st Babylonian
Dynasty wrote their votive inscriptions sometimes in Sumerian, sometimes
in Semitic Babylonian; at other times they employed both languages
for the same text, writing the record first in Sumerian and afterwards
appending a Semitic translation by the side; and in the legal and
commercial documents of the period the old Sumerian legal forms and
phrases were retained intact. In Elam we may suppose that the use of the
Sumerian and Semitic languages was the same.

It may be surmised, however, that the first Semitic incursions into Elam
took place at a much later period than those into Babylonia, and under
very different conditions. When overrunning the plains and cities of the
Sumerians, the Semites were comparatively uncivilized, and, so far as we
know, without a system of writing of their own. The incursions into
Elam must have taken place under the great Semitic conquerors, such as
Sar-gon and Naram-Sin and Alu-usharshid. At this period they had fully
adopted and modified the Sumerian characters to express their own
Semitic tongue, and on their invasion of Elam they brought their system
of writing with them. The native princes of Elam, whom they conquered,
adopted it in turn for many of their votive texts and inscribed
monuments when they wished to write them in the Babylonian language.

Such is the most probable explanation of the occurrence in Elam of
inscriptions in the Old Babylonian language, written by native princes
concerning purely domestic matters. But a further question now suggests
itself. Assuming that this was the order in which events took place,
are we to suppose that the first Semitic invaders of Elam found there a
native population in a totally undeveloped stage of civilization? Or did
they find a population enjoying a comparatively high state of culture,
different from their own, which they proceeded to modify and transform!
Luckily, we have not to fall back on conjecture for an answer to these
questions, for a recent discovery at Susa has furnished material from
which it is possible to reconstruct in outline the state of culture of
these early Elamites.

This interesting discovery consists of a number of clay tablets
inscribed in the proto-Elamite system of writing, a system which was
probably the only one in use in the country during the period before the
Semitic invasion. The documents in question are small, roughly formed
tablets of clay very similar to those employed in the early pe