22 OLD BABYLONIAN INSCRIPTIONS 



further northward. The inscriptions of Alusharshid testify to his supremacy over 

 the South, 1 and to his victories in the East and North-East of Babylonia. In view of 

 all this, I regard it as impossible to question the historical character of the statements 

 of the tablet of omens relative to JSTaram-Sin. Since we know that about that time 

 a Semitic population dwelt in the northern and northeastern countries of Gnti and 

 Lnlubi, 2 whose kings wrote inscriptions on rocks and vases in a dialect entirely 

 identical with the Babylonian, it can no longer seem strange that JSTaram-Sin took 

 the Semitic king R"ish-Rammdn, of Apirak, prisoner. It is evident, however, that 

 A pi rale, which by its termination forcibly recalls names like A(E)shnunak, 3 is to be 

 sought in the North-East 4 of Babylonia rather than in the South. 5 If the credibility 

 of the tablet of omens is therefore established as far as ISTaram-Sin is concerned, we 

 are no longer at liberty to call in question what it relates concerning Sargon I, unless 

 more solid objections than have heretofore been raised, be brought against it. With 

 Tiele, therefore, I regard as facts what Winckler describes as fiction, viz., that Sar- 

 gon I subjugated nearly the whole world known to him, or in other words, "the four 

 quarters of the earth." 6 



But how is it that whilst Sargon always bears the title sharru dannu shar Agade 

 or dannu shar Agade or only shar Agade, 7 both in the legend and in his own inscrip- 



1 Including Lagash. Cf. p. 19. 



2 This fact argues in favor of a migration of the Semites into Babylonia from the North. Cf. the "legend of Sar- 

 gon," according to which his uncle dwelt in the mountains, and he himself was carried down the river in an ark made 

 of reed. Cf. also Winckler, OescJi., p. 141. 



3 Pognon found there Semitic inscriptions written by patesis of Ashnunak. Nothing can be said with certainty 

 as-to the exact date of these texts, but they seem to belong to the second millennium B. C. Cf. Pognon, Quelques rois 

 du pays d'Achnounnak, read at the Aeademie des inscriptions et belles lettres, March 18, 1892. On this country see fur- 

 ther Delitzsch, Paradies, p. 230 seq.; Koss'der, p. 60 ; and also Jensen in Schrader's K. B., Part I, p. 137, note . 



4 Hommel is on the right track (Gesch., p. 310, note 1). His reading A-ma-rak, however, has neither support nor 

 probability. 



6 Delitzsch, Paradies, p. 231, "zicmlicli sudlich zu suelien." 



6 1 regard also Sargon's campaign in the West, to the Mediterranean Sea and to Cyprus, as historic facts. The 

 cylinder of Naram-Sin's servant found at Cyprus, and now in the Metropolitan Museum of New York (cf. Sayce, 

 Trans. 8. B. A. V, p. 441 seq.), has, however, no direct bearing upon the whole question. Through the kindness of 

 Prof. Isaac Hall, Curator of the Museum, I obtained an accurate impression of the cylinder, to which, for paleographic 

 reasons (observe, e. g., the form of the character to), I cannot assign an earlier date than c. 2000-1500 B. C. The 

 pictures on it also point to a more recent date. But the cylinder is undoubtedly no modern forgery (Hommel, I. c, 

 p. 309). 



7 Nabuna'id calls him, for apparent reasons, shar Babili. It is in itself not impossible that there were kings of 

 Babylon at some time in that ancient period. For the place where the vase of Naram-Sin was found by the French 

 expedition, the tablet of omens (I, 7-11, of. my restoration of this passage below, p. 26) and the occasional mentioning 

 of Babylon (under another name) in the Sumerian inscriptions of the kings and patesis of Shirpurla clearly show that 

 Babylon not only existed at this early time and belonged to Sargon's kingdom, but that it even had already obtained 

 considerable prominence (cf. below, p. 26). Cf. however, Winckler, Unters., p. 76 seq., and Lehmann, Shamashshum- 

 vkin, p. 96, note 4. 



