The next stage of Assyrian expansion is marked by a similar occupation
of a position on the Syrian side of the Euphrates, to cover the landing
and be a gathering-place of tribute. Here stood Pitru, formerly a Hatti
town and, perhaps, the Biblical Pethor, situated beside the Sajur on
some site not yet identified, but probably near the outfall of the
stream. It received an Assyrian name in Shalmaneser's sixth year, and
was used afterwards as a base for all his operations in Syria. It served
also to mask and overawe the larger and more wealthy city of Carchemish,
a few miles north, which would remain for a long time to come free of
permanent Assyrian occupation, though subjected to blackmail on the
occasion of every western raid by the Great King.

With this last westward advance of his permanent territorial holding,
Shalmaneser appears to have rested content. He was sure of the Euphrates
passage and had made his footing good on the Syrian bank. But we cannot
be certain; for, though his known records mention the renaming of no
other Syrian cities, many may have been renamed without happening to be
mentioned in the records, and others may have been occupied by standing
Assyrian garrisons without receiving new names. Be that as it may, we
can trace, year by year, the steady pushing forward of Assyrian raiding
columns into inner Syria. In 854 Shalmaneser's most distant base of
operations was fixed at Khalman (Aleppo), whence he marched to the
Orontes to fight, near the site of later Apamea, the battle of Karkar.
Five years later, swooping down from a Cilician raid, he entered Hamath.
Six more years passed before he made more ground to the south, though he
invaded Syria again in force at least once during the interval. In 842,
however, having taken a new road along the coast, he turned inland from
Beirut, crossed Lebanon and Anti-Lebanon, and succeeded in reaching the
oasis of Damascus and even in raiding some distance towards the Hauran;