244 
NATURE 
[JANUARY 14, 1897 
copies of the tablets, cones, &c., which Mr. King has just 
given us confirm this opinion, and we are brought face 
to face with a class of tablets to which, hitherto, we have 
been strangers. And just as the tablets are new to us, 
So, too, is their shape—for they are round, and resemble 
large bread-cakes more than anything else—and the eras 
in which they are dated are new, and the characters in 
which they are written are more complicated than any 
which we have hitherto seen. The texts upon them form 
public accounts and lists of revenue and produce which 
were drawn up for the public “ record office” of the kings 
of the second dynasty of the city of Ur, about B.C. 2300 ; 
the kings most frequently mentioned are Bur-Sin, Ine- 
Sin and Gamil-Sin. Curiously, however, these tablets 
are not dated by regnal years, as are thousands and 
thousands of other documents, but by important events 
in the past history of the country, such as the capture of 
an enemy’s city, or the invasion of an enemy, or the com- 
pletion of some great public work, and unfortunately we 
have, at present, no means of telling wen these events 
took place. Among the miscellaneous texts which Mr. 
King has given us we find a very important inscription in 
Accadian (No. 96-4-4, 2) containing an invocation to the 
goddess Nininsina to preserve the lives of Rim-Aku 
(Arad-Sin) and his father Kudur-Mabug, who flourished, 
probably before B.C. 2300, about one hundred years before 
Khammurabi succeeded in consolidating his kingdom in 
Babylonia. Another remarkable inscription is found on 
four clay “cones” (No. 96-6-12, 3), whereon we find re- 
corded the name and titles of Mul-babbar, or if we read 
it as a Semitic name, Amél-Shamash, a very early pavesz 
or viceroy of Babylonia. We believe that this Mul- 
babbar is here met with for the first time. Still another 
most valuable text is found on the stone mace-head 
(No. 96-6-15, 1), where we have recorded a prayer to a 
god on behalf of one Nin-kagina, the son of Ka-azaggid, 
and of the viceroy under whom-he served ; the name 
of the latter is Nam-maghani, and he ruled over 
the city of Lagash. or Shirpurla, about B.C. 2500. It is 
an important fact that the name of Nin-kagina’s father 
is given, and it would seem as if hereditary offices 
of high rank had already been established at that early 
period. 
Want of space forbids our calling the reader’s atten- 
tion to many other important details in connection 
with these early texts; but it must be mentioned that 
their true value arises from the fact that they enable 
us to fill up part of the gap in our knowledge of the 
period which lies between the reigns of Khammurabi and 
Sargon I. of Agade. More than that, when worked out, 
these tablets will help us to understand the social fabric 
of the civilisation of the period, and will, no doubt, 
reveal the conditions of land tenure in Babylonia. It 
seems as if the land was managed for the kings or 
viceroys by the priests, and as if much of the administra- 
tive work of the country was deputed to them ; that kings 
themselves also held priestly rank is also most probable. 
But although the forty tablets, &c., here published, yield 
so many results, it must never be forgotten that our 
knowledge of this period must be always fragmentary as 
long as a single tablet remains unpublished. We are very 
glad to see from the prefatory note to Mr. King’s work, 
that other volumes of a similar character are to be issued 
NO. 1420, VOL. 55 
by the Trustees of the British Museum, and we can only 
hope that the intervals between the appearance of the 
parts will not be long. They had already laid all cunei- 
form students under a debt of gratitude for their liberality 
in the publication of unremunerative books of Assyrian 
and Babylonian texts, and the present volume will make 
that debt greater. 
In conclusion it may be mentioned that Mr. King’s 
copies have been reproduced by photo-lithography, and 
that the work is therefore free from misprints which so 
often puzzle the reader, and lead him, sometimes, astray; 
the handwriting is clear, and neat, and careful—three 
qualities which should not be lightly esteemed. 
HANDBOOKS OF PHYSIOLOGY. 
Kirkes Handbook of Physiology. By Prof. W. D. 
Halliburton, F.R.S. Fourteenth edition. Pp. 851. 
8vo. (London: John Murray, 1896.) 
T is not very many years ago since “ Kirke,” as 
the book before us has been familiarly termed by 
many generations of students of medicine, had the field 
all to itself as a physiological handbook. During many 
years it had no rival; for the “ Principles of Physiology ” 
of the late Dr. W. B. Carpenter, although co-existent 
with it, was far too bulky to be regarded as in any sense 
a handbook. How different are matters in this respect 
now! What with Waller, Starling, McKendrick, Stewart, 
to say nothing of Foster, of Landois and Stirling, and 
of even bigger books looming in the distance, the 
student at the present day can take his choice; which 
he could not do then, for the only book offered to him 
in the days we are speaking of was the compilation by 
Dr. Kirkes, which, unlike most text-books, has been 
destined long to survive its original author. And an 
excellent compilation it was, founded upon the best work 
on physiology of its time, and, as some think, of all 
time, that by Johannes Miiller; written, moreover, in a 
readable manner, so that the attention of the reader 
was easily maintained, and his interest in the subject 
never allowed to flag. But, alas! science is progressive, 
and a book on physiology may be ever so readable to- 
day but will not be read to-morrow, unless means are 
taken to bring its material “up to Saturday night.” 
Thereafter comes the inevitable “editing,” which may 
be all well enough so long as the author can himself 
undertake the repairs of his own fabric, but which is 
apt to render that fabric a very patchwork quilt of a 
book when it consists of the paste and scissors work of 
inserting a paragraph here and deleting a paragraph 
there, as was to all appearance the manner of preparing 
a good many of the round dozen of editions which 
intervened between the original book and the one we 
are considering. 
The result was that the work became full of incon- 
sistencies, amounting in some cases to grave errors ; 
and at a certain period of its career it was so unfavour- 
ably regarded by the professors of physiology, that one 
of the most eminent of these is reported to have addressed 
his class in the following terms:—“If any gentleman 
present has purchased a copy of a book called ‘ Kirkes’ 
Physiology,’ I would advise him to take it out with him 
when he goes for a walk... and throw it over the highest 
