He was worshipped under the symbol of a conical stone, probably an aerolite, surmounted by a gilded crescent, and the ground-plan of the town roughly described a crescent-shaped curve in honour of its patron. His cult, even down to late times, was connected with cruel practices; generations after the advent to power of the Abbasside caliphs, his faithful worshippers continued to sacrifice to him human victims, whose heads, prepared according to the ancient rite, were accustomed to give oracular responses.* The government of the surrounding country was in the hands of princes who were merely vicegerents:** Chaldaean civilization before the beginnings of history had more or less laid hold of them, and made them willing subjects to the kings of Babylon.*** * Without seeking to specify exactly which were the doctrines introduced into Harranian religion subsequently to the Christian era, we may yet affirm that the base of this system of faith was merely a very distorted form of the ancient Chaldaean worship practised in the town. ** Only one vicegerent of Mesopotamia is known at present, and he belongs to the Assyrian epoch. His seal is preserved in the British Museum. *** The importance of Harran in the development of the history of the first Chaldaean empire was pointed out by Winckler; but the theory according to which this town was the capital of the kingdom, called by the Chaldaean and Assyrian scribes "the kingdom of the world," is justly combated by Tiele. These sovereigns were probably at the outset somewhat obscure personages, without much prestige, being sometimes independent and sometimes subject to the rulers of neighbouring states, among others to those of Agade. In later times, when Babylon had attained to universal power, and it was desired to furnish her kings with a continuous history, the names of these earlier rulers were sought out, and added to those of such foreign princes as had from time to time enjoyed the sovereignty over them--thus forming an interminable list which for materials and authenticity would well compare with that of the Thinite Pharaohs. This list has come down to us incomplete, and its remains do not permit of our determining the exact order of reigns, or the status of the individuals who composed it. We find in it, in the period immediately subsequent to the Deluge, mention of mythical heroes, followed by names which are still semi-legendary, such as Sargon the Elder; the princes of the series were, however, for the most part real beings, whose memories had been preserved by tradition, or whose monuments were still existing in certain localities. Towards the end of the XXVth century before our era, however, a dynasty rose into power of which all the members come within the range of history.*