uthern)
provinces so firmly, that he could venture to conduct an expedition into
Lower Syria, and to claim there the fealty of Assyrians vassals. Or
possibly he may have been a Babylonian monarch, who in the troublous
times that had now evidently come upon the northern empire, possessed
himself of the Euphrates valley, and thence descended upon Syria and
Palestine. Berosus, it must be remembered, represented Pul as a
Chaldaean king; and the name itself, which is wholly alien to the
ordinary Assyrian type, has at least one counterpart among known
Babylonian namies.

The time of Pul's invasion may be fixed by combining the Assyrian and
the Hebrew chronologies within very narrow limits. Tiglath-Pileser
relates that he took tribute from Menahem in a war which lasted from his
fourth to his eighth year, or from B.C. 742 to B.C. 738. As Menahem only
reigned ten years, the earliest date that can be assigned to Puls
expedition will be B.C. 752, while the latest possible date will be B.C.
746, the year before the accession of Tiglath-Pileser. In any case the
expedition fells within the eight years assigned by the Assyrian Canon
to the reign of Asshur-lush, Tiglath-Pileser's immediate predecessor.

It is remarkable that into this interval falls also the famous era of
Nabonassar, which must have marked some important change, dynastic or
other, at Babylon. The nature of the change will be considered at length
in the Babylonia a section. At present it is sufficient to observe that,
in the declining condition of Assyria under the kings who followed
Vul-lush III., there was naturally a growth of power and independence
among the border countries. Babylon, repenting of the submission which
she had made either to Vul-lush III., or to his father, Shamas-Vul II.,
once more vindicated her right to freedom, and resumed the position of a
separate and hostile monarchy. Samaria, Damascus, Judaea, ceased to pay
tribute. Enterprising kings, like Jeroboam II., and Menahem, taking
advantage of Assyria's weakness, did not content themselves with merely
throwing off her yoke, but proceeded to enlarge their dominions at the
expense of her feudatories. Judging of the unknown from the known, we
may assume that on the north and east there were similar defections to
those on the west and south--that the tribes of Armenia and of the
Zagros range rose in revolt, and that the Assyrian boundaries were thus
contracted in every quarter.

At the same time, wit