Anatolia thus formed a subsidiary centre for the further spread of Babylonian culture, which had reached it by way of Northern Syria before crossing the Taurus. The importance of the latter district in this connection has been already emphasized by Mr. Hogarth.[63] Every traveller from the coast to the region of the Khâbûr will endorse his description of the vast group of mounds, the deserted sites of ancient cities, which mark the surface of the country. With one or two exceptions these still await the spade of the excavator, and, when their lowest strata shall have yielded their secrets, we shall know far more of the early stages in the spread of Babylonian culture westwards. We have already noted the rôle of Syria as a connecting-link between the civilizations of the Euphrates and the Nile,[64] and it plays an equally important part in linking both of them with the centre of early Hittite culture in Asia Minor. It was by the coastal regions of Syria that the first Semitic immigrants from the south reached the Euphrates, and it was to Syria that the stream of Semitic influence, now impregnated with Sumerian culture, returned. The sea formed a barrier to any further advance in that direction, and so the current parted, and passed southwards into the Syro-Palestinian region and northwards through the Cilician Gates, whence by Hittite channels it penetrated to the western districts of Asia Minor. Here, again, the sea was a barrier to further progress westwards, and the Asiatic coast of the Aegean forms the western limit of Asiatic influence. Until the passing of the Hittite power, no attempts were made by Aegean sea-rovers or immigrants from the mainland of Greece to settle on the western coast of Asia Minor,[65] and it is not therefore surprising that Aegean culture should show such scanty traces of Babylonian influence.
Of the part which the Sumerians took in originating and moulding the civilization of Babylonia, it is unnecessary to treat at greater length. Perhaps their most important achievement was the invention of cuneiform writing, for this in time was adopted as a common script throughout the east, and became the parent of other systems of the same character. But scarcely less important were their legacies in other spheres of activity. In the arts of sculpture and seal-engraving their own achievements were notable enough, and they inspired the Semitic work of later times. The great code of Hammurabi's laws, which is claimed to have influenced western codes besides having moulded much of the Mosaic legislation, is now definitely known to be of Sumerian origin, and Urukagina's legislative effort was the direct forerunner of Hammurabi's more successful appeal to past tradition. The literature of Babylon and Assyria is based almost throughout on Sumerian originals, and the ancient ritual of the Sumerian cults survived in the later temples of both countries. Already we see Gudea consulting the omens before proceeding to lay the foundations of E-ninnû, and the practice of hepatoscopy may probably be set back into the period of the earliest Sumerian patesis. Sumer, in fact, was the principal source of Babylonian civilization, and a study of its culture supplies a key to many subsequent developments in Western Asia. The inscriptions have already yielded a fairly complete picture of the political evolution of the people, from the village community and city-state to an empire which included the effective control of foreign provinces. The archaeological record is not so complete, but in this direction we may confidently look for further light from future excavation and research.
[1] For discussions of the merits of the theory, in view of the admitted resemblance of certain features in the civilizations of Babylonia and Egypt, see King and Hall, "Egypt and Western Asia," pp. 32 ff., and Sayce, "The Archaeology of the Cuneiform Inscriptions;" cf. also De Morgan, "Les premières civilisations," pp. 170 ff. The publication of the results obtained by Dr. Reisner's prolonged diggings, supplemented by the more recent work of M. Naville at Abydos, has considerably increased the material on which a more definite decision can be based. I may add that Mr. Hall agrees with me as to the necessity of modifying many points in the theory, in consequence of the additional information that has recently become available for use. It should be noted that in his "Oldest Civilization of Greece," p. 179, n. 1, he had already emphasized the indigenous origin of much of Egyptian culture; cf. also "Egypt and Western Asia," p. 45 f.
[2] As a subsidiary meaning, the word possibly conveys the idea of soldiers armed with dagger and lance; see Maspero, "Bibliothèque Egyptologique," II., pp. 313 ff. On the walls of the temple of Edfu the Mesniu are represented as holding in the left hand a kind of dagger, and in the right a light dart tipped with metal. The important part played by metal in their armament is emphasized by these late representations, as by the name assigned them in the Legend of Edfu. They bore the same relation to their patron deity as the Shemsu-Hor, or "Followers of Horus," bore to him in his other aspect as the son of Isis.
[3] Cf. Newberry, "Annals of Archaeology," pp. 17 ff.
[4] The most striking of these comparisons is that of Asari, a Sumerian god who was afterwards identified with Marduk, and Asar, the Egyptian god Osiris. For not only is there identity of name-sound, but there is also a resemblance between the Egyptian and Sumerian sign-groups for the names (cf. Sayce, "The Archaeology of the Cuneiform Inscriptions," p. 119). The resemblance, however, is not quite so close as it is sometimes represented, for the Sumerian sign eri or uru is invariably employed for "city," a meaning which never attaches to as, the character in the corresponding half of the Egyptian group. To regard the resemblance as other than a coincidence, it is necessary to assume a very close relationship between the early religious ideas of Sumer and Egypt, an assumption that would only be justified by the strongest proofs of connection from the archaeological side.
[5] See Reisner, "The Early Dynastic Cemeteries of Naga-ed-Dêr," Part I., published as Vol. II. of the "University of California Publications," 1908.
[6] Cf. Maciver and Woolley, "Areika," pp. 14 ff. Mr. Maciver also cites the occurrence of a similar black-topped red-ware on sites in Egypt, dated between the Twelfth and Eighteenth Dynasties (op. cit., p. 16).
[7] See Reisner, "Naga-ed-Dêr," I., p. 133 f.