On the Early Babylonian Eclipse of the Sun. 
247 
preceding dynasty, one of whom reigned seventeen years and the other 
twenty-two years, with whom the unknown king of the Chronicle might 
be identified. But, as already stated, the probabilities are in favour of his 
identification with Simmash-shikhu." 
This last paragraph of Mr. King's comments may be considered in 
more detail. 
Adopting Mr. King's identification of Nahu-mukin-apli as the founder 
of the Eighth Dynasty, in which he is in accord with Sayce and Winckler, 
the seventh year of Eulbar-shakin-shum, the founder of the Sixth 
Dynasty, would be nineteen years earlier than the first year of Nabu- 
mtikin-apli, and the seventh year of Simmash-shikhu would have been 
forty-one years before this epoch. If the unknown king was neither of 
these, he must have been one of the kings of the Fourth Dynasty, pro- 
bably either Merodach-nadin-akhi, whose seventh year would have been 
about eighty years preceding the first year of Nabu-miikin-apli, or Mero- 
dach . . . whose seventh year would have preceded this epoch by from 
one hundred and fifty to some one hundred and eighty years. 
Now the missing portion of the Chronicle between the bottom of 
column II and the top of column III it has been seen is from eighty to 
over one hundred lines. 
What interval of time does this represent ? 
In column II of the Chronicle the eleven lines, 12-22, cover a period 
of ten years, from the seventh to the seventeenth year, of the unknown 
king's reign. Then on the twenty-sixth line is a reference to the four- 
teenth year of some king. Query the same one or that of a successor ? 
On this point Mr. King remarks : — 
" If the fourteenth year mentioned in column II line 26 of the 
Chronicle does not belong to the same reign as the seventeenth year in 
lines 19 and 20, we may refer the date in the upper part of the column to 
Simmash-shikhu, and the fourteenth year in line 26 to Eulhar-shakin- 
shum ; but if the fourteenth year, as is more probable, is merely men- 
tioned out of order, and belongs to the same reign as the seventeenth 
year, we may refer all the dates preserved in the Ilnd column to the 
same king" ("Chronicles Concerning Early Babylonian Kings," vol. i., 
p. 224). 
Yet this misplacing in order would be exceptional. It is true it does 
occur in column III, where lines 6-13 state that " (6) In the month 
Nisan in the eighth year of Nabu-mukin-apli the king (7) the Aramaeans 
made war and the Ferry Gate of the City of Har-bel-matati (8) they cap- 
tured : and the king crossed not over and Nabu went not (to Babylon) (9) 
and Bel went not forth ; on the eve of the New Year's festival in E-sagila 
according to the word of [ . . . ] made the offering. (10) In the month 
Nisan in the nineteenth year of Nabti-mukin-apH, the king, the same 
