Assyria

ASSYRIA

I. The Name. II. The Country. Geographical Position and Extent (§ 1). The Tigris (§ 2). Influence of Topography on History (§ 3). Climate, Fauna, Flora, and Minerals (§ 4). III. Exploration and Excavation. The Persepolis Inscriptions (§ 1). Preliminary Exploration. Rich and Porter (§ 2). Botta at Khorsabad (§ 3). Layard and Rassam (§ 4). Rassam, 1852 (§ 5). Place (§ 6). George Smith (§ 7). Rassam, 1877–82 (§ 8). Obstacles in Excavating (§ 9). IV. The Cities. Asshur (§ 1). Nineveh (§ 2). Calah (§ 3). Resen, Arbela, and Dur-Sharrukin (§ 4). V. The People, Language, and Culture. National Character (§ 1). Occupations (§ 2). Language (§ 3). The Culture not Native (§ 4). VI. The History. 1. Chronology. Sources and Results (§ 1).

2. Ethnological Data. Peoples and Places Named in Assyrian Annals (§ 1). 3. The Story of Assyria. Early History and Names, to 1500 B.C. (§ 1). The Winning of Independence, 1500–1300 B.C. (§ 2). Shalmaneser I-Tiglath-Pileser I, 1300–1100 B.C. (§ 3). Semitic Rule Unstable (§ 4). A Time of Quiescence, 1100–950 B.C. (§ 5). Tiglath-Pileser II, 950 B.C.–Ashurnasirpal III, 885–860 B.C., (§ 6). Shalmaneser II, 860–824 B.C. (§ 7). Shamshi-Ramamn IV and his Successors, 824–745 B.C. (§ 8). Tiglath-Pileser III, 745–727 B.C. (§ 9). Shalmaneser IV, 727–722 B.C. (§ 10). Sargon, 722–705 B.C. (§ 11). Senascherib, 705–681 B.C. (§ 12). Esarhaddon, 681–668 B.C. (§ 13). Asshurbanipal, 668–626 B.C. (§ 14). Asshurbanipal’s Successors, 626–606 B.C. (§ 15). VII. The Religion. Relation to Babylonian Religion (§ 1). Asshur (§ 2). Ishtar (§ 3). Ramman (§ 4). The Sun-gods Shamash, Ninib, and Nergal (§ 5). Sin, the Moon-god. Nusku, the Fire-god (§ 6). Rivalry of Babylonia and Assyria (§ 7). Magic (§ 8).

I. The Name.

The original form seems to have been a-usar (” water-plain” ), which was assimilated to or confused with the name of the god Anshar (” Host of Heaven “), softened into Asshar, and Asshur. The country appears in both Assyrian and Hebrew as Asshur and “land of Asshur” ; to the Greeks it was Assyria; in the Aramaic the name became Athur and Athuriya.

II. The Country.

1. Geographical Position and Extent.

In the case of a land the extent of which fluctuated so greatly at different periods, and the name of which connoted very different areas, some convention is necessary. Accordingly, following the datum of original size rather than of subsequent development, historians regard as Assyria that portion of territory lying along the Tigris, mainly to the east of it, north of the confluence of the Lower (or Little) Zab on the south to the foothills of the mountains of Armenia on the north, and on the east from the Zagros Mountains to just beyond the Tigris on the west. This demarcation coincides with a change in the topographical character of the country at its southern limit. Below the Lower Zab the country becomes alluvial; above that it is rolling or mountainous; while the desert lies to the west. Since this is in accord with native characteristics of the people to be noted later, for which it helps to account, the boundaries given above are assumed for this article.

2. The Tigris.

Topographically the Tigris is the chief feature, the character of which is best understood by comparison with the Euphrates (q.v.). It rises only a few miles south of the course of the Euphrates and at about the same level, but on the south side of the mountains. The Euphrates, therefore, has to skirt the north side of the range and break through on its much longer journey south. The general course of the Tigris is quite consistently southeast; and the two rivers reach the same level about opposite Bagdad. The consequence is that to make the difference in level of about 1,000 feet between the source and the alluvium, the Tigris, having a much shorter distance to go, makes a more rapid descent than the Euphrates, sad its current is swifter. A second and noteworthy difference is that while the Euphrates receives only two important tributaries after turning south, the Tigris continues to receive all the way to its mouth streams which drain the mountain regions and basins to the east. While, therefore, the Euphrates loses much of its water to the thirsty soil through which it passes, the Tigris swells its torrent as it proceeds.

3. Influence of Topography on History.

Another characteristic of the country is its partial isolation. Mountains make it difficult of access from the north and east; and the desert does the same on the west. Its only easy approach is from the south by the rivers, where settled populations in ancient times guarded it from the nomadic hordes in that direction. Still one more note should be made. The country, is not alluvial like the great and marvelously fertile plain of Babylonia. It is rolling or hilly, harder therefore to cultivate, and, being more northerly in situation, its returns to the cultivator are less generous. All these facts have their bearing upon the character of the people. Further still, the land to the west of the river being prevailingly desert, the population of Assyria, was almost entirely to the east of it; and there, with a single exception, the great cities were situated.

4. Climate, Fauna, and Minerals.

In its temperature and its sufficiently abundant rainfall Assyria was fortunate: it was much cooler and moister than its southern neighbor. Of course, the temperature was lower in proportion to elevation and and to distance north. In the hills the winter were severe. The fauna was very extensive. In the earlier periods the elephant was known about the middle Euphrates. Of beasts of prey, there were the black-maned and another species of lion, the bear, panther, lynx, wild-cat, wolf, fox, jackal, and hyena. Of other animals, the porcupine, beaver, wild ass, wild boar, wild sheep, wild goat, ibex, gray deer, spotted 323deer, and hare may be named, while the great wild ox was not yet extinct. Of birds of prey or carrion, the eagle, vulture, and various hawks were known. Birds suitable for food were the bustard, swan, goose, duck, partridge, grouse, and plover. The common domestic animals were employed, while dogs were trained for the chase. The pine, poplar, plane, oak, sycamore, and walnut abounded. Under cultivation, though some of them were importations, were the date (of inferior quality), orange, lemon, pomegranate, apricot, mulberry, fig, and grape. Assyrian citrons were famous; melons were abundant; while cucumbers, onions, the grains—wheat, barley, and millet—and the leguminous plants were food staples. Under the careful and extensive system of irrigation in use, the agriculturist reaped a good return for his labors. Mineral resources were abundant and conveniently at hand in the shape of iron, lead, copper, alum, salt, and bitumen, while alabaster of a fine quality, limestone, and sandstone were in close proximity to the cities or easily reached from the Tigris, on which they were floated down to the places where they were required.

III. Exploration and Excavation.

1. The Persepolis Inscriptions.

It may appear somewhat inconsequent that excavations in Assyria and Babylonia should be the result of the discovery and partial decipherment of inscriptions from a locality so distant as Persepolis. Yet the discovery that these were neither mere ornamentation nor arbitrary signs influenced greatly the patient toil and research which have recovered in large part the history of nations once forgotten, and have carried history back into the fifth pre-Christian millennium. The steps leading to these results are as follows. The ruins at Persepolis had been mentioned in 1320 by Odoric, and the inscriptions in 1611 by the friar Antonio de Gouvea; they were first described by the Spanish ambassador of Philip III to Shah Abbas, Don Garcia Sylva Figueroa, in 1621; the guess that they read from left to right was first made in 1677 by Thomas Herbert; they were first called cuneiform in 1700 by Thomas Hyde; first decided to be in three forms of writing in 1774 by Carsten Niebuhr; declared to be in three languages in 1798 by Olaf Tychsen; and first really translated, in part, in 1815 by Georg F. Grotefend, whose work was the climax which finally stimulated to direct effort upon Assyrian and Babylonian mounds. While discussion had been going on over the Persepolis inscriptions, bits of inscriptions in the cuneiform character had been collected by the surveyors who had been observing, locating, and plotting the mounds in Assyria and Babylonia. A relationship had been asserted between these scraps and the Persepolis writing; and Niebuhr had urgently advised excavation in Babylonia and had predicted rich results.

2. Preliminary Exploration. Rich and Porter.

The site of Nineveh had been correctly located as early as 1160 by the rabbi Benjamin of Tudela. Desultory digging had been done in Babylonia at various sites by Claudius Rich of the East India Company, in some cases missing by only a foot or two walls which must have led him to investigate farther and have anticipated by over a quarter of a century the real discovery of the lost empires. That was in 1811; he visited Nineveh in 1820 and there turned up a few bricks with characters on them and bought others from the natives, all of which were sent home and found place in the British Museum. A visit of the artist and archeologist Sir R. K. Porter to the region, particularly to the mounds at Hillah in Babylonia, under the guidance of Rich, led to the publication in 1821-22 of a sumptuous work by Porter illustrated by his own brush. The interesting and even brilliant description of what was to be seen and inferred aroused anew the interest of Europe; so that the years which followed, as well as those which preceded his visit, were years of exploration. The sites of the mounds were visited and plotted and described until localities and names, with conjectures as to their history, became almost commonplace. The era of excavation, however, was still to come.

3. Botta at Khorsabad.

In 1842 a French consulate was established at Mosul, across the river from the site of Nineveh, and Paul Emil Botta was appointed consul. Botta had served in Egypt, Arabia, and Syria, and had so become well acquainted with the Arabs and their methods of working, as well as with French procedure in archeological investigation. He had met a German scholar named Julius Mohl, who had visited Babylonia and had been impressed with the opportunities which it was not in his power to grasp. By him Botta was urgently advised not to be content with mere explorations and plotting of sites, but to dig. Accordingly Botta at once began at Kouyunjik, but with results so scanty that he transferred his operations to Khorsabad, where speedily so large a number of bas-reliefs and well-preserved inscriptions were discovered in the uncovered palace of Sargon, that upon his sober report of the facts the French government made a grant of 3,000 francs to continue the work. The local pasha meanwhile had procured an order for the cessation of the operations; but the arrival of a firman soon enabled Botta to resume, the result being the nucleus of the magnificent collection now in the Louvre, made between 1842 and 1846. In the latter year Botta was transferred, and his work as an excavator came to an end; but the results were published by the French government in five magnificent volumes which are even yet almost high-water mark.

4. Layard and Rassam.

While Botta, was engaged in digging, and after some of his successes had been gained, he was visited by Austen Henry Layard, whose early reading had given him a decided bent toward archeology. Layard told the story of the mounds to Lord Stratford, who had secured the Halicarnassus marbles for the British Museum; and in 1845 the latter made a contribution of £60 which Layard was to use in excavating. Layard returned to Mosul, kept his plans from the local pasha, and began excavating at Nimrud (Calah) at two different points. His first day’s work led him into two chambers, belonging to two palaces, lined with 324alabaster slabs bearing inscriptions. Further effort resulted in the uncovering of colossi which created sensation first among his Arab laborers and then in England, in the latter case so pronounced that the apathetic British government made a parsimonious grant for the continuance of the work. The local pasha had closed the trenches; but authority from the Porte was obtained which overruled opposition. The palace of Shalmaneser II was excavated, and the black obelisk unearthed with its sunken panels of relief and its 210 lines of inscription and the mention of Jehu of Israel, along with many other inscriptions. Layard had the benefit of Hormuzd Rassam’s skill in managing natives, since Rassam was himself of the country, but educated in England. In 1847 Kalah-Shergat was attacked; and among other finds was the great inscription of Tiglath-Pileser I. An interval of two years was employed partly in writing his first books, and then Layard returned as the agent of the British Museum and excavated at Nimrud, Kalah-Shergat, Nebi Yunus, and Kouyunjik, at the latter place uncovering Sennacherib’s palace. In 1851 his transference to the diplomatic service at Constantinople brought his work as an excavator to an end. He had identified Calah and Nineveh, had discovered eight palaces, and had recovered part of the great royal library, many historical inscriptions, the great collection of seals and seal impressions, the great slab, 21 ft. by 16 ft. 7 in., the monolith and statue of Asshurnasirpal, and great numbers of bronze and copper vessels, implements, and arms. Meanwhile his books, written in most pleasing style and using with telling effect Biblical passages referring to Assyria and Babylon, had thoroughly awakened England to the importance of the operations. While his active work in digging creased, his diplomatic post afforded him the opportunity of facilitating the efforts of others by preventing much of the local bigoted and fanatical or avaricious obstruction which had impeded his own success.

5. Rassam, 1852.

In the year 1852 Rassam, who had contributed so much to Layard’s success, was commissioned by the British Museum to continue the work of excavating, under the direction of Sir Henry Rawlinson. He unearthed at Kouyunjik the palace of Asshurbanipal with its ” chamber of the lion hunt” and the record chamber with its heaps of inscribed tablets, including the Deluge Tablets, the richest discovery yet made. At Nimrud he found E-zida, the temple of Nebo, six statues of the god, the stele of Shamshi-Ramman IV, and the fragments of the black obelisk of Asshurbanipal II. At Kalah-Shergat the two intact prisms of Tiglath-Pileser I with their 811 lines of inscription were the prizes. His work was followed by that of Loftus and Boutcher, which produced less spectacular but equally solid values, while Hilmi Pasha, who had displaced the unscrupulous Mohammed Pasha, recovered at Nebi Yunus some winged bulls, a number of bas-reliefs, and other important material.

6. Place.

Meanwhile the French government had made an appropriation of 70,000 francs, by which Victor Place was enabled during 1851-55 to carry on investigations at Khorsabad and Kalah-Shergat. The plan of the former was thoroughly worked out, while fourteen cylinders, a magazine of pottery, another of glazed tiles, and the bakery and wine cellar of the palace were uncovered. Unfortunately the materials gathered by this expedition and the one of the same period at Birs Nimrud in Babylonia were lost by the capsizing of the raft on which they were being conveyed down the river for shipment.

7. George Smith.

The joint results of these labors being a mass of unread inscriptions, it is hardly surprising that a tacit understanding supervened to suspend excavations until decipherment should decide the value of the documents. Progress was rapid; Assyrian and Babylonian, Vannic and Sumerian yielded their secrets; and the reading of part of the material proved its great importance (see Inscriptions). A new start was taken in the year 1872. George Smith had discovered among Rassam’s tablets obtained from Asshurbanipal’s palace the fragments of the deluge story. The possible, even certain, illumination of the Bible by these documents, guaranteed by the reading of the names of several of the Hebrew kings, stimulated to new effort. The popular demand became urgent for new discovery; yet the government’s action was so tardy, under the restrictions of routine, that private enterprise was evoked and the London Daily Telegraph offered £1,000 to defray the expenses of an expedition, if Smith would lead it and send reports of progress. The start was made in January of 1873; Kouyunjik was the site chosen for work; and three new fragments of the deluge series were recovered, along with a number of historical inscriptions. With this success the Telegraph was satisfied and recalled Smith. The same year he was sent back by the British Museum, and secured some 3,000 inscriptions, many of which filled gaps in the material already at hand. In 1875 he was again sent out; but Turkish opposition intervened, and when that had been overcome, his death had occurred.

8. Rassam, 1877-82.

During the period 1877-82 Rassam was the agent in the field; and he unearthed at Balawat (fifteen miles from Mosul) the beautiful bronze plates of the gates of Imgur-Bel, a city which was the site of a palace of Asshurnasirpal II. Kouyunjik was more thoroughly explored, 2,000 pieces, some of them exceedingly fine, being the reward. But the rich finds of previous years made these results seem meager; and the consequence was a cessation of excavation in Assyria which has not yet been resumed, the southern region of Babylonia being more promising and offering greater rewards.

9. Obstacles in Excavating.

The difficulties which have to be overcome by excavating archeologists in these regions are fourfold. (1) Financial. The French and German governments have established a fine record of support of scientific research; the record of the British 325is not so clear; the United States has done nothing, Consequently expeditions from the United States have to rely upon private enterprise. It is a pity that some great fund is not available that shall make appeal for special resources unnecessary: the result would be more thorough work and not the kind which looks for spectacular effects and leaves on the ground material as valuable as that recovered. (2) Governmental. This is in the shape either of refusal or delay, at the Sublime Porte, to grant permission to dig, or at the field in the case of bigoted or obstinate pashas. The only remedy in the former case is timely application supported by suitable diplomatic effort. If the pasha on the ground is inclined to interpose obstructions, the display of a firman should be sufficient. (3) Popular. The suspicion and superstition of the Arabs can be overcome only by the exercise of great patience and diplomacy. Their confidence once gained, the Arabs are loyal to their employers, as is amply proved by experience. The assistance of one trained in dealing with them is, however, a necessity. (4) Natural. The ruins of the country and of its system of irrigation, the resulting stretches of marshes with their miasmatic fevers, the heat of the sun, and the scorching winds and dust-storms, are obstacles which can not be overcome. Their effects may be palliated by proper precautions, which, unfortunately, the excavator too often neglects in the ardor of his pursuit of knowledge.

IV. The Cities.

According to the best reading of Gen. x, 11 (R. V. margin), “out of Shinar went forth Asshur, and builded Nineveh, Rehoboth-Ir, and Calah, and Resen.” By excepting from these Rehoboth-Ir (which is now regarded as a mistake for Rehoboth-Nina, either the place where Mosul new is, or the “open places,” i.e., “squares,” of Nineveh itself), and by adding Asshur, Arbela, and Dur-Sharrukin, a list of the known cities belonging to Assyria proper is completed.

1. Asshur.

Asshur, the modern Kalah-Shergat, on the west side of the Tigris, rather below the middle point of the places where the Upper and the Lower Zab join the Tigris, was the chief city of Assyria until the reign of Asshur-bel-kala, son of Tiglath-Pileser I, c. 1090 B.C. It never attained as frequent mention or description as Nineveh in contemporary records, though the inscriptions record the frequent rebuilding and repair of the great temple of Asshur which bore the name of E-karsag-kurkurra. That it was eclipsed by its rival Nineveh is due perhaps to two causes: (1) The more healthful and pleasant situation of the latter; and (2) The location of Asshur in the zone of danger from Babylonian attack. But the return of quite late kings to it as their capital shows the hold the old city had upon the sentimental regard of those rulers.

2. Nineveh.

Nineveh (Assyr. Nina or Ninua; Hebr. Ninweh or Nineweh; LXX, Nineui), the modern Kouyunjik on the north and Nebbi Yunus on the south of the Choser, named probably, like the southern city of the same name, from Nin, daughter of Ea and identified with Ishtar of Nineveh, stood on the left bank of the Tigris, about twenty miles north of the confluence of the Upper Zab with the Tigris. Its walls enclosed about 1,800 acres, and were about seven and one-half miles in circumference (approximately two miles square), Herodotus describes them as being 380 feet high and 80 feet thick, though in all probability the height given is an exaggeration; but Layard’s plans make them, at one of the principal gates, where they were doubtless reinforced, 110 feet thick. The gates were flanked with towers for their defense. The eastern wall was protected by a moat filled with water from the Choser. The time and circumstances of the founding of the city are unknown, though its Semitic origin seems implied by its name. The last datum is not quite conclusive, since it might have been pre-Semitic and renamed by its Semitic possessors. As it lay on the Indo-Mediterranean caravan route, its early origin and importance are assured. Gudea (see Babylonia, VI, 3, § 3) left an inscription referring to the building of a temple in Nineveh which may (and probably does) refer to the Babylonian city. Similarly precarious is the identification of the Assyrian Nineveh with the one mentioned by Dungi, second king of Ur (c.2700 B.C.), as the place where he built a temple to Nergal. The fact that Shalmaneser I made gifts to such a temple in Nineveh does not, considering the diffusion of the worship of Nergal, make the identification secure. The conjecture of Jeremias that it once belonged to a kingdom called Kisshati has little to support it. About 1450 B.C. it was possibly under control of the (Hittite?) state of Mitanni, since Tushratta, king of Mitanni, lent an image of Ishtar of Nineveh to the contemporary Pharaoh. It is named twice in the Amarna Tablets (q.v.), both times in connection with Ishtar. The first Assyrian who made his residence there was Asshur-bel-kala, mentioned above. It was neglected for a number of centuries, and finally under Sennacherib was made perhaps the richest and best adorned city of the times. He tore down the old palace and built a double one, one part in the Assyrian style and one in the Syrian. He also conducted thither a water-supply drawn from the upper reaches of the Choser. Esarhaddon and Asshurbanipal added great structures, and it became the foremost city of the world, a great center of commerce and enormous wealth. Under the last-named king, it became a repository also of Babylonian culture.

3. Calah.

Calah (Assyr. Kalḥu) was the city next in importance, really a suburb of Nineveh, twenty miles south, in the fork of the Upper Zab and the Tigris. It was apparently founded by Shalmaneser I (c. 1300 B.C.) and used as his capital in place of Asshur. It was then neglected until the time of Asshurnasirpal (c. 880 B.C.), who rebuilt it, fortified it with a massive wall, brought a water-supply from the Zab, and made of it a garden city, adorned with foreign trees and shrubbery. His palace was one of great beauty, and the bas-reliefs found there by Layard, George Smith, and Rassam are in the British Museum. Shalmaneser II built another palace, one of the adornments of which was the famous 326Black Obelisk; and this palace was occupied also by Tiglath-Pileser III. Esarhaddon destroyed it and used the materials to construct his own palace. For these different structures a great platform was built of bricks and faced with stone, forty feet high, to guard against floods.

4. Resen, Arbela, and Dur-Sharrukin.

Of Resen (” fountain-source” ) little is known except its location between Nineveh and Calah, and that it is identified with the Larissa of Xenophon’s Anabasia (III, iv, 7). Arbela (” [The City of the] Four Gods” ), the modern Erbil, is never noticed in the early inscriptions, yet must have had an important though quiet life, and long outlived its more pretentious and magnificent sister cities. It was situated in the mountains between the Upper and Lower Zab, and was the seat of worship of one of the Ishtars, next in prominence to her of Nineveh. Dur-Sharrukin (” Sargon’s Fort” ), the modern Khorsabad, the site of the palace of Sargon (707 B.C.) and of the necessary adjuncts thereto, was north of Nineveh, near the sources of the Choser and on the slopes of the hills. It was much smaller than the capital, its walls being 3,820 yards in circumference. Two mountain streams flowed past it. Only in Sargon’s time did it have much importance.

V. The People, Language, and Culture.

1. National Character.

The people belonged to the so-called Northern Semites, and were related consequently most closely to the Semitic Babylonians, Arameans, Hebrews, and Phenicians. They were sturdy in physique, and their physiognomy, clearly portrayed in their many bas-reliefs, is of a pronounced Semitic type. Their character is traceable partly to their origin, partly to their environment. Their isolation preserved or intensified their native qualities, and prohibited the mellowing influences of contact with other peoples as well as the toleration which comes with admixture of blood. Their country was less attractive to marauders, besides being out of the beaten track of the migrations. The mountaineers to the east and north served as buffers against the great waves from the northeast, until they were subdued or denationalized by forced colonization. Thus, in contrast with the Babylonians, who became a much mixed people, the Assyrians preserved the purity of their race and consequently its primitive characteristics, among them that of fierceness (Isa. xxxiii, 19). This quality of a new people is illustrated in the case of two other Semitic peoples. The ferocity of the Chaldeans (c. 600 B.C.) is attributable to the fact that they, too, were a “new people,” only recently from their Arabian habitat; and the fanaticism of the Mohammedan hosts is a matter of history, due not merely to religious causes. The isolation of the Assyrians is in nothing more remarkably illustrated than in the fact that their literature was of late importation from the south, subsequent to their great military operations, much of it in the days of Asshurbanipal (669–626 B.C.). Another trait of this people is a national self-consciousness lacking to most Semites. The larger cities of Assyria do not appear as self-governing units bearing impatiently the sway of the overlord. Assyria appears almost without exception as united; and the exceptions come from dissensions in the royal family in disputes about the succession.

2. Occupations.

The occupations of the people are largely included in the two words “war” and “commerce.” The early Assyrian contract tablets found in Cappadocia bear testimony to a commercial enterprise which prophesied of the wars of the future. It has been correctly concluded by several historians that the object of campaigns was not alone extension of territory, but that security and enlargement of trading operations had their part in the purposes of the warring kings. This finds warrant not so much in the express words of the inscriptions as in indirect hints such as are found in the Amarna Tablets (q.v.) and in the usages of the times as represented by Ahab and Ben-hadad (I Kings xx, 34). Of other occupations, agriculture has already been assumed (see II, § 4, above), as also the handicrafts in the mention of the metals. Casting was known, and there has been found a mold for arrow-heads of accurate construction, in four parts, in which three heads could be cast at the same time. The representations of siege operations show ingenuity in the mechanical construction of implements of offensive warfare.

3. Language.

The language belongs also to the North Semitic group, and is very close to the Babylonian, differing only dialectically. The expression of it in the cuneiform was inherited directly from the Babylonians, indirectly from the pre-Semitic inhabitants of Babylonia, but developing as a consequence of the fact that writing is the expression of a living force, speech.

4. The Culture not Native.

The culture of Assyria was borrowed. In nothing is this clearer than in their methods of building. Although they lived in a land where stone was easily procured, the principal building material was sun-dried brick, in the more pretentious structures faced with burnt brick and sometimes with stone. Even the choice of sites, near the rivers where platforms had to be erected to avoid floods, was probably due to early habit acquired in Babylonia or imitated. To this method and material of building were due the constant repetition of building operations on the great temple structures and the narratives of the same in the annals of both countries. Roof-making was, from a structural point of view, evidently most imperfectly developed. When once the roof was broken, and the elements had access to the unburnt brick, swift collapse of a structure was inevitable. Yet to this very fact in most cases is attributable the preservation of the libraries and records unearthed; for the superincumbent clay sealed hermetically the chambers used as repositories. In the way of literature nothing creative appears to have come from the Assyrians except the mere narratives of the campaigns. The tablets containing the portions of the epics are knows to be 327copies from the south. The elegant style of Asshurbanipal’s annals suggests that the formative period of Assyrian literature was just beginning, but the speedy collapse of the empire prevented any ripening into creative work.

VI. The History.

1. Chronology.

Sources and Results

The crucial datum is the mention of an eclipse in the eponymate of Pur-shagali in the month Sivan (May-June). A total eclipse occurred at Nineveh, June 15, 763 B.C., thus fixing the year of Pur-shagali’s eponymate. The bearing of this on Assyrian chronology appears below. Other data are afforded by the Eponym Canon, found in the library of Asshurbanipal, a sort of calendar in which succeeding years are named respectively for officers of state. There are several sets of these, all incomplete, but often overlapping each other, and in these synchronistic parts showing that they are not replicas of each other, but in some cases independent documents. They cover consecutively the period 902-667 B.C. and give the succession of the kings as well as of the eponyms, often including a short statement of the principal events of the year. In a succession like this, if the date of one is fixed, that of the rest follows; the eclipse just mentioned furnishes the desired fixed date. On these two sets of data hangs nearly all of Assyrian and Babylonian chronology, as well as that of some of the contemporary nations. The Canon of Ptolemy (Greek), is an appendix to the astronomical work of Claudius Ptolemæus, based on solar and lunar eclipses and using Babylonian sources. This was successfully employed to indicate the order in which the Eponym Canon should be arranged. The Synchronistic History of Babylonia and Assyria (cuneiform) gives an enumeration of Babylonian kings and contemporary Assyrian monarchs, and covers the periods 1400-1050 and 900-800 B.C. The Babylonian Chronicle (cuneiform) covers the period 744-668 B.C., during the Assyrian dominance, and therefore throws light on Assyrian chronology or corroborates results otherwise obtained. For the early periods dependence must be placed upon isolated data. Thus, Sennacherib, in the rock inscription at Bavian (Schrader, KB, ii, 116 sqq.) alleges that he restored to the temple E-kallati images carried off to Babylon by Marduk-nadin-ahi 418 years earlier in the days of Tiglath-Pileser I. This is practically corroborated by the Babylonian king’s statement that in his tenth regnal year he gained a victory over Assyria. The date of restoration was 689 B.C., putting the date when the images were carried off at 1107 B.C., making the coronation year of the Babylonian 1117 B.C., and establishing the contemporaneity of the kings. Sennacherib mentions another fact which (though in round numbers and therefore slightly suspicious) places Tiglath-Nindar (or Ninib), son of Shalmaneser I, about the year 1289 B.C. Similarly, Tiglath_Pileser. I (dated above) records a fact which places the death of his great-grandfather Asshur-Dan c. 1175 B.C. He also gives the date of the rebuilding of a temple by the patesi (see Babylonia) Shamshi-Ramman as 641 years earlier, thus placing the latter c. 1815 B.C. Further data are obtained by mention of the ancestors of different monarchs. When Ramman-Nirari calls himself son of Pud-il, grandson of Bel-nirari, great-grandson of Asshur-Uballit, he serves a useful purpose by naming a succession of four kings. Tiglath-Pileser I announces that the Shamshi-Ramman whom he dates was son of Ishmi-Dagan, and that both were patesis of Assyria. This datum shows also that in their time Assyria was not independent, since patesi is not the title of an independent ruler. These data give results upon which in most cases agreement is reached by scholars within the margin of a year.

2. Ethnological Data

1. Peoples and Places Named in Assyrian Annals.

Gutium (Assyr. Kutu) was situated northeast from Nineveh, and stretched from the headwaters of the UpperZab to Lake Urumiah. It is probably referred to in Gen. xiv. The Namri occupied the southern part of the Zagros mountain range, between Media and Assyria, east of the Lower Zab. The Madai and Manda, later known as the Umman-Manda, were Aryan tribes beyond the Namri to the east of the mountains and toward the Caspian. The Kasshi, sometimes confused in the Old Testament (the unpointed Hebrew is the same) with Cush (Ethiopia), were northeastern neighbors of the Elamites and gave a long-lived dynasty to Babylonia. The Kaldu, later known as the Chaldeans, occupied the territory north and west of the head of the Persian Gulf and became rulers of Babylonia when the Assyrian empire fell. The Manni or Minni inhabited the territory between lakes Van and Urumiah, and were sturdy foes of the Assyrians. The Urartu or Armenians dwelt in the Armenian mountains and valleys northwest of Lake Van, and partly controlled the plains at the foot. They were perhaps the most difficult foes the Assyrians had to meet. The Mitanni, during the rise of Assyria, held Upper Mesopotamia c. 1400 B.C., and are supposed to have been a Hittite power. By their position they controlled the trade route between the Upper Tigris, the Mediterranean, and the West. Gozan, later Gauzanitis, was a district on the upper waters of the Chabur. Bit-Adini was the Aramean state north of the confluence of the Chabur with the Euphrates. Kummuḥ was a state considerably to the north of Bit-Adini on the southern spurs of the Taurus Mountains. In the northeastern part of Syria, north of where Antioch was situated later, not quite contemporary with each other were the Aramean states of Patin, Unki, Samal, Gurgum, and Yaudi—the latter for many years mistaken by Assyriologists for Judah, particularly as it had a king named Azriyahu nearly contemporary with Azariah of Judah. It lay between Samal and Unki (cf. Winckler, Altorientalische Forschungen, i, 1893). Kue was the name of the eastern part of the coast of Cilicia. Northeast from Kue was the Muzri of Asia Minor (confused in I Kings x, 28 and II Kings vii, 6 with Egypt, though mentioned in connection with Syria and the Hittites in both passages; in the former Passage the name Kue is perhaps concealed in the word ma-koh). Still farther to the north were the 328Mushke, known to the Greeks as Moschi The Phenicians, the Syrians of Aleppo, Hamath, Arpad, and Damascus are all frequently mentioned in the inscriptions, as are the Hebrew kingdoms, Edom, Moab, Ammon, and Philistia. Arabia was known as Arabi, Arubu, and Aribi. In North Arabia the cuneiform makes known a district called Murẓi or Mizr, also mistaken in the Hebrew of I Kings xi, 17, for Miẓraim, Egypt. It was subdued by Tiglath-Pileser III. South Arabian inscriptions also name the locality. In the same region was a district called Cush, sometimes confused with Ethiopia. Meluḥḥa, the Ma‘in of the Old Testament, was in North Arabia. Saba, the Sheba of I Kings x, 1, Minaea, rediscovered by Glaser, and Yaman, probably the modern Yemen, are all noted in the annals of the kings. Northeast Arabia was known as Magan.

3. The Story of Assyria

1. Early History and Names, to 1500 B.C.

The history of Assyria before 1800 B.C. is veiled. Gen. x, 11 (R. V. margin) affirms the Babylonian background of this people, and all evidence from archeology, language, and cultural, remains, supports the affirmation. The date of colonization is unknown, but it was before 2300 B.C. Asshur was the first city. The connection with the parent country was close c. 2000 B.C. Hammurabi of Babylon (c. 2250 B.C.) had Assyrian soldiers in his army. No ruler earlier than Ishmi-Dagan (c. 1850 B.C.) is known, and he bore the title of patesi (or isshaku), a term that implied political dependence: In the time of his son, Shamshi-Ramman, Nineveh was already in existence; for he restored a temple of Ishtar there. Between his time and that of Asshur-bel-nisheshu only a few names are known. Igur-kapkapu (or Bel-kapkapu or Bel-bani) and his son Shamshi-Ramman II, Kallu and his son Irishum are all, but of the first it is known that a tablet exists dated in his reign, and (from it) that he bore the title of king. Assyrian contract tablets belonging to the period 1800-1500 B.C. have been found in Cappadocia, indicating commercial, and perhaps a beginning of territorial, expansion. At the time when Thothmes III of Egypt was most active, the Assyrian king sent him a gift of ” a great stone of lapis-lazuli” which Thothmes interpreted as a sign of submission, and so recorded it. If Assyria really feared Egypt, that fear did not last long, for the Hittites were soon active, and Egyptian aggression did not threaten the Tigris.

2. The Winning of Independence, 1500-1300 B.C.

The independence of Assyria, won soon afterward, was due, not to Assyria’s strength, but to the weakness of the parent power. Internal strife gave the Kasshites the opportunity to conquer Babylonia, but they were too busy cementing their own power to attack Assyria, and the boundary was settled under Asshur-bel-nisheshu and Puzu-Asshur in treaties to which the Kasshite Karaindash of Babylon was one of the parties. This implies independence. About 1400 B.C., fifty years later, the Babylonian Burnaburiash claimed Assyria for his territory. The probable dependence of Nineveh upon Tushratta of Mitanni has been noted above (IV, § 2). Assur-uballit wrote to Amenophis IV as an independent monarch; and indeed the claim of Assyria to Babylon began in the same reign. The Assyrian’s daughter had married Kara-kardash of Babylon, and the latter’s son had succeeded his father and then been murdered by his subjects Asahur-uballit intervened, subjected Babylon, and placed another grandson on the throne In the same reign and the next the Assyrian arms were carried to the borders of Elam, which led to war between Kurigalzu II of Babylon and Bel-nirari in which the northern cause was successful. Ramman-nirari I (c. 1345-30 B.C.) reconquered the lands already overrun, and located cities for their government. He extended his sway beyond the Euphrates, and had a successful essay against Mitanni. New troubles with Babylonia arose over the conquest of Gutium; both sides claimed the victory, but the Assyrian boundary was advanced. Ramman’s inscription is the earliest one of Assyria that is dated, and in it he calls himself king, not of Asshur, but of Kisshati, ” the world.”

3. Shalmaneser I-Tiglath-Pileser I, 1300-1100 B.C.

Shalmaneser I (c. 1300 B.C.) left on his successors an impression of greatness. He crossed the Euphrates and pushed his conquests as far as Muẓri, which probably means that the territory up to the river at least was added to Assyrian territory. Asshur was abandoned as the capital, and Calah was built. The temple of Ishtar at Nineveh was also reconstructed, and Harran was added to the possessions of the king. Shalmaneser’s son, Tiglath-Ninib, invaded Babylonia, captured and plundered Babylon, partly destroyed the wall, carried north with him the image of Marduk, governed the south from his own capital, and assumed the titles borne by Sargon the Great (see Babylonia), king of Sumer and Akkad, as well as of Kisshati and Asshur. But he could not sustain himself, and lost his life in a rebellion headed by his son. For a time the Assyrian star declined. It is very likely that to this decline the Hittites had contributed; for the dash to the Mediterranean must have aroused them and certainly have included in its scope some of their cities. The Babylonians became the aggressors, and the next king, Asshurnasirpal I had difficulty in repelling them. Under the next four reigns Assyria’s territory shrank to about its original extent. Then Assur-Dan I (c. 1210-1181 B.C.) began to regain territory south of the Lower Zab. His grandson, Asshur-rish-ishi, cleared the way to Babylon by conquering foes on the southeast, and then defeated Nebuchadrezzar I of Babylon. He rebuilt the Ishtar-temple in Calah. With Tiglath-Pileser I began a new era for Assyria. The celebrated eight-sided prism contains a part of his record. That full information of his predecessors’ activity is not at hand is shown by his having in the very beginning of his reign to subdue people so distant as the Mushke. He won a victory over them among their hills, destroyed 14,000 out of the 20,000 engaged, and pursued the plan of subduing the territory by destroying the fighting forces. Tribute was exacted from the rest. During 329the next three years he carried his arms into the mountain regions northeast, northwest, and southeast with the uniform result of success and immense booty A confederation of twenty-three kings from the neighborhood of Lake Van was overcome, and heavy tribute imposed. Muzri was once more subdued, and Babylonia had to submit. At the end of his fifth year Tiglath-Pileser claimed to have subdued ” forty-two countries with their rulers.” Mention of the Hittites first occurs in his reign.

Semitic Rule Unstable.

At this point it is well to note, in explanation of the preceding and of much that follows, a characteristic of early Semitic rule. Constant reconquest of subjected territory was necessary The order of events was: subjection and a light tribute if submission had been ready, a heavy one if strong opposition had been offered; this was invariably followed by rebellion at the first seeming opportunity, and a change in the ruler was always considered an opportunity; then new subjection and a heavier tribute; when rebellion again arose, the case of the rebels was desperate, and further revolt was eliminated by almost complete desolation of the refractory territory. The creation of an empire by unifying peoples under a beneficent rule had not yet been conceived. On the other side was the inherent tendency to segregation, which was a characteristic of the Semites. An invader could reduce city after city, throwing against it the force of his united army, while other cities awaited their fate in trembling. Confederations invariably fell apart. Assyria was the one Semitic power thoroughly unified; and this unity was the cause of its victorious progress until the wars of centuries had sapped its strength.

5. A Time of Quiescence, 1100-950 B.C.

Tiglath-Pileser’s activities were not all warlike; he rebuilt Asshur, restored its temples and palaces, and fostered agriculture and arboriculture. He was followed by two of his sons in succession, who removed the capital to Nineveh once more, restoring its great Ishtar-temple. A new period of quiescence or of exhaustion for Assyria had come, and its enemies organized themselves for new resistance. This resistance coincides with that of the expansion of the Hebrew kingdom. The Arameans had settled in Mesopotamia and fallen heir to the Hittite possessions including Hamath, Aleppo, and Damascus. They were traders, and, holding the caravan routes, directly menaced Assyrian commerce. The Phenicians, too, had been making of their cities strong fortresses. Between Tiglath-Pileser I and II were several rulers whose names are known and little else, while there is also a gap in the known succession. But the period was not the time of entire weakness generally supposed; the outburst of vigor which followed and continued with little intermission for three and one-half centuries proves it a time of development of power which was used in a series of campaign, which have not ceased to astonish since knowledge of them has been regained.

6. Tiglath-Pileser II, 950 B.C.-Asshurnasirpal III, 885-860 B.C.

Tiglath-Pileser II (c. 950 B.C.) began a succession of kings, all of whose names are known, though of what either he or his son Asshur-Dan II (C. 930 B.C.) did, little is certain. During the next reign, that of Ramman-nirari II (911-891 B.C.), the struggle with Babylonia was renewed, the latter losing territory to its opponent. Tiglath-Ninib (890-885 B.C.) placed under tribute the highlands of the north from Urumiah to the Mediterranean. Asshurnasirpal III (885-880 B.C.), son of the foregoing, carried forward the work of conquest. One of the finest inscriptions extant is his, on alabaster in 389 lines, corroborated by other texts. His first campaign in Armenia was so savage that with a single exception, severely punished, all tribes in his line of march hastened to submit. While on a campaign against Kummuh, he heard of the rebellion of an Aramean community at Bit-Kalupe on the Euphrates. He at once countermarched, took and plundered the city, cut off the legs of the officers engaged in the rebellion, flayed the nobles and stretched their skins on a pile built for the purpose, and sent the rebel governor to Nineveh to be flayed. The result was immediate submission of the district and of all in his line of march. While he was thus engaged in the west, rebellion broke out in the east and southeast, was crushed, broke out again, and was again put down with plundering, devastation, and slaughter. Sedition among the Arameans, fomented and assisted by Nabupaliddin of Babylonia, was overcome, and Suru, the capital, destroyed. The fomenter of the trouble in turn found work in repelling the Aramean hordes and occupation in rebuilding the temple of Shamash at Sippar. Continued rebellion among the Arameans revealed the fact that the little state of Bit-Adini, the Bene-‘Edhen of II Kings xix, 12, was the cause of the rising. This the Assyrians assailed and destroyed, and showed that they would permit no strong state on the Euphrates. The Mediterranean coast was next visited; tribute was received from the Phenicians; wood was gathered for the new works at Calah; and a memorial was left on the rocks at Nahr-el-Kalb (near Beirut). Asshurnasirpal made the Assyrian name a synonym for ferocity and savagery. Yet war was not his whole occupation. Calah had fallen into ruins while Asshur had been the capital. He rebuilt it, erected there a great palace, and conducted to the city a water-supply from the Lower Zab.

7.Shalmaneser II, 860-824 B.C.

With Shalmaneser II (860-824 B.C.) began contact of the Assyrians with the Hebrews. In the Black Obelisk and the Monolith texts this king has left some of the finest inscriptions known. These with supplementary records show a personal leadership by the king of his armies for twenty-six consecutive years. Under him began that battering at the gates of Damascus which continued from his time till the city fell in 732 B.C., and then was directed against the Hebrews, Arabs, and Egyptians till about 660 B.C. The three prominent Syrian powers at the time were centered at Hamath, Patin, and Damascus. 330A coalition of these with their allies, including Israelites (Ahab furnished a contingent of 2,000 [?] chariots and 10,000 men), Arabs, and Ammonites, was met and defeated at Karkar. The quality of the victory claimed by Shalmaneser is doubtful, since in three inscriptions (the Black Obelisk, Monolith, and Bull; cf. Schrader, Keilschriftforschung, p. 47) the number of killed varies from 14,000 to 25,000, and no statement is made of tribute imposed. The victory was barren. There was revealed here a force which might have stayed the advance of Assyria could it have been held together. Six campaigns were made in this region during 854-839 B.C., none decisive in itself, but contributing in the end to the isolation of Damascus. Jehu of Israel sent tribute to divert from himself the attacks of Damascus. With reference to his campaigns in Armenia, Shalmaneser describes himself as ” trampling down the country like a wild bull.” But there, too, results were indecisive, and the region remained a menace to the dominant power. Media was invaded in a mere booty-snatching expedition. Internal conflict in Babylonia resulted in the reestablishment of Assyrian power there, and in checking the northward march of the Kaldu. The later years of the king were harassed by rebellions at home, led in one case by his sons, and due in part probably to utter weariness at the constant drain caused by the perpetual wars.

8. Shamshi-Ramman IV and his Successors, 824-745 B.C.

This legacy of civil war was left to the son Shamshi-Ramman IV (824-812 B.C.), who used two years in defeating his brother and in repressing the general rebellion of the provinces. A coalition of Babylonians, Elamites, Southern Arameans, and Kaldu was met and defeated and quiet restored after two campaigns. Payment of tribute was forced in different regions only by the presence of the army. His son, Ramman-nirari III (812-783 B.C.), who called himself a descendant of Igur-(Bel-)kapkapu, reduced Damascus to tributary relationship. The entire eastern coast of the Mediterranean contributed to his exchequer. A series of eight campaigns against the Medes took this king to the Caspian, and the south to the Persian Gulf was tributary. He made an attempt to weld religiously Babylonia and Assyria by the introduction of Babylonian cults into Nineveh, while Babylonia was treated as an Assyrian province. With the next king, Shalmaneser III (783-773 B.C.), began a period of decadence which continued for three reigns. Campaigns to enforce payment of tribute are mentioned, but Armenia in the mean time gained in power. Under Asshur-Dan III (773-755 B.C.) the story of rebellion and disaster grows. The eclipse of the sun, 763 B.C., and pestilence in 759 and 754 were events of this reign. Asshur-nirari II (755-745 B.C.) left fewer notices, but enough to make evident that warlike attempts were not altogether discontinued. In an uprising at Calah he disappeared, and with him the dynasty which had ruled at least since Tiglath-Pileser II.

9. Tiglath-Pileser III, 745-727 B.C.

Under the great Tiglath-Pileser III (745-727 B.C.), the Pul of II Kings xv, 19, Assyria recovered at a bound her greatest former eminence and surpassed it. The origin of the new king is unknown, for in his numerous inscriptions he never mentions his ancestry. His vigor and boldness of conception and swiftness of execution were unparalleled even in Assyrian history. Babylonia, during the period of Assyria’s weakness, had been unable to take advantage of relief from pressure, owing to attacks by the Arameans. Tiglath-Pileser invaded the country, repelled the Arameans, reorganized the government, and conciliated the inhabitants by paying homage to the chief deities. The districts east were reconquered, and a new policy carried out of settling disaffected subjects in a distant part of the empire. Urartu, under a king named Sarduris II, had completely demolished Assyrian supremacy in the north. A single sweeping victory over him changed all this, and his allies paid their tribute to the conqueror. Arpad fell in 740 B.C., and with it the northwest was pacified. A new coalition of states of Syria, Asia Minor, and Palestine was formed; but at the appearance in the field of the Assyrian forces, it fell apart, Menahem of Israel paid tribute, the states north of Israel were put under a governor, their inhabitants deported, and colonists brought in from other parts. A rebellion near Nineveh was suppressed by the governors, who had been made responsible for good order. They deported the rebellious subjects to Syria and settled Syrians in their places. Armenia was crippled in a campaign which reached the capital on Lake Van, but did not capture it. Tiglath-Pileser began next to clear the road to Egypt, just then weakened by attacks from Ethiopia. Syria was effectually overawed, Phenicia paid tribute, and Gaza was captured and held as an outpost. To offset this, Israel and Damascus had determined to force Judah into an alliance against the Assyrian. Ahaz was thoroughly alarmed, and all the efforts of Isaiah were insufficient to restrain him from throwing himself into the arms of Assyria. Tiglath-Pileser listened to the appeal, ravaged Israel, had Hoshea made king (II Kings xv-xvi), assailed Damascus, destroyed its dependencies, and finally captured it in 732 B.C. While engaged in the west, the king heard of rebellion in Babylonia. This was punished; and Merodach-baladan, who proved almost a perennial rebel, submitted. The Assyrian appointed governors from the north instead of leaving native princes to rule, did homage to the gods of the land, in 726 B.C. ” took the hands of Bel,” the annual right and duty of the rightful king of Babylon, and assumed the name Pul with the old title ” King of Sumer and Akkad and of Babylon” (see Babylonia). Tiglath-Pileser’s death occurred the next year. His achievements in war and in government were the greatest the world had yet known. The Semitic crescent of territory from the Persian Gulf to the border of Egypt was his without dispute; tribute was sent from Arabia as far south as Sabæa, from Armenia, from Elam, and from the states on the Mediterranean. The policy of exchanging populations of chronically rebellious states had made 331the empire more homogeneous by putting seditious nations where circumstances did not favor risings.

10. Shalmaneser IV, 727-722 B.C.

Of Tiglath-Pileser’s successor, Shalmaneser IV (727-722 B.C.), but little is known, not even his relationship to his predecessor. Under him Hoshea was led into what proved the final rebellion of the northern Israelitic kingdom, and the episode narrated in II Kings xvii occurred. In this chapter Hoshea is represented as sending messengers to ” So, king of Egypt.” So has been erroneously identified with Shabak. Sargon mentions a Shabi of the Arabian Muzri; Shabi in Assyrian would represent the Hebrew word So pointed to read Seve; and modern scholars are inclined to follow Winckler (Mittheilungen der vorderasiatischen Gesellschaft, i, 5) and see a double confusion in Miẓraim (” Egypt” ) for Muẓri, and in So for Seve. It is to the point that this Shabi furnished no little trouble for Sargon, Shalmaneser’s successor. From him, then, Hoshea expected help and rebelled, when Shalmaneser attacked, defeated, and captured him, and invested Samaria. The city held out for three years. Meanwhile Shalmaneser died and was succeeded by Sargon (722-705 B.C.). Samaria was captured in 721; and the Israelitic kingdom ceased to exist.

11. Sargon 722-705 B.C.

Sargon’s ancestry is very doubtful: he claimed no royal lineage, nor did his son for him; but his grandson, Sennacherib, connected him with the Igur-kapkapu mentioned above. He reproduced the traits of the great Tiglath-Pileser III—self-confidence, vigor in plan and action, and great military and administrative ability. In Babylonia the determined rebel Merodach-baladan seized Babylon with the help of the Elamites; Sargon claimed the victory in the battle which ensued, but Merodach retained his crown. In the west Hamath raised the flag of rebellion, and Shabi of Musri and Hanno of Gaza engaged to support Hamath; but Sargon attacked the town before the allies could come in, then marched south, and defeated Shabi at Raphia. The next rising was in the north, with Urartu as the backbone of the movement. But Assyria was still able to conquer; and, soon after, the old Hittite center, Carchemish, was destroyed. Campaigns in Media, eastern Asia Minor, and Arabia kept the armies moving. Finally peace was secured in the north by the ending of the kingdom of Urartu, which had for centuries defied Assyria and proved its most dangerous foe. A new uprising in Palestine, Philistia, Edom, and Moab, involving Hezekiah of Judah and evidently fomented by Egypt (Isa. xx), necessitated the sending of Sargon’s tartan with an army, who occupied the Philistine cities, deported the inhabitants, and crushed the rebellion. The other states seem to have escaped punishment. Only Babylon was needed to round out the empire. Merodach-baladan had foreign military forces in support; but he had alienated the native priests, the most influential class of his subjects. They called in the Assyrians, who put the Chaldeans to flight; and Sargon was acclaimed the deliverer of the city of Babylon. He performed sacrifice and took office as viceroy (not king), and restored the temple-worship in the great religious centers. In the northwest, boundaries were pushed back, and even Cyprus sent tribute. Sargon built Dur-Sharrukin with its magnificent palace, but occupied it only a year.

12. Sennacherib, 705-681 B.C.

Sargon was succeeded by his son Sennacherib (705-681 B.C.). The change in succession was followed by another attempt of Merodach-baladan to possess Babylonia. It is likely that the embassy to Hezekiah (II Kings xviii, 13) occurred here. If so, its motive is plain: he was fomenting a revolt in the west to create a diversion while he settled himself in the south. But Sennacherib marched south at once, defeated the rebel, captured Babylon, rifled the palace, and then punished severely the Aramean supporters of the Kaldu, appropriating immense booty and removing, according to the Taylor cylinder, over 200,000 people and settling them in the Median mountains after a successful campaign there. The rebellion fomented by Merodach (if the suggestion above be correct) had gathered headway, with Hezekiah leading the movement, the latter having seized Philistia. The revolt must have been general; for Sennacherib first visited Phenicia, captured Sidon, set up his appointee as king, and apportioned him a fair kingdom. The coalition fell apart before his army, though several of the Philistine towns held out and were reduced. An army from Egypt was defeated, Ekron captured, and its chiefs impaled. Then Sennacherib turned on Judah, captured forty-six towns, deported 200,150 inhabitants, and gave the district to his governors in Philistia to manage. Hezekiah submitted and paid tribute, to gather which he was compelled to strip palace and temple. Sennacherib, either at this time or later, sent a small force to demand the surrender of Jerusalem. Beyond question the reason for this was that the conquest of Egypt was projected, and the Assyrian did not care to leave so strong a fortress as Jerusalem in his rear. The surrender was refused; the forces were withdrawn; a new campaign in Babylonia against the irrepressible Merodach-baladan was successfully carried through; and Asshur-nadir-shum, son of Sennacherib, was put on the throne of Babylon. The next eleven years were spent mainly in the south against the Elamites and Kaldu under Merodach-baladan. After holding the country for some time the allies were defeated in 691 B.C. after a terrible conflict. Babylon was taken, sacked, burned to the ground, the waters of the Euphrates turned upon the site, and the statue of Marduk taken to Asshur. A final expedition against Egypt was probably undertaken near the end of his life by Sennacherib. Tirhakah of Egypt advanced to meet him, perhaps as far as Pelusium. There Sennacherib experienced a severe check, variously explained. II Kings ix, 35 tells of a pestilence which destroyed in a single night 185,000 men; Tirhakah claimed credit for a great victory; Herodotus (ii, 141) was told by the Egyptians that field-mice gnawed the bow-strings and quivers of the Assyrians and left them defenseless before the Egyptians; 332and the Babylonian Chronicles suggest the necessity for return in a rebellion in that region. Sennacherib was killed in 681 B.C. by one (Babylonian Chronicle) or two (II Kings xix, 36-37) of his sons. He had removed the seat of government from Calah to Nineveh, and built there the ” peerless” palace, and had provided the city with a system of water-works.

13. Esar-haddon, 681-668 B.C.

Esar-haddon (681-668 B.C.), Sargon’s son, who succeeded him, reversed the policy toward Babylonia. He assumed the title of viceroy of Babylon, and almost at once set about rebuilding the city in a style of greater grandeur. By restoring the gods carried away by his father he regained the good-will of the people. His first care, however, was to avenge the death of Sennacherib and to secure his own position in Nineveh, whence his brothers, the murderers, who had seized the throne, fled on his approach. The extreme south, again in rebellion, was subdued and the projected invasion of Egypt was undertaken. But first the rebellion of Phenicia had to be quelled, in which three years were occupied, when Sidon was destroyed, a new city built and settled by colonists. Tyre was assailed; but its sea-gate enabled it to hold out. In 783 B.C. Tirhakah was enabled to repel the first attack on Egypt; but Esar-haddon renewed the attempt three years later, was successful in three battles, and occupied Memphis. The land was parceled out for government, and no great opposition was offered by the people, to whom the disaster seemed beyond repair. Northeastern Arabia was then subdued that it might no longer afford assistance to the recurrent rebellions of Palestine. New troubles were by that time affecting the northern boundaries. The Indo-European migration, generally known as the Cimmerian or Scythian, had begun. This was split into two bodies, one of which pressed down into Persia and Media and settled there, and the other passed westward. The former occupied a part of what had been Assyrian territory, and later formed a part of the force which captured Nineveh. The latter passed through Armenia; but its forces were prevented by Esar-haddon from penetrating southward. In 668 B.C. the king was called to Egypt by rebellion there. Before leaving, he had one son proclaimed his successor in Assyria (Asshurbanipal) and another in Babylon (Shamash-shum-ukin). He died the same year, and before reaching Egypt, having extended Assyrian domination farther than it had yet reached. He was fond of building, and constructed the great arsenal at Nebi-Yunus, the materials for which were contributed by twenty-two kings and princes, ten of them in Cyprus. The name of Manasseh of Judah appears in this list of tributaries.

14. Asshurbanipal, 668-626 B.C.

The events of the reign of Asshurbanipal (668-626 B.C.; Greek, Sardanapalus, Aram. Osnappar, Ezra iv, 10) are hard to make out, not because of paucity of material, for it is abundant, nor because of roughness or carelessness, for the annals are elegant and polished, but because the chronological clue is not given. It is clear, however, that his first movement was to the borderland between Elam and Babylonia, where his presence prevented serious trouble. A new invasion of Egypt was made necessary by Tirhakah’s return, the Assyrian forces being gathered partly on the Mediterranean coast. Tirhakah was defeated, and the country occupied this time as far south as Thebes. A new rising which took place almost immediately was as quickly punished in ruthless fashion, and enormous booty was sent home. A third insurrection under the son of the now dead Tirhakah was futile. Tyre had finally submitted and sent tribute. But the story continues of revolts in different parts of the empire which presage its speedy fall. The king was occupied in desperate attempts to maintain himself. Participation in these led to the conquest of Elam up to the very walls of Susa. Even his brother on the throne of Babylon revolted; but Asshurbanipal’s movements were swift and sure. Babylon, Borsippa, Sippara, and Cutha were beset; Shamash-shum-ukin in despair burned himself in his own palace; and people from the captured towns were settled in Samaria. A new challenge from Elam was accepted; and finally Susa was taken with immense booty. The usual success attended the king’s final campaign in Arabia. The results of this long succession of successful wars was the heaping up of enormous wealth in the cities of Assyria, particularly in Nineveh. The end of a victorious campaign was the transportation of precious metals, works of art, flocks, and herds, and, in the later reigns, of people as slaves to Assyria. The great works of the Assyrian kings were doubtless in great part the product of the toil of captives. And the captors of Nineveh fell heir to this immense wealth. Asshurbanipal’s wars were not his only interest. Apart from the palace which he built, the walls of which were lined with sculptured reliefs, he was fond of the hunt, and his contests with lions are frequently portrayed. Most significant for modern times was his interest in literature. His library, uncovered by George Smith, was amassed by the copying of tablets from libraries in the south, and contained works on history, ethics, science, religion, and linguistics.

15. Asshurbanipal’s Successors, 626-505 B.C.

Asshurbanipal was succeeded by his son Asshur-etil-ilani, of whom it is known that he built or restored the temple E-zida in Calah, and that during his fourth year he claimed the title of king of Sumer and Akkad. Whether a Sin-shum-lishir next reigned is not known; but mention of him as a king of Assyria has been found. A Sin-shar-ishkun is known from three tablets from Sippar and Erech. In his seventh year he was still king of a part of Babylonia, though not of Babylon, over which Nabopolassar had established himself. Upon an invasion of Babylonia by the Assyrian, Nabopolassar invoked the aid of the Umman-Manda, and Sin-char-ishkun was forced to retreat, Nabopolassar securing the provinces as the former evacuated them. It seems that one branch of the Scythians were allies of the Assyrians at this time and actually defeated the armies of the assailants, thus prolonging the life 333of Nineveh. The rush of the Scythians, which so terrified western Asia and elicited the prophecies of Nahum and Zephaniah (Driver, Introduction, 5th ed., 1894, pp. 314-320), is to be explained by their alliance with Assyria and a desire to attack Egypt, the king of which, Psammetichus, had assailed Philistia. Their sudden disappearance is as remarkable as their unheralded coming.

The Umman-Manda returned soon to Nineveh. The story of the siege is unknown; but the city fell 607-606 B.C., and its vast treasures became the nucleus of the tremendous wealth of the later Persian empire. With it fell the empire which twenty-five years earlier had controlled all southwestern Asia.

VII. The Religion.

1. Relation to Babylonian Religion.

From the relationship of Assyrians and Babylonians set forth in the preceding it would be expected that both resemblances and differences would be found to exist in the two religions. The resemblances are as follows: (1) The general character of the cults is the same; the liturgies, prayers, psalms are often identical, as are some of the deities. (2) The goddesses are of minor importance in Assyria, appearing hardly as prominent as in the southern land. Theoretically the gods had consorts; practically these are but shadows and a name. (3) The great exceptions to this in both countries were the Ishtars; to the extent exhibited below, the pantheons were the same, at least in theory (see Babylonia). The dissimilarities are: (1) Asshur assumes the character of a national god as far back as he can be traced. (2) His aloofness is a new feature; he in particular seems ever without consort and family. (3) The next difference needs stating at some length. In their annals the Babylonians laid great stress upon their temple-building, even more than upon wars and the construction of palaces. From the emphasis laid upon religion, and the care taken to house the divinities and provide for their maintenance, the country seems priest-ridden, with the kings devoted first of all to religion. The Assyrians, on the other hand, while indeed they often built or restored temples, devoted much less space to the recital of their operations and put far less emphasis on the story of this activity than on that attending their wars and the construction of their palaces. They seemed less absorbed in their religion, though not less devout when worshiping. It is a case of correctly reading in a lesser abundance of matter a lower quality of intensity. Religion seemed less on the Assyrian’s mind. (4) The pantheon was much smaller. Tiglath-Pileser I, one of the most pious of Assyrian monarchs, names Asshur, Bel (rarely named elsewhere), Sin, Ramman, Ninib, and Ishtar. Shalmaneser II mentions on the obelisk, in addition to the gods of Tiglath-Pileser I, Anu, Ea, Marduk, Nergal, Nusku, and Belit. It is just the deities mentioned here which were most generally disregarded; and their notice by this king is doubtless to be traced to his attempt to fuse more closely the north and the south. Asshurbanipal omits Anu, Ea, Marduk, and Belit, but mentions two Ishtars and adds Nebo. But a caveat should be entered here, which is justified by knowledge of facts existing in other lands where a similar civilization had been attained; as in Oriental countries generally, so in Assyria there were an aristocratic or official cult and a popular and democratic cult. The pantheon of the kings, particularly of Tiglath-Pileser, represented the former; the peasant and farmer worshiped the gods and spirits of field, tree, and fountain, and these did not get into the inscriptions.

2. Asshur.

The chief of the Assyrian pantheon, not found in the pantheon of Babylonia, was Asshur. His derivation and origin are obscure, though there is some plausibility in the suggestion that he was ultimately derived from Anu, the heaven-god of Babylonia. But it is possible that Asshur the city was not originally Semitic, and that the local god was adopted by the Semitic colonists. As that city was for a long period the capital, he became the chief deity. The great triad of the south was entirely subordinated and lost; Anu, Bel, and Ea find scanty mention in the god-lists of the kings. The significance of Asshur is that he stands for nationalism. His position from the first seems more elevated, his attitude has in it more of aloofness and abstraction than even Marduk ever attained in the south. Moreover, he never appears to be chained to a locality. Whatever city was the capital, there he made his abode. His symbol or representation was not an image, but a winged disk surmounted by the figure of an archer discharging his shaft. This served also as a military standard, and accompanied the armies in their campaigns. While individual kings could and did choose what may be called individual patrons among the gods, Asshur was always the nation’s guardian and protagonist, the unquestioned chief. Yet it must be noted that in spite of this reverence, even when Assyria most completely dominated Babylonia; there was no attempt to displace Marduk or Shamash or any other of the southern deities by Asshur; his domain was his own country, and there was honor among the gods, precluding one from usurping the due of another. Sayce was the first to point out that in this deity and the conceptions about him there was the possibility of all the greatness of a monotheism such as developed in the conception of Yahweh. Asshur’s position was unique, without wife or family, a consideration which doubtless had much to do with the elevation of the conception which was formed of his being. There seems every reason to assume that he was originally a sun-deity, but this feature is not prominent in the original records in which he figures. The other gods form, after a fashion, his retinue or court, but even this feature is far less pronounced than in the case of Marduk.

3. Ishtar.

Ishtar was in Syria never one, but at least three; she of Nineveh, of Arbela, and of Kitmur (a city of which almost nothing is known). The first two were the most prominent; and both appear to have been above all goddesses of battle. Ishtar of Kitmur ruled in the domain of love. In the south this goddess reached her eminence by absorbing 334or assimilating the beings, functions, and rites of local goddesses, such as Nana of Erech, Nina and Bau of Shirpurla, Sarpanit of Babylon, and Anunit. In neither place was she originally a moon-deity; this function appears in late times, and generally in the west after she had become associated, often as consort, with Baal as sun-god. In some cases religious prostitution was associated with her cult; but it was not, as is so often supposed, exclusively or primarily her rite. The origin of name and goddess is obscure. Nearly, if not quite, all Semitic peoples had a deity of the name, though Athtar of South Arabia was male. The hypothesis of non-Semitic origin seems out of court, in view of the universality of her cult among Semites; and yet no satisfactory Semitic etymology has been found. If she was a loan-goddess, she was borrowed in the prehistoric age of the Semitic peoples. The Ishtar of Nineveh ranked next to Asshur in estimation, was to the Assyrians Belit (” the Lady” ), as Asshur was Bel (” the Lord” ); yet, as is implied in the foregoing, she was never his consort. ” Goddess of Battle,” ” Princess of Heaven and Earth,” ” Queen of All,” are titles given her. In the religious literature she is invoked as the ” gracious mother of creation, the giver of plenty, hearer of the supplications of the sinner,” and as the goddess of fertility. It was partly out of this latter conception that the debasing worship grew which attended her as the Oriental Aphrodite. The functions of the various Ishtars were quite the same; and there is more of the primitive attachment to locality than in the case of Asshur. (See Ashtoreth.)

4. Ramman.

The deity who seemed to rank third, at any rate if one may judge by the frequency with which his name was used in the formation of proper names, was Ramman, the thunderer, god of storms, and probably in consequence of this, also of fertility and fruitfulness. He was identified with Hadad or Adad, a deity of Syria, one of whose principal seats was Aleppo. There has always been considerable doubt whether his name, which in the cuneiform is represented by the sign IM, should be read Ramman or Hadad. The name has been found in the region of Van in the cuneiform written phonetically Hadad, so that it is settled that at least the form common in Syria was known in Assyria and used there. But it is not a necessary conclusion that the sign IM is always to be read Hadad and never Ramman.

5. The Sun-gods Shamash, Ninib, and Nergal.

Doubtless the cults of Asshur, Ishtar, and Ramman were those characteristic of Assyria. But the student of religions will always be alert for signs of sun-worship; and, since Asshur, if he was indeed originally a sun-deity, had been disassociated from that relationship, it would be expected that other deities would represent that phase of early worship. There were three sun-gods in Assyria who had a more or less prominent position, were derived from the south and were known in both lands as Shamash, Ninib, and Nergal. The first was par excellence the sun-god (cf. the Hebr. shemesh, ” sun” ); and the splendor and fervor and inspiration of his ritual almost equals that of Asshur. It is practically certain that he had temples in every city. Ninib became connected among the Assyrians with hunting and sports, and then with war. Nergal represented rather the maleficent, destructive power of the sun; he was, therefore, associated with war as the destroyer, with pestilence, and also with the chase.

6. Sin, the Moon-god, Nusku, the Fire-god.

A religion which derived its elements in large part from a people to whom the moon had been an eminent power would be expected to retain clear traces of that cult. Accordingly Sin, called also Nannar, the pre-Semitic EN-ZU, god of wisdom, who had early seats in Ur and Harran, both connected by the Hebrews’ tradition with the father of their race, Abraham, had his seats of worship also in Assyria. The diffused character of his worship will be partly realized when it is remembered that he gave his name to the peninsula of Sinai. He was always closely associated with the endowment of mankind with wisdom. Nusku was a fire-god, then the deity of charms and incantations, a night deity, and also associated with the impartation of knowledge.

7. Rivalry of Babylonia and Assyria.

Other deities had little place in the worship and regard of the people. Mention of them seems rather perfunctory, a sort of parade of piety, or a diplomatic measure of conciliation toward the south, rather than an acknowledgment of their importance for the country or the religion. A factor that swayed mightily the selection of the members of the pantheon—a selection which was instinctive rather than deliberative and planned—was the persistent rivalry of Babylonia and Assyria. It was impossible for the god Marduk to become domiciled in Nineveh or Asshur or Calah, for he was the god of the rival city. Even if he had been more mobile, had the native Babylonian conception of deity been more favorable to a change of residence of the god than it was, the fact mentioned would have impeded his adoption of a seat in the north. But, as has been noted above, even when the arms and star of the Assyrians were thoroughly dominant in the south, no attempt was made to demand that Asshur take his place at the head of the southern pantheon. The image of Marduk was carried to Assyria as a sign of his subjection; but that of Asshur was not installed in his place, so far as any hint goes in the annals accessible. So that the Assyrian recognition of Marduk conveys simply the impression of assent to his lordship in his own land. It is not beyond suspicion that the tendency to favor Nebo was not because he was especially revered, though as the god of oracles he became less chained to a locality and more eligible to general worship than others; more probably he was used by Ramman-nirari and Asshurbanipal to diminish the prestige of the almost hostile god Marduk.

8. Magic.

The background and undercurrent of Assyrian religion was thoroughly animistic. Omens of all sorts were consulted; magic of formulas and of material, sympathetic and simple, was everywhere; 335sorcery was a constant peril and device; spirits evil and good, maleficent and beneficent, swarmed. The diagnosis of disease was recognition of obsession or infliction of suffering or prevention of health by spirits or deities who must be driven out or exorcised or placated in order to lighten or abolish the suffering or to secure health. The formulas of magic were numerous and potent, the medicine-man or shaman as well as the priest thrived. While for king, nobility, army, and priesthood the great gods were supreme, there are hints even in the annals of the kings, and more decided proof in the collections of magical texts, of apprehensions of the lower powers, of hopes that rested not on the gods. Of incantation tablets a whole series give a ritual of “the evil demons.” Parts of the body had their appropriate ritual for their preservation from disease and to banish the spirits which chose them as the spheres of their operations. The formulas arose and became fixed because the occasion which produced them appeared to be recurrent. And, as elsewhere in early religion, the exact letter, word, and intonation were essential to success in using them.

The idea of sin as transgression against the will of the gods was highly developed; and some of the penitential psalms, with the polytheistic expressions eliminated, would fitly express the most pious sentiments of devout Christians in worship of today. The notion of communion between god and man is involved in the elaborate system of omens and oracles which obtained. For ideas of eschatology, the underworld, and future life, see Babylonia.

Geo. W. Gilmore.

Bibliography: On the explorations and discoveries: R. W. Rogers, History of Babylonia and Assyria, vol. i, New York, 1900; H. V. Hilprecht, Explorations in Bible Lands, pp. 1–578, Philadelphia, 1903 (very full and fresh); A. H. Layard, Nineveh and Its Remains, 2 vols., London, 1848–49 (an old classic and good for geographical and topographical detail), and as a companion piece, H. Rassam, Asshur and the Land of Nimrod, New York, 1897.

On the language: F. Delitzsch. Assyrische Grammatik. Leipsic, 1906, Eng. transl., 1889; J. Menant, Les Lanpues perdues de la Perse et de 1’Assyrie, Paris, 1885; A. H. Sayce, Primer of Assyriology, New York, 1895 (deals with the people, the language, and the whole subject).

For sources: H. C. Rawlinson, Cuneiform Inscriptions of Western Asia, 5 vols., London, 1881–84; Assyriologische Bibliothek, begun by C. Bezold, continued by F. Dalitzseh and P. Haupt, Leipsic, 1886 sqq.; Schrader, KB; H. Winecler, Sammlung von Keilinschriften, Leipsic, 1893 sqq.; J. A. Craig, Assyrian and Babylonian Religious Texts, 2 vols., ib. 1895–97; C. Johnston, Epistolary Literature of Assyrians and Babylonians, Baltimore, 1898; R. F. Harper, Assyrian and Babylonian Letters, 5 vols., Chicago, 1900–05; idem, Assyrian Literature, New York, 1901.

On chronology: A. Kamphausen, Die Chronologie der hebräischen Könige, Bonn. 1883; B. G. Niebuhr, Die Chronologie . . . Babyloniens and Assyriens, Leipsic, 1896.

On the history the best for the English reader is R. W. Rogers, History of Babylonia and Assyria, ii, New York, 1900; other works are: F. Hommel, Geschichte Babyloniens and Assyriens, Berlin. 1885; C. P. Tiele, Babylonisch-assyrische Geschichte, 1886–88; F. Mürdter and F. Delitzsch, Geschichte von Babylonien and Assyrien, Stuttgart, 1891; H. Winckler, Geschichte Babyloniens and Assyriens, Leipsic, 1892; idem, Die Vö1ker Vorderasiens, and Die politische Entwickelung Babyloniens und Assyriens, in Der alte Orient, I, i, II, i, ib. 1899–1900; G. Maspero, Dawn of Civilization, New York, 1894; idem, The Struggle of the Nations, 1897; idem, The Passing of the Empires, 1900; J. F. McCurdy, History, Prophecy and the Monuments, 3 vols., ib. 1894–1901 (gives the parallel development of Israel and the contemporary nations); F. Kaulen, Assyrien und Babylonien nach den neuesten Entdeckungen, Freiburg, 1899; L. B. Paton, Early History of Syria and Palestine, New York, 1901 (involves the history of Assyria); G. S. Goodspeed, History of Babylonians and Assyrians, New York, 1902 (popular).

On special subjects: G. Smith, History of Assurbanipal, London, 1871; W. Lotz, Die Inschriften Tiglath-Pilesers I., Leipsic, 1880; E. Schrader, Die Keilinschriften am Eingange der Quellgrotte des Sebeneh-Su, Berlin, 1885 (on the reliefs of Tiglath-Pileser I, Tiglath-Ninib, and Asshurnasirpal III at Sebneh); S. A. Smith, Die Keilschrifttexte Assurbanipals, Leipsic, 1887–89; H. Winckler, Die Keilschrifttexte Sargons, ib. 1889; idem, Die Inschriften Tiglat-Pilesers I., ib. 1893; idem, Die Keilschrifttexte Assurbanipals, ib. 1895; B. Meissner and P. Rost, Die Bauinschriften Sanheribs, ib. 1893; P. Rost, Die Keilschriftexte Tiglat-Pilesers III., ib. 1893; D. G. Lyon, Die Keilschrifttexte Sargons II., in Assyriologische Bibliothek, I, iv, ib. 1883; H. Winckler, Altorientalische Forschungen, lst series, ib. 1893 97, 2d series, 1898–1901, 3d series, 1902, in progress (I, i. 1893, on Yaudi; I, iv, 1896, on Muẓri; I, vi, 1897, on the Cimmerians; II, i, on Esarhaddon; II, ii, 1898, on Tiglath-Pileser III); O. Weber, Sanherib König von Assyrien, in Der alte Orient, ib. 1905; L. W. King, Records of the Reign of Tukulti-Ninib I., King of Assyria, London, 1904; F. Delitzsch and P. Haupt, Beiträge zur Assyriologie, ib. 1890–1906 (contains a series of treatises on special topics); on Muẓri, Meluhha, and Main, cf. H. Winckler in Mitteilungen der vorderasiatischen Gesellschaft, i and iv, 1898, Schrader, KAT, i, 140 sqq., and Winckler, Geschichte Israels, i, 150–153, 2 vols., Leipsic, 1895–1900.

On the religion: M. Jastrow, Religion of Babylonia and Assyria, Boston, 1898 (revised ed., in German, issued in parts and still in progress, Berlin); J. A. Knudtzon, Assyrische Gebete an den Sonnengott, Leipsic, 1894; G. Tasks, Alttestamentliche Theologie, Hanover, 1904; A. S. Geden, Studies in Comparative Religion, London, 1898.

On the relations of Assyriology to the Old Testament: Schrader. KAT, and COT; B. T. A. Evetts, New Light on the Holy Land, ib. 1891; H. Winckler, Alttestamentliche Untersuchungen, Leipsic, 1892; A. H. Sayce, Higher Criticism and the Monuments, London, 1894; C. J. Ball, Light from the East, ib. 1899; T. G. Pinches, The Old Testament in the Light of the History . . . of Assyria and Babylonia, ib. 1902; H. Winckler, Keilinschriftliche Textbuch zum Alten Testament, Leipsic, 1903; J. Jeremias, Das Alte Testament im Lichte des alten Orients, ib. 1904; F. Delitzsch, Babel und Bibel, Leipsic, 1902, Eng. transl., Chicago, 1906.

Journals of note containing valuable material are: ZA; Revue d’Assyriologie et d’Archéologie Orientale, Paris; Orientalische Litteraturzeitung, Berlin; American Journal of Semitic Languages and Literatures, Chicago; Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, London; Transactions and PSBA, ib. Consult also the literature under Babylonia.