This fact we learn from
the unpublished chronicle to which reference has already been made, and
the name of this new foe, as supplied by the chronicle, will render
it necessary to revise all current schemes of Babylonian chronology.
Samsu-iluna's new foe was no other than Iluma-ilu, the first king of the
Second Dynasty, and, so far from having been regarded as Samsu-iluna's
contemporary, hitherto it has been imagined that he ascended the throne
of Babylon one hundred and eighteen years after Samsu-iluna's death.
The new information supplied by the chronicle thus proves two important
facts: first, that the Second Dynasty, instead of immediately succeeding
the First Dynasty, was partly contemporary with it; second, that during
the period in which the two dynasties were contemporary they were at
war with one another, the Second Dynasty gradually encroaching on
the territory of the First Dynasty, until it eventually succeeded in
capturing Babylon and in getting the whole of the country under its
control. We also learn from the new chronicle that this Second Dynasty
at first established itself in "the Country of the Sea," that is to say,
the districts in the extreme south of Babylonia bordering on the Persian
Gulf, and afterwards extended its borders northward until it gradually
absorbed the whole of Babylonia.
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