<span>a failure of conversion to Catholicism, and no successful trade route into China.</span>
A king was in charge. Hammurabi is in charge of ancient Mesopotamia.
Your question presupposes that there is one "literal meaning" to the word in question whereas there are a number of "figurative meanings". Where there are multiple meanings they can be read differently. It doesn't matter whether they are literal or figurative; it is quite possible for two literal meanings of the same word to be read differently. E.g. "I know the ship has a bow, but I don't know who it was that tied it."
