Page:The Chaldean Account of Genesis (1876).djvu/338

 period than 1,000 years. The Median or Elamite conquest took place about 2450, and, if we allow the round number 1,000 years for the previous period, it will make the Flood fall about  3500. In a fragmentary inscription with a list of Babylonian kings, some names are given which appear to belong to the 86 kings of Berosus, but our information about this period is so scanty that nothing can be said about this dynasty, and a suggestion as to the date of the Deluge must be received with more than the usual grain of salt.

We can see, however, that there was a civilized race in Babylonia before the Median Conquest, the progress of which must have received a rude shock when the country was overrun by the uncivilized Eastern borderers.

Among the fragmentary notices of this period is the portion of the inscription describing the building of the Tower of Babel and the dispersion, unfortunately too mutilated to make much use of it.

It is probable from the fragments of Berosus that the incursions and dominion of the Elamites lasted about two hundred years, during which the country suffered very much from them.

I think it probable that Izdubar, or Nimrod, owed a great portion of his fame in the first instance to his slaying Humbaba, and that he readily found the means of uniting the country under one sceptre, as the people saw the evils of disunion, which weakened them and laid them open to foreign invasion.