d carried off to serve as materials for the
south-western palace, whence they were rescued by Layard,
and brought in fragments to the British Museum. (2) The
_Tablets_, K. 3571 and D. T. 3, in the British Museum. (3)
The _Slabs of Nimrud_, discovered by Layard and G. Smith.

The empire still included the original patrimony of Assur and its
ancient colonies on the Upper Tigris, the districts of Mesopotamia won
from the Aramaeans at various epochs, the cities of Khabur, Khindanu,
Laqi, and Tebabni, and that portion of Bit-Adini which lay to the left
of the Euphrates. It thus formed a compact mass capable of successfully
resisting the fiercest attacks; but the buffer provinces which
Assur-nazir-pal and Shalmaneser III. had grouped round their own
immediate domains on the borders of Namri, of Nairi, of Melitene, and of
Syria had either resumed their independence, or else had thrown in their
lot with the states against which they had been intended to watch. The
Aramaean tribes never let slip an opportunity of encroaching on the
southern frontier. So far, the migratory instinct which had brought them
from the Arabian desert to the swamps of the Persian Gulf had met with
no check. Those who first reached its shores became the founders of that
nation of the Kalda which had, perhaps, already furnished Babylon with
one of its dynasties; others had soon after followed in their footsteps,
and passing beyond the Kalda settlement, had gradually made their way
along the canals which connect the Euphrates with the Tigris till they
had penetrated to the lowlands of the Uknu. Towards the middle of
the eighth century B.C. they wedged themselves in between Elam and
Karduniash, forming so many buffer states of varying size and influence.
They extended from north to south along both banks of the Tigris, their
different tribes being known as the Gambulu, the Puqudu, the Litau, the
Damunu, the Ruua, the Khindaru, the Labdudu, the Harilu, and the Rubuu;*
the Itua, who formed the vanguard, reached the valleys of the Turnat
during the reign of Kamman-nirari III. They were defeated in 791 B.C.,
but obstinately renewed hostilities in 783, 782, 777, and 769; favoured
by circumstances, they ended by forcing the cordon of Assyrian outposts,
and by the time of Assur-nirari had secured a footing on the Lower Zab.
Close by, to the east of them, lay Namri and Media, both at that time in
a state of absolute anarchy. The invasions of Menu