monarch we read of in Southern Chaldea, of which Ur appears to have been in some measure the capital, at least in so far as to have a certain supremacy over the other great cities of Shumir. 26. Of these Shumir had many, even more venerable for their age and holiness than those of Accad. For the South was the home of the old race and most ancient culture, and thence both had advanced northward. Hence it was that the old stock was hardier there and endured longer in its language, religion and nationality, and was slower in yielding to the Semitic counter-current of race and culture, which, as a natural consequence, obtained an earlier and stronger hold in the North, and from there radiated over the whole of Mesopotamia. There was ERIDHU, by the sea "at the mouth of the Rivers," the immemorial sanctuary of Ea; there was SIR-GULLA, so lately unknown, now the most promising mine for research; there was LARSAM, famous with the glories of its "House of the Sun" (_E-Babbara_ in the old language), the rival of Ur, the city of the Moon-god, whose kings UR-EA and his son DUNGI were, it appears, the first to take the ambitious title of "Kings of Shumir and Accad" and "Kings of the Four Regions." As for Babylon, proud Babylon, which we have so long been accustomed to think of as the very beginning of state life and political rule in Chaldea, it was perhaps not yet built at all, or only modestly beginning its existence under its Accadian name of TIN-TIR-KI ("the Place of Life"), or, somewhat later, KA-DIMIRRA ("Gate of God"), when already the above named cities, and several more, had each its famous temple with ministering college of priests, and, probably, library, and each its king. But political power was for a long time centred at Ur. The first kings of Ur authentically known to us are Ur-ea and his son Dungi, who have left abundant traces of their existence in the numerous temples they built, not in Ur alone, but in most other cities too. Their bricks have been identified at Larsam (Senkereh), and, it appears, at Sir-burla (Tel-Loh), at Nipur (Niffer) and at Urukh (Erech, Warka), and as the two latter cities belonged to Accad, they seem to have ruled at least part of that country and thus to have been justified in assuming their high-sounding title. [Illustration: 59.--STATUE OF GUDEA, WITH INSCRIPTION; FROM TELL-LOH, (SIR-BURLA OR SIR-GULLA). SARZEC COLLECTION. (Hommel).]