DOMINANCE OF BABYLON, 2100-1100 B.C.
In early times Babylon had not been a city of sufficient size to demand
royal attention. No king had thought it of enough importance to include
with his enumerated possessions, although in all probability, it was
founded as early as 4000 B.C.--perhaps earlier still. Sumu-abi was its
first king, but of him and his immediate successors, we know little. The
sixth king was destined to bring greatness to his city and to the whole
country--for it was he who united the many states of Babylonia into one
strong kingdom and drove the usurping Elamites from the throne.
Hammurabi, sixth king of Babylon, ruled in the twenty-first century
B.C. His reign and the reigns of his family were regarded by the
Babylonians as their "Golden Age." Down to the last days of Babylon,
Babylonian kings emulated his example, modelling even their inscriptions
after his.
How Hammurabi freed the land from Elamite rule is not known, but his
name was soon established as an able soldier. He assumed the titles:
King of Sumer and Accad, King of the Four-Quarters of the World, King of
Babylon. Having annexed all the little city-states to his original
kingdom of Babylon, the capital city gave its name to the whole country.
To make this union lasting, Hammurabi himself appointed officers of
administration for each political division of the kingdom, and so made
the entire system dependent upon the government at the capital. The
pre-eminence now given the capital turned the tide of commerce and
traffic from other places and made Babylon the great center, not only
for matters of government, but for industrial and social life as well.
Hammurabi was not only a distinguished warrior, but a statesman. When he
had made secure his recently united kingdom, he turned to internal
improvements. A post-envoy system for royal messages was established.
This tended to make the roads and highways between different parts of
the country safe. He established royal granaries in the valley of the
Euphrates--as we have found them maintained in the valley of the
Nile--to store grain for use in time of famine.
As each succeeding city was exalted to leadership in Babylonia, we have
found that the patron deity of that community rose to highest place in
the pantheon. Originally, Marduk was accorded a minor position in the
category of gods. By enabling Babylon to gain supremacy over all other
cities, he had now proven himself greatest of all gods; so while Nippur
and other religious centers, long established, retained their deities
and their cults, there came forward a large priesthood devoted to the
worship of Marduk. These priests, centered as they were around Babylon,
probably had much to do with that city's rapid progress in becoming the
center of culture, art and literary effort. Long years after, when the
kings of warlike Assyria had added Babylonia to their numerous
possessions, they turned to the archives of this city for its literary
productions and one of the most productive periods was the reign of
Hammurabi.
Perhaps the most stupendous undertaking of this king was the
construction of a vast canal which reclaimed a large tract of land, long
unproductive. An inscription left by him has been found, and sets forth
his effort in this fashion:
"Hammurabi, the powerful king, king of Babylonia, ... when Anu and Bel
gave unto me to rule the land of Sumer and Accad, and with their scepter
filled my hands, I dug the canal Hammurabi, the Blessing-of-Men, which
bringeth the water of the overflow into the land of Sumer and Accad. Its
banks upon both sides I made arable land; much seed I scattered upon it.
Lasting water I provided for the land of Sumer and Accad. The land of
Sumer and Accad, its separated peoples I united, with blessings and
abundance I endowed them, in peaceful dwellings I made them to live."[1]
He was a tireless builder, spending much care in repairing old temples
and constructing new ones. Indeed King Hammurabi stands forth, after
four thousand years have passed, as a ruler of exceptional executive
ability. Prosperity long attended his people because of the personal
supervision he gave to all branches of the administration.
Among the lasting benefits assured his subjects was means of getting
legal redress. A court of appeals was instituted at Babylon to which any
citizen might come to state his wrongs. He codified the laws of the land
in 282 laws and inscribed them on monoliths, one of which was found ten
years ago in Susa, whither it had been carried by the Elamites about
1100 B.C. In the prologue to the Code he states, "When Marduk sent me to
rule the people ... I established law and justice in the land and
promoted the welfare of the people."
Long after his death his son and successors reaped the benefits of
Hammurabi's splendid rule, and the memory of his strength and capacity
held the country in check as long as his house endured. Probably for
some time before the close of this prosperous era, which came to an end
cir. 1700 B.C., mountaineers threatened the eastern borders, and the
death of the last king of the dynasty was the occasion for an invasion
of the Kassites, a people who emerged from Elam-Media. They seem to have
been one of the many bands of mountaineers who gained a livelihood from
the products of the mountainous regions and by frequent plundering raids
directed against those living on either side of their strongholds. They
well knew that Babylon's long devotion to the arts of peace had weakened
her military strength, and regarded the time as favorable for winning
the fertile valleys for themselves. At all events, they placed their
king upon the throne. The inhabitants of southern Babylonia were never
possessed of strong patriotism. So long as the land was allowed to rest
in peace and the taxes were not increased, there seems to have been no
especial interest on the part of the people generally as to who wore the
crown. The material development of the country did not suffer long on
this occasion, and for nearly 600 years the Kassite dynasty ruled in
Babylon. They rapidly took on the culture of their newly acquired state,
built temples and directed their attention to the prosperity of the
land. As time went on, they wellnigh ceased to be regarded as usurpers.
One of their kings set forth his titles thus: "I am Agumkakrime, the son
of Tashshigurumash; the illustrious descendant of god Shuqamuna; called
by Anu and Bel, Ea and Marduk, Sin and Shamash; the powerful hero of
Ishtar, the warrior among the gods.
"I am a king of wisdom and prudence; a king who grants hearing and
pardon; the son of Tashshigurumash; the descendant of Abiru ... the
crafty warrior; the first son of the great Agum; an illustrious, royal
scion who holds the reins of the nation (and is) a mighty shepherd....
"I am king of the country of Kashshu and of the Akkadians; king of the
wide country of Babylon, who settles the numerous people in Ashnunak;
the King of Padan and Alman; the king of Gutium, a foolish nation; (a
king) who makes obedient to him the four regions, and a favorite of the
great gods."
This enumeration of tributary lands shows these kings to have been good
warriors.
For a hundred years before the end of the Kassite dynasty, the kingdom
of Assyria, founded before 3000 B.C. in all probability, was growing in
strength and importance. When the Babylonians were unable to hold out
against invading kings, naturally the Assyrians felt in no way bound to
render the tribute they had paid Babylonia to usurping foreigners, and
took advantage of the occasion to assert their sovereignty.
As has been previously noted, the Assyrians were of pure Semitic stock,
and, as their own artists represent them, apparently had not
intermarried with the Chaldeans, as the Semites farther south had done.
They were warlike in disposition, and knew neither the luxuries of the
southern state nor its enervating climate. They had even become powerful
enough to make treaties with the rulers of Babylon regarding disputed
lands, and this fact in itself was significant. For some considerable
period after the invasion of the Kassites, Assyria was concerned with
her own affairs, but the time was coming when she would make her power
felt in the mother country.
Generally speaking, the Kassite rule was an age of peace. Among the Tell
el Amarna letters, unearthed upon the ancient site of the "Horizon of
the Sun's Disk," correspondence has been found between some of these
Asiatic rulers and the kings of Egypt. The letters open with the
preliminaries customary in oriental correspondence: "To Kadashman-Bel,
king of Kardunyash, my brother; thus saith Amenophis, the great king,
the king of Egypt, thy brother: with me it is well. May it be well with
thee, with thy house, with thy wives, with thy children, with thy
nobles, with thy horses and with thy chariots, and with thy land may it
be well; with me may it be well, with my house with my wives, with my
children, with my nobles, with my horses, with my chariots, with my
troops, and with my land, may it be very well." Regarding this
particular letter and others of the same period, Rogers says: "No
historical material of great moment is offered in these letters. They
reveal a period of relative peace and prosperity, and deal, in
considerable measure, with the little courtesies and amenities of life.
It is, for example, curious to find the Babylonian king reproving the
king of Egypt for not having sent an ambassador to inquire for him when
he was ill. When kings had time for such courtesies, and could only
excuse themselves for failing to observe them on the ground of their
ignorance of the illness, and the great distance to be covered on the
journey, there must have been freedom from war and from all distress at
home and abroad."[2]
It was not destined to long continue peaceful, however. By 1285 B.C. the
Assyrian king felt himself powerful enough to invade Babylonia.
Penetrating even to the capital itself, he carried away the statue of
the god Marduk--a great indignity. He allowed the Babylonia king to
become his vassal. This state of affairs continued for seven years,
whereupon the Babylonians succeeded in driving the Assyrians north
again, taking from them some of the territory they had seized. When next
the Assyrians threatened, the Semites instituted a revolution, forced
the Kassites from the throne, and established the dynasty of Isin.
Now began the struggle for supremacy in the valley, waged by two great
nations. The strength of Babylonia was waning, but their king,
Nebuchadnezzar I., held the kingdom together with a strong hand. He only
delayed the inevitable. The future belonged to the more vigorous kingdom
to the north, and to her power Babylonia soon fell subservient.
To follow the main thread of activity in the Euphrates valley, we must
now turn to Assyria, while the life so characteristic of Babylon
continued until it could be said: "No capital in the world has ever been
the center of so much power, wealth, and culture for so vast a period of
time."
[Illustration: WINGED LION.]
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Quoted in Rogers: Hist. of Baby. and Assy., 391.
[2] Rogers: Hist. of Baby. and Assy., Vol I., p. 418.