_Sargon as a warrior and as a builder._
Whether Sargon was even remotely connected with the royal line, is a
question which for the present must remain unanswered. He mentions in
one of his inscriptions the three hundred princes who had preceded him
in the government of Assyria, and three lines further on he refers to
the kings his ancestors, but he never mentions his own father by name,
and this omission seems to prove that he was not a direct descendant of
Shalmaneser V., nor of Tiglath-pileser III. nor indeed of any of their
immediate predecessors. It is, however, probable, if not certain, that
he could claim some sort of kinship with them, though more or less
remote. It was customary for the sovereigns of Nineveh to give their
daughters in marriage to important officials or lords of their court,
and owing to the constant contraction of such alliances through several
centuries, there was hardly a noble family but had some royal blood in
its veins; and that of Sargon was probably no exception to the rule.
His genealogy was traced by the chroniclers, through several hundred
generations of princes, to the semi-mythical heroes who had founded the
city of Assur; but as Assur-nazir-pal and his descendants had claimed
Bel-kapkapi and Sulili as the founders of their race, the Sargonids
chose a different tradition, and drew their descent from Belbâni, son of
Adasi. The cause and incidents of the revolution which raised Sargon to
the throne are unknown, but we may surmise that the policy adopted
with regard to Karduniash was a factor in the case. Tiglath-pileser had
hardly entered Babylon before the fascination of the city, the charm of
its associations, and the sacred character of the legends which hallowed
it, seized upon his imagination; he returned to it twice in the space of
two years to take the hands of Bel, and Shalmaneser V. much preferred
it to Calah or Nineveh as a place of residence. The Assyrians doubtless
soon became jealous of the favour shown by their princes to their
ancient enemy, and their discontent must have doubtless conduced to
their decision to raise a new monarch to the throne. The Babylonians,
on the other hand, seem to have realised that the change in the dynasty
presaged a disadvantageous alteration of government; for as soon as the
news reached them a movement was set on foot and search made for a rival
claimant to set up in opposition to Sargon.*
* The succession of events, as indicated in _Pinches
Babylonian Chronicle_, seems indeed to imply that the
Babylonians waited to ascertain the disposition of the new
king before they decided what line to adopt. In fact,
Shalmaneser died in the month Tebeth, and Sargon ascended
the throne at Assur in the same month, and it was only in
the month Nisân that Mero-dach-baladan was proclaimed king.
The three months intervening between the accession of Sargon
and that of Merodach-baladan evidently represent a period of
indecision., when it was not yet known if the king would
follow the policy of his predecessors with regard to
Babylon, or adopt a different attitude towards her.
Of all the nations who had in turn occupied the plains of the Lower
Euphrates and the marshes bordering on Arabia, the Kaldâ alone had
retained their full vitality. They were constantly recruited by
immigrants from their kinsfolk of the desert, and the continual
infiltration of these semi-barbarous elements kept the race from
becoming enervated by contact with the indigenous population, and more
than compensated for the losses in their ranks occasioned by war. The
invasion of Tiglath-pileser and the consequent deportations of prisoners
had decimated the tribes of Bît-Shilâni, Bît-Shaali, and Bît-Amuhkâni,
the principalities of the Kaldâ which lay nearest to Babylonian
territory, and which had borne the brunt of attack in the preceding
period; but their weakness brought into notice a power better equipped
for warfare, whose situation in their rear had as a rule hitherto
preserved it from contact with the Assyrians, namely, Bît-Yakîn. The
continual deposit of alluvial soil at the mouths of the rivers
had greatly altered the coastline from the earliest historic times
downwards. The ancient estuary was partly filled up, especially on the
western side, where the Euphrates enters the Persian Gulf: a narrow
barrier of sand and silt extended between the marshes of Arabia and
Susiana, at the spot where the streams of fresh water met the tidal
waters of the sea, and all that was left of the ancient gulf was a vast
lagoon, or, as the dwellers on the banks called it, a kind of brackish
river, _Nâr marratum_. Bît-Yakîn occupied the southern and western
portions of this district, from the mouth of the Tigris to the edge
of the desert. The aspect of the country was constantly changing, and
presented no distinctive features; it was a region difficult to attack
and easy to defend; it consisted first of a spongy plain, saturated with
water, with scattered artificial mounds on which stood the clustered
huts of the villages; between this plain and the shore stretched a
labyrinth of fens and peat-bogs, irregularly divided by canals and
channels freshly formed each year in flood-time, meres strewn with
floating islets, immense reed-beds where the neighbouring peasants took
refuge from attack, and into which no one would venture to penetrate
without hiring some friendly native as a guide. In this fenland dwelt
the Kaldâ in their low, small conical huts of reeds, somewhat resembling
giant beehives, and in all respects similar to those which the Bedawin
of Irak inhabit at the present day.
[Illustration: 343.jpg ASSYRIAN SOLDIERS PURSUING KALDA REFUGEES IN A
BED OF REEDS]
Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a bas-relief reproduced in
Layard.
Dur-Yakîn, their capital, was probably situated on the borders of the
gulf, near the Euphrates, in such a position as to command the mouths
of the river. Merodach-baladan, who was King of Bît-Yakîn at the time of
Sargons accession, had become subject to Assyria in 729 B.C., and
had paid tribute to Tiglath-pileser, but he was nevertheless the most
powerful chieftain who had borne rule over the Chaldæans since the death
of Ukînzîr.*
* Dur-Yakîn was situated on the shores of the Persian gulf,
as is proved by a passage in the _Bull Inscription_, where
it is stated that Sargon threw into the sea the corpses of
the soldiers killed during the siege; the neighbourhood of
the Euphrates is implied in the text of the _Inscription des
Fastes_, and the _Annals_, where the measures taken by
Merodach-baladan to defend his capital are described. The
name of Bît-Yakîn, and probably also that of Dur-Yakin, have
been preserved to us in the name of Aginis or Aginnê, the
name of a city mentioned by Strabo, and by the historians of
Alexander. Its site is uncertain, but can be located near
the present town of Kornah.
It was this prince whom the Babylonians chose to succeed Shalmaneser V.
He presented himself before the city, was received with acclamation,
and prepared without delay to repulse any hostilities on the part of the
Assyrians.
[Illustration: 344.jpg A REED-HUT OF THE BEDAWIN OF IRAK]
Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph in Peters.
He found a well-disposed ally in Elani. From very ancient times the
masters of Susa had aspired to the possession of Mesopotamia or the
suzerainty over it, and fortune had several times favoured their
ambitious designs. On one occasion they had pressed forward their
victorious arms as far as the Mediterranean, and from that time forward,
though the theatre of their operations was more restricted, they had
never renounced the right to interfere in Babylonian affairs, and
indeed, not long previously, one of them had reigned for a period
of seven years in Babylon in the interval between two dynasties. Our
information with regard to the order of succession and the history of
these energetic and warlike monarchs is as yet very scanty; their names
even are for the most part lost, and only approximate dates can
be assigned to those of whom we catch glimpses from time to time.*
Khumban-numena, the earliest of whom we have any record, exercised a
doubtful authority, from Anshân to Susa, somewhere about the fourteenth
century B.C., and built a temple to the god Kirisha in his capital,
Liyan.**
* These names are in the majority of cases found written on
stamped and baked bricks. They were first compared with the
names contained in the Annals of Sargon and his successors,
and assimilated to those of the princes who were
contemporary with Sennacherib and Assur-bani-pal; then they
were referred to the time of the great Elamite empire, and
one of them was identified with that Kudur-Nakhunta who had
pillaged Uruk 1635 years before Assur-bani-pal. Finally,
they were brought down again to an intermediate period, more
precisely, to the fourteenth or thirteenth century B.C. This
last date appears to be justified, at least as the highest
permissible, by the mention of Durkurigalzu, in a text of
Undasgal.
** Jensen was the first to recognise that Liyan was a place-
name, and the inscriptions of Shilkhak-Inshusinak add that
Liyan was the capital of the kingdom; perhaps it was the
name of a part of Susa. Khumban-numena has left us no
monuments of his own, but he is mentioned on those of his
son.
His son Undasgal carried on the works begun by his father, but that is
all the information the inscriptions afford concerning him, and the mist
of oblivion which for a moment lifted and allowed us to discern dimly
the outlines of this sovereign, closes in again and hides everything
from our view for the succeeding forty or fifty years.
[Illustration: 346.jpg BRICK BEARING THE NAME OF THE SUSIAN KING
SHILKHAK-INSHUSHINAK]
Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Marcel
Dieulafoy.
About the thirteenth century a gleam once more pierces the
darkness, and a race of warlike and pious kings emerges into
view--Khalludush-In-shushinak, his son Shutruk-nakhunta, the latters
two sons, Kutur-nakhunta and Shilkhak-Inshu-shinak,* and then perhaps a
certain Kutir-khuban.
* The order of succession of these princes is proved by the
genealogies with which their bricks are covered. Jensen has
shown that we ought to read Khalludush-Inshushinak and
Shilkhak-Inshushinak, instead of the shorter forms
Khalludush and Shilkhak read previously.
The inscriptions on their bricks boast of their power, their piety, and
their inexhaustible wealth. One after another they repaired and enlarged
the temple built by Khumban-numena at Liyan, erected sanctuaries and
palaces at Susa, fortified their royal citadel, and ruled over Habardîp
and the Cossæans as well as over Anshân and Elam. They vigorously
contested the possession of the countries on the right bank of the
Tigris with the Babylonians, and Shutruk-nakhunta even succeeded in
conquering Babylon itself. He deprived Zamâmâ-shumiddin, the last but
one of the Cossæan kings, of his sceptre and his life, placed his own
son Kutur-nakhunta on the throne, and when the vanquished Babylonians
set up Bel-nadinshumu as a rival sovereign, he laid waste Karduniash
with fire and sword. After the death of Bel-nadinshumu, the Pashê
princes continued to offer resistance, but at first without success.
Shutruk-nakhunta had taken away from the temple of Esagilla the famous
statue of Bel-Merodach, whose hands had to be taken by each newly
elected king of Babylon, and had carried it off in his waggons to Elam,
together with much spoil from the cities on the Euphrates.*
* The name of the king is destroyed on the Babylonian
document, but the mention of Kutur-nakhunta as his son
obliges us, till further information comes to light, to
recognise in him the Shutruk-nakhunta of the bricks of Susa,
who also had a son Kutur-nakhunta. This would confirm the
restoration of Shutruk-nakhunta as the name of a sovereign
who boasts, in a mutilated inscription, that he had pushed
his victories as far as the Tigris, and even up to the
Euphrates.
Nebuchadrezzar I. brought the statue back to Babylon after many
vicissitudes, and at the same time recovered most of his lost provinces,
but he had to leave at Susa the bulk of the trophies which had
been collected there in course of the successful wars. One of these
represented the ancient hero Naram-sin standing, mace in hand, on the
summit of a hill, while his soldiers forced their way up the slopes,
driving before them the routed hosfcs of Susa. Shutruk-nakhunta left the
figures and names untouched, but carved in one corner of the bas-relief
a dedicatory inscription, transforming this ancient proof of Babylonian
victories over Elam into a trophy of Blamite victories over Babylon.
[Illustration: 348.jpg BAS-RELIEF OF NAKAM-SIN, TKANSPORTED TO SUSA BY
SHUTKUK-NAKHUNTA]
Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph by M. de Morgan.
His descendants would assuredly have brought Mesopotamia into lasting
subjection, had not the feudal organisation of their empire tolerated
the existence of contemporary local dynasties, the members of which
often disputed the supreme authority with the rightful king. The dynasty
which ruled Habardîp* seems to have had its seat of government at
Tarrisha in the, valley of Malamîr.**
* The prince represented on the bas-reliefs gives himself
the title Apirra, the name of Apîr, Apirti, or Habardîp.
** Tarrisha is the name of a town, doubtless the capital of
the fief of Malamîr; it is probably represented by the
considerable ruins which Layard identified as the remains of
the Sassanid city of Aidej.
Three hundred figures carved singly or in groups on the rocks of
Kul-Firaun portray its princes and their ministers in every posture of
adoration, but most of them have no accompanying inscription. One large
bas relief, however, forms an exception, and from its legend we learn
the name of Khanni, son of Takhkhi-khîkhutur.*
* The name of Khanni has been explained by Sayce as _the
desirable_, and that of his father, Takhkhi-khîkhutur, as
_help this thy servant_.
[Illustration: 349.jpg THE GREAT ROCK BAS-RELIEF OF MALAMÎR]
Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Babin and Houssay.
This prince, even if possessed of no royal protocol, was none the less
a powerful and wealthy personage. His figure dominates the picture, the
central space of which it completely fills;* his expression is calm, but
somewhat severe. His head is covered by a low cap, from which long
locks escape and flow over his shoulders; the hair on his face is
symmetrically curled above the level of his mouth, and terminates in a
pointed beard. The figure is clothed from head to foot in a stiff robe
and mantle adorned with tufted fringes, and borders of embroidered
rosettes; a girdle at the waist completes the misleading resemblance
to the gala-dress of a Nine vite, monarch. The hands are crossed on
the breast in an attitude of contemplation, while the prince gazes
thoughtfully at a sacrifice which is being offered on his behalf. At the
bottom of the picture stands a small altar, behind which a priest in a
short tunic seems to be accomplishing some cérémonial rite, while two
men are cutting the throat of a ram. Higher up the heads of three rams
lie beside their headless trunks, which are resting on the ground, feet
in the air, while a servant brandishes a short sword with which he
is about to decapitate the fourth beast. Above these, again, three
musicians march in procession, one playing on a harp, another on a
five-stringed lyre, and the third on a tambourine. An attendant holding
a bow, and the minister Shutsururazi, stand quietly waiting till the
sacrifice is accomplished. The long text which runs across several of
the figures is doubtless a prayer, and contains the names of peoples and
princes mingled with those of deities.
* Perrot and Chipiez, misled by the analogy of the Hittite
bas-relief at Ibriz, took the largest figure for the image
of a god. The inscription engraved on the robe, _U Khanni
shak Takkhi-khikutur_, I am Khanni, son of Takhkhi-
khîkhutur, leaves no doubt that the figure represents the
prince himself, and not a divinity.
The memory of these provincial chiefs would be revived, and more of
their monuments discovered, if the mountains and inaccessible valleys of
ancient Elam could be thoroughly explored: it is evident, from the small
portion of their history which has been brought to light, that they must
have been great sources of trouble to the dynasties which reigned in
Susa, and that their revolts must often have jeopardised the safety of
the empire, in spite of the assistance afforded by the Aramæans from
the tenth or eleventh centuries onwards. All the semi-nomadic tribes
which densely peopled the banks of the Tigris, and whose advance towards
the north had been temporarily favoured by the weakness of Assyria--the
Gambulu, the Pukudu, the Eutu, and the Itua--had a natural tendency to
join forces with Elam for the purpose of raiding the wealthy cities of
Chaldæa, and this alliance, or subjection, as it might be more properly
termed, always insured them against any reprisals on the part of their
victims. The unknown king who dwelt at Susa in 745 B.C. committed the
error of allowing Tiglath-pileser to crush these allies. Khumban-igash,
who succeeded this misguided monarch in 742 B.C., did not take up arms
to defend Bit-Amuk-kâni and the other states of the Kaldâ from 731 to
729, but experience must have taught him that he had made a mistake
in remaining an unmoved spectator of their misfortunes; for when
Merodach-baladan, in quest of allies, applied to him, he unhesitatingly
promised him his support.*
* The date of his accession is furnished by the passage in
_Pinches Babylonian Chronicle_, where it is stated that he
ascended the throne of Elam in the fifth year of Nabonazir.
The Assyrian and Babylonian scribes assimilated the Susian
_b_ to the _m_, and also suppressed the initial aspirate of
the Elamite name, writing generally Umman-igash for Khumban-
igash.
Assyria and Elam had hitherto seldom encountered one another on the
field of battle. A wide barrier of semi-barbarous states had for a long
time held them apart, and they would have had to cross the territory
of the Babylonians or the Cossæans before coming into contact with each
other. Tiglath-pileser I., however, had come into conflict with the
northern districts of Elam towards the end of the twelfth century B.C.,
and more recently the campaigns of Assur-nazir-pal, Shalmaneser III.,
and Rammân-nirâri had frequently brought these sovereigns into contact
with tribes under the influence of Susa; but the wildness and poverty of
the country, and the difficulties it offered to the manoeuvres of large
armies, had always prevented the Assyrian generals from advancing far
into its mountainous regions.* The annexation of Aramæan territory
beyond the Tigris, and the conquest of Babylon by Tiglath-pileser III.,
at length broke through the barrier and brought the two powers face
to face at a point where they could come into conflict without being
impeded by almost insurmountable natural obstacles, namely, in the
plains of the Umliash and the united basins of the Lower Ulai and
the Uknu. Ten years experience had probably sufficed to convince
Khumban-igash of the dangers to which the neighbourhood of the Assyrians
exposed his subjects. The vigilant watch which the new-comers kept over
their frontier rendered raiding less easy; and if one of the border
chieftains were inclined to harry, as of old, an unlucky Babylonian
or Cossæan village, he ran the risk of an encounter with a well-armed
force, or of being plundered in turn by way of reprisal.
* Sargon declares distinctly that Merodach-baladan had
invoked the aid of Khumban-igash.
An irregular but abundant source of revenue was thus curtailed, without
taking into consideration the wars to which such incidents must perforce
lead sooner or later. Even unaided the Elamites considered themselves
capable of repelling any attack; allied with the Babylonians or the
Kaldâ, they felt certain of victory in any circumstances. Sargon
realised this fact almost as fully as did the Elamites themselves; as
soon, therefore, as his spies had forewarned him that an invasion was
imminent, he resolved to take the initiative and crush his enemies
singly before they Succeeded in uniting their forces. Khumban-igash had
advanced as far as the walls of Durîlu, a stronghold which commanded
the Umliash, and he there awaited the advent of his allies before laying
siege to the town: it was, however, the Assyrian army which came to meet
him and offered him battle. The conflict was a sanguinary one, as became
an engagement between such valiant foes, and both sides claimed the
victory. The Assyrians maintained then-ground, forcing the Elamites
to evacuate their positions, and tarried some weeks longer to chastise
those of their Aramæan subjects who had made common cause with the
enemy: they carried away the Tumuna, who had given up their sheikh into
the hands of the emissaries of the Kaldâ, and transported the whole
tribe, without Merodach-baladan making any attempt to save his allies,
although his army had not as yet struck a single blow.*
* The history of this first campaign against Merodach-
baladan, which is found in a mutilated condition in the
_Annals of Sargon_, exists nowhere else in a complete form,
but the facts are very concisely referred to in the _Fastes_
and in the _Cylinders_. The general sequence of events is
indicated by _Pinches Babylonian Chronicle_, but the author
places them in 720 B.C., the second year of Merodach-
baladan, contrary to the testimony of the _Annals_, and
attributes the victory to the Elamites in the battle of
Durîlu, in deference to Babylonian patriotism. The course of
events after the battle of Durflu seems to prove clearly
that the Assyrians remained masters of the field.
Having accomplished this act of vengeance, the Assyrians suspended
operations and returned to Nineveh to repair their losses, probably
intending to make a great effort to regain the whole of Babylonia in
the ensuing year. Grave events which occurred elsewhere prevented them,
however, from carrying this ambitious project into effect. The fame of
their war against Elam had spread abroad in the Western provinces of the
empire, and doubtless exaggerated accounts circulated with regard to
the battle of Durîlu had roused the spirit of dissatisfaction in the
west. Sargon had scarcely seated himself securely on a throne to which
he was not the direct heir, when he was menaced by Elam and repudiated
by Chaldæa, and it remained to be seen whether his resources would prove
equal to maintaining the integrity of his empire, or whether the example
set by Merodach-baladan would not speedily be imitated by all who
groaned under the Assyrian yoke. Since the decline of Damascus and
Arpad, Hamath had again taken a prominent place in Northern Syria:
prompt submission had saved this city from destruction in the time of
Tiglath-pileser III., and it had since prospered under the foreign
rule; it was, therefore, on Hamath that all hopes of deliverance still
cherished by rulers and people now centred. A low-born fellow, a smith
named Iaubîdi, rose in rebellion against the prince of Hamath for being
mean-spirited enough to pay tribute, proclaimed himself king, and in
the space of a few months revived under his own leadership the coalition
which Hadadezer and Rezon II. had formed in days gone by. Arpad and
Bît-Agusi, Zimyra and Northern Phoenicia, Damascus and its dependencies,
all expelled their Assyrian garrisons, and Samaria, though still
suffering from its overthrow, summoned up courage to rid itself of its
governor. Meanwhile, Hannon of Gaza, recently reinstated in his city by
Egyptian support, was carrying on negotiations with a view to persuading
Egypt to interfere in the affairs of Syria. The last of the Tanite
Pharaohs, Psamuti, was just dead, and Bocchoris, who had long been
undisputed master of the Delta, had now ventured to assume the diadem
openly (722 B.C.), a usurpation which the Ethiopians, fully engaged in
the Thebaid and on the Upper Nile, seemed to regard with equanimity. As
soon as the petty kings and feudal lords had recognised his suzerainty,
Bocchoris «listened favourably to the entreaties of Hannon, and promised
to send an army to Gaza under the command of his general Shabê. Sargon,
threatened with the loss of the entire western half of his empire,
desisted for a time from his designs on Babylon, Khumban-igash was wise
enough to refrain from provoking an enemy who left him in peace, and
Merodach-baladan did not dare to enter the lists without the support of
his confederate: the victory of Durîlu, though it had not succeeded in
gaining a province for Nineveh, had at least secured the south-eastern
frontier from attack, at all events for so long as it should please
Sargon to remain at a distance.
[Illustration: 356.jpg IAUBÎDI OF HAMATH BEING FLAYED ALIVE.]
Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a sketch by Flandin.
The league formed by Hamath had not much power of cohesion. Iaubîdi had
assembled his forces and the contingents of his allies at the town of
Qarqar as Hadadezer had done before: he was completely defeated, taken
prisoner, and flayed alive. His kingdom was annexed to the Assyrian
empire, Qarqar was burnt to the ground, the fortifications of Hamath
were demolished, and the city obliged to furnish a force of two hundred
charioteers and six hundred horsemen, probably recruited from among
the families of the upper classes, to serve as hostages as well as
auxiliaries. Arpad, Zimyra, Damascus, Samaria, all succumbed without
serious opposition, and the citizens who had been most seriously
compromised in the revolt paid for their disaffection with their lives.
This success confirmed the neighbouring states of Tyre, Sidon, Judah,
Ammon, and Moab in their allegiance, which had shown signs of wavering
since the commencement of hostilities; but Gaza remained unsubdued, and
caused the more uneasiness because it was perceived that behind her was
arrayed all the majesty of the Pharaoh. The Egyptians, slow to bestir
themselves, had not yet crossed the Isthmus when the Assyrians appeared
beneath the walls of Gaza: Hannon, worsted in a preliminary skirmish,
retreated on Raphia, where Shabê, the Egyptian general, had at length
arrived, and the decisive battle took place before this town. It was
the first time that the archers and charioteers of the Nile valley had
measured forces with the pikemen and cavalry of that of the Tigris;
the engagement was hotly contested, but the generals and soldiers of
Bocchoris, fighting according to antiquated methods of warfare, gave
way before the onset of the Assyrian ranks, who were better equipped and
better led. Shabê fled like a shepherd whose sheep had been stolen,
Hannon was taken prisoner and loaded with chains, and Raphia fell into
the hands of the conqueror; the inhabitants who survived the sack of
their city were driven into captivity to the number of 9033 men, with
their flocks and household goods. The manifest superiority of Assyria
was evident from the first encounter, but the contest had been so fierce
and the result so doubtful that Sargon did not consider it prudent to
press his advantage. He judged rightly that these troops, whom he
had not dispersed without considerable effort, constituted merely an
advanced guard. 4 Egypt was not like the petty kingdoms of Syria or Asia
Minor, which had but one army apiece, and could not risk more than one
pitched battle. Though Shabês force was routed, others would not fail
to take its place and contend as fiercely for the possession of the
country, and even if the Assyrians should succeed in dislodging them and
curbing the power of Bocchoris, the fall of Sais or Memphis, far from
putting an end to the war, would only raise fresh complications. Above
Memphis stretched the valley of the Nile, bristling with fortresses,
Khininsu, Oxyrhynchus, Hermopolis, Siut, Thinis, and Thebes, the famous
city of Amon, enthroned on the banks of the river, whose very name
still evoked in the minds of the Asiatics a vivid remembrance of all its
triumphal glories.*
* Thebes was at that time known among the Semites by its
popular name of _the city of Amon_--which the Hebrew writers
transcribed as Nô-Amon (_Nahum_ iii. 8) or Nô alone (Jer.
xlvi. 25; Ezek. xxx. 14, 15, 16), and the Assyrians by Ni.
Thebes itself formed merely one stage in the journey towards Syene,
Ethiopia, Napata, and the unknown regions of Africa which popular
imagination filled with barbarous races or savage monsters, and however
far an alien army might penetrate in a southerly direction, it would
still meet with the language, customs, and divinities of Egypt--an Egypt
whose boundary seemed to recede as the invader advanced, and which was
ever ready to oppose the enemy with fresh forces whenever its troops had
suffered from his attacks. Sargon, having reached Kaphia, halted on the
very threshold of the unexplored realm whose portals stood ajar ready to
admit him: the same vague disquietude which had checked the conquering
career of the Pharaohs on the borders of Asia now stayed his advance,
and bade him turn back as he was on the point of entering Africa. He
had repulsed the threatened invasion, and as a result of his victory the
princes and towns which had invoked the aid of the foreigner lay at his
mercy; he proceeded, therefore, to reorganise the provinces of Philistia
and Israel, and received the homage of Judah and her dependencies. Ahaz,
while all the neighbouring states were in revolt, had not wavered in his
allegiance; the pacific counsels of Isaiah had once more prevailed over
the influence of the party which looked for safety in an alliance with
Egypt.*
* Sargon probably alludes to homage received at this time,
when he styles himself the subduer of far-off Judah. It
is not certain that Ahaz was still King of Judah; it was for
a long time admitted that Hezekiah was already king when
these events took place, in accordance with 2 Kings xviii.
9, 10, where it is stated that Samaria was destroyed in the
sixth year of Hezekiah. I consider, in agreement with
several historians, that the date of Sennacheribs invasion
of Judah must have remained more firmly fixed in the minds
of the Jewish historians than that of the taking of Samaria,
and as 2 Kings xviii. 13 places this invasion in the
fourteenth year of Hezekiah, which corresponds, as we shall
see, to the third year of Sennacherib, or 702 B.C., it seems
better to place the accession of Hezekiah about 715, and
prolong the reign of Ahaz till after the campaign of Sargon
against Hannon of Gaza.
The whole country from the Orontes to the mountains of Seir and the
river of Egypt was again reduced to obedience, and set itself by
peaceful labours to repair the misfortunes which had befallen it during
the previous quarter of a century. Sargon returned to his capital, but
fate did not yet allow him to renew his projects against Babylon.
Barely did an insurrection break out in any part of the country on the
accession of a new king at Nineveh without awaking echoes in the distant
provinces of the empire. The report of a revolt in Chaldæa roused a
slumbering dissatisfaction among the Syrians, and finally led them into
open rebellion: the episodes of the Syrian campaign, narrated in
Armenia or on the slopes of the Taurus with the thousand embellishments
suggested by the rancour of the narrators, excited the minds of the
inhabitants and soon rendered an outbreak inevitable. The danger would
have been serious if the suppressed hatred of all had found vent at the
same moment, and if insurrections in five or six different parts of his
empire had to be faced by the sovereign simultaneously; but as a
rule these local wars broke out without any concentrated plan, and
in localities too remote from each other to permit of any possible
co-operation between the assailants; each chief, before attempting to
assert his independence, seemed to wait until the Assyrians had had
ample time to crush the rebel who first took the field, having done
which they could turn the whole of their forces against the latest
foe. Thus Iaubîdi did not risk a campaign till the fall of Elam and
Karduniash had been already decided on the field of Durilu; in the same
way, the nations of the North and East refrained from entering the lists
till they had allowed Sargon time to destroy the league of Hamath and
repel the attack of Bharaoh.
They were secretly incited to rebellion by a power which played nearly
the same part with regard to them that Egypt had played in Southern
Syria. Urartu had received a serious rebuff in 735 B.C., and the burning
of Dhuspas had put an end to its ascendency, but the victory had been
effected at the cost of so much bloodshed that Tiglath-pileser was not
inclined to risk losing the advantage already gained by pushing it too
far: he withdrew, therefore, without concluding a treaty, and did not
return, being convinced that no further hostilities would be attempted
till the vanquished enemy had recovered from his defeat. He was
justified in his anticipations, for Sharduris died about 730, without
having again taken up arms, and his son Busas I. had left Shalmaneser V.
unmolested:* but the accession of Sargon and the revolts which harassed
him had awakened in Busas the warlike instincts of his race, and the
moment appeared advantageous for abandoning his policy of inactivity.
* The name of this king is usually written Ursa in the
Assyrian inscriptions, but the _Annals of Sargon_ give in
each case the form Rusa, in accordance with which Sayce had
already identified the Assyrian form Ursa or Rusa with the
form Rusas found on some Urartian monuments. Belck and
Lehmann have discovered several monuments of this Rusas I.,
son of Sharduris.
The remembrance of the successful exploits of Menuas and Argistis still
lived in the minds of his people, and more than one of his generals
had entered upon their military careers at a time when, from Arpad and
Carchemish to the country of the Medes, quite a third of the territory
now annexed to Assyria had been subject to the king of Urartu;
Eusas, therefore, doubtless placed before himself the possibility
of reconquering the lost provinces, and even winning, by a stroke of
fortune, more than had been by a stroke of fortune wrested from his
father. He began by intriguing with such princes as were weary of the
Assyrian rule, among the Mannai, in Zikartu,* among the Tabal, and even
among the Khâti.
* Zikruti, Zikirtu, Zikartu, may probably be identified with
the Sagartians of Herodotus.
Iranzu, who was at that time reigning over the Mannai, refused to listen
to the suggestions of his neighbour, but two of his towns, Shuandakhul
and Durdukka, deserted him in 719 B.C., and ranged themselves under
Mitâtti, chief of the Zikartu, while about the same time the strongholds
of Sukkia, Bala, and Abitikna, which were on the borders of Urartu,
broke the ties which had long bound them to Assyria, and concluded a
treaty of alliance with Rusas. Sargon was not deceived as to the meaning
of these events, and at once realised that this movement was not one of
those local agitations which broke out at intervals in one or other of
his provinces. His officers and spies must have kept him informed of the
machinations of Eusas and of the revolutions which the migrations of
the last thirty years had provoked among the peoples of the Iranian
table-land. A new race had arisen in their rear, that of the Cimmerians
and Scythians, which, issuing in irresistible waves from the gorges of
the Caucasus, threatened to overwhelm the whole ancient world of
the East. The stream, after a moments vacillation, took a westerly
direction, and flooded Asia Minor from one end to the other. Some
tribes, however, which had detached themselves from the main movement
sought an outlet towards the south-east, on to the rich plains of the
Araxes and the country around Lake Urumiah. The native races, pressed in
the rear by these barbarians, and hemmed in on either side and in front
by Urartu and Assyria, were forced into closer proximity, and, conscious
of their individual weakness, had begun to form themselves into three
distinct groups, varying considerably in compactness,--the Medes in the
south, Misianda in the north, with Zikartu between them. Zikartu was
at that time the best organised of these nascent states, and its king,
Mitâtti, was not deficient either in military talent or political
sagacity. The people over whom he ruled were, moreover, impregnated with
the civilisation of Mesopotamia, and by constantly meeting the Assyrians
in battle they had adopted the general principles of their equipment,
organisation, and military tactics. The vigour of his soldiers and the
warlike ardour which inspired them rendered his armies formidable even
to leaders as experienced, and warriors as hardened, as the officers
and soldiers of Nineveh. Mitâtti had strongly garrisoned the two rebel
cities, and trusted that if the Assyrians were unable to recapture them
without delay, other towns would not be long in following their example;
Iranzu would, no doubt, be expelled, his place would be taken by a
hostile chief, and the Mannai, joining hands with Urartu on the right
and Zikartu on the left, would, with these two states, form a compact
coalition, whose combined forces would menace the northern frontier of
the empire from the Zagros to the Taurus.
[Illustration: 364.jpg TAKING OF A CASTLE IN ZIKARTU]
Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from the facsimile by Flandin.
Sargon, putting all the available Assyrian forces into the field, hurled
them against the rebels, and this display of power had the desired
effect upon the neighbouring kingdoms: Busas and Mitâtti did not dare to
interfere, the two cities were taken by assault, burnt and razed to
the ground, and the inhabitants of the surrounding districts of Sukkia,
Bala, and Abitikna were driven into exile among the Khâti. The next
year, however, the war thus checked on the Iranian table-land broke out
in the north-west, in the mountains of Cilicia. A Tabal chief, Kiakku
of Shinukhta, refused to pay his tribute (718). Sargon seized him and
destroyed his city; his family and adherents, 7500 persons in all, were
carried away captives to Assyria, and his principality was given to
a rival chief, Mattî of Atuna, on a promise from the latter of an
increased amount of tribute.*
* The name of Atuna is a variant of the name Tuna, which is
found in the inscriptions of Tiglath-pileser III., and Tuna
recalls the name of the old city of Tyana, or that of Tynna
or Tunna, near Tyana, in the Taurus. Shinukhta, not far from
Atuna, must be the capital of a district situated on the
Karmalas or the Saros, on the borders of Cilicia or
Cataonia.
In 717 B.C. more serious dangers openly declared themselves. The Khâti
had not forgotten that they had once been the allies of Urartu, and
that their king, Pisiris, together with Matîlu of Agusi, had fought
for Sharduris against Tiglath-pileser III. Pisiris conspired with Mita,
chief of the Mushki, and proclaimed his independence; but vengeance
swiftly and surely overtook him. He succumbed before his accomplice
had time to come to his assistance, and was sent to join Kiakku and
his adherents in prison, while the districts which he had ruled were
incorporated into Assyrian territory, and Carchemish became the seat of
an Assyrian prefect who ranked among the _limmi_ from whom successive
years took their names. The fall of Pisiris made no impression on
his contemporaries. They had witnessed the collapse of so many great
powers--Elam, Urartu, Egypt--that the misfortunes of so insignificant a
personage awakened but little interest; and yet with him foundered
one of the most glorious wrecks of the ancient world. For more than a
century the Khâti had been the dominant power in North-western Asia, and
had successfully withstood the power of Thebes; crushed by the Peoples
of the Sea, hemmed in and encroached upon by the rising wave of Aramæan
invasion, they had yet disputed their territory step by step with the
Assyrian generals, and the area over which they spread can be traced
by the monuments and inscriptions scattered over Cilicia, Lycaonia,
Cappadocia, and Northern Syria as far as the basins of the Orontes and
the Litâny. So lasting had proved their influence on all around them,
and so fresh was the memory of their greatness, that it would have
seemed but natural that their vitality should survive this last blow,
and that they should enjoy a prosperous future which should vie with
their past. But events proved that their national life was dead, and
that no recuperative power remained: as soon as Sargon had overthrown
their last prince, their tribes became merged in the general body
of Aramæans, and their very name ere long vanished from the pages of
history.
Up to this time Eusas had not directly interfered in these quarrels
between the suzerain and his vassals: he may have incited the latter to
revolt, but he had avoided compromising himself, and was waiting till
the Mannai had decided to make common cause with him before showing
his hand openly. Ever since the skirmish of the year 719, Mitâtti had
actively striven to tempt the Mannai from their allegiance, but his
intrigues had hitherto proved of no avail against the staunch fidelity
first of Irânzu and then of Azâ, who had succeeded the latter about
718. At the beginning of the year 716 Mitâtti was more successful; the
Mannai, seduced at length by his promises and those of Eusas, assembled
on Mount Uaush, murdered their king, and leaving his corpse unburied,
hastened to place themselves under the command of Bagadatti, regent
of Umildîsh. Sargon hurried to the spot, seized Bagadatti, and had him
flayed alive on Mount Uaush, which had just witnessed the murder of Azâ,
and exposed the mass of bleeding flesh before the gaze of the people to
demonstrate the fate reserved for his enemies. But though he had
acted speedily he was too late, and the fate of their chief, far from
discouraging his subjects, confirmed them in their rebellion. They had
placed upon the throne Ullusunu, the brother of Azâ, and this prince had
immediately concluded an alliance with Eusas, Mitâtti, and the people of
Andia; his example was soon followed by other Eastern chiefs, Assurlî of
Karallu and Itti of Allabria, whereupon, as the spirit of revolt spread
from one to another, most of the districts lately laid under tribute
by Tiglath-pileser took up arms--Niksama, Bîtsagbati, Bîtkhirmâmi,
Kilam-bâfci, Armangu, and even the parts around Kharkhar, and Ellipi,
with its reigning sovereign Dalta. The general insurrection dreaded by
Sargon, and which Eusas had for five years been fomenting, had, despite
all the efforts of the Assyrian government, at last broken out, and
the whole frontier was ablaze from the borders of Elam to those of the
Mushku. Sargon turned his attention to where danger was most urgent; he
made a descent on the territory of the Mannai, and laid it waste as
a swarm of locusts might have done; he burnt their capital, Izirtu,
demolished the fortifications of Zibia and Armaîd, and took Ullusunu
captive, but, instead of condemning him to death, he restored to him his
liberty and his crown on condition of his paying a regular tribute. This
act of clemency, in contrast with the pitiless severity shown at the
beginning of the insurrection, instantly produced the good effects he
expected: the Mannai laid down their arms and swore allegiance to the
conqueror, and their defection broke up the coalition. Sargon did not
give the revolted provinces time to recover from the dismay into which
his first victories had thrown them, but marched rapidly to the south,
and crushed them severally; commencing with Andia, where he took 4200
prisoners with their cattle, he next attacked Zikartu, whose king,
Mitâtti, took refuge in the mountains and thus escaped death at the
hands of the executioner. Assurlî of Karalla had a similar fate to
Bagadatti, and was flayed alive. Itti of Allabria, with half of his
subjects, was carried away to Hamath. The towns of Niksama and Shurgadia
were annexed to the province of Parsuash. The town of Kishîsim was
reduced to ashes, and its king, Belsharuzur, together with the treasures
of his palace, was carried away to Nineveh. Kharkhar succumbed after a
short siege, received a new population, and was henceforward known as
Kar-Sharrukîn; Dalta was restored to favour, and retained his dominion
intact. Never had so great a danger been so ably or so courageously
averted. It was not without good reason that, after his victory over the
Mannai, Sargon, instead of attacking Busas, the most obstinate of
his foes, turned against the Medes. Bllipi, Parsuash, and Kharkhar,
comprising half the countries which had joined in the insurrection, were
on the borders of Elam or had frequent relations with that state, and it
is impossible to conjecture what turn affairs might have taken had
Elam been induced to join their league, and had the Elamite armies, in
conjunction with those of Merodach-baladan, unexpectedly fallen upon the
Assyrian rear by the valleys of the Tigris or the Turnât.
[Illustration: 369.jpg TAKING OF THE CITY OF KISHÎSIM BY THE ASSYRIANS]
Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from the facsimile by Plandin. The
figures resembling stags horns, which crown three of the
upper towers, are tongues of flame, as was indicated by the
red colouring which still remained on them when the bas-
relief was discovered.
Had the Elamites, however, entertained a desire to mingle in the fray,
the promptness with which Sargon had re-established order must
have given them cause to reflect and induced them to maintain their
neutrality. The year which had opened so inauspiciously thus ended
in victory, though the situation was still fraught with danger. The
agitation which had originated in the east and northeast in 716 reached
the north-west in 715, and spread as far as the borders of Southern
Syria. Rusas had employed the winter in secret negotiations with the
Mannai, and had won over one of their principal chiefs, a certain
Dayaukku, whose name seems to be identical with that which the Greeks
transliterated as Deiokes.*
* The identity of the name Dayaukku with that of Deiokes is
admitted by all historians.
As soon as spring had returned he entered the territory of Ullusunu, and
occupied twenty-two strongholds, which were probably betrayed into his
hands by Dayaukku. While this was taking place Mita of Mushki invaded
Cilicia, and the Arab tribes of the Idumsean desert--the Thamudites,
the Ibadites, the Marsimanu, and Khayapâ--were emboldened to carry their
marauding expeditions into Assyrian territory. The Assyrian monarch was
thus called on to conduct three distinct wars simultaneously in three
different directions; he was, moreover, surrounded by wavering subjects
whom terror alone held to their allegiance, and whom the slightest
imprudence or the least reverse might turn into open foes.
Sargon resolutely faced the enemy at all three points of attack. As in
the previous year, he reserved for himself the position where danger
was most threatening, directing the operations against the Mannai. He
captured one by one the twenty-two strongholds of Ullusunu which Rusas
had seized, and laying hands on Dayaukku, sent him and his family into
exile to Hamath. This display of energy determined Ianzu of Naîri to
receive the Assyrian monarch courteously within the royal residence of
Khubushkia and to supply him with horses, cattle, sheep, and goats in
token of homage. Proceeding from thence in an oblique direction, Sargon
reached Andia and took prisoner its king Tilusînas. Having by this
exploit reduced the province of Mannai to order, he restored the
twenty-two towns to Ullusunu, and halting some days in Izirtu, erected
there a statue of himself, according to his custom, as a visible witness
of Assyrian supremacy, having done which, he retraced his steps to
the south-east. The province of Kharkhar, which had been reduced to
subjection only a few months previously, was already in open revolt, and
the district of Kar-Sharrukîn alone remained faithful to its governor:
Sargon had to reconquer it completely, town by town, imposing on the
four citadels of Kishislu, Kindâu, Bît-Bagaiâ, and Zaria the new names
of Kar-Nabu, Kar-Sin, Kar-Rammânu, and Kar-Ishtar, besides increasing
the fortifications of Kar-Sharrukîn. The Medes once more acknowledged
his suzerainty, and twenty-two of their chiefs came to tender the
oath of allegiance at his feet; two or three districts which remained
insubordinate were given up to pillage as far as Bît-Khambân, and the
inhabitants of Kimirra were sent into captivity. The eastern campaign
was thus brought to a most successful issue, fortune, meanwhile, having
also favoured the Assyrian arms in the other menaced quarters. Mita,
after pushing forward at one point as far as the Mediterranean, had been
driven back into the mountains by the prefect of Kuî, and the Bedâwin of
the south had sustained a serious reverse.
These latter were mere barbarians, ignorant of the arts of reading and
writing, and hitherto unconquered by any foreign power: their survivors
were removed to Samaria, where captives from Hamath had already been
established, and where they were soon joined by further exiles from
Babylon.
[Illustration: 372.jpg THE TOWN OF BÎT-BAGAÎA BURNT BY THE ASSYRIANS]
Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from the facsimile by Flandin. The
tongues of flame which issue from the towers still bore
traces of red and yellow colouring when the bas-relief was
discovered.
This episode had greater effect than its importance warranted; or
perhaps the majority of the neighbouring states made it a convenient
pretext for congratulating Sargon on his victories over more serious
enemies. He received gifts from Shamshiê, the Arabian queen who had
formerly fought against Tiglath-pileser, from Itamar the Saboan, and the
sheikhs of the desert, from the kings of the Mediterranean sea-board,
and from the Pharaoh himself. Bocchoris had died after a troublous reign
of seven years.*
* The two dynasties of Tanis and Sais may be for the present
reconstituted as follows:--
[Illustration: 373.jpg TABLE OF DYNASTIES OF TANIS AND SAIS]
His real character is unknown, but as he left a deep impression on the
memories of his people, it is natural to conclude that he displayed,
at times, both ability and energy. Many legends in which the miraculous
element prevailed were soon in circulation concerning him. He was,
according to these accounts, weak in body and insignificant in
appearance, but made up for these defects by mental ability and sound
judgment. He was credited with having been simple in his mode of life,
and was renowned as one of the six great legislators produced by Egypt.
A law concerning debt and the legal rates of interest, was attributed to
him; he was also famed for the uprightness of his judgments, which
were regarded as due to divine inspiration. Isis had bestowed on him
a serpent, which, coiling itself round his head when he sat on the
judgment-seat, covered him with its shadow, and admonished him not to
forget for a moment the inflexible principles of equity and truth.
Neither Tafnakhti nor any of the local sovereigns mentioned on the
stele of Piônkhi wore comprised in the official computation; there is,
therefore, no reason to add them to this list.
A collection of the decisions he was reputed to have delivered in famous
cases existed in the Græco-Roman period, and one of them is quoted
at length: he had very ingeniously condemned a courtesan to touch the
shadow of a purse as payment for the shadowy favours she had bestowed in
a dream on her lover.
[Illustration: 374.jpg KING BOCCHORIS GIVING JUDGMENT BETWEEN TWO WOMEN,
RIVAL CLAIMANTS TO A CHILD]
Drawn by Faucher-Gudin.
An Alexandrian poet, Pancrates, versified the accounts of this juridical
collection,* and the artists of the Imperial epoch drew from it motives
for mural decoration; they portrayed the king pronouncing judgment
between two mothers who disputed possession of an infant, between two
beggars laying claim to the same cloak, and between three men asserting
each of them his right to a wallet full of food.**
* Pancrates lived in the time of Hadrian, and Athenæus, who
has preserved his memory for us, quotes the first book of
his Bocchoreidion.
** Considerable remains of this decorative cycle have been
discovered at Pompeii and at Rome, in a series of frescoes,
in which Lumbroso and E. Lowy recognise the features of the
legends of Bocchoris; the dispute between the two mothers
recalls the famous judgment of Solomon (1 Kings iii. 16-28).
A less favourable tradition represents the king as an avaricious
and irreligious sovereign: he is said one day to have conceived the
sacrilegious desire to bring about a conflict between an ordinary bull
and the Mnevis adored at Heliopolis. The gods, doubtless angered by his
crimes, are recorded to have called into being a lamb with eight feet,
which, suddenly breaking into articulate speech, predicted that Upper
and Lower Egypt would be disgraced by the rule of a stranger.*
* This legend, preserved by Manetho and Ulian is also known
from the fragments of a demotic papyrus at Vienna, which
contains the prophecy of the lamb.
[Illustration: 375.jpg SABACO]
Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from Lepsius.
The monuments of his reign which have come down to us tell us nothing of
his deeds; we can only conjecture that after the defeat sustained by
his generals at Raphia, the discords which had ruined the preceding
dynasties again broke out with renewed violence. Indeed, if he succeeded
in preserving his crown for several years longer, he owed the fact more
to the feebleness of the Ethiopians than to his own vigour: no sooner
did an enterprising prince appear at Barkal and demand that he should
render an account of his usurpation, than his power came to an end.
Kashto having died about 716,* his son Shabaku, the Sabaco of the
Greeks, inherited the throne, and his daughter Amenertas the priesthood
and principality of Thebes, in right of her mother Shapenuapît.
* The date of the accession of Sabaco is here fixed at 716-
715, because I follow the version of the lists of Manetho,
which gives twelve years as the reign of that prince; an
inscription from Hammamât mentions his twelfth year.
Sabaco was an able and energetic prince, who could by no means tolerate
the presence of a rival Pharaoh in the provinces which Piônkhi had
conquered. He declared war, and, being doubtless supported in his
undertaking by all the petty kings and great feudal nobles whose
jealousy was aroused by the unlooked-for prosperity of the Saite
monarch, he defeated Bocchoris and took him prisoner. Tafnakhti had
formerly recognised the Ethiopian supremacy, and Bocchoris, when
he succeeded to his fathers dominions, had himself probably sought
investiture at the hands of the King of Napata. Sabaco treated him as a
rebel, and either burnt or flayed him alive (715).*
* According to Manetho, he was burnt alive; the tradition
which mentions that he was flayed alive is found in John of
Antioch.
The struggle was hardly over, when the news of Sargons victories
reached Egypt. It was natural that the new king, not yet securely seated
on his throne, should desire to conciliate the friendship of a neighbour
who was so successful in war, and that he should seize the first
available pretext to congratulate him. The Assyrian on his part received
these advances with satisfaction and pride: he perceived in them a
guarantee that Egyptian intrigues with Tyre and Jerusalem would cease,
and that he could henceforth devote himself to his projects against
Busas without being distracted by the fear of an Ethiopian attack and
the subversion of Syria in his rear.
Sargon took advantage of these circumstances to strike a final blow at
Urartu. He began in the spring of 714 by collecting among the Mannai the
tribute due from Ullusuna, Daltâ, and the Median chiefs; then pushing
forward into the country of the Zikartu, he destroyed three forts and
twenty-four villages, and burnt their capital, Parda. Mitatti escaped
servitude, but it was at the price of his power: a proscribed fugitive,
deserted by his followers, he took refuge in the woods, and never
submitted to his conqueror; but he troubled him no further, and
disappeared from the pages of history. Having achieved this result,
Sargon turned towards the north-west, and coming at length into close
conflict with Eusas, did not leave his enemy till he had crushed him.
He drove him into the gorges of Uaush, slaughtered a large number of his
troops, and swept away the whole of his body-guard--a body of cavalry of
two hundred men, all of whom were connected by blood with the reigning
family. Eusas quitted his chariot, and, like his father Sharduris on
the night of the disaster at Kishtân, leaped upon a mare, and fled,
overwhelmed with shame, into the mountains. His towns, terror-stricken,
opened their gates at the first summons to the victor; Sargon burnt
those which he knew he could not retain, granted the district of Uaush
to his vassal Ullusunu as a recompense for his loyalty, and then marched
up to rest awhile in Naîri, where he revictualled his troops at the
expense of Ianzu of Khubushkia. He had, no doubt, hoped that Urzana of
Muzazîr, the last of the friends of Eusas to hold out against
Assyria, would make good use of the respite thus, to all appearances
unintentionally, afforded him, and would come to terms; but as the
appeal to his clemency was delayed, Sargon suddenly determined to assume
the aggressive. Muzazîr, entrenched within its mountain ranges, was
accessible only by one or two dangerous passes; Urzana had barricaded
these, and believed himself in a position to defy every effort of the
Assyrians. Sargon, equally convinced of the futility of a front attack,
had recourse to a surprise.
[Illustration: 378.jpg TAKING OF A TOWN IN URARTU BY THE ASSYRIANS]
Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from the drawing by Botta.
Taking with him his chariots and one thousand picked horsemen, he left
the beaten track, and crossing the four or five mountain chains--the
Shiak, the Ardinshi, the Ulayau, and the Alluria--which lay between him
and Muzazîr, he unexpectedly bore down upon the city. Urzana escaped
after a desperate resistance, but the place was taken by assault and
sacked, the palace destroyed, the temple overthrown, and the statues of
the gods Khaldîa and Bagbartu dragged from their sanctuary. The entire
royal family were sent into slavery, and with them 20,170 of the
inhabitants who had survived the siege, besides 690 mules, 920 oxen,
100,225 sheep, and incalculable spoils in gold, silver, bronze, iron,
and precious stones and stuffs, the furniture of Urzana, and even his
seal, being deposited in the treasury at Nineveh.
[Illustration: 379.jpg THE SEAL OF URZANA, KING OF MUZAZÎR]
Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from an impression of the original
seal which is preserved at the Hague.
The disaster at Muzazîr was the final blow to Urartu; it is impossible
to say what took place where Eusas himself was, and whether the
feudatories refused him any further allegiance, but in a short time he
found himself almost forsaken, without friends, troops, or a place
of refuge, and reduced to choose between death or the degradation of
appealing to the mercy of the conqueror. He stabbed himself rather
than yield; and Sargon, only too thankful to be rid of such a dangerous
adversary, stopped the pursuit. Argistis II. succeeded to what was left
of his fathers kingdom,* and, being anxious above all things to obtain
peace for his subjects, suspended hostilities, without however disarming
his troops.
* No text states positively that Argistis II. immediately
succeeded his father; but he is found mentioned as King of
Urartu from 708 onwards, and hence it has been concluded,
not without some reason, that such was the fact. The Vannic
inscriptions have not as yet given us this sovereigns name.
As was the case under Tiglath-pileser III., Urartu neither submitted to
Assyria, nor was there any kind of treaty between the belligerents to
prescribe the conditions of this temporary truce. Both sides maintained
their positions on their respective territories: Sargon kept the
frontier towns acquired by him in previous years, and which he had
annexed to the border provinces, retaining also his suzerainty over
Muzazîr, the Mannai, and the Median states implicated in the struggle;
Argistis, on his side, strengthened himself in the regions around the
sources of the Euphrates and Lake Van--in Biaînas, in Etius, and in
the plains of the Araxes. The material injuries which he had received,
however considerable they may appear, were not irreparable, and, as
a fact, the country quickly recovered from them, but the peoples
confidence in their prince and his chiefs was destroyed. The defeat of
Sharduris, following as it did on a period of advantageous victories,
may have seemed to Argistis one of those unimportant occurrences which
constantly take place in the career of the strongest nations; the
disaster of Rusas proved to him that, in attempting to wipe out his
first repulse, he had only made matters worse, and the conviction was
borne in upon his princes that they were not in a position to contest
the possession of Western Asia with the Assyrians. They therefore
renounced, more from instinct than as the result of deliberation,
the project of enlarging their borders to the south, and if they
subsequently reappeared on the Mesopotamian plains, it was in search
of booty, and not to acquire territory. Any attempt to stop their
incursions, or to disturb them in their mountain fastnesses, found them
prepared to hold their own with the same obstinacy as of old, and they
were quite able to safeguard their independence against an intruder.
Besides this, the Cimmerians and the Scythians were already pressing on
their frontier, and were constantly harassing them.
[Illustration: 379.jpg THE ASSYRIANS TAKING A MEDIAN TOWN]
Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from the facsimile by Flandin. It
seems that this town was called Amkaru, and its name
appears, as far as I know, in none of the accounts which we
possess of the campaigns. The town was apparently situated
in Karalla or in Median territory.
This fresh danger absorbed their entire attention, and from this time
forward they ceased to play a part in general history; the century which
had seen the rise and growth of their power was also a witness of their
downfall under the attacks of Assyria. During the last months of 714,
the tribes which had formerly constituted the kingdom of Karalla mutinied
against the tyranny of their governor, and invited Ami-tashshi, the
brother of their ancient lord Assurlî, to rule over them. Sargon
attacked them in the spring of 713, dispersed their troops, held them
to ransom, and after having once more exacted homage from Bît-Dayaukku,*
Ellipi, and Allabria.
* The Dayaukku who gave his name to this province was at
first confounded with the personage who was entangled in the
affairs of Ullusunu, and was then banished by Sargon to
Hamath. A good number of historians now admit that they were
different persons. Bît-Dayaukku is evidently the district of
Ecbatana.
He made a raid extending as far as the confines of the Iranian desert,
the barren steppes of Eastern Arabia,* and the district of Nagira
belonging to the powerful Manda.*
* The Eastern Arabs mentioned here were nomadic, and
inhabited the confines of the Great Desert to the south-east
of Media, or the steppes of Northern Iran. They are those
mentioned in a passage of Appian, together with Parthians,
Bactrians, and Tapyræans, as having submitted to Seleucus.
** The powerful Manda, encamped in the mountain and
desert, and who were named after the Eastern Arabs, must be
the peoples situated between the Caspian and the steppes of
the Iranian plateau, and a branch of the Scythians who are
soon to appear in Asiatic history.
While he was thus preparing the way for peace in his Median domains, one
of his generals crossed the Euphrates to chastise the Tabal for their
ill deeds. The latter had figured, about the year 740 B.C., among the
peoples who had bowed before the supremacy of Urartu, and their chief,
Uassarmi, had been the ally or vassal of Sharduris. Contemptuously
spared at the taking of Arpad, he had not been able to resign himself
to the Assyrian yoke, and had, in an ill-timed moment, thrown it off
in 731; he had, however, been overcome and forced to surrender, and
Tiglath-pileser had put in his place a man of obscure birth, named
Khulli, whose fidelity had remained unshaken throughout the reign of
Shalmaneser V. and the first years of Sargon. Khullis son, Ambaridis,
the husband of a Ninevite princess, who had brought him as dowry a
considerable part of Cilicia, had been unable to resist the flattering
offers of Kusas; he had broken the ties which attached him to the new
Assyrian dynasty, but had been left unmolested so long as Urartu and
Muzazir remained unshaken, since his position at the western extremity
of the empire prevented him from influencing in the smallest degree the
issue of the struggle, and it was well known that when the fall of Kusas
took place Ambaridis would be speedily brought to account. He was, in
fact, seized, banished to the banks of the Tigris, and his hereditary
fief of Bît-Burutash annexed to Cilicia, under the rule of an Assyrian.
The following year was signalised by a similar execution at which Sargon
himself deigned to preside in person. Tarkhunazi, the King of Miliddu,
not only had taken advantage of the troubles consequent on the Armenian
war to rebel against his master, but had attacked Gunzinânu, who held,
and had ruthlessly pillaged, the neighbouring district of Kammanu.*
Sargon overcame him in the open field, took from him his city of
Miliddu, and stormed the town of Tulgarimmê in which he had taken
refuge.**
* Kammanu is probably not the Kammanênc of the Greek
geographers, which is too far north relatively to Melitênè,
but is probably Comana of Cappadocia and its district.
** Tulgarimmê has been connected with the Togarmah of the
Bible (Gen. x. 3) by Halévy and Delitzsch, and their views
on this subject have been adopted by most historians.
Here again the native kingdom disappeared, and was replaced by an
Assyrian administration. Kammanu, wedged in between Urartu and Mushki,
separated these two countries, sometimes rivals to each other, but
always enemies to Nineveh. Its maintenance as an independent kingdom
prevented them from combining their efforts, and obtaining that unity of
action which alone could ensure for them, if not a definite triumph,
at least preservation from complete extinction and an opportunity of
maintaining their liberty; the importance of the position, however,
rendered it particularly perilous to hold, and the Assyrians succeeded
in so doing only by strongly fortifying it. Walls were built round ten
cities, five on the Urartian frontier, three on that of Mushki, and two
on the north, and the country which they protected was made into a new
province, that of Tulgarimmê, the district of Miliddu being confided
to the care of Mutallu, Prince of Kummukh (710). An incident which
took place in the following year furnished a pretext for completing
the organisation and military defence of this western border province.
Gurgum had been for thirty years or more in the possession of
Tarkhulara; this prince, after having served Sharduris, had transferred
his homage to Tiglath-pileser, and he had thenceforward professed
an unwavering loyalty to the Assyrian sovereigns. This accommodating
personage was assassinated by his son Mutallu; and Sargon, fearing
a revolt, hastened, at the head of a detachment of picked troops, to
avenge him. The murderer threw down his arms almost without having
struck a blow, and Gurgum was thenceforward placed under the direct
rule of Nineveh. The affair had not been brought to a close before an
outbreak took place in Southern Syria, which might have entailed very
serious consequences had it not been promptly dealt with. Egypt, united
from end to end under the sceptre of Sabaco, jealously kept watch over
the political complications in Asia, and though perhaps she was not
sure enough of her own strength to interfere openly before the death
of Eusas, she had renewed negotiations with the petty kingdoms of the
Hebrews and Philistines. Ashdod had for some time past showed signs
of discontent, and it had been found necessary to replace their king,
Azuri, who had refused to pay tribute, by his brother Akhimiti; shortly
after this, however, the people had risen in rebellion: they had
massacred Akhimiti, whom they accused of being a mere thrall of Assyria,
and had placed on the throne Yamani, a soldier of fortune, probably
an adventurer of Hellenic extraction.* The other Philistine cities had
immediately taken up arms; Edom and Moab were influenced by the general
movement, and Isaiah was striving to avert any imprudent step on the
part of Judah. Sargon despatched the Tartan,** and the rapidity with
which that officer carried out the campaign prevented the movement from
spreading beyond Philistia. He devastated Ashdod, and its vassal, Gath,
carried off their gods and their inhabitants, and peopled the cities
afresh with prisoners from Asia Minor, Urartu, and Media. Yamani
attempted to escape into Egypt, but the chief of Milukhkha intercepted
him on his way, and handed him over in chains to the conqueror.***
* This princes name, usually written Yamani, is also
written Yatnani in the _Annals_, and this variation, which
is found again in the name of the island of Cyprus and the
Cypriotes, gives us grounds for believing that the Assyrian
scribe took the race-name of the prince for a proper name:
the new king of Ashdod would have been a Yamani, a Greek of
Cyprus.
** The Assyrian narratives, as usual, give the honour of
conducting the campaign to the king. Isaiah (xx. 1)
distinctly says that Sargon sent the Tartan to quell the
revolt of Ashdod.
*** The _Annals_ state that Yamani was made prisoner and
taken to Assyria. The _Fastes_, more accurate on this point,
state that he escaped to Muzri, and that he was given up by
the King of Milukhkha. The Muzri mentioned in this passage
very probably here means Egypt.
The latter took care not to call either Moab, Edom, or Judah to account
for the part they had taken in the movement, perhaps because they
were not mentioned in his instructions, or because he preferred not to
furnish them, by an untimely interference, with a pretext for calling in
the help of Egypt. The year was doubtless too far advanced to allow him
to dream of marching against Pharaoh, and moreover that would have been
one of those important steps which the king alone had the right to take.
There was, however, no doubt that the encounter between the two empires
was imminent, and Isaiah ventured to predict the precise date of its
occurrence. He walked stripped and barefoot through the streets of
Jerusalem--a strange procedure which he explained by the words which
Jahveh had put into his lips: Like as My servant Isaiah hath walked
naked and barefoot three years for a sign and a wonder upon Egypt
and upon Kush (Ethiopia); so shall the King of Assyria lead away the
captives of Egypt and the exiles of Kush, young and old, naked and
barefoot, and with buttocks uncovered, to the shame of Egypt. And they
shall be dismayed and ashamed, because of Kush their expectation, and
of Egypt their glory. And the inhabitants of this coastland shall say in
that day, Behold, such is our expectation, whither we fled for help to
be delivered from the King of Assyria: and we, how shall we escape? *
* Isa. xx.
The fulfilment of this prophecy did not take place as quickly as the
prophet perhaps desired. Egypt appeared too strong to be openly attacked
by a mere section of the battalions at the disposal of Assyria, and
besides, it may have been deemed imprudent to involve the army to any
serious extent on so distant a field as Africa, when Babylon was ready
and waiting to fall upon the very heart of Assyria at the first news of
a real or supposed reverse. Circumstances seemed, moreover, to favour a
war against Merodach-baladan. This sovereign, who had been received with
acclamation by the Babylonians, had already lost the popularity he had
enjoyed at his accession. The fickle character of the people, which made
them nearly always welcome a fresh master with enthusiasm, soon led
them from love and obedience to hatred, and finally to revolt.
Merodach-baladan trusted to the Kaldâ to help him to maintain his
position, and their rude barbarity, even if it protected him against the
fickleness of his more civilised subjects, increased the discontent at
Kutha, Sippar, and Borsippa. He removed the statues of the gods from
these towns, imprisoned the most turbulent citizens, confiscated their
goods, and distributed them among his own followers; the other cities
took no part in the movement, but Sargon must have expected to find
in them, if not effective support, at least sympathies which would
facilitate his work of conquest. It is true that Elam, whose friendship
for the Aramæan was still undiminished, remained to be reckoned with,
but Elam had lost much of its prestige in the last few years. The aged
Khumban-igash had died in 717,* and his successor, Shutruk-nakhunta,
had not apparently inherited all the energy of his father,** and it is
possible that troubles had arisen among the vassals of his own kingdom
which prevented him from interfering on behalf of his ally. Sargon took
account of all these circumstances in arranging his plan of campaign. He
divided his army into two forces, one of which, under his own command,
was to be directed against Merodach-baladan, while the other was to
attack the insurgent Aramæans on the left bank of the Tigris, and was
to be manoeuvred so as to drive Shutruk-nakhunta back on the marshes of
the Uknu.*** The eastern force was the first to be set in movement, and
it pushed forward into the territory of the Gambulu. These latter had
concentrated themselves round Dur-Atkharas, one of their citadels;****
they had increased the height of the walls, and filled the ditches with
water brought from the Shurappu by means of a canal, and having received
a reinforcement of 600 horsemen and 4000 foot soldiers, they had drawn
them up in front of the ramparts.
* The date of the death of Khumban-igash is indirectly given
in the passage of the _Babylonian Chronicle of Pinches_,
where it is said that in the first year of Ashshur-nâdin-
shumu, King of Babylon, Ishtar-khundu (= Shutruk-nakhunta)
was dethroned by his brother, Khallushu, after having
reigned over Elam eighteen years: these events actually took
place, as we shall see below, about the year 699 before our
era.
** Shutruk-nakhunta is the Susian form of the name; the
Assyrian texts distort it into Shutur-nankhundi, and the
_Babylonian Chronicle of Pinches_, into Ishtar-khundu, owing
to a faint resemblance in the sound of the name of the
goddess Ishtar with the form _Shutur, Sthur_, itself derived
from Shutruk, with which the name began.
*** The earlier historians of Assyria, misled in the first
place by the form in which the scribes have handed down the
account in the Annals and the _Fastes_, assumed the
existence of a single army, led by Sargon himself, and which
would have marched on all the above-mentioned places of the
country, one by one. Tiele was the first to recognise that
Sargon must have left part of his forces to the command of
one of his lieutenants, and Winckler, enlarging on this
idea, showed that there were then two armies, engaged at
different seats of war, but manoeuvring as far as possible
by mutual arrangement.
**** The site of Dur-Atkharas is unknown. Billerbeck places
it hypotheti-cally on the stream of Mendeli, and his
conjecture is in itself very plausible. I should incline,
however, to place it more to the south, on account of the
passage in which it is said that the Kaldâ, to complete the
defences of the town, brought a canal from the Shurappu and
fortified its banks. The Shurappu, according to Delitzsch,
would be the Shatt Umm-el-Jemâl; according to Delattrc, the
Kerkha; the account of the campaign under consideration
would lead me to recognise in it a watercourse like the Tib,
which runs into the Tigris near Amara, in which case the
ruins of Kherîb would perhaps correspond with the site of
Dur-Atkharas.
A single morning sufficed to disperse them, and the Assyrians, entering
the city with the fugitives, took possession of it on the same day. They
made 16,490 prisoners, and seized horses, mules, asses, camels, and
both sheep and oxen in large numbers. Eight of the chiefs of the
neighbourhood, who ruled over the flat country between the Shurappu and
the Uknu, begged for mercy as soon as they learned the result of the
engagement. The name of Dur-Atkharas was changed to that of Dur-Nebo,
the territory of the Gambulu was converted into a province, and its
organisation having been completed, the army continued its march,
sweeping before it the Euâ, the Khindaru, the Puqudu, in short, all the
tribes occupying the district of Yatbur. The chiefs of these provinces
sought refuge in the morasses of the lower Kerkha, but finding
themselves surrounded and short of provisions, they were forced by
famine to yield to the enemy, and came to terms with the Assyrians, who
imposed a tribute on them and included them within the new province
of Gambulu. The goal of this expedition was thus attained, and Blam
separated from Karduniash, but the issue of the war remained undecided
as long as Shutruk-nakhunta held the cities at the edge of the plain,
from which he could emerge at will into the heart of the Assyrian
position. The conqueror therefore turned in that direction, rapidly took
from him the citadels of Shamuna and Babduri, then those of Lakhirimmu
and Pillutu, and pitched his camp on the bank of the Naditi, from whence
he despatched marauding bands to pillage the country. Dismay spread
throughout the district of Rashi; the inhabitants, abandoning their
cities--Tîl-Khumba, Durmishamash, Bubî, and Khamanu--migrated as far as
Bît-Imbi; Shutruk-nakhunta, overcome with fear, took refuge, so it was
said, in the distant mountains to preserve his life.*
* None of these places can be identified with certainty. So
far as I can follow the account of this campaign on the map,
it seems that the attacks upon Shutruk-nakhunta took place
on the plain and in the mountains between the Ab-î-Gengir
and the Tib, so that the river Naditi would be the Aftâh or
one of its tributaries. If this were so, Lakhirimmu and
Pillutu would be situated somewhere near the Jughaî ben Ruan
and the Tope Ghulamen of de Morgans map of Elam, Shamuna
near Zirzir-têpî, Babdurî near Hosseini-yeh. But I wish it
to be understood that I do not consider these comparisons as
more than simple conjectures. Bît-Imbi was certainly out of
the reach of the Assyrians, since it was used as a place of
refuge by the inhabitants of Rashî; at the same time it must
have been close to Rashî, since the people of this country
fled thither. The site of Ghilân which de Morgan has adopted
on his map seems to me to be too far north to comply with
these conditions, and that of Tapa, approved by Billerboek,
too southerly. If, as I believe, Rashî corresponds to the
regions of Pushti-kuh which lie on both sides of the upper
waters of the Mendeli stream, we ought to look for Bît-Imbi
somewhere near the Desht-î-Ghoaur and the Zenjan, near a
point where communication with the banks of the Ab-î-Kirind
would be easy.
Sargon, meanwhile, had crossed the Euphrates with the other force, and
had marched straight upon Bît-Dakkuri; having there noticed that
the fortress of Dur-Ladînu was in ruins, he rebuilt it, and, firmly
installed within the heart of the country, he patiently waited until
the eastern force had accomplished its mission. Like his adversary,
Merodach-baladan, he had no desire to be drawn into an engagement until
he knew what chance there was of the latter being reinforced by the King
of Elam. At the opening of hostilities Merodach-baladan claimed the help
of the Elamite king, and lavished on him magnificent presents--a couch,
a throne, a portable chair, a cup for the royal offerings, and his own
pectoral chain; these all reached their destination in good condition,
and were graciously accepted. But before long the Elamite prince,
threatened in his own domain, forgot everything except his own personal
safety, and declared himself unable to render Merodach-baladan any
assistance. The latter, on receiving this news, threw himself with his
face in the dust, rent his clothes, and broke out into loud weeping;
after which, conscious that his strength would not permit of his meeting
the enemy in the open field, he withdrew his men from the other side of
the Tigris, escaped secretly by night, and retired with his troops to
the fortress of Ikbîbel. The inhabitants of Babylon and Borsippa did
not allow themselves to be disconcerted; they brought the arks of Bel,
Zarpanît, Nebo, and Tashmît out of their sanctuaries, and came forth
with chanting and musical instruments to salute Sargon at Dûr-Ladînu.
He entered the city in their company, and after he had celebrated the
customary sacrifices, the people enthroned him in Merodach-baladans
palace. Tribute was offered to him, but he refused to accept any part of
it for his personal use, and applied it to a work of public utility--the
repairing of the ancient canal of Borsippa, which had become nearly
filled up. This done, he detached a body of troops to occupy Sippara,
and returned to Assyria, there to take up his winter quarters.
Once again, therefore, the ancient metropolis of the Euphrates was ruled
by an Assyrian, who united in one protocol the titles of the sovereigns
of Assur and Kar-duniash. Babylon possessed for the kings of Nineveh
the same kind of attraction as at a later date drew the German Cæsars to
Rome. Scarcely had the Assyrian monarchs been crowned within their own
domains, than they turned their eyes towards Babylon, and their ambition
knew no rest till the day came for them to present themselves in pomp
within the temple of its god and implore his solemn consecration. When
at length they had received it, they scrupulously secured its renewal on
every occasion which the law prescribed, and their chroniclers recorded
among the important events of the year, the ceremony in which they took
the hand of Bel. Sargon therefore returned, in the month Nisan of the
year 709, to preside over the procession of the god, and he devoutly
accomplished the rites which constituted him the legitimate successor of
the semi-fabulous heroes of the old empire, foremost among whom was his
namesake Shargâni of Agadê. He offered sacrifices to Bel, Nebo, and to
the divinities of Sumir and Akkad, and he did not return to the camp
until he had fulfilled all the duties incumbent on his new dignity. He
was involved that year in two important wars at opposite points of his
empire. One was at the north-western extremity, against the Mushki and
their king Mita, who, after having supported Eusas, was now intriguing
with Argistis; the other in the south-east, against the Kaldâ, and
probably also against Elam. He entrusted the conduct of the former to
the governor of Kuî, but reserved to himself the final reckoning with
Merodach-baladan. The Babylonian king had made good use of the respite
given him during the winter months. Too prudent to meet his enemy in
the open plain, he had transformed his hereditary principality into a
formidable citadel. During the preceding campaign he had devastated
the whole of the country lying between the marshes and the territory
occupied by the Assyrians, and had withdrawn the inhabitants. Most
of the towns--Ikbîbel, Uru, Uruk, Kishik, and Nimid-laguda--were also
deserted, and no garrisons were left in them. He had added to the
fortifications of Dur-Yakîa, and enlarged the moat till it was two
hundred cubits wide and eighteen deep, so as to reach the level of
infiltration; he then turned into it the waters of the Euphrates, so
that the town appeared to be floating on a lake, without either bridges
or quays by means of which the besiegers might have brought their
machines within range and their troops been able to approach for an
assault. Merodach-baladan had been careful not to shut himself within
the town, but had taken up a position in the marshes, and there awaited
the arrival of the Assyrians. Sargon, having left Babylon in the
month of Iyyâr, encountered him within sight of Dur-Yakîn. The Aramæan
infantry were crushed by repeated charges from the Mnevito chariotry and
cavalry, who pursued the fugitives to the outer side of the moat, and
seized the camp with all its baggage and the royal train, including the
kings tent, a canopy of solid silver which protected the throne, his
sceptre, weapons, and stores of all kinds. The peasants, to the number
of 90,580, crowded within the lines, also fell into their hands,
together with their flocks and herds--2500 horses, 610 mules, and
854 camels, as well as sheep, oxen, and asses; the remainder of the
fugitives rushed within the outworks for refuge like a pack of wild
boars, and finally were driven into the interior of the place, or
scattered among the beds of reeds along the coast. Sargon cut down
the groves of palm trees which adorned the suburbs, and piled up their
trunks in the moat, thus quickly forming a causeway right up to
the walls. Merodach-baladan had been wounded in the arm during the
engagement, but, nevertheless, fought stubbornly in defence of his city;
when he saw that its fall was inevitable, he fled to the other side of
the gulf, and took refuge among the mud flats of the Lower Ulaî. Sargon
set fire to Dur-Yakîn, levelled its towers and walls with the ground,
and demolished its houses, temples, and palaces. It had been a sort of
penal settlement, to which the Kaldâ rulers used to consign those of
their subjects belonging to the old aboriginal race, who had rendered
themselves obnoxious by their wealth or independence of character; the
number of these prisoners was considerable, Babylon, Borsippa, Nipur,
and Sippar, not to speak of Uni, Uruk, Eridu, Larsam, and Kishîk,
having all of them furnished their share. Sargon released them all,
and restored their gods to the temples; he expelled the nomads from the
estates which, contrary to all justice, had been distributed among them
in preceding years, and reinstated the former owners. Karduniash, which
had been oppressed for twelve long years by a semi-barbarian despot, now
breathed again, and hailed Sargon as its deliverer, while he on his
part was actively engaged in organising his conquest. The voluntary
submission of Upiri, King of Dilmun, who lived isolated in the open
sea, as though in a birds nest, secured to Sargon possession of the
watercourses which flowed beyond the Chaldæan lake into the Persian
Gulf: no sooner had he obtained it than he quitted the neighbourhood of
Dur-Yakîn, crossed the Tigris, and reinforced the garrisons which lined
his Elamite frontier on this side. He had just finished building a
strongly fortified citadel on the site of Sagbat,* when ambassadors
arrived from Mita.
* This Sagbat, which must not be confused with the district
of Bît-Sagbati mentioned in the reign of Tiglath-pileser
III., seems to correspond with a post to the south of
Durîlu, perhaps the ruins of Baksayeh, on the Tchengula.
The governor of Kuî had at length triumphed over the obstinacy of the
Mushki, and after driving them from village to village, had compelled
them to sue for terms: the tidings of the victories over the Kaldâ had
doubtless hastened their decision, but they were still so powerful that
it was thought wiser not to impose too rigorous conditions upon them.
Mita agreed to pay tribute, and surrendered one or two districts, which
were turned into an Aramæan settlement: the inhabitants were transferred
to Bît-Yakîn, where they had to make the best they could of lands
that had been devastated by war. At this juncture the Greeks of Cyprus
flattered the pride of the Assyrians in a most unexpected way: after
the manner of their race they scoured the seas, and their fleets
persistently devastated the coasts of Syria and Cilicia.
[Illustration: 396.jpb STELE AT LARNAKA]
Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from the plaster cast in the Louvre.
Seven of their kings were so far alarmed by the report of Sargons
achievements as to dread punishment for their misdeeds. They therefore
sent him presents, and, for the moment, abandoned their piratical
expeditions in Phoenician waters. The homage of these inveterate robbers
raised Sargon in his own eyes and in those of his subjects. Some years
later, about 708 B.C., he presented them with a stele of black
marble, on which he had engraved his own portrait, together with a long
inscription setting forth his most glorious exploits. They set it up
at Kition (Citium), where it has been preserved amongst the ruins, a
priceless witness to the greatness of Assyria.
While war thus raged around him, Sargon still found time for works of a
peaceful character. He set himself to remodel and complete the system of
irrigation in the Assyrian plain; he repaired the dykes, and cleaned out
and made good the beds of the canals which had been neglected during the
troublous times of the last generation. He erected buildings at Calah*
and at Nineveh, but in these cities everything seemed to recall too
vividly the memory of the sovereigns who had gone before him: he wished
for a capital which should belong to himself alone, where he would not
be reminded of a past in which he had no part. After meditating day and
night, his choice fell upon the village of Maganubba, a little to the
north-east of Nineveh, in a wide plain which extends from the banks of
the Khuzur to the hills of Muzri, and by a single decree he expropriated
all its inhabitants. He then built on the land which he had purchased
from them a city of unrivalled magnificence, which he called by his own
name, Dur-Sharrukîn.**
* At Calah, he lived in an old palace of Assur-nazir-pal
restored and adapted for his use, as shown by the
inscription published by Layard.
** In most of the texts the village of Maganubba is not
named; it is mentioned in the _Cylinder Inscription_, and
this document is the only one which furnishes details of the
expropriation, etc. The modern name of the place is
Khorsabad, _the city of Khosroes_, but the name of its
founder was still associated with its ruins, in the time of
Yakut, who mentions him under the name of Sarghun. It was
first explored in 1843 by Botta, then by Place and Oppert.
The antiquities collected there by Botta and Place
constitute the bulk of the Assyrian Museum in the Louvre;
unfortunately, a part of the objects collected by Place went
to the bottom of the Tigris with the lighter which was
carrying them.
The ground plan of it is of rectangular shape, the sides being about
1900 yards long by 1800 yards wide, each corner exactly facing one
of the four points of the compass. Its walls rest on a limestone
sub-structure some three feet six inches high, and rise fifty-seven feet
above the ground; they are strengthened, every thirty yards or so, by
battlemented towers which project thirteen feet from the face of the
wall and stand sixteen feet higher than the ramparts.*
* Place reckoned the height of the wall at 75 feet, a
measurement adopted by Perrot and Chipiez; Dieulafoy has
shown that the height of the wall must be reduced to 47
feet, and that of the towers about 65 feet.
[Illustration: 398.jpg PLAN OF THE ROYAL CITY OF DUR-SHARRUKÎN]
Reduction by Faucher-Gudin, from the plan published in
Place.
Access was gained to the interior by eight gates, two on each side of
the square, each of them marked by two towers separated from one another
by the width of the bay. Every gate had its patron, chosen from among
the gods of the city; there was the gate of Shamash, the gate of Rammân,
those of Bel and Beltis, of Ami, of Tshtar, of Eâ, and of the Lady of
the Gods. Each of them was protected externally by a _migdol_, or small
castle, built in the Syrian style, and flanked at each corner by a low
tower thirteen yards in width; five allowed of the passage of beasts
as well as men. It was through these that the peasants came in every
morning, driving their cattle before them, or jolting along in waggons
laden with fruit and vegetables. After passing the outposts, they
crossed a paved courtyard, then made their way between the two towers
through a vaulted passage over fifty yards long, intersected at almost
equal intervals by two transverse galleries. The other three gates had a
special arrangement of their own; a flight of twelve steps built out
in front of the courtyard rendered them inaccessible to animals or
vehicles. At the entrance to the passage towered two colossal bulls with
human heads, standing like sentinels--their faces and foreparts turned
outward, their hind-quarters ranged along the inner walls--as though
gazing before them into space in company with two winged genii. The arch
supported by their mitred heads was ornamented by a course of enamelled
bricks, on which other genii, facing one another in pairs, offered
pine-cones across a circular ornament of many colours. These were the
mystic guardians of the city, who shielded it not only from the attacks
of men, but also from invasions of evil spirits and pernicious diseases.
The rays of the sun made the forecourt warm in winter, while it was
always cool under the archway in summer; the gates served as resorts for
pleasure or business, where old men and idlers congregated to discuss
their affairs and settle the destinies of the State, merchants
bargained and disposed of their goods, and the judge and notables of the
neighbouring quarter held their courts.
[Illustration: 400.jpg PART OF THE ENAMELLED COURSE OF A GATE]
Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a drawing published in Place.
It was here that the king generally exposed to view the chieftains and
kings whom he had taken captive; here they lay, chained like dogs in
cages, dependent on the pity of their guards or of passers-by for such
miserable fare as might be flung to them, and, the first feeling of
curiosity once passed, no longer provoking even the jeers of the crowd,
until a day came when their victor took it into his head to remove
them from their ignominious position, and either restored them to their
thrones or sent them to the executioner.* The town itself, being
built from plans drawn up by one mind, must have presented few of the
irregularities of outline characteristic of ancient cities.
* To mention but a single instance, it was in this way that
Assur-bani-pal treated the Arab kings captured by him.
The streets leading from the gates were of uniform breadth throughout,
from one side of the enclosure to the other. They were paved, had no
sideways or footpaths, and crossed one another at right angles. The
houses on either side of them seem, for the most part, to have consisted
of a single story. They were built of bricks, either baked or
unbaked, the outer surfaces of which were covered with white or tinted
rough-casting. The high and narrow doors were nearly always hidden
away in a corner of the front; the bare monotony of the walls was only
relieved here and there at long intervals by tiny windows, but often
instead of a flat roof the building was surmounted by a conical dome
or by semi-cupolas, the concave sides of which were turned inwards. The
inhabitants varied greatly in race and language: Sargon had filled his
city with prisoners collected from all the four quarters of his empire,
from Elam, Chaldæa, and Media, from Urartu and Tabal, Syria and
Palestine, and in order to keep these incongruous elements in check he
added a number of Assyrians, of the mercantile, official, or priestly
classes. He could overlook the whole city from the palace which he had
built on both sides the north-eastern wall of the town, half within
and half without the ramparts. Like all palaces built on the Euphratean
model, this royal castle stood on an artificial eminence of bricks
formed of two rectangles joined together in the shape of the letter
T. The only entrance to it was on the city side, foot-passengers being
admitted by a double flight of steps built out in front of the ramparts,
horsemen and chariots by means of an inclined plane which rose in
a gentle gradient along the right flank of the masonry work, and
terminated on its eastern front. Two main gates corresponded to these
two means of approach; the one on the north-east led straight to the
royal apartments, the other faced the city and opened on to the double
staircase. It was readily distinguishable from a distance by its two
flagstaffs bearing the royal standard, and its two towers, at the base
of which were winged bulls and colossal figures of Gilgames crushing the
lion.
[Illustration: 402.jpg birds eye view of sargons palace at
dur-sharrukîn]
Drawn by Boudier, from the restoration by Thomas in Place.
Two bulls of still more monstrous size stood sentry on either side of
the gate, the arch was outlined by a course of enamelled bricks, while
higher up, immediately beneath the battlements, was an enamelled mosaic
showing the king in all his glory. This triumphal arch was reserved for
his special use, the common people being admitted by two side doors of
smaller size less richly decorated.
[Illustration: 403.jpg ONE OF THE GATES OF THE PALACE AT DUR-SHARRUKÎN]
Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from the restoration by Thomas, in
Place.
Saragon resided at Caleh, where he had taken up his quarters in the
former palace of Assur-nazir-pal, while his new city was still in
the hands of the builders. Every moment that he could spare from his
military and administrative labours was devoted to hastening on the
progress of the work, and whenever he gained a victory or pillaged a
district, he invariably set aside a considerable part of the booty in
order to meet the outlay which the building involved. Thus we find that
on returning from his tenth campaign he brought with him an immense
convoy laden with timber, stone, and precious metals which he had
collected in the neighbourhood of Mount Taurus or among the mountains of
Assyria, including coloured marbles, lapis-lazuli, rock crystal, pine,
cedar, and cypress-wood, gold, silver, and bronze, all of which was
destined for Dur-Sharrukîn; the quantity of silver included among these
materials was so great that its value fell to a level with that of
copper.
[Illustration: 404.jpg PLAN OF THE EXCAVATED PORTIONS OF THE PALACE AT
DUR-SHARRUKÎN]
Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from the plan by Thomas, in Place.
The interior of the building, as in the case of the old Chaldæan
palaces, was separated into two well-marked divisions. The larger of
these was used by the king in his public capacity, and to this the
nobles and soldiers, and even the common people, were admitted under
certain conditions and on certain days prescribed by custom. The outer
court was lined on three sides by warehouses and depots, in which were
stored the provisions, commodities, and implements required for the host
of courtiers and slaves who depended on the sovereign for support. Each
room had, as may still be seen, its own special purpose. There were
cellars for wine and oil, with their rows of large oblong jars; then
there were store-rooms for implements of iron, which Place found full
of rusty helmets, swords, pieces of armour, maces, and ploughshares;
a little further on were rooms for the storage of copper weapons,
enamelled bricks, and precious metals, and the kings private treasury,
in which were hidden away the spoils of the vanquished or the regular
taxes paid by his subjects; some fine bronze lions of marvellous
workmanship and lifelike expression were found still shut up here.
[Illustration: 405.jpg ONE OF THE BRONZE LIONS FROM DUR-SHARRUKÎN]
Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from the original in the Louvre.
The kitchens adjoined the pantries, and the stables for horses and
camels communicated direct with the coach-houses in which the state
chariots were kept, while the privies were discreetly hidden in a
secluded corner. On the other side, among the buildings occupying the
southern angle of the courtyard, the menials of the palace lived
huddled together, each family quartered in small, dark rooms. The royal
apartments, properly so called, stood at the back of these domestic
offices, facing the south-east, near the spot where the inclined plane
debouched on to the city ramparts. The monumental entrance to these
apartments was guarded, in accordance with religious custom, by a
company of winged bulls; behind this gate was a lawn, then a second
gate, a corridor and a grand quadrangle in the very centre of the
palace.
[Illustration: 406.jpg A HUNTING EXPEDITION IN THE WOODS NEAR
DUR-SHARRUKÎN]
Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a drawing by Flandin, in Botta.
The king occupied a suite of some twenty rooms of a rather simple
character; here he slept, ate, worked, and transacted the greater
part of his daily business, guarded by his eunuchs and attended by his
ministers and secretaries. The remaining rooms were apartments of state,
all of the same pattern, in which the crowd of courtiers and employés
assembled while waiting for a private audience or to intercept the king
as he passed. A subdued light made its way from above through narrow
windows let into the massive arches. The walls were lined to a height
of over nine feet from the floor with endless bas-reliefs, in greyish
alabaster, picked out in bright colours, and illustrating the principal
occupations in which the sovereign spent his days, such as the audiences
to ambassadors, hunting in the woods, sieges and battles. A few brief
inscriptions interspersed above pictures of cities and persons indicated
the names of the vanquished chiefs or the scenes of the various events
portrayed; detailed descriptions were engraved on the back of the
slabs facing the brick wall against which they rested. This was a
precautionary measure, the necessity for which had been but too plainly
proved by past experience. Every one--the king himself included--well
knew that some day or other Dur-Sharrukîn would be forsaken just as
the palaces of previous dynasties had been, and it was hoped that
inscriptions concealed in this manner would run a better chance of
escaping the violence of man or the ravages of time; preserved in them,
the memory of Sargon would rise triumphant from the ruins. The gods
reigned supreme over the north-east angle of the platform, and a large
irregular block of buildings was given up to their priests; their cells
contained nothing of any particular interest, merely white walls and
black plinths, adorned here and there with frescoes embellished by
arabesques, and pictures of animals and symbolical genii. The _ziggurât_
rose to a height of some 141 feet above the esplanade. It had seven
storeys dedicated to the gods of the seven planets, each storey being
painted in the special colour of its god--the first white, the second
black, the third purple, the fourth blue, the fifth a vermilion red;
the sixth was coated with silver, and the seventh gilded. There was no
chamber in the centre of the tower, but a small gilded chapel probably
stood at its base, which was used for the worship of Assuf or of Ishtar.
The harem, or _Bît-riduti_, was at the southern corner of the enclosure,
almost in the shadow of the _ziggurât_. Sargon had probably three queens
when he founded his city, for the harem is divided into three separate
apartments, of which the two larger look out on the same quadrangle.
[Illustration: 408.jpg THE ZIGGURAT AT DUR-SHARRUKIN]
Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from the restoration by Thomas, in Place.
Two courses of enamelled bricks ran along the base of the façade, while
statues were placed at intervals against the wall, and the bay of the
gateway was framed by two bronze palm trees gilt: the palm being the
emblem of fruitfulness and grace, no more fitting decoration could have
been chosen for this part of the building. The arrangement was the same
in all three divisions: an ante-chamber of greater width than length;
an apartment, one half of which was open to the sky, while the other
was covered by a half-dome, and a flight of twelve steps, leading to
an alcove in which stood a high wooden couch. The queens and princesses
spent their lives in this prison-like _bît-riduti_: their time was taken
up with dress, embroidery, needlework, dancing and singing, the
monotony of this routine being relieved by endless quarrels, feuds,
and intrigues. The male children remained in the harem until the age
of puberty, when they left it in order to continue their education as
princes and soldiers under the guidance of their father.*
* An inscription of Assur-bani-pal, gives a summary
description of the life led in the harem by heirs to the
throne, and describes generally the kind of education
received by them from their earliest childhood.
[Illustration: 409.jpg SECTION OF A BEDROOM IN THE HAREM]
Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from the restoration by Thomas, in
Place.
This group of buildings was completed by a park, in which cedars of
Lebanon, pines, cypresses, gazelles, stags, wild asses and cattle, and
even lions, were acclimatised, in addition to a heterogeneous collection
of other trees and animals. Here, the king gave himself up to the
pleasures of the chase, and sometimes invited one or other of his wives
to come thither and banquet or drink with him.
After Mitas surrender, Sargon had hoped to be allowed to finish
building his city in peace; but an ill-advised movement in Kummukh
obliged him to don his harness again (708 B.C.). King Mutallu had
entered into an alliance with Argistis of Urartu, and took the field
with his army; but when details of what had taken place in Chaldæa
reached his ears, and he learnt the punishment that had been inflicted
on the people of Bît-Yakin, his courage failed him.
[Illustration: 410.jpg MAIN BOOK OF THE HAREM AT DUK-SHARRUKÎN]
Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from the restoration by Thomas, in
Place.
He fled without waiting for the Assyrians to appear, and so great was
his haste that he had no time to take his family and treasure with
him. Sargon annexed his kingdom, placed it under the government of
the _tartan_, and incorporated into his own the whole army of Kummukh,
including 150 chariots, 1500 horsemen, 20,000 archers, and 10,000
pikemen. In the following year (707) his vassal Dalta died, leaving two
sons, Nibi and Ishpabara, both of whom claimed possession of the fief of
Ellipi; Nibi appealed to Elam for help, and Ishpabara at once turned for
aid to Assyria. Sargon sent him a body of troops, commanded by seven
of his generals, while Shutruk-nakhunta lent his _protégé_ 4500 bowmen;
Ishpabara won the day, took the city of Marubishti by storm, and
compelled his brother to take refuge in Susian territory. The affair
wras over so quickly that it caused practically no delay in the
completion of the works at the capital. The consecration of a new city
necessitated the observance of a host of complicated ceremonies, which
extended over several months. First of all provision had to be made for
its religious worship; the omens were consulted in order to determine
which of the gods were to be invoked, and, when this was decided, there
followed the installation of the various statues and arks which were to
preside over the destinies of the city and the priests to whom they were
intrusted; the solemn inauguration took place on the 22nd day of Tisri,
in the year 707 B.C., and from that day forward Dur-Sharrukîn occupied
the rank officially assigned to it among the capitals of the empire.
Sargon, however, did not formally take up his residence within it till
six months later, on the 6th day of Iyyâr, 706. He must, by this time,
have been advancing in years, and even if we assume him to have been a
young man when he ascended the throne, after the sixteen years of bodily
fatigue and mental worry through which he had passed since coming into
power, he must have needed repose. He handed over the government of the
northern provinces to his eldest son Sin-akhê-irba, better known to us
as Sennacherib, whom he regarded as his successor; to him he transferred
the responsibility of keeping watch over the movements of the Mannai,
of Urartu, and of the restless barbarians who dwelt beyond the zone
of civilised states on the banks of the Halys, or at the foot of
the distant Caucasus: a revolt among the Tabal, in 706, was promptly
suppressed by his young and energetic deputy. As for Sargon himself, he
was content to retain the direct control of the more pacific provinces,
such as Babylon, the regions of the Middle Euphrates, and Syria, and he
doubtless hoped to enjoy during his later years such tranquillity as was
necessary to enable him to place his conquests on a stable basis. The
envious fates, however, allowed him but little more than twelve short
months: he perished early in 705 B.C., assassinated by some soldier of
alien birth, if I interpret rightly the mutilated text which furnishes
us with a brief mention of the disaster. Sennacherib was recalled in
haste from the frontier, and proclaimed king immediately on his arrival,
thus ascending unopposed to the throne on the 12th day of Ab. His
fathers body had been left unburied, doubtless in order that he might
verify with his own eyes the truth of what had been told him concerning
his death, and thus have no ground for harbouring suspicions that
would have boded ill for the safety of the late kings councillors and
servants. He looked upon his fathers miserable ending as a punishment
for some unknown transgression, and consulted the gods to learn what
it was that had aroused their anger, refusing to authorise the burial
within the palace until the various expiatory rites suggested by the
oracle had been duly performed.*
* This is my interpretation of the text published and
translated by Winckler. Winckler sees in it the account of
a campaign during which Sargon was killed by mountaineers,
as was Cyprus in later times by the Massagetse; the kings
body (according to him) remained unburied, and was recovered
by Sennacherib only after considerable delay. In support of
his version of this event Winckler cites the passage in Isa.
xiv. 4-20, which he takes as having been composed to exult
over the death of Sargon, and then afterwards adapted to the
death of a king of Babylon.
Thus mysteriously disappeared the founder of the mightiest dynasty that
ever ruled in Assyria, perhaps even in the whole of Western Asia. At
first sight, it would seem easy enough to determine what manner of
man he was and to what qualities he owed his greatness, thanks to the
abundance of documents which his contemporaries have bequeathed to us;
but when we come to examine more closely, we soon find the task to be by
no means a simple one. The inscriptions maintain so discreet a silence
with regard to the antecedents of the kings before their accession, and
concerning their education and private life, that at this distance of
time we cannot succeed in forming any clear idea as to their individual
temperament and character. The monuments record such achievements
as they took pride in, in terms of uniform praise which conceal or
obliterate the personality of the king in question; it is always the
ideal Assyrian sovereign who is held up for our admiration under a score
of different names, and if, here and there, we come upon some trait
which indicates the special genius of this or that monarch, we may
be sure that the scribe has allowed it to slip in by accident, quite
unconscious of the fact that he is thus affording us a glimpse of his
masters true character and disposition. A study of Sargons campaigns
as revealed in his annals will speedily convince us that he was
something more than a fearless general, with a keen eye to plunder,
who could see nothing in the most successful expedition but a means of
enriching his people or adding to the splendours of his court. He was
evidently convinced that certain nations, such as Urartu and Elam, would
never really assimilate with his own subjects, and, in their case, he
adhered strictly to the old system of warfare, and did all he could to
bring about their ruin; other nations, on the contrary, he regarded as
capable of amalgamation with the Assyrians, and these he did his best to
protect from the worst consequences of their rebellion and resistance.
He withdrew them from the influence of their native dynasties, and
converted their territories into provinces under his own vigilant
administration, and though he did not scruple to send the more turbulent
elements among them into exile, and did his best to weaken them by
founding alien colonies in their midst, yet he respected their religion,
customs, and laws, and, in return for their obedience to his rule,
guaranteed them an equitable and judicious government. Moreover, he
took quite as much interest in their well-being as in his own military
successes, and in the midst of his heroic struggles against Rusas and
Merodach-baladan he contrived to find time for the consideration of such
prosaic themes as the cultivation of the vine and of corn; he devoted
his attention to the best methods of storing wine, and sought to prevent
oil, which is the life of man and healeth wounds, from rising in price,
and the cost of sesame from exceeding that of wheat. We seem to see
in him, not only the stern and at times cruel conqueror, but also the
gracious monarch, kind and considerate to his people, and merciful to
the vanquished when policy permitted him to indulge his natural leaning
to clemency.
END OF VOL. VII.