collecting his own troops and those of his allies, the Chaldaeans, the Aramaeans or Syrians, and the Zimri—­a vast host—­met the invader on the river Daban—­perhaps a branch of the Euphrates—­and fought a great battle in defence of his city.  He was, however, defeated by the Assyrians, with the loss of 5000 killed, 2000 prisoners, 100 chariots, 200 tents, and the royal standard and pavilion.  What further military or political results the victory may have had is uncertain.  Shamas-Vul’s annals terminate abruptly at this point, and we are left to conjecture the consequences of the campaign and battle.  It is possible that they were in the highest degree important; for we find, in the next reign, that Babylonia, which has so long been a separate and independent kingdom, is reduced to the condition of a tributary, while we have no account of its reduction by the succeeding monarch, whose relations with the Babylonians, so far as we know, were of a purely peaceful character.

The stele of Shamas-Vul contains one allusion to a hunting exploit, by which we learn that this monarch inherited his grandfather’s partiality for the chase.  He found wild bulls at the foot of Zagros when he was marching to invade Babylonia, and delaying his advance to hunt them, was so fortunate as to kill several.

We know nothing of Shamas-Vul as a builder, and but little of him as a patron of art.  He seems to have been content with the palaces of his father and grandfather, and to have been devoid of any wish to outshine them by raising edifices which should throw theirs into the shade.  In his stele he shows no originality; for it is the mere reproduction of a monument well known to his predecessors, and of which we have several specimens from the time of Asshur-izir-pal downwards.  It consists of a single figure in relief—­a figure representing the king dressed in his priestly robes, and wearing the sacred emblems round his neck, standing with the right arm upraised, and enclosed in the customary arched frame.  This figure, which is somewhat larger than life, is cut on a single solid block of stone, and then placed on another broader block, which serves as a pedestal.  It closely resembles the figure of Asshur-izir-pal, whereof a representation has been already given.

The successor of Shamas-Vul was his son Vul-lush, the third monarch of that name, who ascended the throne B.C. 810, and held it for twenty-nine years, from B.C. 810 to B.C. 781.  The memorials which we possess of this king’s reign are but scanty.  They consist of one or two slabs found at Nimrod, of a short dedicatory inscription on duplicate statues of the god Nebo brought from the same place, of some brick inscriptions from the mound of Nebbi Vunus, and of the briefest possible notices of the quarters in which he carried on war, contained in one copy of the Canon.  As none of these records are in the shape of annals except the last, and as only these and the slab notices are historical, it is impossible