Bishri[916] to the sword, and advancing northwards, devastated the frontier lands (Muzri), which lay now, as we have seen, beyond Kummukh, nearer to the kingdom of Malatia. The Kumani, dwelling probably in the mountainous region round Comana (Shahr), seem to have gone out to the assistance of their kinsfolk, harassing the Assyrian probably on his left flank. But their native fastnesses and walled cities did not protect them from the vengeance of the Assyrian. Their advanced troops were overcome and imprisoned in the fortress of Arinni; while the remainder of their fighting men, some 20,000 strong, who lay entrenched on Mount Tala, were driven out and pursued as far as the range of Kharusa, on the frontiers.[917] Kibshuna, the capital of the Kumani, surrendered. The states of Syria were the next to fall to the Assyrian conqueror, for a fresh expedition passing up the Orontes seems to have crossed the Lebanon and reached the Mediterranean coast northward from Beyrout.[918] Though the expeditions of Tiglath-Pileser I. were far-reaching, they do not seem to have established anything like a permanent hold over the Hittite states of Syria. Carchemish, upon the frontier, does not seem to have lost any of its independence, and it may be suspected that after the decline of the Hatti, this state remained the chief centre of the Hittite power.[919] There is indeed a suggestion that its kings were descended from, or early related to, the Hatti rulers,[920] and that at one time, perhaps in the eleventh century, they held sway as far as Gurun,[921] in the valley of the Tochma Su, indicating a kingdom which embraced all the central Hittite states. However that may be, some names of the early kings of Carchemish have been handed down among the archives of the Hatti,[922] under whom it seems clearly to have been already a state of major importance; and its independence was maintained, in name at least, as late as any of which the history is known. The apparent independence of Carchemish throughout the reign of Tiglath-Pileser is not only a testimony to its own military resources, but an indication that the Assyrian conquests were not secured. The time of the great Assyrian empire was not yet, and as the Assyrian power gradually weakened for a while, so did that of the Hittite states revive. For something like a century and a half, until about 950 B.C., some semblance of Assyrian authority may still be traced on the near side of the Euphrates,[923] but in view of the history of these times it may be said that during the tenth century B.C., until the renewal of Assyrian invasions (about 850 B.C.), the Hittite states of Syria were free, and their works illustrate to us their latent vitality and the revival of their traditions.