It was a period of calamity and distress, during which the Arabs or the
Aramæans ravaged the country, and pillaged without compunction not only
the property of the inhabitants, but also that of the gods. The
Elamite usurper having died about the year 1030, a Babylonian of noble
extraction expelled the intruders, and succeeded in bringing the larger
part of the kingdom under his rule.*


* The names of the first kings of this dynasty are destroyed in
the copies of the Royal Canon which have come down to us. The three
preceding dynasties are restored as follows:--

[Illustration: 006.jpg TABLE OF KINGS]

Five or six of his descendants had passed away, and a certain
Shamash-mudammiq was feebly holding the reins of government, when the
expeditions of Rammân-nirâri III. provoked war afresh between Assyria
and Babylon. The two armies encountered each other once again on
their former battlefield between the Lower Zab and the Turnat.
Shamash-mudammiq, after being totally routed near the Yalmân mountains,
did not long survive, and Naboshumishkun, who succeeded him, showed
neither more ability nor energy than his predecessor. The Assyrians
wrested from him the fortresses of Bambala and Bagdad, dislodged him
from the positions where he had entrenched himself, and at length took
him prisoner while in flight, and condemned him to perpetual captivity.*

* Shamash-mudammiq appears to have died about 900.
Naboshumishkun probably reigned only one or two years, from
900 to 899 or to 898. The name of his successor is destroyed