The first question that presents itself to us when we read this inscription is how we are to reconcile the mention of Ahab in it with the date of the battle of Karkar (B.C. 853). According to the chronology adopted in the margin of our Bibles, Ahab would have been dead long before the event. The Assyrian monuments, however, have proved that this chronology exceeds the true one by more than forty years; and the date assigned to Ahab by the inscription harmonises completely with the dates that other inscriptions assign to later kings of Israel and Judah. In all probability, the battle of Karkar took place shortly before Ahab’s death; and it was no doubt in consequence of the defeat undergone there by the Syrian forces that Ahab was not only enabled to shake off his subjection to Damascus, but also to ally himself with Judah, and endeavour to recover the frontier fortress of Ramoth, of which Israel had been robbed. The alliance between Ahab and the king of Damascus is recorded in 1 Kings xx. 34. The battle of Karkar must have followed not very long afterwards, since the attack on Ramoth was made within three years after the conclusion of the alliance. Ahab’s death may, therefore, be placed in B.C. 851. Another question that may be asked is how the Assyrian monarch can say that twelve princes were arrayed in arms against him, when, according to his own enumeration, the forces of only eleven nations were present, some of which do not seem to have been under the command of any king. The only answer that can be given is that Shalmaneser is guilty of a similar arithmetical inaccuracy to that which makes him say that 14,000 of the enemy fell in battle, whereas, according to other accounts, the number was really 20,500; though it is possible that the latter number may include the loss in other battles that took place during the campaign besides the decisive one at Karkar. When, however, we find such arithmetical corruptions as these in contemporaneous documents, we need not wonder that the numerical statements of the Old Testament have become changed and uncertain in their passage through the hands of generations of copyists.