and his son Anniy, “citizens of Sidon, the crown of the gods,” we know that they have come from the Phœnician coast.[129] Like the cuneiform tablets, they bear witness to the long-continued influence of Babylonian culture in Canaan on its literary side. When we turn to theology and law, the same influence is recognizable. The deities of Canaan were to a large extent Babylonian, with Babylonian names. The Babylonian gods Ana, Nebo, Rimmon (Rammân), Hadad and Dagon meet us in the names of places and persons, and Ashtoreth, who shared with Baal the devotion of the inhabitants of Palestine, is the Babylonian Istar with the suffix of the feminine attached to her name. Even Asherah, in whom Semitic scholars were long inclined to see a genuinely Canaanitish goddess, turns out to have been of Babylonian origin, and to be the feminine counterpart of Asir, or Asur, the national god of Assyria. The recently-discovered legal code of Khammu-rabi has shown that such glimpses as we have in the Book of Genesis of the laws and legal customs of Canaan in the patriarchal age all presuppose Babylonian law. From time to time usages are referred to and laws implied which have no parallel in the Mosaic code, and are therefore presumably pre-Israelite. But though they have no parallel in the Mosaic code, we have now learnt that they were all provided for in the code of Khammu-rabi. Thus Abram’s adoption of his slave and house-steward Eliezer is in strict accordance with the provisions of the old Babylonian law. Adoption, indeed, which was practically unknown among the Israelites, was a leading feature in Babylonian life, and the childless man was empowered to adopt an heir, even from among his slaves, to whom he left his name and his property. So, again, Sarai’s conduct in regard to Hagar, or Rachel’s conduct in regard to Bilhah, is explained by the Babylonian enactment which allowed the wife to present her husband with a concubine; while we can now understand why Hagar was not sold after her quarrel with Sarai, for the Babylonian law laid down that “if a man has married a wife, and she has given a concubine to her husband by whom he has had a child, should the concubine afterwards have a dispute with her mistress because she has borne children, her mistress cannot sell her; she can only lay a task upon her and make her live with the other slaves.”