Another king of Kish, whose name has been recovered in short votive inscriptions from Abû Habba[26] and Niffer is Manishtusu.[27] But fortunately for our knowledge of his reign, we possess a monument, which, though giving little information of an historical nature, is of the greatest value for the light it throws upon the Semitic character of the population and the economical conditions which prevailed in Northern Babylonia at the time it was drawn up. This monument is the famous Obelisk of Manishtusu,[28] which was discovered by M. de Morgan at Susa, during his first season's work on that site in the winter of 1897-8. On the obelisk is engraved a text in some sixty-nine columns, written in Semitic Babylonian, and recording the purchase by Manishtusu of large tracts of cultivated land situated in the neighbourhood of Kish and of three other cities in Northern Babylonia. Each of the four sides of the stone is devoted to a separate area or tract of land, near one of the four great cities. Thus the first side records the purchase of certain land made up of three estates and known as the Field of Baz, which lay near the city of Dûr-Sin; the second side records the purchase of the Field of Baraz-sîrim, near the city of Kish, Manishtusu's capital; the third side, like the first, deals with three estates, and these together were known as the Meadow (or, strictly, the Marsh) of Ninkharsag, near the city of Marad; while the fourth side is concerned with the purchase of the Field of Shad-Bitkim and Zimanak, near a city the name of which may be provisionally rendered as Shid-tab.[29] The great length of the inscription is due to the fact that, in addition to giving details with regard to the size, value, and position of each estate, the text enumerates by name the various proprietors from whom the land was purchased, the former overseers or managers who were dispossessed, and the new overseers who were installed in their place. The names of the latter are repeated on all four sides of the obelisk before the purchase-formula.
[Illustration: MACE-HEAD DEDICATED TO THE GOD MESLAMTAEA ON BEHALF OF DUNGI, KING OF UR; AND MACE-HEAD DEDICATED TO A DEITY OR DEITIES BY LASIRAB, KING OF GUTIU.--_Brit. Mus., Nos._ 91074 _and_ 90852.]