105 



of Ptolemy. The name of this prince^ who played a very im- 

 portant part in Babylonian history is written Y >->-Y J:Y >-^^^ 

 >-^ *~Y|-<^ >— ^Y and read D.P. Shamas-suma-uldna, "the 



Sun-god has established a name,'^ was originally read Saul 

 miigina,hnt tablets recently discovei"ed by Mr. Rassam establish 

 this reading as the correct one.* In an inscription brought 

 home by Mr. Rassam from Babylon in 1881, Assurbanipal 



speaks of him as ►^^yyT-'^ *"^yiT *'t^JT T*" ^^'^^^ ta-li-mi 



" my own brother/' a phrase which may be compared 

 with the Scripture name Bar tliolomeiv {'' sons o£ one's 

 own brother/"' Matt. x. 3). His conduct towards his elder 

 brother, the King of Assyria, seems to have been anything 

 but brotherly. He revolted against him, and soon the 

 loving and familiar epithet, which we find in the cylinder 



above, is replaced by ^^ti7i^ 4;^ T TTEj >-<y< alchi JcJddhuti 



" my wicked brother." By means of gold, silver, and 

 treasure, taken from the treasure-house of the Temple of 

 Esaggil at Babylon, of Nebo at Borsippa, and Nergal at 

 Kutha, the most ancient of the Babylonian temples, he bribed 

 Umman-nigas, king of Elam, to join him in revolt against 

 his brother. After a long and bloody war, the details of 

 which are very fully given in the inscriptions of Assurbanipal, 

 the rebellion was put down, and Shamas-suma-ukin set fire to 

 his palace and perished in the flames. It was probably this 

 death of the brother of Assurbanipal's that gave rise to the 

 story of the death of Sardanapalus, or Assurbanipal himself, in 

 such a manner. On the overthrow of 8hamas-su'ma-%ikina, in 

 B.C. 648, Assurbanipal assumed the crown of Babylon 



himself, but appointed a deputy named j I^JJ *^^ ^11 *^ 



{Kin-la-da-nji), the Kinladanus of Canon of Ptolemy. Tablets 

 dated in his reign have been found by Mr. Rassam at Abbo 

 Ilubba. There are also in the British Museum tablets dated 

 in the reign of Assurbanipal, as King of Babylon, the latest 



* In a bi-lingual list of royal names (Proceedings Soc. Bib. Arrh., vol. iii., 

 p. 40), the royal name f <^f^iy ^ftf >-^] iz] ^^^ is explained by D.P. 

 t^hamas-upaJMMr, "The Sun-god has assembled or gathered together." 

 This establishes the reading of the complex group which begins tlie naino. 

 The Shamm, on account of the weakness of the ^ in Babylonian, and its 

 similarity to "^ was corrupted by the Greek writer into fiaoA from Savaos. 



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