History of Egypt, Chaldæa, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 4 (of 12)Maspero, G. (Gaston)
History
History of Egypt, Chaldæa, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 4 (of 12)
Maspero, G. (Gaston)
Civilization, Ancient; Egypt -- History -- To 640 A.D.; History, Ancient; Middle East -- History
*** All these identifications are furnished by the glossary
of Delitzsch. Ubriash, under the form of Buriash, is met
with in a large number of proper names, Burnaburiash,
Shagashaltiburiash, Ulamburiash, Kadashmanburiash, where the
Assyrian scribe translates it _Bel-matati_, lord of the
world: Buriash is, therefore, an epithet of the god who was
called Ramman in Chaldaea. The name of the moon-god is
mutilated, and only the initial syllable Shi... remains,
followed by an indistinct sign: it has not yet been
restored.
**** Halevy considers Khala, or Khali, as a harsh form of
Gula: if this is the case, the Cossaeans must have borrowed
the name, and perhaps the goddess herself, from their
Chaldaean neighbours.
The Chaldaean Ninip corresponded both to Gidar and Maruttash, Bel to
Kharbe and Turgu, Merodach to Shipak, Nergal to Shugab.* The Cossaean
kings, already enriched by the spoils of their neighbours, and supported
by a warlike youth, eager to enlist under their banner at the first
call,** must have been often tempted to quit their barren domains and to
swoop down on the rich country which lay at their feet. We are ignorant
of the course of events which, towards the close of the XVIIIth century
B.C., led to their gaining possession of it. The Cossaean king who seized
on Babylon was named Gandish, and the few inscriptions we possess of
his reign are cut with a clumsiness that betrays the barbarism of the
conqueror. They cover the pivot stones on which Sargon of Agade or one
of the Bursins had hung the doors of the temple of Nippur, but which
Gandish dedicated afresh in order to win for himself, in the eyes of
posterity, the credit of the work of these sovereigns.***
* Hilprecht has established the identity of Turgu with Bel
of Nippur.
** Strabo relates, from some forgotten historian of
Alexander, that the Cossaeans "had formerly been able to
place as many as thirteen thousand archers in line, in the
wars which they waged with the help of the Elymaeans against
the inhabitants of Susa and Babylon."
*** The full name of this king, Gandish or Gandash, which is
furnished by the royal lists, is written Gaddash on a
monument in the British Museum discovered by Pinches, whose
conclusions have been erroneously denied by Winckler. A
process of abbreviation, of which there are examples in the
names of other kings of the same dynasty, reduced the name
to Gande in the current language.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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