CHIEFLY FROM NIPPUR. 257 



stated above, we are justified in placing Lugalzaggisi before these two rulers of Shir- 

 purla and in regarding most of the inscriptions published as ISos. 86-112 as older than 

 the earliest royal inscriptions from Tello. 1 At any rate, they are not later than these. 

 A question of fundamental importance for our correct conception of the earliest 

 phase of Babylonian history has been repeatedly discussed within the last ten years : In 

 which relation did Sargon I (and Naram-Sin) stand to the early kings of Tello ? Did 

 he antedate or succeed them ? Winckler and Maspero 3 expressed themselves decidedly 

 in favor of the former view, 4 while Hommel, 5 Heuzey ° and myself (Part I, p. 19), 7 with 

 more or less emphasis placed Sargon I and his son after Ur-Nina and Edingiranagin 

 I will now briefly give the definite proof of the validity of our theory. 



1. The results of the exploration of the lowest strata of Ekur will have convinced, 

 us that Babylonian civilization had a history antedating the kingdom of Sargon I by 

 several thousand years. This pre-Sargonic period must have had a system of writing ; 

 for the earliest texts at our disposal, however closely approaching the original picture in 

 a number of cases, presuppose an earlier stage of writing, such as is testified to have 

 existed in Babylonia by the monument " Blau " 8 and by the famous fragments from 

 Kuyunjik. 9 Pieces of inscribed objects unearthed below the Sargon level prove posi- 

 tively that writing existed in Nippur long before Sargon I. It seems, therefore, at the 

 very outset, impossible to believe that not one document antedating the highly devel- 

 oped style of writing in Sargon's monuments should have been excavated in Nuffar 

 or Tello. In fact, it would be altogether unreasonable to regard the inscriptions of 

 Sargon and Naram-Sin as the first written records of the ancient Babylonian civili- 

 zation. 



2. Everybody who has studied the earliest inscriptions of Babylonia from their 

 originals, and has devoted that special pains to all the details of palaeography, which 



J Tlie little fragment No. 107 cannot be referred to the time of Entemena, the only other ruler of Tello who, 

 according to our present knowledge, presented an inscribed vase to Inlil. Perhaps it is the first indication of 

 the rising of Shirpurla in the South and of the extending of its sphere of influence northward at the expense of 

 ffisftBANM. 



2 Untersuchungen, p. 43 ; Oeschichte, pp. 40f. (but cf. on the other side p. 42 !) ; Allorienlalische Forschungen III, 

 pp. 236ff. 



3 In Recueil XV, pp. 65f. ; The Dawn of Civilization, p. 605, note 3 (end). 



* Recently adopted by Rogers, Outlines of the History of Early Babylonia, Leipzig, 1893, p. 11, note 1 [but given 

 up again after hearing my address, Contributions to the History of Sargon I and His Predecessors, before the Oriental 

 Club of Philadelphia]. 



5 Ztitschrift fur KeilschriftforscJiung II, p. 182 ; Qesehichte Babyloniens und Assyriens, p. 291. 



6 Cf., e. g., Les Origines Orientates, pp. 50, 84 ; Revue d' Assyriologie III, pp. 54, 57. 



7 Cf. also Recent Research in Bible Lands, pp. 66f. 



8 Called so for the sake of brevity. Cf. above, p. 249, note 4. 



'Published by Houghton in Trans. Soc. Bibl. Arch., p. 454, and reproduced in several other works. 



