[377] G. Smith, loc. cit. p. 154, 155, 169, 201. "Disc." p. 338.
[378] Above, p. 163. It is certain that Psammetichus's reign ends in the year 610 B.C.; Boeckh, "Manetho," Zeitschr. "für Geschich.," s. 716 ff., Unger, "Manetho," s. 280. Herodotus and Manetho allot 54 years to the reign of Psammetichus, and an Apis-pillar tells us that a new Apis was installed in the month Athyr of the 54th year of the reign of Psammetichus. Necho therefore died before, or in the year 664 B.C. (610 + 54).
[379] G. Smith, "Assurb." p. 66; "Disc." p. 332. In the computation of Herodotus, the accession of Gyges of Lydia takes place in 719 or 716, according as the fall of Sardis is put in 549 or 546 B.C.; his death takes place in 681 or 678 B.C. In the canon of Eusebius, on the same data, he is computed to have ascended the throne in 699 or 696, and to have reigned till 663 or 660. In the list of Lydian kings (Euseb. "Chron." I, p. 69, ed. Schöne), he ascended, on the same data, in 689 or 686, and reigned to 653 or 650 B.C. The latter dates must be accepted if Gyges sent help to Psammetichus. Samul-sum-ukin would not have found it necessary to invite the prince or princes of Miluhhi to rebellion, if Egypt had revolted from Assyria before his rebellion—Miluhhi must then be used on the cylinder in a wider sense for Egypt and Meroe—and Gyges could not send any help to Psammetichus, if he was not king himself. We are not in a position to fix accurately the date of the rebellion of Samul-sum-ukin, since the list of the Assyrian rulers breaks off with the year 665 B.C. The fact that it is the sixth war of Assurbanipal in which he marches against his brother—I enumerate the wars according to Cylinder A—only proves that the war cannot have taken place before 660 B.C. In the astronomical canon the reign of Saosduchinus ends with the year 648 B.C.; and we may therefore assume with certainty that the overthrow of Samul-sum-ukin took place in this year. How long before this Samul-sum-ukin took up arms, we do not know; he may very well have done so in the year 652 B.C. For the rebellion was not brought to a close till after a long siege of Babylon: or the rebellion may have commenced even earlier, so that Gyges could undoubtedly have sent help to Psammetichus in the last years of his reign. The cylinders, which narrate the history of the wars of Assurbanipal, date from the year of Samasdainani, who in Cylinder A is called viceroy of Accad, and on the others viceroy of Babel. We are not in a position to fix definitely the place of this year. A tablet of Erech bears the date of 20 Nisan of the twentieth year of Assurbanipal in Babel (Ménant, "Annal." p. 29 ff.). As Assurbanipal must have dated his rule in Babylon from the overthrow of Samul-sum-ukin, and Assurbanipal himself died in the year 626 B.C., Samul-sum-ukin's death must have taken place at least before 646 B.C. On the cylinders and on the reliefs in his palace at Nineveh, Assurbanipal merely calls himself king of Asshur. If in the documents relating to his buildings in Babylon as well as on the Babylonian brick already mentioned he calls himself king of Babel, it follows that these inscriptions belong to the period after the war with his brother. G. Smith, "Disc." p. 378, 380.
[380] G. Smith, "Assurb." p. 199; Ménant, loc. cit. p. 288.
[381] Ménant, loc. cit. p. 293; G. Smith, loc. cit. p. 165-168, 181.
[382] G. Smith, "Disc." p. 349 ff. If Babylon fell in the sixth war, 648B.C., the destruction of Susa at the end of the eighth war cannot have taken place earlier than in the year 645 B.C.
[383] G. Smith, "Disc." p. 371; "Assurb." p. 237, 241, 243, 304, 306; Ménant, loc. cit. p. 291.
[384] Ezekiel xxxii. 24.
[385] G. Smith, "Assurb." p. 299; "Assyr. Canon," p. 148.
[386] G. Smith, "Disc." p. 370.