An indication that we are right in placing the southern conquests of Eannatum before the war with Umma may, perhaps, be seen in the invocations to deities engraved upon the Stele of the Vultures with which Eannatum sought to protect his treaty. In the course of the invocations Eannatum states that he has made offerings to the goddess Ninkharsag in the city of Kesh, to Enzu, the Moon-god, in Ur, and to Babbar, the Sun-god, in Larsa. These passages we may assume refer to offerings made by Eannatum in his character of suzerain, and, if this view is correct, we must conclude that the conquest of these cities had already taken place. The invocation to Enki perhaps presupposes that Eridu also was in the hands of Eannatum at this time, a corollary that would almost necessarily follow, if the three neighbouring cities of Ur, Erech, and Larsa had fallen before his arms. Accordingly, the list of gods by whom Eannatum and the men of Umma swore to preserve the treaty becomes peculiarly significant. They were selected on political as much as on purely religious grounds, and in their combined jurisdiction represented the extent of Eannatum's dominion in Sumer at the time. That a ruler should be in a position to exact an oath by such powerful city-gods was obviously calculated to inspire respect for his own authority, while the names of the gods themselves formed a sufficient guarantee that divine punishment would surely follow any violation of the treaty. The early successes gained by Eannatum, by which he was enabled to exercise suzerainty over the principal cities of Southern Babylonia, may well have been the cause of his arousing the active hostility of Kish and Opis. When he had emerged victorious from his subsequent struggle with the northern cities, we may assume that he claimed the title of king, which he employs in place of his more usual title of patesi in certain passages in the text of his treaty with Umma.