he coolness of the night
rendered the heat during the day more bearable. It became the custom for
the kings and vicegerents to pass the most trying months of the year at
Nineveh, taking up their abode close to the temple of Nina, the Assyrian
Ishtar, but they did not venture to make it their habitual residence,
and consequently Assur remained the official capital and chief sanctuary
of the empire. Here its rulers concentrated their treasures, their
archives, their administrative offices, and the chief staff of the army;
from this town they set out on their expeditions against the Cossaeans of
Babylon or the mountaineers of the districts beyond the Tigris, and it
was in this temple that they dedicated to the god the tenth of the spoil
on their return from a successful campaign.*

* The majority of scholars now admit that the town of Nina, mentioned by
Gudea and the vicegerents of Telloh, was a quarter of, or neighbouring
borough of, Lagash, and had nothing in common with Nineveh, in spite of
Hommel's assumption to the contrary.

The struggle with Chaldaea, indeed, occupied the greater part of their
energies, though it did not absorb all their resources, and often left
them times of respite, of which they availed themselves to extend their
domain to the north and east. We cannot yet tell which of the Assyrian
sovereigns added the nearest provinces of the Upper Tigris to his
realm; but when the names of these districts appear-in history, they
are already in a state of submission and vassalage, and their principal
towns are governed by Assyrian officers in the same manner as those of
Singara and Nisibe. Assuruballit, the conqueror of the Cossaeans, had
succeeded in establishing his authority over the turbulent hordes of
Shubari which occupied the neighbourhood of the Masios, between the
Khabur and the Balikh, and extended perhaps as far as the Euphrates; at
any rate, he was considered by posterity as the actual founder of the
Assyrian empire in these districts.* Belnirari had directed his efforts
in another direction, and had conquered the petty kingdoms established
on the slopes of the Iranian table-land, around the sources of the two
Zabs, and those of the Badanu and the Turnat.**

* It is called, in an inscription of his great-grandson,
Ramman-nirari L, the powerful king "who reduced to servitude
the forces of the vast country of Shubari, and who enlarged
the territory and limits "of Assur.