Adrammelech

ADRAMMELECH, ɑ-dram´el-ec: 1. Name of a deity worshiped with child-sacrifice by the colonists whom Sargon, king of Assyria, transplanted from Sepharvaim to Samaria (II Kings xvii. 31; cf. xviii. 34; Isa. xxxvi. 19, xxxvii. 13). Since Sepharvaim is probably the Syrian city Shabara’in, mentioned in a Babylonian chronicle as having been destroyed by Shalmaneser IV., the god Adrammelech is no doubt a Syrian divinity. The name has been explained as meaning “Adar the prince,” “splendor of the king,” and “fire-king,” while others think that the original reading was “Adadmelech.” Since the name is Aramaic, the last is to be preferred.

2. According to II Kings xix. 37 and Isa. xxxvii. 38, Adrammelech was the name of the son and murderer of the Assyrian king Sennacherib. The form corresponds to the “Adramelus” of Abydenus in the Armenian chronicle of Eusebius (ed. A. Schöne, i., Berlin, 1875, p. 35) and the “Ardumuzanus” of Alexander Polyhistor (p. 27).

Bibliography: (1) Schrader, KAT, ii. 408, 450; P. Scholz, Götzendienst und Zauberwesen bei den alten Hebräern, pp. 401-405, Ratisbon, 1877. (2) H. Winckler, Der Mörder Sanheribs, in ZA, ii. (1887) 392-396.