The second lecture was devoted to the first two reigns of the period, that of Abi-ešuh, who lasted 28 years (between 1711 and 1684), then that of Ammi-ditana, who occupied the throne for 37 years (from 1683 to 1647). This 65-year period represents slightly more than half of the late Paleo-Babylonian period, and we know more and more about it, not least thanks to recently published texts.
We have no information whatsoever about Abi-ešuh's life before he came to the throne. We know nothing about the circumstances of Samsu-iluna's death: it is certain, however, that he was not young when he died, since he had occupied the thronefor 37 years (and his father Hammu-rabi for 43 years). A major difficulty concerns the chronology of this reign. We have no list of the names of Abi-ešuh's years; only one tablet has preserved a few remnants, which give the sequence of the first five years. It is therefore by studying dated documents that we can try to reconstruct the order of the other formulas. An additional difficulty arises from the fact that these names of years were very long. In practice, scribes abbreviated the formulas, but not always in thesame way: we therefore have different wordings that actually correspond to a single year name. Most of the archival documents come from "Sippar", although it is not always possible to distinguish between tablets from Abu Habba, i.e. Sippar-Yahrurum, and those from tell ed-Der, i.e. Sippar-Amnanum, 6 km away. These include letters from the king to the authorities of these twin cities. In the current state of publications, Abi-ešuh is the second king of the 1st Babylonian dynasty in terms of the number of letters written, 22 in all; far from Hammu-rabi's 229 letters, but more than Samsu-iluna's 18. The tablets from the two Sippars are complemented by those from Dilbat and Kiš. Not far from the latter, a small locality called Ṣupur-Šubula has given clandestine diggers 54 tablets, the majority of which form the archives of Ubarum, who was a soldier under Abi-ešuh. Finally, we should mention the tablets from Dur-Abi-ešuh. Discovered in the 1990s on what is probably a small tell in the Nippur region, which has been badly affected by looting, they are now in private collections. Of the 300 or so tablets published to date, mostly by K. Van Lerberghe, 81 tablets are dated to Abi-ešuh: they are mainly rations of grain, flour and beer for workers, but mainly for soldiers.
