Boscawen, in a paper read at the Victoria Institute in 1886, says that inscriptions found at Larsa, a neighbouring city to Ur of the Chaldees, show that from as early a period as 3750 b.c. a Semitic population existed in the latter city, speaking a language akin to Hebrew, carrying on trade and commerce, and with a religion which, although not Monotheist, had at the head of its pantheon a supreme god, Ilu or El, from whose name that of Elohim and Allah has been inherited as the name of God by the Hebrews and Arabs. The latest discoveries all point to the earliest dates, and some authorities think that genuine traces of the earliest Accadian civilization can be found as far back as 6000 b.c. There can be no doubt, moreover, that this Sharrukin or Sargon I. is a perfect historical personage. A statue of him has been found at Agade or Accad, and also his cylinder with an inscription on it giving his name and exploits. It begins, "Sharrukin the mighty king am I," and goes on to say, "that he knew not his father, but his mother was a royal princess, who to conceal his birth placed him in a basket of rushes closed with bitumen, and cast him into the river, from which he was saved by Akki the water-carrier, who brought him up as his own child." It is singular how the same or a very similar story is told of Moses, Cyrus, and other heroes of antiquity. It is probable from this that he was a military adventurer who rose to the throne; but there can be no doubt that he was a great monarch, who united the two provinces of Shumir and Accad, or of Lower and Upper Mesopotamia, into one kingdom, as Menes did the Upper and Lower Egypts, and extended his rule over some of the adjoining countries. He says "that he had reigned for forty-five years, and governed the black-headed (Accadian) race. In multitudes of bronze chariots I rode over rugged lands. I governed the upper countries. Three times to the coast of the sea I advanced." If there is any truth in this inscription it would be very interesting as showing the existence in Western Asia of nations to be conquered in great campaigns, with a force of horse-chariots, at this remote period, 2000 years earlier than the campaigns of Ahmes and Thotmes recorded in the Egyptian monuments of the eighteenth dynasty.
CYLINDER SEAL OF SARGON I., FROM AGADE. (Hommel, "Gesch. Babyloniens u. Assyriens.")
The reality of these campaigns is moreover confirmed by inscriptions and images of this Sargon having been found in Cyprus and on the opposite coast of Syria, and by a Babylonian cylinder of his son Naram-Sin, found by Cesnola in the Cyprian temple of Kurion. In another direction he and his son carried their arms into the peninsula of Sinai, attracted doubtless by the copper and turquoise mines of Wady Maghera, which were worked by the Egyptians under the third dynasty. Sargon I. is also known to have been a great patron of literature, and to have founded the library of Agade, which was long one of the most famous in Babylonia. A work on Astronomy and Astrology, in seventy-two books, which was so well known in the time of Berosus as to be translated by him into Greek, was also compiled for him.
Another king of the same name, known as Sargon II., who reigned about 2000 b.c., either founded or enlarged the library of the priestly college at Erech, which was one of the oldest and most famous cities of Lower Chaldæa, and known as the "City of Books." It was also considered to be a sacred city, and its necropolis extends over a great part of the adjoining desert, and contains innumerable tombs and graves ranging over all periods of Chaldæan and Assyrian history, up to an unknown antiquity.
The exact historical date of Sargon I. may be a little uncertain; but whatever its antiquity may be, it is evident that it is already far removed from the beginnings of Chaldæan civilization. Sargon II. is perfectly historical, and his library and the state of the arts and literature in his reign prove this conclusively. He states in his tablets that 350 kings had reigned before him, and in such a literary age he could hardly have made such a statement without some foundation. If anything like this number of kings had reigned before 2000 b.c., the date of Sargon II.'s Chaldæan chronology would have to be extended to a date preceding that of Egypt. Moreover, Sargon was a Semite, who founded a powerful monarchy over a mixed population, consisting mainly of a primitive Accadian race, who had already built large cities and famous temples, written sacred books, and made considerable progress in literature, science, agriculture, and industrial arts. This primitive race was neither Semitic nor Aryan, but Turanian. They spoke an agglutinative language, and resembled the Chinese very much both in physical type and in character. They were a short, thick-set people, with yellow skins, coarse black hair, and, judging from the ancient statues recently discovered, of decidedly Tartar or Mongolian features. They were, like the Chinese, a peaceable, patient, and industrious people, addicted to agriculture, and specially skilled in irrigation. They were educated and literary, but very superstitious in regard to ghosts, omens, and evil spirits. This resemblance to the Chinese has been remarkably confirmed by the discovery made within the last few years, that the Accadian and Chinese languages are closely allied, and that a great many words are identical. The early prehistoric and astronomical legends were almost similar, and in some instances, as in the division of the year, the names and order of the planets, and the number and duration of the fabulous reigns of gods, so identical as to leave no doubt of their having had a common origin. But as the Chinese annals do not extend farther back than about 2700 b.c., the priority of invention must be assigned to the Accadians.
This Turanian population had been long settled in Mesopotamia before the accession of Sargon I., and before the supremacy of the Semitic races began to assert itself. Though called Accadian, which is said to mean "Highlanders," their principal seat was in Shumir or Lower Mesopotamia, in the alluvial delta formed in the course of ages by the Euphrates, Tigris, and other rivers which flow into the Persian Gulf; and their traditions point to their civilization having come from the shores of this Gulf, and having gradually spread northwards. Their most ancient cities and temples were in the Lower Province of Shumir, and the bulk of the population continued for ages to be Turanian, while in Accad or Upper Mesopotamia, where the land rises from the alluvial plain up to the mountains of Kurdistan and Armenia, the Semitic element preponderated from an early period, though the civilization and religion long remained those of Shumir or Chaldæa proper.
When the Semite Sargon I. founded the united monarchy, the capital of which was Agade in the upper province, he made no change in the established state of things, maintained the old temples, and built new ones to the same gods. Before his reign we have, as in the parallel case of Egypt before Menes, little definite information from monuments or historical records. We only know that the country was divided into a number of small states, each grouped about a city with a temple dedicated to some god; as Eridhu, the sanctuary of Ea, one of the trinity of supreme gods; Larsam, with its Temple of the Sun; Ur, the city of the Moon-god; Sirgalla, with another famous temple. These small states were ruled by patesi, or priest-kings, a term corresponding to the Horsheshu of Egypt; and a fortunate discovery by M. de Sarzec in 1881 at Tell-loh, the site of the ancient Sirgalla, has given us valuable information respecting its patesi. To the surprise of the scientific world, with whom it had been a settled belief that no statues were ever found in Assyrian art, M. de Sarzec discovered and brought home nine large statues of diorite, a very hard black basalt of the same material as that of the statue of Chephren, the builder of the second pyramid, and in the same sitting attitude. The heads had been broken off, but one head was discovered which was of unmistakably Turanian type, beardless, shaved, and with a turban for head-dress. With these statues a number of small works of art were found, representing men and animals of a highly artistic design and exquisite finish, and also several cylinders. Both these and the backs of the statues are covered with cuneiform inscriptions in the old Accadian characters, which furnish valuable historical information. The name of one of the patesi whose statues were found was Gud-Ea, and his date is computed by some of the best authorities at from 4000 to 4500 b.c., probably earlier, and certainly not later than 4000 b.c. This makes the patesi of Sirgalla contemporary with the earliest Egyptian kings, or even earlier, and it shows a state of the arts and civilization then prevailing in Chaldæa very similar to those of the fourth dynasty in Egypt, and in both cases as advanced as those of 2000 or 3000 years later date.