udies,
and we shall take them for our guide in a rapid indication of the ruling
character and approximate duration of each of those periods into which the
twenty centuries of development may be divided. We shall then have some
fixed points by which to guide our steps in the vast region whose monuments
we are about to explore. So that if we say that a certain fragment belongs
to the _first_ or _second Chaldaean Empire_, our readers will know, not
perhaps its exact date, but at least its relative age, and all risk of
confusing the time of Ourkam or Hammourabi with that of Nebuchadnezzar
will be avoided.

* * * * *

When we attempt to mount the stream of history and to pierce the mists
which become ever thicker as we near its source, what is it that we see? We
see the lower part of the basin through which the twin rivers make their
way, entirely occupied by tribes of various origin and blood whose ethnic
characteristics we have endeavoured to point out. These mixed populations
are divided by the Tigris into two distinct groups. These groups often came
into violent collision, and in spite of mutual relations kept up through a
long series of years, the line of demarcation between them ever remained
distinct.

Towards the east, in the plain which borders the river, and upon the
terraces which rise one above the other up to the plateau of Iran, we have
the country called by the Greeks Susiana, and by the Hebrews the kingdom of
Elam. West of the Tigris, in Mesopotamia, the first Chaldaean Empire is
slowly taking shape.

The eastern state, that of which Susa was the capital, was, at intermittent
periods, a great military power, and more than once poured its hosts, not
only over Babylonia, but over the Syrian provinces to the west of the
Euphrates. But in these momentary successes, nevertheless, the part played
by this state was, on the whole, a subordinate one. It spent itself in
bloody conflicts with the Mesopotamian empires, to which it became subject
in the end, while at no time does it appear to have done anything to
advance civilization either by isolated inventions or by general
perseverance in the ways of progress. We know very little of its internal
history, and nothing to speak of about its religion and government, its
manners and laws; but the few monuments which have been discovered suffice
to prove that its art had no independent existence, that it was never
anything better than a s