526 anntjaij report Smithsonian institution, 1931 



the age of the Third Dynasty of Ur about 2300 B. C, which shows 

 that the Land trade still existed at that period.^ When this trade 

 first began we have yet to learn, but it must go back to the time when 

 in Elam at least the primitive pictographs had not yet been super- 

 seded by the cuneiform script. At a later date the so-called Cappa- 

 docian Cuneiform tablets discovered at Kara Eyuk, 18 kilometers 

 north of Kaisariyeh, have shown how extensive and modern in char- 

 acter Babylonian commerce must have been at that time. Here sev- 

 eral thousand tablets have been brought to light, mostly consisting 

 of trading and legal documents and including a good many private 

 letters. At the time when they were written the copper, lead, and 

 more especially silver mines of the Taurus Mountains were being 

 worked by Babylonian firms whose agents had their depot and chief 

 center at Ganis, the present Kara Eyuk. " Companies " (illati) had 

 been formed to exploit them and caravans traveled regularly along 

 the roads which led from Asia Minor to Assur, the original capital 

 of Assyria, on the one hand, and to Babylon, on the other. There 

 was, in fact, what we should call a postal service, and one of the let- 

 ters expresses the hope that the moon will shine brightly so that 

 there might be no delay in the delivery of the mail, while another 

 letter states that a particular route was being taken, as it was now 

 considered safe. The tablets were enclosed in clay envelopes on 

 which the addresses were inscribed as well as a statement of the 

 contents. 



Some of the tablets are of the nature of cheques and bills of credit. 

 The writer states in them that they represent so many manehs or 

 shekels of silver, gold, or copper, in return for which cloths or other 

 goods are to be sent. Besides metals, a large trade was carried on 

 in textiles and clothes, showing that Asia Minor at the time was 

 not only exporting metals on a large scale, but was also the seat, like 

 Babylonia, of an extensive textile industry. Among the articles 

 manufactured it is interesting to note the berigani, the braccae of 

 the Keltic languages, and our English " breeches," which can, there- 

 fore, claim a Hittite ancestry. 



The principal silver mines were at the modern Bereketli, where 

 traces of the old workings have been found extending over several 

 miles. Gold was also mined, but in small quantities; one of the 

 sources from which it was derived seems to have been in the north- 

 west of the peninsula. Iron is also mentioned, but it is uncertain 

 whether this was derived from the rock or from a meteoric source. 

 In the later days of the Hittite Empire we are told that " black 

 iron " as distinguished from " iron," came " from heaven," like the 

 ba-n-pet, " metal of heaven," which denoted " iron " in the Egyptian 



•See the Journ. Asiatic Soc. Bengal., vol. 11, pp. 310 sqq. The seal was bought by 

 Major Pottinger, but afterwards lost — fortunately, not before a good copy of the in- 

 scription had been made by the purchaser and published .in the Journal. 



