We may now return to the difficulty introduced by the new list of Larsa kings, on which, as we have already noted, the long reign of Rîm-Sin is apparently entered as preceding the thirty-second year of Hammurabi's rule in Babylon. Soon after the publication of the chronicle, from a broken passage on which it was inferred that Rîm-Sin survived into Samsu-iluna's reign.[25] an attempt was made to explain the words as referring to a son of Rîm-Sin and not to that ruler himself.[26] But it was pointed out that the sign, which it was suggested should be rendered as "son," was never employed with that meaning in chronicles of the period,[27] and that we must consequently continue to regard the passage as referring to Rîm-Sin. It was further noted that two contract-tablets found at Tell Sifr, which record the same deed of sale, are dated the one by Rîm-Sin, and the other in Samsu-iluna's tenth year.[28] In both of these deeds the same parties are represented as carrying out the same transaction, and, although there is a difference in the price agreed upon, the same list of witnesses occur on both, and both are dated in the same month. The most reasonable explanation of the existence of the two documents would seem to be that, at the period the transaction they record took place, the possession of the town now marked by the mounds of Tell Sifr was disputed by Rîm-Sin and Samsu-iluna. Soon after the first of the deeds had been drawn up, the town may have changed hands, and, in order that the transaction should still be recognized as valid, a fresh copy of the deed was made out with the new ruler's date-formula substituted for that which was no longer current.[29] But whatever explanation be adopted, the alternative dates upon the documents, taken in conjunction with the chronicle, certainly imply that Rîm-Sin was living at least as late as Samsu-iluna's ninth year, and probably in the tenth year of his reign. If, then, we accept the face value of the figures given by the new Larsa Kings' List, we are met by the difficulty already referred to, that Rîm-Sin would have been an active political force in Babylonia some eighty-three years after his own accession to the throne. And assuming that he was merely a boy of fifteen when he succeeded his brother at Larsa, he would have been taking the field against Samsu-iluna in his ninety-eighth year.[30] But it is extremely unlikely that he was so young at his accession, and, in view of the improbabilities involved, it is preferable to scrutinize the figures in the Larsa list with a view to ascertaining whether they are not capable of any other interpretation.