducing Elam, and in taking and destroying Susa, the ancient metropolis of the country. In his inscriptions this king of Assyria informs us that King Kudur-Nanchundi[331] of Elam laid his hand on the temples of Accad (p. 257); two neres, seven sosses, and fifteen years—i.e., 1,635 years previously, he carried away the image of the goddess Nana. He (Assurbanipal) brought her back; on the first of the month Kisallu (Kislev) the goddess was conducted back to Erech (p. 237); in Bithiliana he built for her a lasting sanctuary. As Elam was not completely subdued by Assurbanipal till the year 645 B.C., we may place the recovery of the statue of Nana in this year.[332] Hence the date of Kudur-Nanchundi of Elam, whom an inscription of Susa calls the son of Sutruk-Nanchundi, would fall in the year 2280 B.C., and if about this time it was possible to carry away images of gods from Babylonia, we cannot place the beginnings of civilisation in Babylonia later than the year 2500 B.C. Tiles found at Mugheir, at no great distance from the mouth of the Euphrates in Babylonia, belong to a second king with a name of similar formation—Kudur-Mabuk. His inscriptions tell us that Kudur-Mabuk, lord of the west-land (martu), had erected a shrine to the god "Sin, his king, for prolonging his own life and that of his son, Zikar-Sin."[333] On a statuette of bronze, now in the Louvre, we also read the name of Kudur-Mabuk and his son. Babylonian inscriptions speak of battles of Hammurabi king of Babylon against Kudur-Mabuk and against Elam.[334] The tradition of the Hebrews tells us that the kings of Sodom and Gomorrah, the kings of Adama, Zeboiim, and Zoar, i.e. the princes of the land of Jordan, whose names are quoted, had served Kedor-Laomer, king of Elam, for twelve years, and when they revolted, Kedor-Laomer and the princes with him, Amraphel of Shinar, Arioch and Tidal, had come down and conquered the Horites, the Amalekites, and the Amorites, i.e. the tribes of the Syrian desert, the land of Aram between Sinai and Hermon; and the kings of Jordan were defeated in the valley of Siddim. The first part of the name Kedor-Laomer corresponds to Kudur in the name Kudur-Nanchundi and Kudur-Mabuk. The second part recurs in the name Lagamar, which is the name of a god worshipped by the Elamites.[335] According to this, the Kudurids, or kings of Elam, of whom Sutruk and Kudur-Nanchundi, Kudur-Mabuk, and Kudur-Lagamar are known by name, first attacked Babylonia, then became rulers of Babylonia, and at one time extended their dominion to the west as far as Syria. According to the computations of the Hebrews, the campaign of Kedor-Laomer to Syria would take place about the year 2100 B.C. The inscription would carry the beginning of the rule of the Kudurids in Elam to the year 2500 B.C., and consequently the beginning of a political constitution in Elam may be assumed to be prior to the year 2300 B.C., and the sovereignty of the Kudurids over Babylon and in the west may be placed about the year 2000 B.C.

If Elam was once more powerful than Babylon it may have been also older—as among the Hebrews Elam is the eldest son of Shem—the civilisation of the Elamites may have developed earlier than that of the Babylonians. But although a number of names of kings have been handed down to us on Assyrian tablets, which also tell us of ceaseless battles with Elam, we are in almost total darkness about the nature and direction of the civilisation of Elam. Our first notice is the Assyrian account of the fall of the kingdom and the capture of the capital, and from this we learn that the conditions and mode of life in the capital of the Elamites were not very different from those of Babylon and Nineveh. A picture of the city (found in the palace of Assurbanipal), shows it to us between the two rivers (p. 249), oblong in shape, and surrounded by high walls with numerous towers. Outside the city, between the walls and the rivers are palms, and some dwelling-houses.[336] Assurbanipal