THE BABYLONIAN PERIOD
or so of them have been dug up and dispersed over two continents.
Ur and Haran were probably both distinctly literary cities for they were centers of Moon-god worship and the Moon-god everywhere, Egypt and Greece as well as Babylonia, was a patron of literature, and in general the number of libraries and the quantity of tablets which date from Abram's time or earlier, found in the excavated places, is a matter of perennial wonder. Lagash or Shirpurla (Tello) and her great rival Umma (Jôkha) have yielded enormous quantities, Fara and Abu Hatab many and they were nearly all of this period for the cities were early destroyed and not rebuilt. Enormous quantities came also from Nippur, but not all early. Sippara (Abu Habba), Babylon and Borsippa have yielded thousands of tablets of the period. Warka (Erech) Mukayyar (Ur) Abu Shahrain (Eridu) and others have yielded something and
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