ruled by their own kings, who in war unite their troops against the common enemy; but are so jealous of each other, that they do not seem even to appoint a generalissimo.  On the Euphrates, between Hit and Carchemish, are, first, the Tsukhi or Shuhites, of whom no particulars are given; and, next, the Aramaeans or Syrians, who occupy both banks of the river, and possess a number of cities, no one of which is of much strength.  Above the Aramaeans are the Khatti or Hittites, whose chief city, Carchemish, is an important place; they are divided into tribes, and, like the Aramaeans, occupy both banks of the great stream.  North and north-west of their country, probably beyond the mountain-range of Amanus, are the Muskai (Moschi), an aggressive people, who were seeking to extend their territory eastward into the land of the Qummukh or people of Commagene.  These Qummukh hold the mountain country on both sides of the Upper Tigris, and have a number of strongholds, chiefly on the right bank.  To the east they adjoin on the Kirkhi, who must have inhabited the skirts of Niphates, while to the south they touch the Nairi, who stretch from Lake Van, along the line of the Tigris, to the tract known as Commagene to the Romans.  The Nairi have, at the least, twenty-three kings, each of whom governs his own tribe or city.  South of the more eastern Nairi is the country of Muzra mountain tract well peopled and full of castles, probably the region about Amadiyeh and Rowandiz.  Adjoining Muzr to the east or north-east, are the __Quwanu or Comani, who are among the most powerful of Assyria’s neighbors, being able, like the Moschi, to bring into the field an army of 20,000 men.  At this time they are close allies of the people of Muzr—­finally, across the lower Zab, on the skirts of Zagros, are various petty tribes of small account, who offer but little resistance to the arms of the invader.

Such was the position of Assyria among her neighbors in the latter part of the twelfth century before Christ.  She was a compact and powerful kingdom, centralized under a single monarch, and with a single great capital, in the midst of wild tribes which clung to a separate independence, each in its own valley or village.  At the approach of a great danger, these tribes might consent to coalesce and to form alliances, or even confederations; but the federal tie, never one of much tenacity, and rarely capable of holding its ground in the presence of monarchic vigor, was here especially weak.  After one defeat of their joint forces by the Assyrian troops, the confederates commonly dispersed, each flying to the defence of his own city or territory, with a short-sighted selfishness which deserved and ensured defeat.  In one direction only was Assyria confronted by a rival state pomsessing a power and organization in character not unlike her own, though scarcely of equal strength.  On her southern frontier, in the broad flat plain intervening between the Mesopotamian upland and the sea—­the