This warlike monarch marched into Syria in 701 B. C., captured Sidon and
Askelon, defeated the forces of Hezekiah, king of Judah, with his
Egyptian and Ethiopian allies, and made Hezekiah pay tribute. In 700 B.
C. Sennacherib marched into Arabia, there defeated Tirhakah, king of
Egypt and Ethiopia, and then his army perished before Libnah, in the
south of Judah, by the catastrophe recorded in the Hebrew Scriptures.
Sennacherib was engaged, on his return to Assyria, in crushing
rebellions of the Babylonians, constructing canals and aqueducts, and
greatly adding to the size and splendor of Nineveh.
In 681 he was murdered by two of his sons, and another son, Esarhaddon,
became king in 680. Esarhaddon made successful expeditions into Syria,
Arabia, Egypt, and as far as the Caucasus Mountains, and after the
erection of splendid buildings at Nimrud and other cities, was succeeded
in 668 by his son Asshur-banipal (the origin of the Greek
“Sardanapalus”).