Sargon of Agade and his significance--Early recognition of his place in history--The later traditions of Sargon and the contemporary records of Shar-Gani-sharri's reign--Discovery at Susa of a monument of "Sharru-Gi, the King"--Probability that he was Manishtusu's father and the founder of the kingdom of Kish--Who, then, was Sargon?--Indications that only names and not facts have been confused in the tradition--The debt of Akkad to Kish in art and politics--Expansion of Semitic authority westward under Shar-Gani-sharri--The alleged conquest of Cyprus--Commercial intercourse at the period and the disappearance of the city-state--Evidence of a policy of deportation--The conquest of Narâm-Sin and the "Kingdom of the Four Quarters"--His Stele of Victory and his relations with Elam--Narâm-Sin at the upper reaches of the Tigris, and the history of the Pir Hussein Stele--Narâm-Sin's successors--Representations of Semitic battle-scenes--The Lagash Stele of Victory, probably commemorating the original conquest of Kish by Akkad--Independent Semitic principalities beyond the limits of Sumer and Akkad--The reason of Akkadian pre-eminence and the deification of Semitic kings CHAPTER IX THE LATER RULERS OF LAGASH Sumerian reaction tempered by Semitic influence--Length of the intervening period between the Sargonic era and that of Ur--Evidence from Lagash of a sequence of rulers in that city who bridge the gap--Archaeological and epigraphic data--Political condition of Sumer and the semi-independent position enjoyed by Lagash--Ur-Bau representative of the earlier patesis of this epoch--Increase in the authority of Lagash under Gudea--His conquest of Anshan--His relations with Syria, Arabia, and the Persian Gulf--His influence of a commercial rather than of a political character--Development in the art of building which marked the later Sumerian period--Evolution of the Babylonian brick and evidence of new architectural ideas--The rebuilding of E-ninnû and the elaborate character of Sumerian ritual--The art of Gudea's period--His reign the golden age of Lagash--Gudea's posthumous deification and his cult--The relations of his son, Ur-Ningirsu, to the Dynasty of Ur CHAPTER X THE DYNASTY OF UR AND THE KINGDOM OF SUMER AND AKKAD