Abstract

Yabliya (map 10) Middle Bronze Age city in the middle Euphrates region called Suhum which lay south of the kingdom of Mari. Yabliya was the capital of Lower Suhum. Hammurabi, king of Babylon (1792–1750), and Zimri-Lim, king of Mari (1774–1762), apparently both claimed possession of the city, along with the cities of Hit and Harbe (*ARM XXVI/2: 336–7, no. 449), all of which lay in the frontier region between Babylonia and Mari. The governor of Lower Suhum, who was based at Yabliya, was a man called Hammanum. He had occupied the governorship from the time Suhum was subject to Yasmah-Addu, the Assyrian viceroy at Mari (1782–1775). Military operations conducted in Suhum by forces from Eshnunna early in Zimri-Lim’s reign resulted in the capture of the city of Harbe by the Eshnunnite commander Shallurum, who dispatched a force of 5,000 troops from there to occupy Yabliya (*LKM 383–4, nos 26.479 and 26.480). These operations were intended to pave the way for Eshnunna’s seizure of the entire land of Suhum. Reinforcements sent to Yabliya to fortify it failed to prevent the city from eventually falling to the Eshnunnites, along with the nearby cities of Ayabu and Mulhan. With the support of Hammurabi, king of Babylon, Zimri-Lim regained possession of the occupied territories. His control of them was confirmed in a peace accord concluded with the Eshnunnite king Ibal-pi-El II in 1770. Possession of the cities of Yabliya, Harbe, and Hit was eventually conceded by Hammurabi to Zimri-Lim when the Babylonian and Mariote kings shared out the territories of Suhum following the retreat of the Eshnunnite forces from the region.