ria. Kami to the south of the Turnat, and
Dibina on Mount Yalrnan, suffered the same fate, but Gananate held out
for a time; its garrison, however, although reinforced by troops from
the surrounding country, was utterly routed before its walls, and the
survivors, who fled for refuge to the citadel in the centre of the town,
were soon dislodged. The Babylonians, who had apparently been taken by
surprise at the first attack, at length made preparations to resist
the invaders. The Prince of Dur-papsukal, who owned allegiance to
Marduk-balatsu-ikbi, King of Babylon, had disposed his troops so as
to guard the fords of the Tigris, in order to prevent the enemy from
reaching his capital. But Samsi-ramman dispersed this advanced force,
killing thirteen thousand, besides taking three thousand prisoners, and
finally reduced Dur-papsukal to ashes.

[148.jpg MONOLITH OF SAMSI-RAMMAN IV]

Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Mansell. The
original is in the British Museum.

The respite thus obtained gave Marduk-balatsu-ikbi sufficient time to
collect the main body of his troops: the army was recruited from Kalda
and Ela-mites, soldiers from Namri, and Aramaean contingents, and the
united force awaited the enemy behind the ruins of Dur-papsukal,
along the banks of the Daban canal. Five thousand footmen, two hundred
horsemen, one hundred chariots, besides the king's tent and all his
stores, fell into the hands of the Assyrians. The victory was complete;
Babylon, Kuta, and Borsippa capitulated one after the other, and the
invaders penetrated as far as the land of the Kalda, and actually
reached the Persian Gulf. Samsi-ramman offered sacrifices to the
gods, as his father had done before him, and concluded a treaty with
Marduk-balatsu-ikbi, the terms of which included rectification of
boundaries, payment of a subsidy, and the other clauses usual in
such circumstances; the peace was probably ratified by a matrimonial
alliance, concluded between the Babylonian princess Sammuramat and
Bamman-nirari, son of the conqueror. In this manner the hegemony of
Assyria over Karduniash was established even more firmly than before
the insurrection; but all available resources had been utilised in the
effort necessary to secure it. Samsi-ramman had no leisure to reconquer
Syria or Asia Minor, and the Euphrates remained the western frontier of
his kingdom, as it had been in the early days of Shalmaneser III. The
peace with Babylon, mo