EVIDENCES OF THE MIGRATION OF ABEAM. 109 



covery of inscriptions both in Akkadian and Semitic Baby- 

 lonian. Of the Semitic inscriptions of this king both are in 

 the Louvre. One of these has been known a long time, and 

 was first published by M. Menant ; the other, on a small 

 alabaster tablet, was first published by myself in 1879. 

 Throughout this long inscription of thirty-seven lines there 

 are only six words that are not pure Semitic, or which are not 

 to be found in the Hebrew Bible. The inscription reads, 

 '^ To Merodach the great lord, the giver of fertility from the 

 gods Lord of the (Temples) E-Sagila* and E Zidaf his 

 lord, Khammurabi The proclaimed of Ann. The beloved of 

 Bel, the worshipper of Samas — the prince beloved by Mero- 

 dach. The great King King of the people of the SumeriJ 

 and Akkadi,§ King of the four quarters The Prince who the 

 people and land to be his dominion the god Bel has given 

 him. Their seed to his hand he has entrusted. To Merodach 

 the god his Creator, in Borsippa|| his beloved city E Zida his 

 holy shrine he has made it.^^ 



Still more important than these inscriptions, which are 

 in themselves absolute proof as to the existence of a 

 Semitic people who were subjects of the great king and to 

 whom these texts appealed, are a series of tablets found in the 

 mound of Senkereh, the ancient Larsa, which we know was the 

 capital of the province ruled by Eriaku the son of Kudur- 

 Mabug. 



These tablets ai-e a number of legal and commercial inscrip- 

 tions, which were found stored in the ruins of one of the 

 temples of Larsa, probably the temple of the Sun-god, which 

 was the chief edifice of the city. Tlais temple in Larsa, which 

 was the southern Heliopolis, was called ^j -^y ^^f e-pae-ea, 

 "i\\e House of Light '^ — and, like most temples in Chaldea, was 

 the laviT court and treasury of the district. In this treasury at 

 Larsa more than four thousand years ago these precious 

 documents, which now form the treasures of the British 

 Museum, and which yield up such important evidence for my 

 paper, were stored. The tablets are of peculiar make, belonging 

 to a class known as envelope tablets — that is, the inscriptions 

 are written in duplicate and placed one inside the other. 

 First a tablet is inscribed and partially dried, then round it a 

 clay envelope is made and the inscription repeated, so that if 



* The House of the Lofty Head, 

 t The House of Life. 



X South Babylonia, the Shinar of the Hebrews. 

 § North Babylonia, with Agadhe or Akkad as its capital. 

 II The city whose ruins are marked by the Birs-Nimrud, a sister city of 

 Babylon. 



VOL. XX. I 



