_Phoenicia and the northern nations after the death of Ramses III.--The
first Assyrian empire: Tiglath-pileser I.--The Aramoans and the Khâti._
The cessation of Egyptian authority over countries in which it had so
long prevailed did not at once do away with the deep impression which
it had made upon their constitution and customs. While the nobles
and citizens of Thebes were adopting the imported worship of Baal and
Astartê, and were introducing into the spoken and written language words
borrowed from Semitic speech, the Syrians, on the other hand, were
not unreceptive of the influence of their conquerors. They had applied
themselves zealously to the study of Egyptian arts, industry and
religion, and had borrowed from these as much, at least, as they had
lent to the dwellers on the Nile. The ancient Babylonian foundation
of their civilization was not, indeed, seriously modified, but it was
covered over, so to speak, with an African veneer which varied in depth
according to the locality.*
* Most of the views put forth in this part of the chapter
are based on posterior and not contemporary data. The most
ancient monuments which give evidence of it show it in such
a complete state that we may fairly ascribe it to some
centuries earlier; that is, to the time when Egypt still
ruled in Syria, the period of the XIXth and even the XVIIIth
dynasty.
Phoenicia especially assumed and retained this foreign exterior. Its
merchants, accustomed to establish themselves for lengthened periods in
the principal trade-centres on the Nile, had become imbued therein
with something of the religious ideas and customs of the land, and
on returning to their own country had imported these with them and
propagated them in their neighbourhood. They were not content with other
household utensils, furniture, and jewellery than those to which they
had been accustomed on the Nile, and even the Phonician gods seemed to
be subject to this appropriating mania, for they came to be recognised
in the indigenous deities of the Said and the Delta. There was, at
the outset, no trait in the character of Baalat by which she could be
assimilated to Isis or Hathor: she was fierce, warlike, and licentious,
and wept for her lover, while the Egyptian goddesses were accustomed
to shed tears for their husbands only. It was this element of a common
grief, however, which served to associate the Phonician and Egyptian
goddesses, and to produce at length a strange blending of their persons
and the legends concerning them; the lady of Byblos ended in becoming an
Isis or a Hathor,* and in playing the part assigned to the latter in the
Osirian drama.
* The assimilation must have been ancient, since the Egyptians of the
Theban dynasties already accepted Baalat as the Hathor of Byblos.
[Illustration: 101.jpg THE TREE GROWING ON THE TOMB OF OSIRIS]
Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from Prisse dAvennes
This may have been occasioned by her city having maintained closer
relationships than the southern towns with Bûto and Mendes, or by her
priests having come to recognise a fundamental agreement between their
theology and that of Egypt. In any case, it was at Byblos that the most
marked and numerous, as well as the most ancient, examples of borrowing
from the religions of the Nile were to be found. The theologians of
Byblos imagined that the coffin of Osiris, after it had been thrown into
the sea by Typhon, had been thrown up on the land somewhere near their
city at the foot of a tamarisk, and that this tree, in its rapid growth,
had gradually enfolded within its trunk the body and its case. King
Malkander cut it down in order to use it as a support for the roof of
his palace: a marvellous perfume rising from it filled the apartments,
and it was not long before the prodigy was bruited abroad. Isis, who was
travelling through the world in quest of her husband, heard of it, and
at once realised its meaning: clad in rags and weeping, she sat down
by the well whither the women of Byblos were accustomed to come every
morning and evening to draw water, and, being interrogated by them,
refused to reply; but when the maids of Queen Astartê* approached
in their turn, they were received by the goddess in the most amiable
manner--Isis deigning even to plait their hair, and to communicate to
them the odour of myrrh with which she herself was impregnated.
* Astartê is the name taken by the queen in the Phoenician
version: the Egyptian counterpart of the same narrative
substituted for it Nemanous or Saôsis; that is to say, the
two principal forms of Hathor--the Hermopolitan Nahmâûît and
the Heliopolitan lûsasît. It would appear from the presence
of these names that there must have been in Egypt two
versions at least of the Phoenician adventures of Isis--the
one of Hermopolitan and the other of Heliopolitan origin.
Their mistress came to see the stranger who had thus treated her
servants, took her into her service, and confided to her the care of her
lately born son. Isis became attached to the child, adopted it for her
own, after the Egyptian manner, by inserting her finger in its mouth;
and having passed it through the fire during the night in order to
consume away slowly anything of a perishable nature in its body,
metamorphosed herself into a swallow, and flew around the miraculous
pillar uttering plaintive cries. Astartê came upon her once while she
was bathing the child in the flame, and broke by her shrieks of
fright the charm of immortality. Isis was only able to reassure her by
revealing her name and the object of her presence there. She opened the
mysterious tree-trunk, anointed it with essences, and wrapping it in
precious cloths, transmitted it to the priests of Byblos, who deposited
it respectfully in their temple: she put the coffin which it contained
on board ship, and brought it, after many adventures, into Egypt.
Another tradition asserts, however, that Osiris never found his way back
to his country: he was buried at Byblos, this tradition maintained, and
it was in his honour that the festivals attributed by the vulgar to the
young Adonis were really celebrated. A marvellous fact seemed to support
this view. Every year a head of papyrus, thrown into the sea at some
unknown point of the Delta, was carried for six days along the Syrian
coast, buffeted by wind and waves, and on the seventh was thrown up at
Byblos, where the priests received it and exhibited it solemnly to the
people.* The details of these different stories are not in every case
very ancient, but the first fact in them carries us back to the time
when Byblos had accepted the sovereignty of the Theban dynasties,
and was maintaining daily commercial and political relations with the
inhabitants of the Nile valley.**
* In the later Roman period it was letters announcing the
resurrection of Adonis-Osiris that the Alexandrian women
cast into the sea, and these were carried by the current as
far as Byblos. See on this subject the commentaries of Cyril
of Alexandra and Procopius of Gaza on chap, xviii. of
Isaiah.
** It is worthy of note that Philo gives to the divinity
with the Egyptian name Taautos the part in the ancient
history of Phoenicia of having edited the mystic writings
put in order by Sanchoniathon at a very early epoch.
The city proclaimed Horus to be a great god.* El-Kronos allied himself
with Osiris as well as with Adonis; Isis and Baalat became blended
together at their first encounter, and the respective peoples made
an exchange of their deities with the same light-heartedness as they
displayed in trafficking with the products of their soil or their
industry.
* This is confirmed by one of the names inscribed on the Tel
el-Amarna tablets as being that of a governor of Byblos
under Amenôthes IV. This name was read Rabimur, Anrabimur,
or Ilrabimur, and finally Ilurabihur: the meaning of it is,
Muru is the great god, or Horus is the great god. Muru is
the name which we find in an appellation of a Hittite king,
Maurusaru, Mauru is king. On an Aramoan cylinder in the
British Museum, representing a god in Assyrian dress
fighting with two griffins, there is the inscription
Horkhu, Harmakhis.
[Illustration: 104.jpg THE PHOENICIAN HORUS]
Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from an intaglio engraved in
Cesnola. The Phoenician figures of Horus and Thot which I
have reproduced were pointed out to me by my friend
Clermont-Ganneau.
After Osiris, the Ibis Thot was the most important among the deities
who had emigrated to Asia. He was too closely connected with the Osirian
cycle to be forgotten by the Phoenicians after they had adopted his
companions. We are ignorant of the particular divinity with whom he was
identified, or would be the more readily associated from some similarity
in the pronunciation of his name: we know only that he still preserved
in his new country all the power of his voice and all the subtilty of
his mind. He occupied there also the position of scribe and enchanter,
as he had done at Thebes, Memphis, Thinis, and before the chief of each
Heliopolitan Ennead. He became the usual adviser of El-Kronos at Byblos,
as he had been of Osiris and Horus; he composed charms for him,
and formulae which increased the warlike zeal of his partisans; he
prescribed the form and insignia of the god and of his attendant
deities, and came finally to be considered as the inventor of letters.*
* The part of counsellor which Thot played in connexion with
the god of Byblos was described at some length in the
writings attributed to Sankhoniathon.
[Illustration: 105.jpg THE PHOENICIAN THOT]
Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, after an intaglio engraved in M. de
Vogué.
The epoch, indeed, in which he became a naturalised Phoenician coincides
approximately with a fundamental revolution in the art of writing--that
in which a simple and rapid stenography was substituted for the
complicated and tedious systems with which the empires of the ancient
world had been content from their origin. Tyre, Sidon, Byblos, Arvad,
had employed up to this period the most intricate of these systems. Like
most of the civilized nations of Western Asia, they had conducted their
diplomatic and commercial correspondence in the cuneiform character
impressed upon clay tablets. Their kings had had recourse to a
Babylonian model for communicating to the Amenôthes Pharaohs the
expression of their wishes or their loyalty; we now behold them, after
an interval of four hundred years and more*--during which we have no
examples of their monuments--possessed of a short and commodious script,
without the encumbrance of ideograms, determinatives, polyphony and
syllabic sounds, such as had fettered the Egyptian and Chaldæan
scribes, in spite of their cleverness in dealing with them. Phonetic
articulations were ultimately resolved into twenty-two sounds, to each
of which a special sign was attached, which collectively took the place
of the hundreds or thousands of signs formerly required.
* The inscription on the bronze cup dedicated to the Baal of
the Lebanon, goes back probably to the time of Hiram I., say
the Xth century before our era; the reasons advanced by
Winckler for dating it in the time of Hiram II. have not
been fully accepted up to the present. By placing the
introduction of the alphabet somewhere between Amenôthes IV.
in the XVth and Hiram I. in the Xth century before our era,
and by taking the middle date between them, say the
accession of the XXIsdynasty towards the year 1100 B.C. for
its invention or adoption, we cannot go far wrong one way or
the other.
[Illustration: 106.jpg ONE OF THE MOST ANCIENT PHOENICIAN INSCRIPTIONS]
Drawn by Paucher-Gudin, from a heliogravure. This is the cup
of the Baal of the Lebanon.
This was an alphabet, the first in point of time, but so ingenious and
so pliable that the majority of ancient and modern nations have found
it able to supply all their needs--Greeks and Europeans of the western
Mediterranean on the one hand, and Semites of all kinds, Persians and
Hindus on the other.
[Illustration: 107.jpg Table of Alphabets]
It must have originated between the end of the XVIIIth and the beginning
of the XXIst dynasties, and the existence of Pharaonic rule in Phoenicia
during this period has led more than one modern scholar to assume that
it developed under Egyptian influence.*
* The hypothesis of an Egyptian origin, suggested casually
by Champollion, has been ably dealt with by E. de Rougé. E.
de Rougé derives the alphabet from the Hieratic, and his
identifications have been accepted by Lauth, by Brugsch, by
P. Lenormant, and by Isaac Taylor. Halévy would take it from
the Egyptian hieroglyphics directly without the intervention
of the Hieratic. The Egyptian origin, strongly contested of
late, has been accepted by the majority of scholars.
Some affirm that it is traceable directly to the hieroglyphs, while
others seek for some intermediary in the shape of a cursive script,
and find this in the Hieratic writing, which contains, they maintain,
prototypes of all the Phoenician letters. Tables have been drawn up,
showing at a glance the resemblances and differences which appear
respectively to justify or condemn their hypothesis. Perhaps the
analogies would be more evident and more numerous if we were in
possession of inscriptions going back nearer to the date of origin. As
it is, the divergencies are sufficiently striking to lead some scholars
to seek the prototype of the alphabet elsewhere--either in Babylon, in
Asia Minor, or even in Crete, among those barbarous hieroglyphs which
are attributed to the primitive inhabitants of the island. It is no easy
matter to get at the truth amid these conflicting theories. Two points
only are indisputable; first, the almost unanimous agreement among
writers of classical times in ascribing the first alphabet to the
Phoenicians; and second, the Phonician origin of the Greek, and
afterwards of the Latin alphabet which we employ to-day.
To return to the religion of the Phoenicians: the foreign deities were
not content with obtaining a high place in the estimation of priests
and people; they acquired such authority over the native gods that
they persuaded them to metamorphose themselves almost completely into
Egyptian divinities.
[Illustration: 109.jpg RASHUF ON HIS LION]
Drawn by Paucher-Gudin, from a photograph reproduced in
Clermont-Ganneau.
One finds among the majority of them the emblems commonly used in the
Pharaonic temples, sceptres with heads of animals, head-dress like the
Pschent, the _crux ansata_, the solar disk, and the winged scarab. The
lady of Byblos placed the cows horns upon her head from the moment
she became identified with Hathor.* The Baal of the neighbouring
Arvad--probably a form of Bashuf--was still represented as standing
upright on his lion in order to traverse the high places: but while, in
the monument which has preserved the figure of the god, both lion and
mountain are given according to Chaldæan tradition, he himself, as the
illustration shows, is dressed after the manner of Egypt, in the striped
and plaited loin-cloth, wears a large necklace on his neck and bracelets
on his arms, and bears upon his head the white mitre with its double
plume and the Egyptian uraaus.**
* She is represented as Hathor on the stele of Iéhav-melek,
King of Byblos, during the Persian period.
** This monument, which belonged to the Péretié collection,
was found near Amrîth, at the place called Nahr-Abrek. The
dress and bearing are so like those of the Rashuf
represented on Egyptian monuments, that I have no hesitation
in regarding this as a representation of that god.
He brandishes in one hand the weapon of the victor, and is on the point
of despatching with it a lion, which he has seized by the tail with
the other, after the model of the Pharaonic hunters, Amenôthes I. and
Thûtmosis III. The lunar disk floating above his head lends to him,
it is true, a Phonician character, but the winged sun of Heliopolis
hovering above the disk leaves no doubt as to his Egyptian antecedents.*
* The Phonician symbol represents the crescent moon holding
the darkened portion in its arms, like the symbol reserved
in Egypt for the lunar gods.
[Illustration: 110.jpg A PHOENICIAN GOD IN HIS EGYPTIAN SHRINE]
Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from Renan.
The worship, too, offered to these metamorphosed gods was as much
changed as the deities themselves; the altars assumed something of the
Egyptian form, and the tabernacles were turned into shrines, which were
decorated at the top with a concave groove, or with a frieze made up of
repetitions of the uraeus. Egyptian fashions had influenced the better
classes so far as to change even their mode of dealing with the dead, of
which we find in not a few places clear evidence. Travellers arriving in
Egypt at that period must have been as much astonished as the tourist of
to-day by the monuments which the Egyptians erected for their dead.
[Illustration: 111.jpg AMENÔTHES I. SEIZING A LION]
Drawn by Faucher-Gudin. This monument was in the Louvre
Museum. Analogous figures of gods or kings holding a lion by
the tail are found on various monuments of the Theban
dynasties.
The pyramids which met their gaze, as soon as they had reached the apex
of the Delta, must have far surpassed their ideas of them, no matter how
frequently they may have been told about them, and they must have been
at a loss to know why such a number of stones should have been brought
together to cover a single corpse. At the foot of these colossal
monuments, lying like a pack of hounds asleep around their master, the
mastabas of the early dynasties were ranged, half buried under the sand,
but still visible, and still visited on certain days by the descendants
of their inhabitants, or by priests charged with the duty of keeping
them up. Chapels of more recent generations extended as a sort of screen
before the ancient tombs, affording examples of the two archaic types
combined--the mastaba more or less curtailed in its proportions, and the
pyramid with a more or less acute point. The majority of these monuments
are no longer in existence, and only one of them has come down to us
intact--that which Amenôthes III. erected in the Serapeum at Memphis in
honour of an Apis which had died in his reign.
[Illustration: 112.jpg A PHOENICIAN MASTABA AT ARVAD]
Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from the restoration by Thobois, as
given in Renan. The cuttings made in the lower stonework
appear to be traces of unfinished steps. The pyramid at the
top is no longer in existence, but its remains are scattered
about the foot of the monument, and furnished M. Thobois
with the means of reconstructing with exactness the original
form.
Phoenicians visiting the Nile valley must have carried back with them
to their native country a remembrance of this kind of burying-place, and
have suggested it to their architects as a model. One of the cemeteries
at Arvad contains a splendid specimen of this imported design.*
* Pietschmann thinks that the monument is not older than the
Greek epoch, and it must be admitted that the cornice is not
such as we usually meet with in Egypt in Theban times;
nevertheless, the very marked resemblance to the Theban
mastaba shows that it must have been directly connected with
the Egyptian type which prevailed from the XVIIIth to the
XXth dynasties.
[Illustration: 113.jpg TWO OF THE TOMBS AT ARVAD]
Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a water-colour by Thobois,
reproduced in Renan.
It is a square tower some thirty-six feet high; the six lower courses
consist of blocks, each some sixteen and a half feet long, joined to each
other without mortar. The two lowest courses project so as to form a
kind of pedestal for the building. The cornice at the top consists of
a deep moulding, surmounted by a broad flat band, above which rises the
pyramid, which attains a height of nearly thirty feet. It is impossible
to deny that it is constructed on a foreign model; it is not a slavish
imitation, however, but rather an adaptation upon a rational plan to
the conditions of its new home. Its foundations rest on nothing but a
mixture of soil and sand impregnated with water, and if vaults had been
constructed beneath this, as in Egypt, the body placed there would soon
have corrupted away, owing to the infiltration of moisture. The dead
bodies were, therefore, placed within the structure above ground, in
chambers corresponding to the Egyptian chapel, which were superimposed
the one upon the other. The first storey would furnish space for three
bodies, and the second would contain twelve, for which as many niches
were provided. In the same cemetery we find examples of tombs which the
architect has constructed, not after an Egyptian, but a Chaldæan model.
A round tower is here substituted for the square structure and a
cupola for the pyramid, while the cornice is represented by crenellated
markings. The only Egyptian feature about it is the four lions, which
seem to support the whole edifice upon their backs.*
* The fellahîn in the neighbourhood call these two monuments
the Meghazîl or distaffs.
Arvad was, among Phoenician cities, the nearest neighbour to the
kingdoms on the Euphrates, and was thus the first to experience either
the brunt of an attack or the propagation of fashions and ideas from
these countries. In the more southerly region, in the country about
Tyre, there are fewer indications of Babylonian influence, and such
examples of burying-places for the ruling classes as the Kabr-Hiram
and other similar tombs correspond with the mixed mastaba of the Theban
period. We have the same rectangular base, but the chapel and its
crowning pyramid are represented by the sarcophagus itself with its
rigid cover. The work is of an unfinished character, and carelessly
wrought, but there is a charming simplicity about its lines and a
harmony in its proportions which betray an Egyptian influence.
[Illustration: 115.jpg THE KABR-HIRAM NEAR TYRE]
Drawn by Boudier, from a sketch by Thobois, reproduced by
Renan.
The spirit of imitation which we find in the religion and architecture
of Phoenicia is no less displayed in the minor arts, such as
goldsmithswork, sculpture in ivory, engraving on gems, and
glass-making. The forms, designs, and colours are all rather those of
Egypt than of Chaldæa. The many-hued glass objects, turned out by the
manufacturers of the Said in millions, furnished at one time valuable
cargoes for the Phoenicians; they learned at length to cast and
colour copies of these at home, and imitated their Egyptian models so
successfully that classical antiquity was often deceived by them.*
* Glass manufacture was carried to such a degree of
perfection among the Phoenicians, that many ancient authors
attributed to them the invention of glass.
Their engravers, while still continuing to employ cones and cylinders
of Babylonian form, borrowed the scarab type also, and made use of it
on the bezils of rings, the pendants of necklaces, and on a kind of
bracelet used partly for ornament and partly as a protective amulet.
The influence of the Egyptian model did not extend, however, amongst the
masses, and we find, therefore, no evidence of it in the case of common
objects, such as those of coarse sand or glazed earthenware. Egyptian
scarab forms were thus confined to the rich, and the material upon which
they are found is generally some costly gem, such as cut and polished
agate, onyx, haematite, and lapis-lazuli. The goldsmiths did not
slavishly copy the golden and silver bowls which were imported from the
Delta; they took their inspiration from the principles displayed in
the ornamentation of these objects, but they treated the subjects
after their own manner, grouping them afresh and blending them with
new designs. The intrinsic value of the metal upon which these artistic
conceptions had been impressed led to their destruction, and among the
examples which have come down to us I know of no object which can be
traced to the period of the Egyptian conquest. It was Theban art for
the most part which furnished the Phoenicians with their designs. These
included the lotus, the papyrus, the cow standing in a thicket and
suckling her calf, the sacred bark, and the king threatening with his
uplifted arm the crowd of conquered foes who lie prostrate before him.
[Illustration: 117.jpg EGYPTIAN TREATMENT OF THE COW ON A PHOENICIAN
BOWL]
Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, after Grifi.
The kings double often accompanied him on some of the original objects,
impassive and armed with the banner bearing the name of Horus. The
Phoenician artist modified this figure, which in its original form
did not satisfy his ideas of human nature, by transforming it into
a protective genius, who looks with approval on the exploits of his
_protégé_, and gathers together the corpses of those he has slain. Once
these designs had become current among the goldsmiths, they continued to
be supplied for a long period, without much modification, to the markets
of the Eastern and Western worlds. Indeed, it was natural that they
should have taken a stereotyped form, when we consider that the
Phoenicians who employed them held continuous commercial relations
with the country whence they had come--a country of which, too, they
recognised the supremacy. Egypt in the Ramesside period was, as we
have seen, distinguished for the highest development of every branch of
industry; it had also a population which imported and exported more raw
material and more manufactured products than any other.
[Illustration: 118.jpg THE KING AND HIS DOUBLE ON A PHOENICIAN BOWL]
Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a sketch by Longpérier.
The small nation which acted as a commercial intermediary between Egypt
and the rest of the world had in this traffic a steady source of profit,
and even in providing Egypt with a single article--for example, bronze,
or the tin necessary for its preparation--could realise enormous
profits. The people of Tyre and Sidon had been very careful not to
alienate the good will of such rich customers, and as long as the
representatives of the Pharaoh held sway in Syria, they had shown
themselves, if not thoroughly trustworthy vassals, at least less
turbulent than their neighbours of Arvad and Qodshû. Even when the
feebleness and impotence of the successors of Ramses III. relieved them
from the obligation of further tribute, they displayed towards their old
masters such deference that they obtained as great freedom of trade with
the ports of the Delta as they had enjoyed in the past. They maintained
with these ports the same relations as in the days of their dependence,
and their ships sailed up the river as far as Memphis, and even higher,
while the Egyptian galleys continued to coast the littoral of Syria.
An official report addressed to Hrihor by one of the ministers of the
Theban Amon, indicates at one and the same time the manner in which
these voyages were accomplished, and the dangers to which their crews
were exposed. Hrihor, who was still high priest, was in need of foreign
timber to complete some work he had in hand, probably the repair of the
sacred barks, and commanded the official above mentioned to proceed
by sea to Byblos, to King Zikarbâl,* in order to purchase cedars of
Lebanon.
* This is the name which classical tradition ascribed to the
first husband of Dido, the founder of Carthage--Sicharbas,
Sichaeus, Acerbas.
The messenger started from Tanis, coasted along Kharu, and put into
the harbour of Dor, which then belonged to the Zakkala: while he was
revictualling his ship, one of the sailors ran away with the cash-box.
The local ruler, Badilu, expressed at first his sympathy at this
misfortune, and gave his help to capture the robber; then unaccountably
changing his mind he threw the messenger into prison, who had
accordingly to send to Egypt to procure fresh funds for his liberation
and the accomplishment of his mission. Having arrived at Byblos, nothing
occurred there worthy of record. The wood having at length been cut and
put on board, the ship set sail homewards. Driven by contrary winds,
the vessel was thrown upon the coast of Alasia, where the crew were
graciously received by the Queen Khatiba. We have evidence everywhere,
it may be stated, as to the friendly disposition displayed, either with
or without the promptings of interest, towards the representative of the
Theban pontiff. Had he been ill-used, the Phoenicians living on Egyptian
territory would have been made to suffer for it.
Navigators had to take additional precautions, owing to the presence
of Ægean or Asiatic pirates on the routes followed by the mercantile
marine, which rendered their voyages dangerous and sometimes interrupted
them altogether. The Syrian coast-line was exposed to these marauders
quite as much as the African had been during the sixty or eighty years
which followed the death of Ramses II.; the seamen of the north--Achæans
and Tyrseni, Lycians and Shardanians--had pillaged it on many occasions,
and in the invasion which followed these attacks it experienced as
little mercy as Naharaim, the Khâti, and the region of the Amorites. The
fleets which carried the Philistines, the Zakkala, and their allies had
devastated the whole coast before they encountered the Egyptian ships of
Ramses III. near Magadîl, to the south of Carmel. Arvad as well as Zahi
had succumbed to the violence of their attack, and if the cities of
Byblos, Berytus, Sidon, and Tyre had escaped, their suburbs had been
subjected to the ravages of the foe.*
* See, for this invasion, vol. v. pp. 305-311, of the
present work.
Peace followed the double victory of the Egyptians, and commerce on
the Mediterranean resumed once more its wonted ways, but only in those
regions where the authority of the Pharaoh and the fear of his vengeance
were effective influences. Beyond this sphere there were continual
warfare, piracy, migrations of barbaric hordes, and disturbances of all
kinds, among which, if a stranger ventured, it was at the almost certain
risk of losing his life or liberty. The area of undisturbed seas became
more and more contracted in proportion as the memory of past defeats
faded away. Cyprus was not comprised within it, and the Ægeans, who were
restrained by the fear of Egypt from venturing into any region under
her survey, perpetually flocked thither in numerous bodies. The Achæans,
too, took up their abode on this island at an early date--about the time
when some of their bands were infesting Libya, and offering their help
to the enemies of the Pharaoh. They began their encroachments on the
northern side of the island--the least rich, it is true, but the nearest
to Cilicia, and the easiest to hold against the attacks of their rivals.
The disaster of Piriu had no doubt dashed their hopes of finding a
settlement in Egypt: they never returned thither any more, and the
current of emigration which had momentarily inclined towards the south,
now set steadily towards the east, where the large island of Cyprus
offered an unprotected and more profitable field of adventure. We know
not how far they penetrated into its forests and its interior. The
natives began, at length, under their influence, to despise the customs
and mode of existence with which they had been previously contented:
they acquired a taste for pottery rudely decorated after the Mycenean
manner, for jewellery, and for the bronze swords which they had seen in
the hands of the invaders. The Phoenicians, in order to maintain their
ground against the intruders, had to strengthen their ancient posts
or found others--such as Carpasia, Gerynia, and Lapathos on the
Achæan coast itself, Tamassos near the copper-mines, and a new town,
Qart-hadashât, which is perhaps only the ancient Citium under a new
name.* They thus added to their earlier possessions on the island
regions on its northern side, while the rest either fell gradually into
the hands of Hellenic adventurers, or continued in the possession of
the native populations. Cyprus served henceforward as an advance-post
against the attacks of Western nations, and the Phoenicians must have
been thankful for the good fortune which had made them see the wisdom
of fortifying it. But what became of their possessions lying outside
Cyprus? They retained several of them on the southern coasts of Asia
Minor, and Rhodes remained faithful to them, as well as Thasos, enabling
them to overlook the two extremities of the Archipelago;** but, owing to
the movements of the People of the Sea and the political development of
the Mycenean states, they had to give up the stations and harbours of
refuge which they held in the other islands or on the continent.
* It is mentioned in the inscription of Baal of Lebanon, and
in the Assyrian inscriptions of the VII century B.C.
* This would appear to be the case, as far as Rhodes is
concerned, from the traditions which ascribed the final
expulsion of the Phoenicians to a Doric invasion from Argos.
The somewhat legendary accounts of the state of affairs
after the Hellenic conquest are in the fragments of Ergias
and Polyzelos.
They still continued, however, to pay visits to these
localities--sometimes in the guise of merchants and at others as
raiders, according to their ancient custom. They went from port to port
as of old, exposing their wares in the market-places, pillaging the
farms and villages, carrying into captivity the women and children whom
they could entice on board, or whom they might find defenceless on the
strand; but they attempted all this with more risk than formerly, and
with less success. The inhabitants of the coast were possessed of
fully manned ships, similar in form to those of the Philistines or
the Zakkala, which, at the first sight of the Phoenicians, set out in
pursuit of them, or, following the example set by their foe, lay in
wait for them behind some headland, and retaliated upon them for their
cruelty. Piracy in the Archipelago was practised as a matter of course,
and there was no islander who did not give himself up to it when
the opportunity offered, to return to his honest occupations after a
successful venture. Some kings seem to have risen up here and there who
found this state of affairs intolerable, and endeavoured to remedy it
by every means within their power: they followed on the heels of the
corsairs and adventurers, whatever might be their country; they followed
them up to their harbours of refuge, and became an effective police
force in all parts of the sea where they were able to carry their flag.
The memory of such exploits was preserved in the tradition of the Cretan
empire which Minos had constituted, and which extended its protection
over a portion of continental Greece.
If the Phoenicians had had to deal only with the piratical expeditions
of the peoples of the coast or with the jealous watchfulness of the
rulers of the sea, they might have endured the evil, but they had now
to put up, in addition, with rivalry in the artistic and industrial
products of which they had long had the monopoly. The spread of art
had at length led to the establishment of local centres of production
everywhere, which bade fair to vie with those of Phoenicia. On the
continent and in the Cyclades there were produced statuettes, intaglios,
jewels, vases, weapons, and textile fabrics which rivalled those of the
East, and were probably much cheaper. The merchants of Tyre and Sidon
could still find a market, however, for manufactures requiring great
technical skill or displaying superior taste--such as gold or silver
bowls, engraved or decorated with figures in outline--but they had to
face a serious falling off in their sales of ordinary goods. To extend
their commerce they had to seek new and less critical markets, where the
bales of their wares, of which the Ægean population was becoming weary,
would lose none of their attractions. We do not know at what date they
ventured to sail into the mysterious region of the Hesperides, nor by
what route they first reached it. It is possible that they passed from
Crete to Cythera, and from this to the Ionian Islands and to the point
of Calabria, on the other side of the straits of Otranto, whence they
were able to make their way gradually to Sicily.*
* Ed. Meyer thinks that the extension of Phoenician commerce
to the Western Mediterranean goes back to the XVIIIth
dynasty, or, at the latest, the XVth century before our era.
Without laying undue stress on this view, I am inclined to
ascribe with him, until we get further knowledge, the
colonisation of the West to the period immediately following
the movements of the People of the Sea and the diminution of
Phoenician trade in the Grecian Archipelago. Exploring
voyages had been made before this, but the founding of
colonies was not earlier than this epoch.
Did the fame of their discovery, we may ask, spread so rapidly in the
East as to excite there the cupidity and envy of their rivals? However
this may have been, the People of the Sea, after repeated checks
in Africa and Syria, and feeling more than ever the pressure of the
northern tribes encroaching on them, set out towards the west, following
the route pursued by the Phoenicians. The traditions current among
them and collected afterwards by the Greek historians give an account,
mingled with many fabulous details, of the causes which led to their
migrations and of the vicissitudes which they experienced in the course
of them. Daedalus having taken flight from Crete to Sicily, Minos, who
had followed in his steps, took possession of the greater part of the
island with his Eteocretes. Iolaos was the leader of Pelasgic bands,
whom he conducted first into Libya and finally to Sardinia. It came also
to pass that in the days of Atys, son of Manes, a famine broke out and
raged throughout Lydia: the king, unable to provide food for his people,
had them numbered, and decided by lot which of the two halves of the
population should expatriate themselves under the leadership of his son
Tyrsenos. Those-who were thus fated to leave their country assembled at
Smyrna, constructed ships there, and having embarked on board of them
what was necessary, set sail in quest of a new home. After a long
and devious voyage, they at length disembarked in the country of the
Umbrians, where they built cities, and became a prosperous people under
the name of Tyrseni, being thus called after their leader Tyrsenos.*
* Herodotus, whence all the information of other classical
writers is directly or indirectly taken. Most modern
historians reject this tradition. I see no reason for my own
part why they should do so, at least in the present state of
our knowledge. The Etrurians of the historical period were
the result of a fusion of several different elements, and
there is nothing against the view that the Tursha--one of
these elements--should have come from Asia Minor, as
Herodotus says. Properly understood, the tradition seems
well founded, and the details may have been added
afterwards, either by the Lydians themselves, or by the
Greek historians who collected the Lydian traditions.
The remaining portions of the nations who had taken part in the attack
on Egypt--of which several tribes had been planted by Ramses III. in
the Shephelah, from Gaza to Carmel--proceeded in a series of successive
detachments from Asia Minor and the Ægean Sea to the coasts of Italy
and of the large islands; the Tursha into that region which was known
afterwards as Etruria, the Shardana into Sardinia, the Zakkala into
Sicily, and along with the latter some Pulasati, whose memory is still
preserved on the northern slope of Etna. Fate thus brought the Phonician
emigrants once more into close contact with their traditional enemies,
and the hostility which they experienced in their new settlements from
the latter was among the influences which determined their further
migration from Italy proper, and from the region occupied by the
Ligurians between the Arno and the Ebro. They had already probably
reached Sardinia and Corsica, but the majority of their ships had sailed
to the southward, and having touched at Malta, Gozo, and the small
islands between Sicily and the Syrtes, had followed the coast-line of
Africa, until at length they reached the straits of Gribraltar and the
southern shores of Spain. No traces remain of their explorations, or of
their early establishments in the western Mediterranean, as the towns
which they are thought--with good reason in most instances--to have
founded there belong to a much later date. Every permanent settlement,
however, is preceded by a period of exploration and research, which may
last for only a few years or be prolonged to as many centuries. I am
within the mark, I think, in assuming that Phonician adventurers,
or possibly even the regular trading ships of Tyre and Sidon, had
established relations with the semi-barbarous chiefs of Botica as early
as the XIIth century before our era, that is, at the time when the power
of Thebes was fading away under the weak rule of the pontiffs of Amon
and the Tanite Pharaohs.
The Phoenicians were too much absorbed in their commercial pursuits
to aspire to the inheritance which Egypt was letting slip through her
fingers. Their numbers were not more than sufficient to supply men
for their ships, and they were often obliged to have recourse to their
allies or to mercenary tribes--the Leleges or Carians--in order to
provide crews for their vessels or garrisons for their trading posts;
it was impossible, therefore, for them to think of raising armies fit to
conquer or keep in check the rulers on the Orontes or in Naharaim. They
left this to the races of the interior--the Amorites and Hittites--and
to their restless ambition. The Hittite power, however, had never
recovered from the terrible blow inflicted on it at the time of the
Asianic invasion.
[Illustration: 128.jpg AZÂZ--ONE OF THIS TUMULI ON THE ANCIENT HITTITE
PLAIN]
Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph by M. Barthélémy.
The confederacy of feudal chiefs, which had been brought momentarily
together by Sapalulu and his successors, was shattered by the violence
of the shock, and the elements of which it was composed were engaged
henceforward in struggles with each other. At this time the entire plain
between the Amanus and the Euphrates was covered with rich cities, of
which the sites are represented to-day by only a few wretched villages
or by heaps of ruins. Arabian and Byzantine remains sometimes crown the
summit of the latter, but as soon as we reach the lower strata we find
in more or less abundance the ruins of buildings of the Greek or Persian
period, and beneath these those belonging to a still earlier time. The
history of Syria lies buried in such sites, and is waiting only for a
patient and wealthy explorer to bring it to light.* The Khâti proper
were settled to the south of the Taurus in the basin of the Sajur,
but they were divided into several petty states, of which that which
possessed Carchemish was the most important, and exercised a practical
hegemony over the others. Its chiefs alone had the right to call
themselves kings of the Khâti. The Patinu, who were their immediate
neighbours on the west, stretched right up to the Mediterranean above
the plains of Naharairn and beyond the Orontes; they had absorbed, it
would seem, the provinces of the ancient Alasia. Aramaeans occupied
the region to the south of the Patinu between the two Lebanon ranges,
embracing the districts of Hamath and Qobah.**
* The results of the excavations at Zinjirli are evidence of
what historical material we may hope to find in these
tumuli. See the account of the earlier results in P. von
Luschan, _Ausgrabungen in Sendschirli_, 1893.
** The Aramaeans are mentioned by Tiglath-pileser I. as
situated between the Balikh, the Euphrates, and the Sajur.
The valleys of the Amanus and the southern slopes of the Taurus included
within them some half-dozen badly defined principalities--Samalla on the
Kara-Su,* Gurgum** around Marqasi, the Qui*** and Khilakku**** in
the classical Cilicia, and the Kasku^ and Kummukh^^ in a bend of the
Euphrates to the north and north-east of the Khâti.
* The country of Samalla, in Egyptian Samalûa, extended
around the Tell of Zinjirli, at the foot of the Amanus, in
the valley of Marash of the Arab historians.
** The name has been read Gamgumu, Gaugum, and connected by
Tom-kins with the Egyptian Augama, which he reads Gagama, in
the lists of Thûtmosis III. The Aramaean inscription on the
statue of King Panammu shows that it must be read Gurgumu,
and Sachau has identified this new name with that of Jurjum,
which was the name by which the province of the Amanus,
lying between Baias and the lake of Antioch, was known in
the Byzantine period; the ancient Gurgum stretches further
towards the north, around the town of Marqasi, which Tomkins
and Sachau have identified with Marash.
*** The site of the country of Qui was determined by
Schrader; it was that part of the Cilician plain which
stretches from the Amanus to the mountains of the Kêtis, and
takes in the great town of Tarsus. F. Lenor-mant has pointed
out that this country is mentioned twice in the Scriptures
(1 _Kings_ x, 28 and 2 _Chron_. i. 16), in the time of
Solomon. The designation of the country, transformed into
the appellation of an eponymous god, is found in the name
Qauîsaru, Qauî is king.
**** Khilakku, the name of which is possibly the same as the
Egyptian Khalakka, is the Cilicia Trachsea of classical
geographers.
^ The country of Kashku, which has been connected with
Kashkisha, which takes the place of Karkisha in an Egyptian
text, was still a dependency of the Hittites in the time of
Tiglath-pileser. It was in the neighbourhood of the Urumu,
whose capital seems to have been Urum, the Ourima of
Ptolemy, near the bend of the Euphrates between Sumeîsat and
Birejik; it extended into the Commagene of classical times,
on the borders of Melitene and the Tubal.
^^ Kummukh lay on both sides of the Euphrates and of the
Upper Tigris; it became gradually restricted, until at
length it was conterminous with the Commagene of classical
geographers.
The ancient Mitanni to the east of Carchemish, which was so active in
the time of the later Amenôthes, had now ceased to exist, and there
was but a vague remembrance of its farmer prowess. It had foundered
probably in the great cataclysm which engulfed the Hittite empire,
although its name appears inscribed once more among those of the vassals
of Egypt on the triumphal lists of Ramses III. Its chief tribes had
probably migrated towards the regions which were afterwards described by
the Greek geographers as the home of the Matieni on the Halys and in the
neighbourhood of Lake Urmiah. Aramaean kingdoms, of which the greatest
was that of Bit-Adîni,* had succeeded them, and bordered the Euphrates
on each side as far as the Chalus and Balikh respectively; the ancient
Harran belonged also to them, and their frontier stretched as far as
Hamath, and to that of the Patinu on the Orontes.
* The province of Bît-Adîni was specially that part of the
country which lay between the Euphrates and the Balikh, but
it extended also to other Syrian provinces between the
Euphrates and the Aprie.
It was, as we have seen, a complete breaking up of the old
nationalities, and we have evidence also of a similar disintegration in
the countries to the north of the Taurus, in the direction of the Black
Sea. Of the mighty Khâti with whom Thûtmosis III. had come into contact,
there was no apparent trace: either the tribes of which they were
composed had migrated towards the south, or those who had never left
their native mountains had entered into new combinations and lost even
the remembrance of their name. The Milidu, Tabal (Tubal), and Mushku
(Meshech) stretched behind each other from east to west on the confines
of the Tokhma-Su, and still further away other cities of less importance
contended for the possession of the Upper Saros and the middle region of
the Halys. These peoples, at once poor and warlike, had been attracted,
like the Hittites of some centuries previous, by the riches accumulated
in the strongholds of Syria. Eevolutions must have been frequent in
these regions, but our knowledge of them is more a matter of conjecture
than of actual evidence. Towards the year 1170 B.C. the Mushku swooped
down on Kummukh, and made themselves its masters; then pursuing their
good fortune, they took from the Assyrians the two provinces, Alzi and
Purukuzzi, which lay not far from the sources of the Tigris and the
Balikh.*
* The _Annals of Tiglath-pileser I_. place their invasion
fifty years before the beginning of his reign. Ed. Meyer saw
a connexion between this and the invasion of the People of
the Sea, which took place under Ramses III. I think that the
invasion of the Mushku was a purely local affair, and had
nothing in common with the general catastrophe occasioned by
the movement of the Asiatic armies.
A little later the Kashku, together with some Aramaeans, broke into
Shubarti, then subject to Assyria, and took possession of a part of it.
The majority of these invasions had, however, no permanent result: they
never issued in the establishment of an empire like that of the Khâti,
capable by its homogeneity of offering a serious resistance to the march
of a conqueror from the south. To sum up the condition of affairs: if
a redistribution of races had brought about a change in Northern Syria,
their want of cohesion was no less marked than in the time of the
Egyptian wars; the first enemy to make an attack upon the frontier of
one or other of these tribes was sure of victory, and, if he persevered
in his efforts, could make himself master of as much territory as he
might choose. The Pharaohs had succeeded in welding together their
African possessions, and their part in the drama of conquest had
been played long ago; but the cities of the Tigris and the Lower
Euphrates--Nineveh and Babylon-were ready to enter the lists as soon as
they felt themselves strong enough to revive their ancient traditions of
foreign conquest.
The successors of Agumkakrimê were not more fortunate than he had been
in attempting to raise Babylon once more to the foremost rank; their
want of power, their discord, the insubordination and sedition that
existed among their Cossæan troops, and the almost periodic returns of
the Theban generals to the banks of the Euphrates, sometimes even to
those of the Balikh and the Khabur, all seemed to conspire to aggravate
the helpless state into which Babylon had sunk since the close of the
dynasty of Uruazagga. Elam was pressing upon her eastern, and Assyria
on her northern frontier, and their kings not only harassed her with
persistent malignity, but, by virtue of their alliances by marriage with
her sovereigns, took advantage of every occasion to interfere both
in domestic and state affairs; they would espouse the cause of some
pretender during a revolt, they would assume the guardianship of such
of their relatives as were left widows or minors, and, when the occasion
presented itself, they took possession of the throne of Bel, or bestowed
it on one of their creatures. Assyria particularly seemed to regard
Babylon with a deadly hatred. The capitals of the two countries were not
more than some one hundred and eighty-five miles apart, the intervening
district being a flat and monotonous alluvial plain, unbroken by any
feature which could serve as a natural frontier. The line of demarcation
usually followed one of the many canals in the narrow strip of land
between the Euphrates and the Tigris; it then crossed the latter, and
was formed by one of the rivers draining the Iranian table-land,--either
the Upper Zab, the Radanu, the Turnat, or some of their ramifications in
the spurs of the mountain ranges. Each of the two states strove by every
means in its power to stretch its boundary to the farthest limits,
and to keep it there at all hazards. This narrow area was the scene of
continual war, either between the armies of the two states or those of
partisans, suspended from time to time by an elaborate treaty which was
supposed to settle all difficulties, but, as a matter of fact, satisfied
no one, and left both parties discontented with their lot and jealous of
each other. The concessions made were never of sufficient importance
to enable the conqueror to crush his rival and regain for himself the
ancient domain of Khammurabi; his losses, on the other hand, were
often considerable enough to paralyse his forces, and prevent him from
extending his border in any other direction. When the Egyptians seized
on Naharaim, Assyria and Babylon each adopted at the outset a different
attitude towards the conquerors. Assyria, which never laid any permanent
claims to the seaboard provinces of the Mediterranean, was not disposed
to resent their occupation by Egypt, and desired only to make sure of
their support or their neutrality. The sovereign then ruling Assyria,
but of whose name we have no record, hastened to congratulate Thûtmosis
III. on his victory at Megiddo, and sent him presents of precious vases,
slaves, lapis-lazuli, chariots and horses, all of which the Egyptian
conqueror regarded as so much tribute. Babylon, on the other hand, did
not take action so promptly as Assyria; it was only towards the latter
years of Thûtmosis that its king, Karaîndash, being hard pressed by the
Assyrian Assurbelnishishu, at length decided to make a treaty with the
intruder.*
* We have no direct testimony in support of this hypothesis,
but several important considerations give it probability. As
no tribute from Babylon is mentioned in the _Annals of
Thûtmosis III_., we must place the beginning of the
relations between Egypt and Chaldæa at a later date. On the
other hand, Burnaburiash II., in a letter written to
Amenôthes III., cites Karaîndash as the first of _his
fathers,_ who had established friendly relations with _the
fathers_ of the Pharaoh, a fact which obliges us to place
the interchange of presents before the time of Amenôthes
III.: as the reigns of Amenôthes II. and of Thûtmosis IV.
were both short, it is probable that these relations began
in the latter years of Thûtmosis III.
The remoteness of Egypt from the Babylonian frontier no doubt relieved
Karaîndash from any apprehension of an actual invasion by the Pharaohs;
but there was the possibility of their subsidising some nearer enemy,
and also of forbidding Babylonish caravans to enter Egyptian provinces,
and thus crippling Chaldæan commerce. Friendly relations, when once
established, soon necessitated a constant interchange of embassies and
letters between the Nile and the Euphrates. As a matter of fact, the
Babylonian king could never reconcile himself to the idea that Syria had
passed out of his hands. While pretending to warn the Pharaoh of Syrian
plots against him,* the Babylonians were employing at the same time
secret agents, to go from city to city and stir up discontent at
Egyptian rule, praising the while the great Cosssean king and his
armies, and inciting to revolt by promises of help never meant to be
fulfilled. Assyria, whose very existence would have been endangered by
the re-establishment of a Babylonian empire, never missed an opportunity
of denouncing these intrigues at head-quarters: they warned the royal
messengers and governors of them, and were constantly contrasting the
frankness and honesty of their own dealings with the duplicity of their
rival.
* This was done by Kurigalzu I., according to a letter
addressed by his son Burnaburiash to Amenôthes IV.
This state of affairs lasted for more than half a century, during which
time both courts strove to ingratiate themselves in the favour of the
Pharaoh, each intriguing for the exclusion of the other, by exchanging
presents with him, by congratulations on his accession, by imploring
gifts of wrought or unwrought gold, and by offering him the most
beautiful women of their family for his harem. The son of Karaîndash,
whose name still remains to be discovered, bestowed one of his daughters
on the young Amenôthes III.: Kallimasin, the sovereign who succeeded
him, also sent successively two princesses to the same Pharaoh. But
the underlying bitterness and hatred would break through the veneer of
polite formula and protestations when the petitioner received, as the
result of his advances, objects of inconsiderable value such as a lord
might distribute to his vassals, or when he was refused a princess of
solar blood, or even an Egyptian bride of some feudal house; at such
times, however, an ironical or haughty epistle from Thebes would recall
him to a sense of his own inferiority.
As a fact, the lot of the Cossæan sovereigns does not appear to have
been a happy one, in spite of the variety and pomposity of the titles
which they continued to assume. They enjoyed but short lives, and we
know that at least three or four of them--Kallimasin, Burnaburiash I.,
and Kurigalzu I. ascended the throne in succession during the forty
years that Amenôthes III. ruled over Egypt and Syria.*
* The copy we possess of the Royal Canon of Babylon is
mutilated at this point, and the original documents are not
sufficiently complete to fill the gap. About two or three
names are missing after that of Agumkakrimê, and the reigns
must have been very short, if indeed, as I think, Agumka-
krimî and Karaîndash were both contemporaries of the earlier
Pharaohs bearing the name of Thûtmosis. The order of the
names which have come down to us is not indisputably
established. The following order appears to me to be the
most probable at present:--
Karaîndash. Kallimasin. Burnaburiash I. Kurigalzu I.
Burnaburiash II. Karakhardash. Kadashmankiiarbê I.
Nazibugas II.. Kurigalzu II. Nazimaruttasii. Kadashmanturgu.
This is, with a slight exception, the classification adopted
by Winckler, and that of Hilprecht differs from it only in
the intercalation of Kudurturgu and Shagaraktiburiash
between Burnaburiash II. and Karakhardash.
Perhaps the rapidity of this succession may have arisen from some
internal revolution or from family disturbances. The Chaldæans of the
old stock reluctantly rendered obedience to these Cosssean kings,
and, if we may judge from the name, one at least of these ephemeral
sovereigns, Kallimasin, appears to have been a Semite, who owed his
position among the Cossoan princes to some fortunate chance. A few
rare inscriptions stamped on bricks, one or two letters or documents of
private interest, and some minor objects from widely distant spots, have
enabled us to ascertain the sites upon which these sovereigns erected
buildings; Karaîndash restored the temple of Nana at Uruk, Burnaburiash
and Kurigalzu added to that of Shamash at Larsam, and Kurigalzu took in
hand that of Sin at Uru. We also possess a record of some of their acts
in the fragments of a document, which a Mnevite scribe of the time of
Assurbanipal had compiled, or rather jumbled together,* from certain
Babylonian chronicles dealing with the wars against Assyria and Elam,
with public treaties, marriages, and family quarrels. We learn from
this, for example, that Burnaburiash I. renewed with Buzurassur the
conventions drawn up between Karaîndash and Assurbelnishishu. These
friendly relations were maintained, apparently, under Kurigalzu I.
and Assur-nadin-akhi, the son of Buzurassur;** if Kurigalzu built or
restored the fortress, long called after him Dur-Kurigalzu,*** at one
of the fords of the Narmalka, it was probably as a precautionary measure
rather than because of any immediate danger. The relations between
the two powers became somewhat strained when Burnaburiash II.
and Assuruballît had respectively succeeded to Kurigalzu and
Assur-nadin-akhi; **** this did not, however, lead to hostilities, and
the subsequent betrothal of Karakhardash, son of Burnaburiash II., to
Mubauîtatseruâ, daughter of Assuruballît, tended to restore matters to
their former condition.
* This is what is generally called the Synchronous
History, the principal remains of which were discovered and
published by H. Rawlinson. It is a very unskilful
complication, in which Winckler has discovered several
blunders.
** Assur-nadin-akhi I. is mentioned in a Tel el-Amarna
tablet as being the father of Assuruballît.
*** This is the present Akerkuf, as is proved by the
discovery of bricks bearing the name of Kurigalzu; but
perhaps what I have attributed to Kurigalzu I. must be
referred to the second king of that name.
**** We infer this from the way in which Burnaburiash speaks
of the Assyrians in the correspondence with Amenôthes IV.
The good will between the two countries became still more pronounced
when Kadashmankharbê succeeded his father Karakhardash. The Cossæan
soldiery had taken umbrage at his successor and had revolted,
assassinated Kadashmankharbê, and proclaimed king in his stead a man
of obscure origin named Nazibùgash. Assuruballît, without a moments
hesitation, took the side of his new relatives; he crossed the frontier,
killed Nazibugash, and restored the throne to his sisters child,
Kurigalzu II., the younger. The young king, who was still a minor at
his accession, appears to have met with no serious difficulties; at any
rate, none were raised by his Assyrian cousins, Belnirârî I. and his
successor Budîlu.*
* The _Synchronous History_ erroneously places the events of
the reign of Rammân-nirâri in that of Belnirârî. The order
of succession of Buzurassur, Assuruballît, Belnirârî, and
Budîlu, has been established by the bricks of Kalah-Shergât.
Towards the close of his reign, however, revolts broke out, and it was
only by sustained efforts that he was able to restore order in Babylon,
Sippara, and the Country of the Sea. While the king was in the midst of
these difficulties, the Elamites took advantage of his troubles to
steal from him a portion of his territory, and their king, Khurbatila,
challenged him to meet his army near Dur-Dungi. Kurigalzu accepted the
challenge, gained a decisive victory, took his adversary prisoner, and
released him only on receiving as ransom a province beyond the Tigris;
he even entered Susa, and, from among other trophies of past wars,
resumed possession of an agate tablet belonging to Dungi, which the
veteran Kudurnakhunta had stolen from the temple of Nipur nearly
a thousand years previously. This victory was followed by the
congratulations of most of his neighbours, with the exception of
Bammân-nirâri II., who had succeeded Budîlu in Assyria, and probably
felt some jealousy or uneasiness at the news. He attacked the Cossæans,
and overthrew them at Sugagi, on the banks of the Salsallât; their
losses were considerable, and Kurigalzu could only obtain peace by the
cession to Assyria of a strip of territory the entire length of the
north-west frontier, from the confines of the Shubari country, near
the sources of the Khabur, to the suburbs of Babylon itself. Nearly the
whole of Mesopotamia thus changed hands at one stroke, but Babylon had
still more serious losses to suffer. Nazimaruttash, who attempted to
wipe out the disaster sustained by his father Kurigalzu, experienced two
crushing defeats, one at Kar-Ishtar and the other near Akarsallu, and
the treaty which he subsequently signed was even more humiliating for
his country than the preceding one. All that part of the Babylonian
domain which lay nearest to Nineveh was ceded to the Assyrians, from
Pilaski on the right bank of the Tigris to the province of Lulumê in
the Zagros mountains. It would appear that the Cossæan tribes who had
remained in their native country, took advantage of these troublous
times to sever all connection with their fellow-countrymen established
in the cities of the plain; for we find them henceforward carrying on a
petty warfare for their own profit, and leading an entirely independent
life. The descendants of Gandish, deprived of territories in the north,
repulsed in the east, and threatened in the south by the nations of
the Persian Gulf, never recovered their former ascendency, and their
authority slowly declined during the century which followed these
events. Their downfall brought about the decadence of the cities over
which they had held sway; and the supremacy which Babylon had exercised
for a thousand years over the countries of the Euphrates passed into the
hands of the Assyrian kings.
Assyria itself was but a poor and insignificant country when compared
with her rival. It occupied, on each side of the middle course of the
Tigris, the territory lying between the 35th and 37th parallels of
latitude.*
* These are approximately the limits of the first Assyrian
empire, as given by the monuments; from the Persian epoch
onwards, the name was applied to the whole course of the
Tigris as far as the mountain district. The ancient
orthography of the name is Aushâr.
It was bounded on the east by the hills and mountain ranges running
parallel to the Zagros Chain--Gebel Guar, Gebel Gara, Zerguizavân-dagh,
and Baravân-dagh, with their rounded monotonous limestone ridges, scored
by watercourses and destitute of any kind of trees. On the north it
was hemmed in by the spurs of the Masios, and bounded on the east by an
undefined line running from Mount Masios to the slopes of Singar,
and from these again to the Chaldæan plain; to the south the frontier
followed the configuration of the table-land and the curve of the low
cliffs, which in prehistoric times had marked the limits of the Persian
Gulf; from here the boundary was formed on the left side of the Tigris
by one of its tributaries, either the Lower Zab or the Badanu. The
territory thus enclosed formed a compact and healthy district: it was
free from extremes of temperature arising from height or latitude, and
the relative character and fertility of its soil depended on the absence
or presence of rivers. The eastern part of Assyria was well watered by
the streams and torrents which drained the Iranian plateau and the lower
mountain chains which ran parallel to it. The beds of these rivers are
channelled so deeply in the alluvial soil, that it is necessary to stand
on the very edge of their banks to catch a sight of their silent and
rapid waters; and it is only in the spring or early summer, when they
are swollen by the rains and melting snow, that they spread over the
adjacent country. As soon as the inundation is over, a vegetation of the
intensest green springs up, and in a few days the fields and meadows are
covered with a luxuriant and fragrant carpet of verdure. This brilliant
growth is, however, short-lived, for the heat of the sun dries it up as
quickly as it appears, and even the corn itself is in danger of being
burnt up before reaching maturity. To obviate such a disaster, the
Assyrians had constructed a network of canals and ditches, traces of
which are in many places still visible, while a host of _shadufs_
placed along their banks facilitated irrigation in the dry seasons. The
provinces supplied with water in this manner enjoyed a fertility which
passed into a proverb, and was well known among the ancients; they
yielded crops of cereals which rivalled those of Babylonia, and included
among their produce wheat, barley, millet, and sesame. But few olive
trees were cultivated, and the dates were of inferior quality; indeed,
in the Greek period, these fruits were only used for fattening pigs and
domestic animals. The orchards contained the pistachio, the apple, the
pomegranate, the apricot, the vine, the almond, and the fig, and, in
addition to the essences common to both Syria and Egypt, the country
produced cédrats of a delicious scent which were supposed to be an
antidote to all kinds of poisons. Assyria was not well wooded, except in
the higher valleys, where willows and poplars bordered the rivers, and
sycamores, beeches, limes, and plane trees abounded, besides several
varieties of pines and oaks, including a dwarf species of the latter,
from whose branches manna was obtained.
[Illustration: 143.jpg THE 1ST ASSYRIAN EMPIRE--MAP]
This is a saccharine substance, which is deposited in small lumps, and
is found in greater abundance during wet years and especially on foggy
days. When fresh, it has an agreeable taste and is pleasant to eat;
but as it will not keep in its natural state, the women prepare it for
exportation by dissolving it in boiling water, and evaporating it to a
sweetish paste, which has more or less purgative, qualities. The aspect
of the country changes after crossing the Tigris westward. The slopes of
Mount Masios are everywhere furrowed with streams, which feed the Khabur
and its principal affluent, the Kharmis;* woods become more frequent,
and the valleys green and shady.
* The Kharmis is the Mygdonios of Greek geographers, the
Hirmâs of the Arabs; the latter name may be derived from
Kharmis, or it may be that it merely presents a fortuitous
resemblance to it.
The plains extending southwards, however, contain, like those of the
Euphrates, beds of gypsum in the sub-soil, which render the water
running through them brackish, and prevent the growth of vegetation.
The effects of volcanic action are evident on the surface of these
great steppes; blocks of basalt pierce through the soil, and near the
embouchure of the Kharmis, a cone, composed of a mass of lava, cinders,
and scorial, known as the Tell-Kôkab, rises abruptly to a height of
325 feet. The mountain chain of Singar, which here reaches its western
termination, is composed of a long ridge of soft white limestone, and
seems to have been suddenly thrown up in one of the last geological
upheavals which affected this part of the country: in some places it
resembles a perpendicular wall, while in others it recedes in natural
terraces which present the appearance of a gigantic flight of steps. The
summit is often wooded, and the spurs covered with vineyards and fields,
which flourish vigorously in the vicinity of streams; when these fail,
however, the table-land resumes its desolate aspect, and stretches
in bare and sandy undulations to the horizon, broken only where it
is crossed by the Thartar, the sole river in this region which is not
liable to be dried up, and whose banks may be traced by the scanty line
of vegetation which it nourishes.
[Illustration: 145.jpg THE VOLCANIC CONE OF KÔKAB]
Drawn by Boudier, from the cut in Layard.
In a country thus unequally favoured by nature, the towns are
necessarily distributed in a seemingly arbitrary fashion. Most of them
are situated on the left bank of the Tigris, where the fertile nature
of the soil enables it to support a dense population. They were all
flourishing centres of population, and were in close proximity to each
other, at all events during the centuries of Assyrian hegemony.*
* We find, for example, in the inscription of Bavian, a long
enumeration of towns and villages situated almost within the
suburbs of Nineveh, on the banks of the Khôser.
Three of them soon eclipsed their rivals in political and religious
importance; these were Kalakh and Nina on the Tigris, and Arbaîlu,
lying beyond the Upper Zab, in the broken plain which is a continuation
eastwards of the first spurs of the Zagros.* On the right bank, however,
we find merely some dozen cities and towns, scattered about in places
where there was a supply of water sufficient to enable the inhabitants
to cultivate the soil; as, for example, Assur on the banks of the Tigris
itself, Singara near the sources of the Thartar, and Nazibina near those
of the Kharmis, at the foot of the Masios. These cities were not all
under the rule of one sovereign when Thûtmosis III. appeared in Syria,
for the Egyptian monuments mention, besides the kingdom of Assyria, that
of Singara** and Araphka in the upper basin of the Zab.***
* The name of Arbeles is written in a form which appears to
signify the town of the four gods.
** This kingdom of Singara is mentioned in the Egyptian
lists of Thûtmosis III. Schrader was doubtful as to its
existence, but one of its kings is mentioned in a letter
from the King of Alasia to Amenôthes IV.; according to
Niebuhr, the state of which Singara was the capital must
have been identical, at all events at one period, with the
Mitanni of the Egyptian texts.
*** The Arapakha of the Egyptian monuments has been
identified with the Arrapakhitis of the Greeks.
Assyria, however, had already asserted her supremacy over this corner of
Asia, and the remaining princes, even if they were not mere vicegerents
depending on her king, were not strong enough in wealth and extent
of territory to hold their own against her, since she was undisputed
mistress of Assur, Arbeles, Kalakh, and Nineveh, the most important
cities of the plain. Assur covered a considerable area, and the
rectangular outline formed by the remains of its walls is still
discernible on the surface of the soil. Within the circuit of the
city rose a mound, which the ancient builders had transformed, by
the addition of masses of brickwork, into a nearly square platform,
surmounted by the usual palace, temple, and ziggurat; it was enclosed
within a wall of squared stone, the battlements of which remain to the
present day.* The whole pile was known as the Ekharsagkurkurra, or the
House of the terrestrial mountain, the sanctuary in whose decoration
all the ancient sovereigns had vied with one another, including
Samsirammân I. and Irishum, who were merely vicegerents dependent upon
Babylon. It was dedicated to Anshar, that duplicate of Anu who had
led the armies of heaven in the struggle with Tiâmat; the name Anshar,
softened into Aushar, and subsequently into Ashshur, was first applied
to the town and then to the whole country.**
* Ainsworth states the circumference of the principal mound
of Kalah-Shergât to be 4685 yards, which would make it one
of the most extensive ruins in the whole country.
** Another name of the town in later times was Palbêki, the
town of the old empire, the ancient capital, or Shauru.
Many Assyriologists believe that the name Ashur, anciently
written Aushâr, signified the plain at the edge of the
water; and that it must have been applied to the town
before being applied to the country and the god. Others, on
the contrary, think, with more reason, that it was the god
who gave his name to the town and the country; they make a
point of the very ancient play of words, which in Assyria
itself attributed the meaning good god to the word Ashur.
Jensen was the first to state that Ashur was the god Anshâr
of the account of the creation.
The god himself was a deity of light, usually represented under the form
of an armed man, wearing the tiara and having the lower half of his body
concealed by a feathered disk. He was supposed to hover continually
over the world, hurling fiery darts at the enemies of his people, and
protecting his kingly worshippers under the shadow of his wings. Their
wars were his wars, and he was with them in the thick of the attack,
placing himself in the front rank with the soldiery,* so that when he
gained the victory, the bulk of the spoil--precious metals, gleanings
of the battle-field, slaves and productive lands--fell to his share. The
gods of the vanquished enemy, moreover, were, like their princes, forced
to render him homage. In the person of the king he took their statues
prisoners, and shut them up in his sanctuary; sometimes he would engrave
his name upon their figures and send them back to their respective
temples, where the sight of them would remind their worshippers of his
own omnipotence.** The goddess associated with him as his wife had given
her name, Nina, to Nineveh,*** and was, as the companion of the Chaldæan
Bel, styled the divine lady Belit; she was, in fact, a chaste and
warlike Ishtar, who led the armies into battle with a boldness
characteristic of her father.****
* In one of the pictures, for instance, representing the
assault of a town, we see a small figure of the god, hurling
darts against the enemy. The inscriptions also state that
the peoples are alarmed and quit their cities _before the
arms of Assur, the powerful one_.
** As, for instance, the statues of the gods taken from the
Arabs in the time of Esarhaddon. Tiglath-pileser I. had
carried away twenty-five statues of gods taken from the
peoples of Kurkhi and Kummukh, and had placed them in the
temples of Beltis, Ishtar, Anu, and Rammân; he mentions
other foreign divinities who had been similarly treated.
*** The ideogram of the name of the goddess Nina serves to
write the name of the town Nineveh. The name itself has been
interpreted by Schrader as station, habitation, in the
Semitic languages, and by Fr. Delitzsch repose of the god,
an interpretation which Delitzsch himself repudiated later
on. It is probable that the town, which, like Assur, was a
Chaldæan colony, derived its name from the goddess to whom
it was dedicated, and whose temple existed there as early as
the time of the vicegerent Samsirammân.
**** Belit is called by Tiglath-pileser I. the great spouse
beloved of Assur, but Belit, the lady, is here merely an
epithet used for Ishtar: the Assyrian Ishtar, Ishtar of
Assur, Ishtar of Nineveh, or rather--especially from the
time of the Sargonids--Ishtar of Arbeles, is almost always a
fierce and warlike Ishtar, the lady of combat, who directs
battles, whose heart incites her to the combat and the
struggle. Sayce thinks that the union of Ishtar and Assur
is of a more recent date.
[Illustration: 149.jpg ISHTAR AS A WARRIOR BRINGING PRISONERS TO A
CONQUERING KING]
Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from squeezes brought back by M. do
Morgan.
These two divinities formed an abstract and solitary pair, around whom
neither story nor myth appears to have gathered, and who never became
the centre of any complex belief. Assur seems to have had no parentage
assigned to him, no statue erected to him, and he was not associated
with the crowd of other divinities; on the contrary, he was called their
lord, their peerless king, and, as a proof of his supreme sovereignty
over them, his name was inscribed at the head of their lists, before
those of the triads constituted by the Chaldæan priests--even before
those of Anu, Bel, and Ba. The city of Assur, which had been the first
to tender him allegiance for many years, took precedence of all the
rest, in spite of the drawbacks with which it had to contend. Placed at
the very edge of the Mesopotamian desert, it was exposed to the dry and
burning winds which swept over the plains, so that by the end of the
spring the heat rendered it almost intolerable as a residence. The
Tigris, moreover, ran behind it, thus leaving it exposed to the attacks
of the Babylonian armies, unprotected as it was by any natural fosse
or rampart. The nature of the frontier was such as to afford it no
safeguard; indeed, it had, on the contrary, to protect its frontier.
Nineveh, on the other hand, was entrenched behind the Tigris and the
Zab, and was thus secure from any sudden attack. Northerly and easterly
winds prevailed during the summer, and the coolness of the night
rendered the heat during the day more bearable. It became the custom for
the kings and vicegerents to pass the most trying months of the year at
Nineveh, taking up their abode close to the temple of Nina, the Assyrian
Ishtar, but they did not venture to make it their habitual residence,
and consequently Assur remained the official capital and chief sanctuary
of the empire. Here its rulers concentrated their treasures, their
archives, their administrative offices, and the chief staff of the army;
from this town they set out on their expeditions against the Cossæans of
Babylon or the mountaineers of the districts beyond the Tigris, and it
was in this temple that they dedicated to the god the tenth of the spoil
on their return from a successful campaign.*
* The majority of scholars now admit that the town of Nina, mentioned by
Gudea and the vicegerents of Telloh, was a quarter of, or neighbouring
borough of, Lagash, and had nothing in common with Nineveh, in spite of
Hommels assumption to the contrary.
The struggle with Chaldæa, indeed, occupied the greater part of their
energies, though it did not absorb all their resources, and often left
them times of respite, of which they availed themselves to extend their
domain to the north and east. We cannot yet tell which of the Assyrian
sovereigns added the nearest provinces of the Upper Tigris to his
realm; but when the names of these districts appear-in history, they
are already in a state of submission and vassalage, and their principal
towns are governed by Assyrian officers in the same manner as those of
Singara and Nisibe. Assuruballît, the conqueror of the Cossæans, had
succeeded in establishing his authority over the turbulent hordes of
Shubari which occupied the neighbourhood of the Masios, between the
Khabur and the Balîkh, and extended perhaps as far as the Euphrates; at
any rate, he was considered by posterity as the actual founder of the
Assyrian empire in these districts.* Belnirâri had directed his efforts
in another direction, and had conquered the petty kingdoms established
on the slopes of the Iranian table-land, around the sources of the two
Zabs, and those of the Badanu and the Turnât.**
* It is called, in an inscription of his great-grandson,
Rammân-nirâri L, the powerful king who reduced to servitude
the forces of the vast country of Shubari, and who enlarged
the territory and limits of Assur.
** The inscription of Rammân-nirâri I. styles him the prince
who crushes the army of the Cossæans, he whose hand
unnerves the enemy, and who enlarges the territory and its
limits. The Cossæans mentioned in this passage are usually
taken to be the Cossæan kings of Babylon, and not the
mountain tribes.
Like Susiana, this part of the country was divided up into parallel
valleys, separated from each other by broken ridges of limestone, and
watered by the tributaries of the Tigris or their affluents.
[Illustration: 152.jpg A VILLAGE IN THE MOUNTAIN DISTRICTS OF THE OLD
ASSÆAN KINGDOM]
Drawn by Boudier, from a drawing by Père Durand.
It was thickly strewn with walled towns and villages; the latter,
perched upon the precipitous mountain summits, and surrounded by deep
ravines, owed their security solely to their position, and, indeed,
needed no fortification. The country abounded in woods and pastures,
interspersed with cornlands; access to it was gained by one or two
passes on the eastern side, which thus permitted caravans or armies to
reach the districts lying between the Erythræan and Caspian Seas.
The tribes who inhabited it had been brought early under Chaldæan
civilization, and had adopted the cuneiform script; such of their
monuments as are still extant resemble the bas-reliefs and inscriptions
of Assyria.* It is not always easy to determine the precise locality
occupied by these various peoples; the Guti were situated near the upper
courses of the Turnât and the Badanu, in the vicinity of the Kashshu;**
the Lulumê had settled in the neighbourhood of the Batîr, to the north
of the defiles of Zohab;*** the Namar separated the Lulumê from Elam,
and were situated half in the plain and half in the mountain, while the
Arapkha occupied, both banks of the Great Zab.
* Pinches has published an inscription of a king of Khani,
named Tukultimir, son of Ilushaba, written in
Chaldeo-Assyrian, and found in the temple of Shamash at
Sippara, where the personage himself had dedicated it.
Winckler gives another inscription of a king of the Guti,
which is also in Semitic and in cuneiform character.
** The name is written sometimes Quti, at others Guti, which
induced Pognon to believe that they were two different
peoples: the territory occupied by this nation must have
been originally to the east of the Lesser Zab, in the upper
basins of the Adhem and the Diyaleh. Oppert proposes to
recognise in these Guti the ancestors of the Goths, who,
fifteen hundred years ago, pushed forward to the Russia of
the present day: we find, (he adds), in this passage and in
others, some of which go back to the third millennium before
the Christian era, the earliest mention of the Germanic
races.
*** The people of Lulumô-Lullubi have been pointed out as
living to the east of the Lesser Zab by Schrader; their
exact position, together with that of Mount Padîr-Batîr in
whose neighbourhood they were, has been determined by Père
Scheil.
Budîlu carried his arms against these tribes, and obtained successes
over the Turuki and the Nigimkhi, the princes of the Guti and the Shuti,
as well as over the Akhlamî and the Iauri.*
* The Shutu or Shuti, who are always found in connection
with the Guti, appear to have been the inhabitants of the
lower mountain slopes which separate the basin of the Tigris
with the regions of Elam, to the south of Turnât. The
Akhlamê were neighbours of the Shuti and the Guti; they were
settled partly in the Mesopotamian plain and partly in the
neighbourhood of Turnât. The territory of the Iauri is not
known; the Turuki and the Nigimkhi were probably situated
somewhere to the east of the Great Zab: in the same way that
Oppert connects the Goths with the Guti, so Hommel sees in
the Turuki the Turks of a very early date.
The chiefs of the Lulumê had long resisted the attacks of their
neighbours, and one of them, Anu-banini, had engraved on the rocks
overhanging the road not far from the village of Seripul, a bas-relief
celebrating his own victories. He figures on it in full armour, wearing
a turban on his head, and treading underfoot a fallen foe, while Ishtar
of Arbeles leads towards him a long file of naked captives, bound
ready for sacrifice. The resistance of the Lulumê was, however, finally
overcome by Rammân-nirâri, the son of Budilû; he strengthened the
suzerainty gained by his predecessor over the Guti, the Cossæans, and
the Shubarti, and he employed the spoil taken from them in beautifying
the temple of Assur. He had occasion to spend some time in the regions
of the Upper Tigris, warring against the Shubari, and a fine bronze
sabre belonging to him has been found near Diarbekîr, among the ruins of
the ancient Amidi, where, no doubt, he had left it as an offering in one
of the temples. He was succeeded by Shalmânuâsharîd,* better known to
us as Shalmaneser I., one of the most powerful sovereigns of this heroic
age of Assyrian history.
[Illustration: 155.jpg THE SABRE OF RAMMAN-NIRARI]
Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from the sketch published in the
_Transactions_ of the Bibl. Arch. Soc.
His reign seems to have been one continuous war against the various
races then in a state of ferment on the frontiers of his kingdom. He
appears in the main to have met with success, and in a few years had
doubled the extent of his dominions.* His most formidable attacks were
directed against the Aramaeans** of Mount Masios, whose numerous tribes
had advanced on one side till they had crossed the Tigris, while on the
other they had pushed beyond the river Balîkh, and had probably reached
the Euphrates.***
* Shalmânu-âsharîd, or Shulmânu-âsharîd, signifies the god
Shulmânu (Shalmânu) is prince, as Pinches was the first to
point out.
** Some of the details of these campaigns have been
preserved on the much-mutilated obelisk of Assur-nazir-pal.
This was a compilation taken from the Annals of Assyria to
celebrate the important acts of the kings ancestors. The
events recorded in the third column were at first attributed
to the reign of Tiglath-pileser I.; Fr. Delitzsch was the
first to recognise that they could be referred to the reign
of this Shalmaneser, and his opinion is now admitted by most
of the Assyriologists who have studied the question.
*** The identity of the Arami (written also Armaya, Arumi,
Arimi) with the Aramoans, admitted by the earlier Kammin-
nikâbi Assyriologists.
He captured their towns one after another, razed their fortresses, smote
the agricultural districts with fire and sword, and then turned upon the
various peoples who had espoused their cause--the Kirkhu, the Euri, the
Kharrîn,* and the Muzri, who inhabited the territory between the basins
of the two great rivers;** once, indeed, he even crossed the Euphrates
and ventured within the country of Khanigalbat, a feat which his
ancestors had never even attempted.***
* The people of the country of Kilkhi, or Kirkhi, the
Kurkhi, occupied the region between the Tigris at Diarbekîr
and the mountains overlooking the lake of Urumiah. The
position of the Ruri is not known, but it is certain that on
one side they joined the Aramaeans, and that they were in
the neighbourhood of Tushkhân. Kharrân is the Harrân of the
Balikh, mentioned in vol. iv. pp. 37, 38 of the present
work.
** The name of Muzri frequently occurs, and in various
positions, among the countries mentioned by the Assyrian
conquerors; the frequency of its occurrence is easily
explained if we are to regard it as a purely Assyrian term
used to designate the military confines or marches of the
kingdom at different epochs of its history. The Muzri here
in question is the borderland situated in the vicinity of
Cilicia, probably the Sophene and the Gumathene of classical
geographers. Winckler appears to me to exaggerate their
importance when he says they were spread over the whole of
Northern Syria as early as the time of Shalmaneser I.
*** Khanigalbat is the name of the province in which Milid
was placed.
He was recalled by a revolt which had broken out in the scattered cities
of the district of Dur-Kurigalzu; he crushed the rising in spite of the
help which Kadash-manburiash, King of Babylon, had given to the rebels,
and was soon successful in subduing the princes of Lulumê. These were
not the raids of a days duration, undertaken, without any regard to the
future, merely from love of rapine or adventure. Shalmaneser desired to
bring the regions which he annexed permanently under the authority of
Assyria, and to this end he established military colonies in suitable
places, most of which were kept up long after his death.*
* More than five centuries after the time of Shalmaneser I.,
Assurnazir-pal makes mention, in his _Annals_, of one of
these colonies, established in the country of Diarbekîr at
Khabzilukha (or Khabzidipkha), near to the town of Damdamua.
He seems to have directed the internal affairs of his kingdom with the
same firmness and energy which he displayed in his military expeditions.
It was no light matter for the sovereign to decide on a change in
the seat of government; he ran the risk of offending, not merely his
subjects, but the god who presided over the destinies of the State, and
neither his throne nor his life would have been safe had he failed in
his attempt. Shalmaneser, however, did not hesitate to make the change,
once he was fully convinced of the drawbacks presented by Assur as
a capital. True, he beautified the city, restored its temples, and
permitted it to retain all its privileges and titles; but having
done so, he migrated with his court to the town of Kalakh, where
his descendants continued to reside for several centuries. His son
Tukulti-ninip made himself master of Babylon, and was the first of his
race who was able to claim the title of King of Sumir and Akkad.
The Cossæans were still suffering from their defeat at the hands of
Bammân-nirâri. Four of their princes had followed Nazimaruttash on the
throne in rapid succession--Kadashmanturgu, Kadashmanburiash, who
was attacked by Shalmaneser, a certain Isammeti whose name has been
mutilated, and lastly, Shagaraktiburiash: Bibeiasdu, son of this latter,
was in power at the moment when Tukulti-ninip ascended the throne. War
broke out between the two monarchs, but dragged on without any marked
advantage on one side or the other, till at length the conflict was
temporarily suspended by a treaty similar to others which had been
signed in the course of the previous two or three centuries.*
* The passage from the _Synchronous History_, republished by
Winckler, contains the termination of the mutilated name of
a Babylonian king... _ashu_, which, originally left
undecided by Winckler, has been restored Bibeiashu by
Hilprecht, in the light of monuments discovered at Nipur, an
emendation which has since then been accepted by Winckler.
Winckler, on his part, has restored the passage on the
assumption that the name of the King of Assyria engaged
against Bibeiashu was Tukulti-ninip; then, combining this
fragment with that in the _Pinches Chronicle_, which deals
with the taking of Babylon, he argues that Bibeiashu was the
king dethroned by Tukulti-ninip. An examination of the
dates, in so far as they are at present known to us from the
various documents, seems to me to render this arrangement
inadmissible. The _Pinches Chronicle_ practically tells us
that Tukulti-ninip reigned over Babylon for _seven years_,
when the Chaldæans revolted, and named Rammânshumusur king.
Now, the Babylonian Canon gives us the following reigns for
this epoch: Bibeiashu _8 years_, Belnadînshumu _1 year 6
months_, Kadashmankharbe _1 year 6 months_, Rammânnadînshumu
_6 years_, Rammânshumusur _30 years,_ or _9 years_ between
the end of the reign of Bibeiashu and the beginning of that
of Rammânshumusur, instead of the _7 years_ given us by the
_Pinches Chronicle_ for the length of the reign of Tukulti-
ninip at Babylon. If we reckon, as the only documents known
require us to do, seven years from the beginning of the
reign of Rammânshumusur to the date of the taking of
Babylon, we are forced to admit that this took place in the
reign of Kadashmankharbe IL, and, consequently, that the
passage in the _Synchronous History_, in which mention is
made of Bibeiashu, must be interpreted as I have done in the
text, by the hypothesis of a war prior to that in which
Babylon fell, which was followed by a treaty between this
prince and the King of Assyria.
The peace thus concluded might have lasted longer but for an unforeseen
catastrophe which placed Babylon almost at the mercy of her rival. The
Blamites had never abandoned their efforts to press in every conceivable
way their claim to the Sebbeneh-su, the supremacy, which, prior to
Kbammurabi, had been exercised by their ancestors over the whole of
Mesopotamia; they swooped down on Karduniash with an impetuosity like
that of the Assyrians, and probably with the same alternations of
success and defeat. Their king, Kidinkhutrutash, unexpectedly attacked
Belnadînshumu, son of Bibeiashu, appeared suddenly under the walls
of Nipur and forced the defences of Durîlu and Étimgarka-lamma:
Belnadînshumu disappeared in the struggle after a reign of eighteen
months. Tukulti-ninip left Belna-dînshumus successor, Kadashmankharbe
II., no time to recover from this disaster; he attacked him in turn,
carried Babylon by main force, and put a number of the inhabitants to
the sword. He looted the palace and the temples, dragged the statue of
Merodach from its sanctuary and carried it off into Assyria, together
with the badges of supreme power; then, after appointing governors of
his own in the various towns, he returned to Kalakh, laden with booty;
he led captive with him several members of the royal family--among
others, Bammânshumusur, the lawful successor of Bibeiashu.
This first conquest of Chaldæa did not, however, produce any lasting
results. The fall of Babylon did not necessarily involve the subjection
of the whole country, and the cities of the south showed a bold front to
the foreign intruder, and remained faithful to Kadashmankharbe; on the
death of the latter, some months after his defeat, they hailed as king a
certain Bammânshumnadîn, who by some means or other had made his escape
from captivity. Bammânshumnadîn proved himself a better man than his
predecessors; when Kidinkhutrutash, never dreaming, apparently, that he
would meet with any serious resistance, came to claim his share of
the spoil, he defeated him near Ishin, drove him out of the districts
recently occupied by the Elamites, and so effectually retrieved his
fortunes in this direction, that he was able to concentrate his whole
attention on what was going on in the north. The effects of his victory
soon became apparent: the nobles of Akkad and Karduniash declined to pay
homage to their Assyrian governors, and, ousting them from the offices
to which they had been appointed, restored Babylon to the independence
which it had lost seven years previously. Tukulti-ninip paid dearly
for his incapacity to retain his conquests: his son Assurnazirpal I.
conspired with the principal officers, deposed him from the throne, and
confined him in the fortified palace of Kar-Tukulti-ninip, which he
had built not far from Kalakh, where he soon after contrived his
assassination. About this time Rammânshumnadîn disappears, and we can
only suppose that the disasters of these last years had practically
annihilated the Cossæan dynasty, for Rammânshu-musur, who was a prisoner
in Assyria, was chosen as his successor. The monuments tell us nothing
definite of the troubles which next befell the two kingdoms: we seem to
gather, however, that Assyria became the scene of civil wars, and
that the sons of Tukulti-ninip fought for the crown among themselves.
Tukultiassurbel, who gained the upper hand at the end of six years, set
Raminân-shumusur at liberty, probably with the view of purchasing
the support of the Chaldæans, but he did not succeed in restoring his
country to the position it had held under Shalmaneser and Tukulti-ninip
I. The history of Assyria presents a greater number of violent contrasts
and extreme vicissitudes than that of any other Eastern people in the
earliest times. No sooner had the Assyrians arrived, thanks to the
ceaseless efforts of five or six generations, at the very summit of
their ambition, than some incompetent, or perhaps merely unfortunate,
king appeared on the scene, and lost in a few years all the ground
which had been gained at the cost of such tremendous exertions: then
the subject races would rebel, the neighbouring peoples would pluck up
courage and reconquer the provinces which they had surrendered, till the
dismembered empire gradually shrank back to its original dimensions. As
the fortunes of Babylon rose, those of Nineveh suffered a corresponding
depression: Babylon soon became so powerful that Eammânshumusur was able
to adopt a patronising tone in his relations with Assur-nirâri I. and
Nabodaînâni, the descendants of Tukultiassurbel, who at one time shared
the throne together.*
* All that we know of these two kings is contained in the
copy, executed in the time of Assurbanipal, of a letter
addressed to them by Eammânshumusur. They have been placed,
at one time or another, either at the beginning of Assyrian
history before Assurbelnishishu, or after Tigiath-pileser
I., about the XIth or Xth, or even the VIIIth century before
our era. It has since been discovered that the
Rammânshumusur who wrote this letter was the successor of
Tukulti-ninip I. in Chaldæa.
This period of subjection and humiliation did not last long.
Belkudurusur, who appears on the throne not long after Assurnirâri
and his partner, resumed military operations against the Cossæans, but
cautiously at first; and though he fell in the decisive engagement,
yet Bammân-shumusur perished with him, and the two states were thus
simultaneously left rulerless. Milishikhu succeeded Bammânshumusur,
and Ninipahalesharra filled the place of Belkudurusur; the disastrous
invasion of Assyria by the Chaldæans, and their subsequent retreat, at
length led to an armistice, which, while it afforded evidence of the
indisputable superiority of Milishikhu, proved no less plainly the
independence of his rival. Mero-dachabaliddina I. replaced Milishikhu,
Zamâniashu-middin followed Merodachabaliddina: Assurdân I., son of
Ninipahalesharra, broke the treaty, captured the towns of Zabân, Irrîa,
and Akarsallu, and succeeded in retaining them. The advantage thus
gained was but a slight one, for these provinces lying between the two
Zabs had long been subject to Assyria, and had been wrested from her
since the days of Tukulti-ninip: however, it broke the run of ill luck
which seemed to have pursued her so relentlessly, and opened the way for
more important victories. This was the last Cossæan war; at any rate,
the last of which we find any mention in history: Bel-nadînshumu II.
reigned three years after Zamâmashu-middin, but when he died there was
no man of his family whom the priests could invite to lay hold of the
hand of Merodach, and his dynasty ended with him. It included thirty-six
kings, and had lasted five hundred and seventy-six years and six
months.*
* The following is a list of some of the kings of this dynasty according
to the canon discovered by Pinches.
[Illustration: 163.jpg TABLE]
It had enjoyed its moments of triumph, and at one time had almost seemed
destined to conquer the whole of Asia; but it appears to have invariably
failed just as it was on the point of reaching the goal, and it became
completely exhausted by its victories at the end of every two or
three generations. It had triumphed over Elam, and yet Elam remained a
constant peril on its right. It had triumphed over Assyria, yet Assyria,
after driving it back to the regions of the Upper Tigris, threatened to
bar the road to the Mediterranean by means of its Masian colonies: were
they once to succeed in this attempt, what hope would there be left to
those who ruled in Babylon of ever after re-establishing the traditional
empire of the ancient Sargon and Khammurabi? The new dynasty sprang from
a town in Pashê, the geographical position of which is not known. It was
of Babylonian origin, and its members placed, at the be ginning of their
protocols, formula which were intended to indicate, in the clearest
possible manner, the source from which they sprang: they declared
themselves to be scions of Babylon, its vicegerents, and supreme
masters. The names of the first two we do not know: the third,
Nebuchadrezzar, shows himself to have been one of the most remarkable
men of all those who flourished during this troubled era. At no time,
perhaps, had Chaldæa been in a more abject state, or assailed by more
active foes. The Elamite had just succeeded in wresting from her Namar,
the region from whence the bulk of her chariot-horses were obtained, and
this success had laid the provinces on the left bank of the Tigris open
to their attacks. They had even crossed the river, pillaged Babylon,
and carried away the statue of Bel and that of a goddess named Eria, the
patroness of Khussi: Merodach, sore angered, held himself aloof from
the country of Akkad; the kings could no longer take his hands on
their coming to the throne, and were obliged to reign without proper
investiture in consequence of their failure to fulfil the rite required
by religious laws.*
* The _Donation to Shamud and Shamaî_ informs us that
Nebuchadrezzar took the hands of Bel as soon as he
regained possession of the statue. The copy we possess of
the Royal Canon. Nebuchadrezzar I.s place in the series
has, therefore, been the subject of much controversy.
Several Assyriologists were from the first inclined to place
him in the first or second rank, some being in favour of the
first, others preferring the second; Dolitzsch put him into
the fifth place, and Winckler, without pronouncing
definitely on the position to be assigned him, thought he
must come in about half-way down the dynasty. Hilprecht, on
taking up the questions, adduced reasons for supposing him
to have been the founder of the dynasty, and his conclusions
have been adopted by Oppert; they have been disputed by
Tiele, who wishes to put the king back to fourth or fifth in
order, and by Winckler, who places him fourth or fifth. It
is difficult, however, to accept Hilprechts hypothesis,
plausible though it is, so long as Assyriologists who have
seen the original tablet agree in declaring that the name of
the first king began with the sign of _Merodach_ and not
with that of _Nebo_, as it ought to do, were this prince
really our Nebuchadrezzar.
Nebuchadrezzar arose in Babylon,--roaring like a lion, even as Bammân
roareth,--and his chosen nobles, roared like lions with him.--To
Merodach, lord of Babylon, rose his prayer:--How long, for me, shall
there be sighing and groaning?--How long, for my land, weeping and
mourning?--How long, for my countries, cries of grief and tears? Till
what time, O lord of Babylon, wilt thou remain in hostile regions?--Let
thy heart be softened, and make Babylon joyful,--and let thy face be
turned toward Eshaggil which thou lovest! Merodach gave ear to the
plaint of his servant: he answered him graciously and promised his
aid. Namar, united as it had been with Chaldæa for centuries, did not
readily become accustomed to its new masters. The greater part of the
land belonged to a Semitic and Cossæan feudality, the heads of which,
while admitting their suzerains right to exact military service from
them, refused to acknowledge any further duty towards him. The kings of
Susa declined to recognise their privileges: they subjected them to a
poll-tax, levied the usual imposts on their estates, and forced them
to maintain at their own expense the troops quartered on them for the
purpose of guaranteeing their obedience.*
* Shamuà and Shamaî fled in like manner towards Karduniash,
before the King of Elam; it would seem that Rittimerodach
had entered into secret negotiations with Nebuchadrezzar,
though this is nowhere explicitly stated in the text.
Several of the nobles abandoned everything rather than submit to such
tyranny, and took refuge with Nebuchadrezzar: others entered into secret
negotiations with him, and promised to support him if he came to their
help with an armed force. He took them at their word, and invaded Namar
without warning in the month of Tamuz, while the summer was at its
height, at a season in which the Elamites never even dreamt he would
take the field. The heat was intense, water was not to be got, and the
army suffered terribly from thirst during its forced march of over
a hundred miles across a parched-up country. One of the malcontents,
Eittimerodach, lord of Bitkarziabku, joined Nebuchadrezzar with all the
men he could assemble, and together they penetrated as far as Ulaî.
The King of Elam, taken by surprise, made no attempt to check their
progress, but collected his vassals and awaited their attack on the
banks of the river in front of Susa. Once the fire of the combat had
been lighted between the opposing forces, the face of the sun grew dark,
the tempest broke forth, the whirlwind raged, and in this whirlwind of
the struggle none of the characters could distinguish the face of his
neighbour. Nebuchadrezzar, cut off from his own men, was about to
surrender or be killed, when Eittimerodach flew to his rescue and
brought him off safely. In the end the Chaldæans gained the upper hand.*
* _Donation to Rittimerodach,_ col. i. 11. 12-43. The
description of the battle as given in this document is
generally taken to be merely symbolical, and I have followed
the current usage. But if we bear in mind that the text lays
emphasis on the drought and severity of the season, we are
tempted to agree with Pinches and Budge that its statements
should be taken literally. The affair may have been begun in
a cloud of dust, and have ended in a downpour of rain so
heavy as to partly blind the combatants. The king was
probably drawn away from his men in the confusion; it was
probably then that he was in danger of being made prisoner,
and that Rittimerodach, suddenly coming up, delivered him
from the foes who surrounded him.
The Elamites renounced their claims to the possession of Namar, and
restored the statues of the gods: Nebuchadrezzar at once laid hold of
the hands of Bel, and thus legalised his accession to the throne. Other
expeditions against the peoples of Lulurne and against the Cossæans
restored his supremacy in the regions of the north-east, and a campaign
along the banks of the Euphrates opened out the road to Syria. He
rewarded generously those who had accompanied him on his raid against
Elam. After issuing regulations intended to maintain the purity of the
breed of horses for which Namar was celebrated, he reinstated in their
possessions Shamuâ and his son Shamaî, the descendants of one of the
priestly families of the province, granting them in addition certain
domains near Upi, at the mouth of the Turnât. He confirmed Rittimerodach
in possession of all his property, and reinvested him with all the
privileges of which the King of Elam had deprived him. From that time
forward the domain of Bitkarziabku was free of the tithe on corn, oxen,
and sheep; it was no longer liable to provide horses and mares for the
exchequer, or to afford free passage to troops in time of peace; the
royal jurisdiction ceased on the boundary of the fief, the seignorial
jurisdiction alone extended over the inhabitants and their property.
Chaldæan prefects ruled in Namar, at Khalman, and at the foot of the
Zagros, and Nebuchadrezzar no longer found any to oppose him save the
King of Assyria.
The long reign of Assurdân in Assyria does not seem to have been
distinguished by any event of importance either good or bad: it is true
he won several towns on the south-east from the Babylonians, but then
he lost several others on the north-west to the Mushku,* and the loss on
the one side fully balanced the advantage gained on the other.
* Hommel has proved, by a very simple calculation, that
Assurdân must have been the king in whose reign the Mushku
made the inroad into the basin of the Upper Tigris and of
the Balikh, which is mentioned in the _Annals of Tiglath-
pileser I._ These _Annals_ are our authority for stating
that Assurdân was on the throne for a long period, though
the exact length of his reign is not known.
His son Mutakkilnusku lived in Assur at peace,* but his grandson,
Assurîshishî, was a mighty king, conqueror of a score of countries, and
the terror of all rebels: he scattered the hordes of the Akhlamê and
broke up their forces; then Ninip, the champion of the gods, permitted
him to crush the Lulumê and the G-uti in their valleys and on their
mountains covered with forests. He made his way up to the frontiers of
Elam,** and his encroachments on territories claimed by Babylon stirred
up the anger of the Chaldæans against him; Nebuchadrezzar made ready to
dispute their ownership with him.
* _Annals of Tiglath-pileser I_. Mutakkilnusku himself has
only left us one inscription, in which he declares that he
had built a palace in the city of Assyria.
** Smith discovered certain fragments of Annals, which he
attributed to Assurîshishî. The longest of these tell of a
campaign against Elam. Lotz attributed them to Tiglath-
pileser I., and is supported in this by most Assyriologists
of the day.