at Nippur. His son and successor was
Dungi, whose reign lasted more than 51 years, and among whose vassals was
Gudea, the _patesi_ or high-priest of Lagash. Gudea was also a great
builder, and the materials for his buildings and statues were brought from
all parts of western Asia, cedar wood from the Amanus mountains, quarried
stones from Lebanon, copper from northern Arabia, gold and precious stones
from the desert between Palestine and Egypt, dolerite from Magan (the
Sinaitic peninsula) and timber from Dilmun in the Persian Gulf. Some of his
statues, now in the Louvre, are carved out of Sinaitic dolerite, and on the
lap of one of them (statue E) is the plan of his palace, with the scale of
measurement attached. Six of the statues bore special names, and offerings
were made to them as to the statues of the gods. Gudea claims to have
conquered Anshan in Elam, and was succeeded by his son Ur-Ningirsu. His
date may be provisionally fixed at 2700 B.C.

This dynasty of Ur was Semitic, not Sumerian, notwithstanding the name of
Dungi. Dungi was followed by Bur-Sin, Gimil-Sin, and Ibi-Sin. Their power
extended to the Mediterranean, and we possess a large number of
contemporaneous monuments in the shape of contracts and similar business
documents, as well as chronological tables, which belong to their reigns.

[Sidenote: Khammurabi.]

After the fall of the dynasty, Babylonia passed under foreign influence.
Sumuabi ("Shem is my father"), from southern Arabia (or perhaps Canaan),
made himself master of northern Babylonia, while Elamite invaders occupied
the south. After a reign of 14 years Sumuabi was succeeded by his son
Sumu-la-ilu, in the fifth year of whose reign the fortress of Babylon was
built, and the city became for the first time a capital. Rival kings,
Pungun-ila and Immerum, are mentioned in the contract tablets as reigning
at the same time as Sumu-la-ilu (or Samu-la-ilu); and under Sin-muballidh,
the great-grandson of Sumu-la-ilu, the Elamites laid the whole of the
country under tribute, and made Eri-Aku or Arioch, called Rim-Sin by his
Semitic subjects, king of Larsa. Eri-Aku was the son of Kudur-Mabug, who
was prince of Yamutbal, on the eastern border of Babylonia, and also
"governor of Syria." The Elamite supremacy was at last shaken off by the
son and successor of Sin-muballidh, Khammurabi, whose name is also written
Ammurapi and Khammuram, and who was the Amraphel of Gen. xiv. 1. The
Elamites, under their king