ancestor.

The cases where we can prove that the editor of the Annals "improved"
his original are few but striking. It is indeed curious that he has in
a few cases lowered the numbers of his original, even to the extent of
giving three fortified cities and twenty four villages [Footnote:
Ann. 105.] where the tablet has twelve fortified cities and eighty
four villages. [Footnote: Tabl. 89.] On the other hand, by a trick
especially common among the Sargonide scribes, the 1,235 sheep of the
tablet [Footnote: Tabl. 349.] has reached the enormous total of
100,225! [Footnote: Ann. 129; of. Thureau-Dangin, _op. cit._, 68,
n. 4 for comparison of numbers. The same phenomenon can be constantly
seen in the huge increases of the numbers of the Display inscription
as compared with its original, the Annals.] More serious, because less
likely to be allowed for, is the statement that Parda was
captured [Footnote: Ann. 106.] when the original merely says that it
was abandoned by its chief. [Footnote: Tabl. 84.] But the most glaring
innovation of the scribe is where, in speaking of the fate of Rusash,
the Haldian king, after his defeat, he adds "with his own iron dagger,
like a pig, his heart he pierced, and his life he ended." [Footnote:
Ann. 139.] This has long been doubted on general principles, [Footnote:
Cf. Olmstead, _Sargon_, 111.] but now we have the proof that it
is only history as the scribe would like it to have been written. For
the new inscription, while giving the conventional picture of the
despair of the defeated king, says not a word of any
suicide. [Footnote: Tabl. 411ff.] However, the tablet does elsewhere
mention the sickness of Rusash, [Footnote: _Ibid._ 115.] and it
may well be that it is to this sickness that we must attribute his
death later. [Footnote: Cf. Thureau-Dangin, _op. cit._, xix.] The
complete misunderstanding of the whole campaign by earlier