in a state of submission and vassalage, and their principal towns are governed by Assyrian officers in the same manner as those of Singara and Nisibe.  Assuruballit, the conqueror of the Cossaeans, had succeeded in establishing his authority over the turbulent hordes of Shubari which occupied the neighbourhood of the Masios, between the Khabur and the Balikh, and extended perhaps as far as the Euphrates; at any rate, he was considered by posterity as the actual founder of the Assyrian empire in these districts.* Belnirari had directed his efforts in another direction, and had conquered the petty kingdoms established on the slopes of the Iranian table-land, around the sources of the two Zabs, and those of the Badanu and the Turnat.**

* It is called, in an inscription of his great-grandson, Ramman-nirari L, the powerful king “who reduced to servitude the forces of the vast country of Shubari, and who enlarged the territory and limits “of Assur.

** The inscription of Ramman-nirari I. styles him the prince “who crushes the army of the Cossaeans, he whose hand unnerves the enemy, and who enlarges the territory and its limits.”  The Cossaeans mentioned in this passage are usually taken to be the Cossaean kings of Babylon, and not the mountain tribes.

Like Susiana, this part of the country was divided up into parallel valleys, separated from each other by broken ridges of limestone, and watered by the tributaries of the Tigris or their affluents.

[Illustration:  152.jpg A VILLAGE IN THE MOUNTAIN DISTRICTS OF THE OLD ASSAEAN KINGDOM]

     Drawn by Boudier, from a drawing by Pere Durand.

It was thickly strewn with walled towns and villages; the latter, perched upon the precipitous mountain summits, and surrounded by deep ravines, owed their security solely to their position, and, indeed, needed no fortification.  The country abounded in woods and pastures, interspersed with cornlands; access to it was gained by one or two passes on the eastern side, which thus permitted caravans or armies to reach the districts lying between the Erythraean and Caspian Seas.  The tribes who inhabited it had been brought early under Chaldaean civilization, and had adopted the cuneiform script; such of their monuments as are still extant resemble the bas-reliefs and inscriptions of Assyria.* It is not always easy to determine the precise locality occupied by these various peoples; the Guti were situated near the upper courses of the Turnat and the Badanu, in the vicinity of the Kashshu;** the Lulume had settled in the neighbourhood of the Batir, to the north of the defiles of Zohab;*** the Namar separated the Lulume from Elam, and were situated half in the plain and half in the mountain, while the Arapkha occupied, both banks of the Great Zab.