STORY OF THE DOWNFUL OF ASSYRIA

DOWNFUL OF ASSYRIA


                                 Pul
Tiglath-Pileser known as "Pul"died in b.c. 727, when the crown was seized by Elulæos of Tinu, who took the name of Shalmaneser IV. Shalmaneser's short reign was signalised by an unsuccessful attempt to capture Tyre, and by the beginning of a war against the kingdom of Israel. But the siege of Samaria was hardly commenced when Shalmaneser died, or was murdered, in b.c. 722, and was succeeded by another usurper who assumed the name of Sargon, one of the most famous of [Pg 38]the early Babylonian kings. Sargon in his inscriptions claims royal descent, but the claim was probably without foundation. He proved to be an able general, though his inscriptions show that he continued to the last to be a rough but energetic soldier who had perhaps risen from the ranks.

sARGON 

SAMARIA OF NORTHERN ISRAEL WAS TAKEN
Two years after his accession (b.c. 720) Samaria was taken and placed under an Assyrian governor, 27,280 of its leading inhabitants being carried captive to Gozan and Media. But Sargon soon found that the task of cementing and completing the empire founded by Tiglath-Pileser was by no means an easy one. Babylonia had broken away from Assyria on the news of Shalmaneser's death, and had submitted itself to Merodach-Baladan the hereditary chieftain of Beth-Yagina in the marshes on the coast of the Persian Gulf. The southern portion of Sargon's dominions was threatened by the ancient and powerful kingdom of Elam; the Kurdish tribes on the east renewed their depredations; while the Hittite kingdom of Carchemish still remained unsubdued, and the Syrian conquests could with difficulty be retained. In fact, a new enemy appeared in this part of the empire in the shape of Egypt.

sargon drive elamites into retreat 
Sargon's first act,, was to drive the Elamites back to their own country with considerable loss. He was then recalled to the west by the revolt of Hamath, where Yahu-bihdi, or Ilu-bihdi, whose name perhaps indicates his Jewish parentage, had proclaimed himself [Pg 39]king, and persuaded Arpad, Damascus, Samaria, and other cities to follow his standard. But the revolt was of short duration. Hamath was burnt, 4,300 Assyrians being sent to occupy its ruins, and Yahu-bihdi was flayed alive. Sargon next marched along the sea-coast to the cities of the Philistines. There the Egyptian army was routed at Raphia, and its ally, Khanun of Gaza, taken captive



BATTLE OF CARCHEMISH
In b.c. 717 all was ready for dealing the final blow at the Hittite power in Northern Syria. The rich trading city of Carchemish was stormed, its last king, Pisiris, fell into the hands of the Assyrians, and his Moschian allies were forced to retreat to the north. The plunder of Carchemish brought eleven talents and thirty manehs of gold and 2,100 talents of silver into the treasury of Calah. It was henceforth placed under an Assyrian satrap, who thus held in his hands the key of the high road and the caravan trade between Eastern and Western Asia.

But Sargon was not allowed to retain possession of Carchemish without a struggle. Its Hittite inhabitants found avengers in the allied populations of the north, in Meshech and Tubal, in Ararat and Minni. The struggle lasted for six years, but in the end Sargon prevailed. Van submitted, its king Ursa, the leader of the coalition against Assyria, committed suicide, Cilicia and the Tibareni or Tubal were placed under an Assyrian governor, and the city of Malatiyeh was razed to the ground. In b.c. 711, Sargon was at length free to [Pg 40]turn his attention to the west. Here affairs wore a threatening aspect. Merodach-Baladan, foreseeing that his own turn would come as soon as Sargon had firmly established his power in Northern Syria, had despatched ambassadors to the Mediterranean states, urging them to combine with him against the common foe. We read in the Bible of the arrival of the Babylonian embassy in Jerusalem, and of the rebuke received by Hezekiah for his vainglory in displaying to the strangers the resources of his kingdom. In spite of Isaiah's warning, Hezekiah listened to the persuasions of the Babylonian envoys, and encouraged by the promise of Egyptian support along with Phœnicia, Moab, Edom, and the Philistines, determined to defy the Assyrian king.


SARGON ATTACKED JERUSALEM
But before the confederates were ready to act in concert Sargon descended upon Palestine. Phœnicia and Judah were overrun, Jerusalem was captured, and Ashdod burnt, while the Egyptians made no attempt to help their friends. This siege of Ashdod is the only occasion on which the name of Sargon occurs in the Bible (Isaiah xx. 1). As soon as all source of danger was removed in the west Sargon hurled his forces against Babylonia. Merodach-Baladan had made every preparation to meet the coming attack, and the Elamite king had engaged to help him. But the Elamites were again compelled to fly before the warriors of Assyria, and Sargon entered Babylon in triumph (b.c. 710). The following year he pursued Merodach-Baladan to his ancestral stronghold in the marshes; Beth-Yagina [Pg 41]was taken by storm, and its unfortunate defenders were sent in chains to Nineveh. Sargon was now at the height of his power. His empire was a compact and consolidated whole, reaching from the Mediterranean on the west to the mountains of Elam on the east, and his solemn coronation at Babylon gave a title to his claim to be the legitimate successor of the ancient Sargon of Accad. The old kingdoms of Elam and Egypt alone remained to threaten the newly-founded empire, which received the voluntary homage of the smaller states that lay immediately beyond it. Thus the sacred island of Dilvun in the Persian Gulf submitted itself to the terrible conqueror, and the Phœnicians of Kition or Chittim in Cyprus erected a monumental record of his supremacy.


SENNACHERIB 
Sargon's end was consonant with his whole career. He was murdered by his soldiers in his new city of Dur-Sargon , on the 12th of Ab or July, b.c. 705, and was succeeded by his son Sennacherib. If we may judge from Sennacherib's name, which means 'the Moon-god has increased the brothers,' he would not have been Sargon's eldest son. In any case he had been brought up in the purple, and displayed none of the rugged virtues of his father. He was weak, boastful, and cruel, and preserved his empire only by the help of the veterans and generals whom Sargon had trained.


MERODACH BALADAN
Merodach-Baladan had escaped from captivity, and two years after the death of Sargon had once more possessed himself of Babylon. But a battle at Kis [Pg 42]drove him from the country nine months subsequently, and 


Tirhakah


ASSYRIA BATTLE AGAINST EGYPT UNDER TIRHAKAH



HEZEKIAH KING OF JUDAH
Sennacherib was able to turn his attention to affairs in the west. In b.c. 701, he marched into Phœnicia and Palestine, where Hezekiah KING of Judah and some of the neighbouring kings had refused their tribute. Tirhakah, the Ethiopian king of Egypt, had promised support to the rebellious states, and Padi, the king of Ekron, who remained faithful to the Assyrians, was carried in chains to Jerusalem. The Assyrian army fell first upon Phœnicia. Great and Little Sidon, Sarepta, Acre, and other towns, surrendered, Elulæos, the Sidonian monarch, fled to Cyprus,. Metinti of Ashdod, Pedael of Ammon, Chemosh-nadab of Moab, and Melech-ram of Edom, also submitted. Then, says Sennacherib: 'Zedekiah, king of Ashkelon, who had not submitted to my yoke, himself, the gods of the house of his fathers, his wife, his sons, his daughters, and his brothers, the seed of the house of his fathers, I removed, and I sent him to Syria. I set over the men of Ashkelon Sarludari, the son of Rukipti, their former king, and I imposed upon him the payment of tribute, and the homage due to my majesty, and he became a vassal. In the course of my campaign I approached and captured Beth-Dagon, Joppa, Bene-berak, and Azur, the cities of Zedekiah, which did not submit at once to my yoke, and I carried away their spoil. The priests, the chief men, and the common people of Ekron who had thrown into chains their king Padi because he was faithful to his [Pg 43]oaths to Assyria, and had given him up to Hezekiah, the Jew, who imprisoned him like an enemy in a dark dungeon, feared in their hearts.

assyria attacked egypt
 The king of Egypt, the bowmen, the chariots, and the horses of the king of Ethiopia, had gathered together innumerable forces, and gone to their assistance. In sight of the town of Eltekeh was their order of battle drawn up; they called their troops (to the battle). Trusting in Assur, my lord, I fought with them and overthrew them. My hands took the captains of the chariots, and the sons of the king of Egypt, as well as the captains of the chariots of the king of Ethiopia, alive in the midst of the battle. I approached and captured the towns of Eltekeh and Timnath, and I carried away their spoil. I marched against the city of Ekron, and put to death the priests and the chief men who had committed the sin (of rebellion), and I hung up their bodies on stakes all round the city. The citizens who had done wrong and wickedness I counted as a spoil; as for the rest of them who had done no sin or crime, in whom no fault was found, I proclaimed a free pardon. I had Padi, their king, brought out from the midst of Jerusalem, and I seated him on the throne of royalty over them, and I laid upon him the tribute due to my majesty. But as for Hezekiah of Judah, who had not submitted to my yoke, forty-six of his strong cities, together with innumerable fortresses and small towns which depended on them, by overthrowing the walls and open attack, by battle engines and battering-rams, I besieged, I captured, [Pg 44]I brought out from the midst of them and counted as a spoil 200,150 persons, great and small, male and female, horses, mules, asses, camels, oxen and sheep without number. Hezekiah himself I shut up like a bird in a cage in Jerusalem, his royal city. I built a line of forts against him, and I kept back his heel from going forth out of the great gate of his city. I cut off his cities that I had spoiled from the midst of his land, and gave them to Metinti, king of Ashdod, Padi, king of Ekron, and Zil-baal, king of Gaza, and I made his country small. In addition to their former tribute and yearly gifts, I added other tribute, and the homage due to my majesty, and I laid it upon them. The fear of the greatness of my majesty overwhelmed him, even Hezekiah, and he sent after me to Nineveh



Sennacherib discreetly says nothing about the disaster which befell his army in front of Jerusalem, and which obliged him to return ignominiously to Assyria without attempting to capture Jerusalem, and to deal with Hezekiah as it was his [Pg 45]custom to deal with other rebellious kings.

Sennacherib never recovered from the blow he had suffered in Judah. He made no more expeditions against Palestine, and during the rest of his reign Judah remained unmolested. 

Babylonia, moreover, gave him constant trouble. In the year after his campaign in the west (b.c. 700) a Chaldean, named Nergal-yusezib, stirred up a revolt which Sennacherib had some difficulty in suppressing. Two years later he appointed his eldest son, Assur-nadin-sumi, viceroy of Babylon. In b.c. 694, he determined to attack the followers of Merodach-Baladan in their last retreat at the mouth of the Eulæus,  Chaldean refugees were burnt and destroyed.

DESTRUCTION OF BABYLONIA
 Meanwhile, however, Babylonia itself was invaded by the Elamites; the Assyrian viceroy was carried into captivity,. He defeated the Assyrian forces in a [Pg 46]battle near Nipur, but died soon afterwards, and was followed by Musezib-Merodach, who like his predecessor is called Suzub in Sennacherib's. He defied the Assyrian power for nearly four years. But in b.c. 690 the combined Babylonian and Elamite army was overthrown in the decisive battle of Khalule, and before another year 

SENNACHERIB CAPTURED BABYLON

 Sennacherib had captured Babylon, and given it up to fire and sword. Its inhabitants were sold into slavery, and the waters of the Araxes canal allowed to flow over its ruins. Sennacherib now assumed the title of king of Babylonia, but with the exception of a campaign into the Cilician mountains he seems to have undertaken no more military expeditions. The latter years of his life were passed in constructing canals and aqueducts, in embanking the Tigris, and in rebuilding the palace of Nineveh on a new and sumptuous scale. On the 20th of Tebet, or December,b.c. 681, he was murdered by his two elder sons, Adrammelech and Nergal-sharezer, who were jealous of the favour shown to their younger brother, Esar-haddon.

Esar-haddon was at the time conducting a campaign against Erimenas, king of Armenia, to whom his insurgent brothers naturally fled. Between seven and eight weeks after the murder of the old king, a battle was fought near Malatiyeh, in Kappadokia, between the veterans of Esar-haddon and the forces under his brothers and Erimenas, which ended in the complete defeat of the latter. Esar-haddon was proclaimed king, [Pg 47]and the event proved that a wiser choice could not have been made

ASSYRIAN DESTRUCTION OF SIDON
The trade of Phœnicia was diverted into Assyrian hands by the destruction of Sidon. The caravan-road from east to west was at the same time rendered secure by an expedition into the heart of Northern Arabia. Here Esar-haddon penetrated as far as the lands of Huz and Buz, 280 miles of the march being through a waterless desert. The feat has never been excelled, and the terror it inspired among the Bedouin tribes was not forgotten for many years. The northern frontiers of the kingdom were also made safe by the defeat of Teispes, the Kimmerian, 
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THE FALL OF EGYPT

But the principal achievement of Esar-haddon's reign was his conquest of the ancient monarchy of Egypt. In b.c. 675 the Assyrian army started for the banks of the Nile. Four years later Memphis was taken on the 22nd of Tammuz, or June, and Tirhakah, the Egyptian king, compelled to fly first to Thebes, and then into Ethiopia. Egypt was divided into twenty satrapies, governed partly by Assyrians, partly by native princes, whose conduct was watched by Assyrian garrisons. On his return to Assyria Esar-haddon associated Assur-bani-pal, the eldest of his four sons, in the government on the 12th of Iyyar, or April, b.c. 669, and died two years afterwards (on the 12th of Marchesvan, or October), when again on his way to Egypt. Assur-bani-pal, the Sardanapalos of the Greeks, succeeded to the empire, his brother, Samas-sum-yukin, being entrusted with the government of Babylonia.

ASNAPPER( under book of Ezra)

Assur-bani-pal is probably the 'great and noble' Asnapper of Ezra iv. 10. He was luxurious, ambitious, and cruel, but a munificent patron of literature. The libraries of Babylonia were ransacked for ancient texts, and scribes were kept busily employed at Nineveh in inscribing new editions of older works. But unlike his fathers, Assur-bani-pal refused to face the hardships of [Pg 49] [Pg 50] [Pg 51]a campaign. His armies were led by generals, who were required to send despatches from time to time to the king. It was evident that a purely military empire, like that of Assyria, could not last long, when its ruler had himself ceased to take an active part in military affairs. At first the veterans of his father preserved and even extended the empire of Assur-bani-pal; but before his death it was shattered irretrievably. It is characteristic of Assur-bani-pal that his lion-hunts were mere battues, in which tame animals were released from cages and lashed to make them run; in curious contrast to the lion-hunts in the open field in which his warlike predecessors had delighted


His first occupation was to crush a revolt in Egypt. Tirhakah was once more driven out of the country, and Thebes, called Ni in the Assyrian texts, and No-Amon, or 'No of the god Amun' in Scripture, was plundered and destroyed. Its temples were hewed in pieces, and two of its obelisks, weighing 70 tons in all, were carried as trophies to Nineveh. It is to this destruction of the old capital of the Pharaohs that Nahum refers in his prophecy (iii. 8).

GYGES KING OF THE LUDS  WAS KNOWN AS GOG.....

Meanwhile Tyre had been besieged and forced to surrender, and Cilicia had paid homage to the Assyrian king. Gog, or Gyges, of Lydia, too, voluntarily sent him tribute, including two Kimmerian chieftains whom the Lydian sovereign had captured in battle. When the Lydian ambassadors arrived in Nineveh they found no one who could understand their language; in fact, [Pg 52]the very name of Lydia had been unknown to the Assyrians before.


The Assyrian Empire had now reached its widest limits. Elam had fallen after a long and arduous struggle. Shushan, its capital, was razed to the ground, and the three last Elamite kings were bound to the yoke of Assur-bani-pal's chariot, and made to drag their conqueror through the streets of Nineveh. The Kedarites and other nomad tribes of Northern Arabia were also chastised, the land of the Minni was overrun, and the Armenians of Van begged for an alliance with the Assyrian king.


But while at the very height of his prosperity, the empire was fast slipping away from under Assur-bani-pal's feet. In b.c. 652 a rebellion broke out headed by his brother, the Babylonian viceroy, which shook it to the foundations. Babylonia, Egypt, Palestine, and Arabia made common cause against the oppressor. Lydia sent Karian and Ionic mercenaries to Psammetikhos of Sais, with whose help he succeeded in overthrowing his brother satraps, and in delivering Egypt from the Assyrian yoke. The revolt in Babylonia took long to quell, and for a time the safety of Assur-bani-pal himself was imperilled. At last in 647 Babylon and Cuthah were reduced by famine, and Samas-sum-yukin burnt himself to death in his palace. Fire and sword were carried through Elam, and the last of its monarchs became an outlawed fugitive.


When Assyria finally emerged from the deadly struggle, Egypt was lost to it for ever, and Babylonia was but half subdued. The latter province was placed under the government of Kandalanu, who ruled over it for twenty-two years, more like an independent sovereign than a viceroy. His successor, 

Nabopolassar, the father of Nebuchadnezzar, threw off all semblance of submission to Nineveh, and prepared the way for the empire of his son. But meanwhile the once proud kingdom of Assyria had been contending for bare existence. Assur-bani-pal's son, Assur-etil-ilani, rebuilt with diminished splendour the palace of Calah, which seems to have been burnt by some victorious enemy; and when the last Assyrian king, Esar-haddon II, called Sarakos by the Greeks, mounted the throne, he found himself surrounded on all sides by threatening foes. Kaztarit or Kyaxares, Mamitarsu the Median, the Kimmerians, the Minni, and the people of Sepharad leagued themselves together against the devoted city of Nineveh. The frontier towns fell first, and though Esar-haddon in his despair proclaimed public fasts and prayers to the gods, nothing could ward off the doom pronounced by God's prophets against Nineveh so long before. Nineveh was besieged, captured, and utterly destroyed; and the second Assyrian Empire perished more hopelessly and completely than the first. All that survived was the old capital of the country, Assur, whose former inhabitants were allowed to return to it by Cyrus at the [Pg 54]time when the Jewish exiles also were released from their captivity in Babylon



DESTRUCTION OF NINEVEH CAPITAL OF ASSYRIA
After the death of king Aššurbanipal in 631 BCE, the Assyrianempire became unquiet, and the Babylonians seized their independence. For one year (627/626), two Assyrian officials named Sin-šumlišir and Sin-šar-iškun ruled the ancient city on theEuphrates; in the next year, the Babylonian general Nabû-apla-usur, who had been appointed by Sin-šar-iškun, defeated the Assyrians in a battle near Babylon. The Babylonian chronicle known as ABC 2relates that

King Nabû-apla-usur is better known under his Greek name, Nabopolassar; his accession marks the beginning of the Babylonian Empire, which was to last until its capital was taken by the Persian king Cyrus the Great in October 539


,,Although he had liberated Babylonia, Nabopolassar continued the struggle against Assyria and his contemporaries knew that he would not rest until he had destroyed the capitals of Assyria: the religious center at Aššur and the administrative center at Nineveh. If he would succeed, the balance of power in the Near East would be seriously endangered; consequently, the Egyptians started to support Assyria against the aggressors.,,


,,Nabopolassar defeated an Assyrian force on the banks of the Euphrates, south of Harran. This suggests that Nabopolassar wanted to block the main road between the Assyrian heartland and the territories in the west. However, he was forced to retreat when an Egyptian army (commanded by Psammetichus I) approached; still, the year was not lost because the Babylonian army defeated an Assyrian army near Kirkuk, far to the east. Warfare between Babylonia and Assyria appears to have been quite mobile.



......nOW the Babylonians in the Assyrian heartland, beginning a siege of Aššur. The Assyrians were able to push their enemy away, and the Chronicle does not hide that the Babylonians were in a tight spot for some time. At the end of 615, the Medes, a tribal federation living in modern Iran, intervened in the conflict. The temptation to fish in troubled waters must have been irresistible. in the neighborhood of  they may have taken the town.


....In 614, the Medes succeeded where the Babylonians had failed during the preceding year: they took Aššur. Nabopolassar arrived too late to help the Medes, but he managed to signed a treaty with their king Umakištar, who is better known as Cyaxares. The alliance was cemented by a royal wedding: the Babylonian crown prince Nabû-kudurru-usur, also known as Nebuchadnezzar, married Amytis, the daughter of Cyaxares' son Astyages. This is impossible (Astyages was too young to have children), but perhaps Amytis was the daughter of Cyaxares himself...


.,.