Page:History of Early Iran.pdf/61

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
BABYLONIAN DYNASTS
45

the correct total is 125 years and 40 days. It is impossible to doubt the proven ability of Babylonian mathematicians; yet our addition of the separate reigns totals only 91 years and 40 days, leaving an unexplained balance of 34 years. From these facts it should be clear that there is much yet to be learned concerning the period of Gutian domination.

Toward the end of the period the barbarians appear to have come under the persistent and prevailing influence of Babylonian culture. Perhaps we may assign to this time those kings who have left their own inscriptions but whose names do not appear in the king lists of the native scribes. Lasirab, king of Gutium, called upon the god of Gutium as well as Ishtar and Sin to guard a macehead upon which he inscribed an Akkadian text.[1] To his title another ruler, named Erridupizir, added "King of the Four World-Regions" when he dedicated an object to Enlil of Nippur.[2]

Strange as it may appear, some of the Babylonian cities seem to have enjoyed a renewal of prosperity under the foreign rule. In these the ishakku's of the older races apparently retained control, though they fully acknowledged the sovereignty of the invaders. One of these cities was Umma, whose ishakku Lugal-annadu tells us that while Sium was king of Gutium

  1. H. Winckler in ZA, IV (1889), 406; cf. SAK, pp. 170 ff.
  2. Hilprecht, BE, Ser. D, V, Part 1, 20–24; cf. Poebel, Historical Texts, p. 134.