The king once more set out from Kakzi, crossed the Zab and the Eadanu,
through the gorges of Babiti, and halting on the ridges of Mount Simaki,
peremptorily demanded tribute from Dagara.* This was, however, merely
a ruse to deceive the enemy, for taking one evening the lightest of his
chariots and the best of his horsemen, he galloped all night without
drawing rein, crossed the Turnat at dawn, and pushing straight forward,
arrived in the afternoon of the same day before the walls of Ammali, in
the very heart of the fief of Arashtua.** The town vainly attempted a
defence; the whole population was reduced to slavery or dispersed in the
forests, the ramparts were demolished, and the houses reduced to
ashes. Khudun with twenty, and Kissirtu with ten of its villages, Bara,
Kirtiara, Dur-Lullumê, and Bunisa, offered no further resistance, and
the invading host halted within sight of the defiles of Khashmar.***

* The _Annals of Assur-nazir-pal_ go on to mention that
Mount Simaki extended as far as the Turnat, and that it was
close to Mount Azira. This passage, when compared with that
in which the opening of the campaign is described, obliges
us to recognise in Mounts Simaki and Azira two parts of the
Shehrizôr chain, parallel to the Seguirmé-dagh. The fortress
of Mizu, mentioned in the first of these two texts, may
perhaps be the present Gurân-kaleh.

** Hommel thinks that Ammali is perhaps the present
Suleimaniyeh; it is, at all events, on this side that we
must look for its site.

*** I do not know whether we may trace the name of the
ancient Mount Khashmar-Khashmir in the present Azmir-dagh;
it is at its feet, probably in the valley of Suleimanabad,