, no letter thence to the king has been discovered, although there
is one mention of the city Shakmi (Shechem). The genuinely ancient
passages in the scriptural accounts of the conquest in the Book of Joshua,
and still more the valuable fragments in the first chapter of Judges, are
fairly in accordance with what we here learn from the tablets.

Abdikheba's letters may be considered along with those of Milki-El and
Tagi, of whom Yanhamu, the powerful official, had just made an example.
Their voices take up the chorus of complaint:

ABDIKHEBA. "Lo! Milki-El and Tagi have done as follows.... Thus,
as the king liveth, hath Milki-El committed treachery against me.
Send Yanhamu that he may see what is done in the king's land."

MILKI-EL. "The king, my lord, shall know the deed done by Yanhamu
after I had been dismissed by the king. Lo, he took three thousand
talents from me and said to me, 'Give me thy wife and thy sons
that I may slay them.' May my lord, the king, remember this deed
and send us chariots to bring us away."

TAGI. "Am I not a servant of the king? But my brother is full of
wounds so that I can send no message by him to the king. Ask the
_rabisu_ (a title of Yanhamu) whether my brother is not full of
wounds. But we turn our eyes to thee, to know whether we may rise
to heaven or creep into the earth; our heads remain in thy hand.
Behold, I shall try to make my way to the king by the hand of the
surgeons."

MILKI-EL. "I have received the king's message. Let him send the
Pidati to protect his servant, and grains of myrrh gum for
healing."

As already pointed out, the blame for such occurrences belongs in the
first place to the Egyptian system of government. How little the petty
princes could expect, whether of good or evil, from their suzerain is
shown by glaring examples. King Burnaburiash complained that a Babylonian
trading company established by his ambassador in the Canaanite city of
Khinaton had, immediately after the ambassador's departure, been attacked
and utterly plundered. The principals were killed, and the rest--some of
them mutilated--were sent into slavery. "Canaan is thy land; thou art king
of it," continues Burnaburiash. "It was in thy land that I suffered this
injury; therefore restrain the doers of it. Replace the stolen gold, and
slay the murderers of my subjects to avenge their blood." Whether this was
done