The Victory Stele of Naram-Sin (presently housed in the Louvre) celebrates the victory of the Akkadian monarch over Satuni, king of the Lullubi (a tribe in the Zagros Mountains) and depicts Naram-Sin ascending the mountain, trampling on the bodies of his enemies, in the image of a god. In the thirty-six years he ruled, he expanded the boundaries of the empire, kept order within, increased trade, and personally campaigned with his army beyond the Persian Gulf and, possibly, even to Egypt. Like his father and uncle before him, Naram-Sin had to suppress rebellions across the empire before he could begin to govern but, once he began, the empire flourished under his reign. Naram-Sin: Greatest of the Akkadian KingsManishtusu was succeeded by his son Naram-Sin (also Naram-Suen) who reigned from 2261-2224 BCE. His death is somewhat of a mystery but, according to some scholars, Leick among them, 'Manishtusu was killed by his courtiers with their cylinder seals' though no definite motive has been offered for the killing( The A-Z of Mesopotamia, 111). It should also be noted that Sargon was not the first ruler to unite the disparate cities and tribes under one rule. The King of & the Rise of SargonThe language of the city, Akkadian, was already in use before the rise of the Akkadian Empire (notably in the wealthy city of Mari where vast tablets have helped to define events for later historians) and it is possible that Sargon restored Akkad, rather than built it. While the size and scope of the empire based in Akkad is disputed, there is no doubt that Sargon the Great created the first multi-national empire in the world. (or his scribes) claimed that the Akkadian Empire stretched from the Persian Gulf through modern-day Kuwait, Iraq, (possibly Lebanon) through the lower part of to the Sea and (there is also a claim it stretched as far as in the ). According to legend, it was built by the king (who ruled 2334-2279 BCE) who unified Mesopotamia under the rule of his Akkadian Empire and set the standard for future forms of government in Mesopotamia. It is known that Akkad (also given as Agade) was a city located along the western bank of the Euphrates River possibly between the of Sippar and Kish (or, perhaps, between and or, even, elsewhere along the Euphrates). No one knows where the of was located, how it rose to prominence, or how, precisely, it fell yet once it was the seat of the Akkadian which ruled over a vast expanse of the region of ancient.
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