[6] According to a later literary tradition, an invasion of Elam was thwarted when his army was struck by plague and he narrowly escaped death in the stampede to return home.

In this raid he was accompanied by the Kassite chieftain Šitti-Marduk who struck the decisive blow,[i 1] he was able to overrun Elam in a surprise attack conducted from Dēr during the hottest of the summer months, Dumuzi, when the axes (held in the hand) burned like fire and the road-surfaces were scorching like flame.

[7]According to the kudduru, Nebuchadnezzar routed the Elamite king Ḫulteludiš-Inšušinak on the banks of the river Ulaya in an engagement that saw the dust of the battle darkening the sky.

No contemporary or later source records a sack of Susa by Nebuchadnezzar, but according to another kudurru he was able to retrieve the statue of Marduk (here called Bēl) and that of the goddess Il-āliya (DINGIR.URU-ia) during this or another campaign.

It opens with the king in despair, lamenting over the absence of Marduk, "beautiful Babylon pass through your heart, Turn your face toward (your temple) Esagila, which you love!"

The Synchronistic History[i 12] relates his entente cordiale with his contemporary, the Assyrian king Aššur-rēša-iši I,[i 13] and subsequently the outcome of two military campaigns against the border fortresses of Zanqi and Idi that he conducted in violation of this agreement.

The first was curtailed by the arrival of Aššur-rēša-iši's main force, causing Nabû-kudurrī-uṣur to burn his siege engines and flee, while the second resulted in a battle in which the Assyrians apparently triumphed, "slaughtered his troops (and) carried off his camp."

Lambert has suggested that it was during his reign that Marduk was elevated to the head of the pantheon, displacing Enlil and that the Enûma Eliš was possibly composed, but some historians claim an origin during the earlier Kassite dynasty.

[11] A text concerning chemical process (imitations for precious stones) bears a colophon identifying it as a copy of an older Babylonian original but places it in his library.