The History of Antiquity, Vol. 3 (of 6)

This rising was all the more dangerous, as some of the vassal-princes of Egypt thought it a favourable moment for throwing off the yoke of Assyria. The son of the Necho, whom in spite of his conspiracy with Tirhaka Assurbanipal had a second time made prince of Sais, Neboshezban, who was then ruler of the canton of Athribis, and after the death of his father Necho, which occurred in the mean time (Necho died shortly before, or in, the year 664 B.C.),378 succeeded him as prince of Sais, was at the head of this movement. Assurbanipal tells us that Gyges of Lydia sent aid to Pisamilki, the prince (Sar) of Muzur, who had cast off the yoke of his rule.379 In this Pisamilki we may recognise the Psammetichus of the Greeks, the Psamtik of the Egyptians, the son of Necho of Sais, the same person whom Assurbanipal, when he mentions the restoration of Necho and his son, calls by the Assyrian name of Neboshezban. When the failure of that attempt had made Necho and his son captives of Assyria, the important point was to give pledges to the king of Assyria that the fidelity of his vassals would not again be broken. The Egyptian tradition of the rise of Psammetichus, preserved for us by Herodotus and Diodorus, ought not to have more weight than that Assyrian name against the identity of Pisamilki and Psammetichus. That tradition knows of nothing but contests of Psammetichus with his fellow-princes, not with the Assyrians; like Manetho's list of kings, it is absolutely silent about the Assyrians, because it wishes to conceal the fact that the Assyrians ever had dominion over Egypt. The tradition of Egypt imagines a voluntary retirement of the king of Ethiopia, or his abdication of the government of Egypt, and then represents the Egyptians as setting up 12 princes in the place of one: we have already seen that 20 were set up by Esarhaddon, and retained by Assurbanipal. Manetho's list says nothing either of the Assyrian dominion, or of the twelve; in it the rule of the last Ethiopian is followed by the dynasty of the Saites, two forefathers of Necho, and then by Necho and Psammetichus. The sepulchres of the Apis show, that as a fact, the dates were differently fixed in the seventh century B.C. in Egypt. Even then the kings of Assyria were disregarded; the reign of the Ethiopian Tirhaka is followed immediately by the reign of Psammetichus. The struggles which Psammetichus had to undergo with his fellow-princes, of which Herodotus, Diodorus, and Strabo tell us, were, as a fact, contests with those among the princes who adhered to Assyria, who would not follow the lead of Psammetichus against Assyria, and submit to his rule over Egypt.

The rebellion of Samul-sum-ukin appeared to tear from its lines the whole structure of the Assyrian supremacy. But Assurbanipal knew how to cope with serious danger: deep-seated confusion in Elam made his task easier. Thus he succeeded in this sixth war in driving his brother's army out of the field. He besieged Sippara and Kutha. Against Ummanigas of Elam, who, though placed there by Assurbanipal himself, was now an ally of Samul-sum-ukin, his own son Tammaritu rose in rebellion. He slew his father, but persisted in the war against Assyria, which his father had begun. He marched out to aid Samul-sum-ukin; in the middle of the war Indabigas, one of his servants, rebelled against him; Tammaritu found it necessary to seek the protection of his enemy Assurbanipal. Thus Samul-sum-ukin's hope in the help of Elam vanished. After Sippara, Kutha, and Borsippa had fallen, Babylon was shut up. The famine in the city was so great that "they ate the flesh of their sons and their daughters," as Assurbanipal tells us. Of the death of his brother he tells us: Asshur, Sin, Samas, Bin, Bel, Nebo, and Istar thrust him into burning fire, and destroyed his life. Assurbanipal's punishments were fearful. He had the tongues torn out of those who spoke against him; even those of the offenders who escaped the famine and the burning fire, did not get away free; they were slain or reduced to slavery. But he spared the remainder of the sons of Babylon, Kutha, and Sippara. On the people of Accad, on the portion of the Chaldæans and Aramæans, and those of the sea coast who had taken the side of Samul-sum-ukin, he again placed the yoke of Asshur. A relief of the palace of Assurbanipal exhibits him on the chariot of war, with prisoners and booty before him. The inscription says: the king commands the coronation robe of Samulsum-ukin, his garments, his wives, his chariots, his captains, his warriors, and his slaves to be brought before him.380

After thus suppressing the rising of the Babylonians, Assurbanipal directed the whole of his forces to the subjugation of Elam. The domestic condition of Elam seemed to promise success to a vigorous attack. Indabigas experienced the fate which he had prepared for Tammaritu; he was driven from the throne by a man of the name of Ummanaldas, the son of Attamitu.381 This rebel did not find universal recognition; Pache maintained a part of the land against him. Under such circumstances the victory could not be very difficult. Assurbanipal sent troops under Balibni against the land of Bit Yakin, which was governed by Nabubelzikri, a grandson of Merodach Baladan, as a tributary prince (perhaps the son of Nahid-Merodach, p. 147), who appears to have taken part in the rebellion of Samul-sum-ukin, and then to have escaped to Elam. Assurbanipal had already demanded his surrender from Indabigas, and he repeated the demand after the rise of Ummanaldas, who also refused it. The Assyrian army led by Assurbanipal to his seventh war crossed the borders of Elam. Ummanaldas abandoned his metropolis, Madaktu, and fled into the mountains. Assurbanipal placed Tammaritu on the throne at Susa, but soon returned, either from fear of his disobedience or because he had heard of it, to Elam, dethroned Tammaritu, and carried him prisoner to Assyria; marched through the whole land, devastating it, and took 30 cities, which are enumerated in the inscription. Nevertheless, after his departure, Ummanaldas again obtained power over Elam; Assurbanipal was compelled to march against the country once more. This was his eighth war. He obtained the most complete success; Madaktu and Susa fell into his hand. "I opened their treasure-houses," says Assurbanipal; "I took the treasures, which the earlier kings of Elam and those of these days had collected. No enemy beside myself had laid hands upon them. The silver and gold which the earlier and later kings of Sumir and Accad, and of Kardunias, had sent to Elam, which earlier kings and Samul-sum-ukin had paid for the help of Elam; robes, arms, chariots, I carried to Assyria. I broke down the tower of Susa; Susinak, the god of their oracle, whose image no man had seen, and the remaining gods (eighteen gods and goddesses are mentioned) with their treasures, priests, and servants, I carried to Assyria. Thirty-two images of the kings in silver, gold, brass, and stone, I carried away from Susa, Madaktu, and Huradi, and in addition an image of Humbanigas (p. 99), of Istar-Nandi, of Halludus (p. 144), and the younger Tammaritu. I broke the winged lions and bulls, which guarded the temples, the winged bulls before the temple gates of Elam, and sent their gods and goddesses into captivity: I destroyed the palaces of their kings, the earlier and the later, the opponents of my father; the rulers and inhabitants of their cities, the people great and small, I carried away with their flocks; their warriors I divided throughout the land of my kingdom (645 B.C.)382"

In spite of this savage destruction, Ummanaldas could return from the mountains, and again take possession of the ruins of Madaktu. He was now, as it appears, prepared to accede to Assurbanipal's renewed request to give up the grandson of Merodach Baladan. The latter anticipated his surrender, inasmuch as he and his armour-bearer mutually slew each other. Ummanaldas gave up the corpse, and Assurbanipal had the head cut off. Thus died the last scion of Merodach Baladan of whom we hear: so ended the race which for 80 years, with incredible endurance and stubbornness, had asserted the independence of South Chaldæa and Babylonia against Assyria. After this Ummanaldas had to give way to Pache, who received a part of Elam. But Pache could not stand before the Assyrian army, or did not venture to resist it. He was taken prisoner; Ummanaldas also was captured, "like a raven," in the mountains, into which he had fled for refuge. "Tammaritu, Pache, and Ummanaldas, who ruled over Elam in succession, I brought them beneath my yoke, with Uaiti, the king of the Arabs, whom I brought out of his land to Assyria. I had them bound to the yoke of my war-chariot; they drew it to the gate of the temple of Bilit, the famed wife of Asshur, the mother of the great gods."383

Ancient Elam, the oldest power in the region of the Euphrates and Tigris, and in all hither Asia, which once, before the times of Hammurabi of Babylon, before the year 2000 B.C., had held sway over the states of the lower Euphrates, whose armies in those days had seen Syria, was fallen, never to rise again. "In the midst of hell," says the prophet Ezekiel, "is Elam, and all her multitude about her grave; all of them slain, fallen by the sword, which are gone down uncircumcised into the nether parts of the earth. They who caused terror in the land of the living have borne their share with them that go down to the pit. They have set her a bed in the midst of the slain with all her multitude; they are placed among the slain."384 It is true that, more than a century after the fall of Susa, we hear of stubborn attempts on the part of Elam to restore her state; but after that Elam ceased to exist, except as a name, and her history was then the more utterly forgotten, because after this rebellion the metropolis of Susa became the residence of the wide dominion of the kings of another people, the Achæmenids.

Babylonia was in subjection, and Elam had ceased to exist. Assurbanipal employed his arms in punishing the Arabian tribes who had supported the rebellion of his brother. Ammuladin, the king of the Kedarites, had attacked the princes of Syria who remained loyal to Assurbanipal. The attack failed. Ammuladin was defeated, and taken prisoner by Kamoshalta, the king of Moab; with him Adiya, a princess of the Arabians, was given up to Assurbanipal.385 Two other princes of the Arabs, the brothers Abiyateh and Aimu, had led their warriors to Babylon, to Samul-sum-ukin. They had been there defeated together with him and shut up in Babylon. When the famine was sore there, they attempted in vain to break through the siege; Abiyateh gave himself up to Assurbanipal. With them the soldiers of a third Arabian prince, Uaiti, had marched to Babylon. Assurbanipal now attacked Uaiti, whose tribes dwelt on the borders of Ammon, Moab and Edom, in Hauran and near Zoba; their dwellings and tents were burnt. Uaiti was carried prisoner to Nineveh, and Abiyateh was set up in his place. Scarcely had he been set up, when he united with Nadnu, the prince of the Nebaiyoth, against Assyria. On his ninth campaign, Assurbanipal marched over the Tigris and Euphrates into the deserts of Syria. As he tells us, he defeated the servants of the deity of Atar-Samain and the Nebaiyoth, took both princes prisoners in the battle, and caused their flocks to be driven off far and wide. "I divided camels like sheep," he says; "they fetched half a shekel of silver at the gate. On my return I took Hosah, which lies on the shore of the sea, which was disobedient, and did not pay tribute, and carried the people to Assyria. The people of Akko, who did not obey, I destroyed; the remnant I carried to Assyria."386

Not only the Arabian tribes between the Euphrates and the Jordan, not only the princes of Syria, but the land of Ararat also, as Assurbanipal expressly declares,387 and Cilicia and the East of Asia were subject. This follows, without a doubt, from the circumstance that Ardys, king of Lydia, who succeeded his father Gyges on the throne in the year 653B.C., soon after recognised anew the supremacy of Assurbanipal, in order to obtain his aid against the Cimmerians, who again heavily oppressed Lydia from the Halys. Assurbanipal had not only maintained the kingdom against the revolt of Samul-sum-ukin, he had strengthened it by the overthrow of Elam, established the supremacy of Assyria in Hither Asia, and extended it to the west of Asia Minor. We do not hear anything of an attempt to renew the vassalage of Egypt, though the war against the Nabatæans and Kedarites brought Assurbanipal to the borders of Egypt. We may suppose that the resistance of the regions of Akko and Hosah (to the south of Tyre388) possibly rested on the expectation of Egyptian assistance. But the inscriptions of Assurbanipal end with the war against the Arabians; beyond this we have no accounts of Assyrian origin. The struggles of Assurbanipal with the Nebaiyoth and the Kedarites on the borders of Ammon and Moab, the reduction of Akko, are the last acts of the Assyrians in Syria, of which we have any definite information. They must have taken place not long before the year 640 B.C. It will be seen further on that Assurbanipal after this time was engaged in the East.

The Hebrew Scriptures also know nothing of any interference of Assyria in the fortunes of their race after the reign of Manasses of Judah, which ended in the year 642 B.C. A statement of Herodotus, which is indeed very obscure, makes it possible to conclude that there was a later border war between Assyria and Egypt. He says: "Psammetichus besieged Ashdod (Azotus), a large city of Syria, for 29 years, till he took it." "This city," Herodotus adds, "endured the longest siege of any that we know."389 Psammetichus could not besiege the Philistine city of Ashdod, until the southern fortresses of the Philistines, Raphia, Gaza and Ascalon were in his hands. His object in the attack upon these cities could only be to render the march of the Assyrian armies to his land more difficult. These armies would have to collect in the south of Philistia, and provide themselves with stores, especially water, before they could begin the march through the desert. In the beginning of this war, at any rate, it could not have been merely the forces of the Philistines which Psammetichus had to contend with here; there must have been Assyrian garrisons and Assyrian troops in the cities. Diodorus also tells us of the mode in which Psammetichus drew out his forces in the battles which he fought in Syria.390 That the siege of a city should last 29 years is in itself inconceivable; we can only accept the statement of Herodotus as meaning that the war for the possession of the cities of the Philistines on the coast lasted 29 years. If we calculate this time from the irruption of the Scythians into Syria, which in any case put an end to this war, i. e. from the year 625 B.C., Psammetichus rebelled against Assyria in the year 654 or 653 B.C., and immediately afterwards desired to establish himself on the borders of Syria beyond the desert. If Assurbanipal was fighting against Arabian tribes, on the borders of Edom, just before the year 640 B.C., and took Akko, the narrative of this campaign ought also to speak of a collision with the Egyptian army, if Psammetichus was carrying on war against Ashdod as early as this date. We saw above that Psammetichus's rebellion against Assyria in Egypt could not take place later than the year 653 B.C.

Assurbanipal begins the account of his buildings with a statement of what he had done for the temples of Babylon;391 he concludes it with a description of his works at Nineveh. The walls with which Sennacherib had surrounded that city had been injured by heavy falls of rain which Bin sent down. Assurbanipal strengthened the substructure, and restored them from the foundations to the pinnacles.392 He restored, extended, and adorned the palace of his grandfather Sennacherib, in which he had grown up: the kings of the Arabians whom he had captured in battle had been compelled to work at them. Whoever destroys the inscription of his name, or the name of his father and grandfather, and does not set it up along with the inscription of his own name, him will Asshur and the rest of the gods, Sin, Samas, Bin, Bel, Nebo, Adar, and Nergal punish with the condemnation which will correspond to the glory of his (Assurbanipal's) name.393 In the ruins of this palace, the ruins of Kuyundshik, a number of slabs with reliefs have been preserved, exhibiting the warlike achievements of Assurbanipal, with which he caused the halls of this building to be adorned. On them we see the envoys of the kings of Ararat paying homage to Assurbanipal. Urtaki, Teumman, and Tammaritu are seen in battle against the Assyrians; we see the head of Teumman of Elam brought to Assyria, and Ummanigas is enthroned at Madaktu by an Assyrian officer, (p. 169). Further, a relief shows us Assurbanipal sitting under some trees with some women; on one of the trees hangs the head of the descendant of Merodach Baladan, Nabubelzikri.394 Finally, we find on these reliefs the cities of Elam, the city of Susa, and their sieges. The inscriptions give the names, and briefly explain the incidents depicted.

CHAPTER IX.

THE CONSTITUTION, ARMY, AND ART OF THE ASSYRIANS

"Asshur was a cedar in Lebanon," so the prophet Ezekiel tells us; "a shadowing thicket, and of a tall stature, with fair branches, and his top was among the thick boughs. The waters made him great, the flood set him up on high; with her stream she went round about his plants, and sent her conduits unto all the trees of the field. Therefore his height was exalted above all the trees of the field, and his boughs were great, and his branches became strong because of the multitude of waters, and spread themselves out. All the fowls of heaven made their nests in his boughs, and under his branches did all the beasts of the field bring forth their young, and under his shadow dwelt all great nations. Then was he fair in his greatness, in the length of his branches. The cedars in the garden of God could not hide him; the cypresses were not like his boughs, and the planes were not like his branches. No tree in the garden of God was like to him in beauty. I (Jehovah) have made him fair by the multitude of his branches, and all the trees of Eden envied him."395

Babylon and Asshur are two stems springing out of the same root. The younger could borrow from the elder her religion, her ritual, her models in art and industry, and finally her writing; and along with this those scientific acquisitions, by no means contemptible, which had been made on the Euphrates. The peculiar characteristic of the younger branch rests on its warlike power, which (nurtured in those long struggles in the Zagrus and in the Armenian mountains) at last far exceeded the power of the Babylonians.

There is no state in the ancient East, which, beginning from a reign so small in proportion, and provided with such scanty material means, rose so high as Assyria – which from such a basis attained to a wider supremacy, or maintained it so long and so vigorously. By slow and laborious steps this kingdom worked its way upward in frequent and severe conflicts beside Babylonia. To reduce and keep in obedience the region round the sources of the Euphrates and the Tigris, the land of Van and Ararat, to subjugate the territory of the Moschi and Tibarenes, required the most severe struggles. The attempt of Tiglath Pilesar I. to reach the North of Syria and the Mediterranean was a success, yet it remained without any lasting results. Not till the beginning of the ninth centuryB.C. does the dominion of Assyria obtain more important dimensions, not in the North only, but also in the West and East. Assurnasirpal reached Mount Amanus, the Orontes, Mount Lebanon; he received the tribute of the Phenician cities. Shalmanesar II. directed his most vigorous efforts against Hamath and Damascus, while at the same time he reduced the Cilicians, as well as the nations of the Western table land of Iran, to pay tribute. At the division of the ninth and eighth centuries B.C. Bin-nirar III. held sway from the shore of the Red Sea over Edom, on the shore of the Mediterranean over the Philistines and Israel, in the East over Mount Zagrus and the Medes. Then after the middle of the eighth century Tiglath Pilesar II. forced his way as far as Arachosia, and at the least maintained his dominion over the tribes of the Medes; in the West he humbled Hamath, Damascus, Samaria; Judah paid homage with the Philistines and all the princes of Syria with the distant tribes of the Arabians, to the great king of Asshur. He first completely subjugated Babylonia, and forced even Southern Chaldæa to recognise his supremacy. Sargon, after him, maintained Syria even against the arms of Egypt, and added the crown of Babylon to the crown of Asshur: Cyprus as well as the islands of the Persian Gulf pay homage to him. Sennacherib maintains the dominion over Babylonia against the most stubborn rebellions, as well as against the Elamites, and also the supremacy over Media; and if he was not able to maintain Syria against Egypt, he still retained the upper hand in the eastern half of Asia Minor. Esarhaddon ruled over Asshur and Babel; he restored the dominion over Syria; he conquered Egypt. The armies of his successor not only march victoriously into the gates of Memphis, Thebes, and Babylon, but even into the gates of Susa. In repeated campaigns he annihilates the ancient kingdom of Elam, and receives from the West the homage of Lydia.

No other kingdom can display so long a series of warlike and active princes, unwearied in conflict, as Assyria. They believed that they were fighting not for dominion only, or glory, but also for their gods, for Asshur, Sin and Samas, for Istar, Bin and Adar, against the nations who did not worship these deities. It is this extraordinary activity of the princes which alone explains the long continuance, and the constantly increasing extent, of the Assyrian power. For great as is the activity and unwearied perseverance of these princes, there is an equal lack of capability to create any organisation of their dominion and sovereignty which could secure even approximately the dependence of the subject nations. They take the field, defeat the enemy, and rest content if he pays homage and tribute, if the image of the victorious king of Asshur is engraved on the rocks of the conquered land, or set up in the city of the enemy. Ere long, if the tribute fails, war must be again commenced. The enemy is removed from the government, another prince is set on the throne of the subjugated land; the same game is commenced once more, as soon as there is the least prospect of shaking off the yoke. Owing to the stubbornness, more especially of the Semitic tribes and the mountaineers in the North, the kings of Asshur are condemned to constant campaigns. The defections are punished with savage devastation of the land and destruction of the cities. The rebellious princes and their leading adherents are often put to death with exquisite cruelty; they are flayed, or beheaded, or impaled, and yet such terrorism produces no visible effects. On the other hand, if they submit, they are often pardoned; they are again recognised or set up as princes over their lands, in some cases even after repeated defection. Occasionally, in order to maintain independently the Assyrian supremacy, Assyrian fortresses are planted in the conquered districts; as at the crossings over the Euphrates, in the region of the Medes, on the borders of Elam, and in Syria. For the most part it is only over the smaller districts that Assyrian viceroys were placed. Native kings, chiefs, and princes remain on the throne in the more extensive lands, and over the greater nations, as in the cities and principalities of Syria. Sometimes an attempt is made to secure the submission of princes by alliance with the royal house of Assyria. Over Babylonia alone were sons and brothers of the king repeatedly placed, and not always with a happy result. If Esarhaddon, instead of transferring the government of Egypt, under his supremacy, to one prince, divides it among 20, this organisation was not an Assyrian invention; in all essentials it was a transference of the lords of the districts from vassalage to the king of Napata to vassalage to the king of Assyria. The chief means of the kings of Assyria for securing the obedience of the vanquished for the future consisted at all times in carrying away and transplanting parts of the conquered population. The nationalities of Hither Asia, as far as the table-land of Iran, underwent considerable intermixture in consequence of this system, but this means could only work thoroughly in the smaller regions and communities – for the kingdom of Israel, for Hamath, and the Arabian tribes.