Essential reading for anyone interested in the deep history of state power, ideology, and collapse. Foster proves that Mesopotamia’s first empire is not a prequel—it’s the original script.
If Sargon was the sword, his grandson, Naram-Sin (r. 2254–2218 BCE), was the scholar-king who codified the new order. The "Age of Agade" is not defined merely by violence, but by a radical political philosophy: the transformation of kingship into divinity.