baked. If the outer writing were defaced by accident or altered by design,
the removal of the outer coating would at once show the true text.

The tablets were carefully preserved in great public libraries. Even
during the Turanian period, before the Semites had entered the land, one
or more of these collections existed in each of the chief cities of Accad
and Shumir. "Accad," says Sayce, "was the China of Asia. Almost every one
could read and write." Erech was especially renowned for its great
library, and was known as "the City of Books."

[Illustration: CHALDAEAN TABLET.]

THE RELIGION.--The Accadian religion, as revealed by the tablets, was
essentially the same as that held today by the nomadic Turanian tribes of
Northern Asia--what is known as Shamanism. It consisted in a belief in
good and evil spirits, of which the latter held by far the most prominent
place. To avert the malign influence of these wicked spirits, the
Accadians had resort to charms and magic rites. The religion of the
Semites was a form of Sabaeanism,--that is, a worship of the heavenly
bodies,--in which the sun was naturally the central object of adoration.

When the Accadians and the Semites intermingled, their religious systems
blended to form one of the most influential religions of the world--one
which spread far and wide under the form of Baal worship. There were in
the perfected system twelve primary gods, at whose head stood Il, or Ra.
Besides these great divinities, there were numerous lesser and local
deities.

There were features of this old Chaldaean religion which were destined to
exert a wide-spread and potent influence upon the minds of men. Out of the