knowledge brought him quickly down to the sea-
shore ; in their rapidity and fury of onslaught lay
the main secret of that people's success in war.
" Behold," says the prophet, " they shall come with speed swiftly :
none shall be weary nor stumble among them : none shall slumber
nor sleep ; neither shall the girdle of their loins be loosed, nor the
latchet of their shoes be broken : whose arrows are sharp, and all
their bows bent ; their horses' hoofs shall be counted like flint, and
their wheels like a whirlwind : their roaring shall be like a lion, they
shall roar like young lions ; yea, they shall roar and lay hold of the
prey, and carry it away safe, and there shall be none to deliver."
(Isaiah, v. 26-29.) *
" The Assyrian came down like the wolf on the fold,
And his cohorts were gleaming with purple and gold ;
And the sheen of their spears was like stars on the sea,
When the blue wave rolls nightly down deep Galilee."
They came, " governors and rulers, clothed most
gorgeously, horsemen riding upon horses, all of them
desirable young men" (Ezekiel). Never had king
set out with a lighter heart than did Sennacherib on
this his famous " third campaign, into the land of
Khatti."
8. King Hezekiah of Judah, although no longer
* It has been justly remarked that " we have no contemporary
passage that renders more vividly and visibly the impression pro-
duced in Palestine by the appearance of Assyrian armies." (B.
Stade, "Geschichte des Volkes Israel," p. 605.) And how wonder-
fully this passage is interpreted and completed by the sculptured rep-
resentations of these armies !
304 THE s T0R y OF ASS YRIA .
an impetuous youth, had ended by yielding to the
Sennach- rasn counsels of the war party, against
SSSesSSi the better judgment of the cautious
jSdSS? ' prophet-minister, who was never weary
701 B.C. Q repeat i n g tnat Egypt helpeth in vain
and to no purpose ; " that " the strength of Pharaoh
should be their shame and the trust in the shadow
of Egypt their confusion." Prudence was thrown
to the winds, and not only was tribute refused,
but active hostile demonstrations were indulged
in. " The chief priests, nobles and people of
EKRON had placed Pad!, their king, who kept his
treaties and sworn allegiance to Asshur, in chains
of iron, and unto Hezekiah, king of Judah, had
delivered him. And he wickedly shut him up
in a prison." After such a breach of allegiance
there was nothing left but to hasten the prep-
arations for defence. The first step was to cut
off the water supply from the expected invaders,
" So there was gathered much people together, and
they stopped all the fountains (wells) and the brook
that flowed through the middle of the land, saying,
Why should the king of Assyria come and find
much water? " * The wall of the city also was built
up wherever it was broken down, the citadel was
strengthened, weapons and shields were made in
* The Bible chapters referred to are Second Kings, xviii., xix.;
Second Chronicles, xxxii.; Isaiah, xxxvi., xxxvii. a literal repeti-
tion, with very slight variations, of the greater part of the narrative
in Second Kings. In reconstructing the campaign from these books
and the Assyrian monuments, E. Schrader's interpretation has been
mainly followed, in " Keilinschriften und Altes Testament."
20
THE SARGONIDES. SENNACHERIB.
305
abundance ; captains of war were set over the peo-
ple, and the king " gathered them together to him
in the broad place at the gate of the city, and spake
comfortably to them."
9. Fortunately for Jerusalem, Sennacherib loi-
tered on his way down the sea-coast. He tarried at
Sidon, the king of which had fled to Cyprus, to
settle the affairs of the city, and to receive the per-
sonal homage and tribute of several other Phoeni-
cian kings, as well as those of Ammon, Moab and
Edom. Among the names of these kings we find
that of a " Menahem, king of Samsimuruna ; " if
the name stands for Samirina (Samaria) it would
seem that Israel was even yet suffered to retain a
pale phantom of royalty. Then Ascalon had to be
reduced to obedience, with the usual routine of ran-
soming, transportation, and change of king. It was
only after this that he sent a detachment of his
army to deal retribution on the offending Hebrew
state, while he himself proceeded with the bulk of his
forces in a south-easterly direction, to besiege the
important fortified city of LAKHISH, which it would
have been a great blunder to leave for the Egyp-
tians to occupy. What next happened was nothing
unusual : " Sennacherib, king of Assyria, came up
against all the fenced cities of Judah and took them."
The conqueror himself is more explicit : " Forty-six
of his strong cities, his castles and the smaller towns
of their territory without number, with warlike en-
gines, by assault and storming, by fire and by the
axe, I attacked and captured. 200,150 people, great
and small, horses, asses, oxen and sheep beyond num-
306 the story of Assyria.
ber, from the midst of them I carried off and counted
them as spoils. Himself, like a bird in a cage, inside
Jerusalem, his royal city, I shut up. I cast up a
mound against him and barred the issue from his
city gate." And the Egyptians still tarried. Then
Hezekiah was fain to retract and try conciliation.
He " sent to the king of Assyria to Lakhish, saying :
I have offended. Return from me ; that which thou
puttest on me will I bear." And the fine imposed
on him was a sum equal to about one million dol-
lars in gold and half that in silver. To meet
this demand, after all the outlay caused by his
warlike preparations, he was forced not only to
empty his own treasury and that of the temple, but
to cut from the doors and the pillars of the latter
the gold casing with which he himself had had them
overlaid in the days of his prosperity. These valua-
bles he sent with a heavy heart to the king before
Lakhish, together with the person of Padi, the de-
posed king of Ekron, whom Sennacherib forthwith
proceeded to restore to his former dignity. The
lands taken from Judah he divided among this same
Padi and the loyal kings of Ashdod and Gaza, not
forgetting to increase their tribute proportionately.
10. Lakhish, meanwhile, was taken, and though
the siege of this city is not mentioned in the great
texts, we have the strongest possible evidence for
it in a still more convincing form, for it is repre-
sented at full length on one of the finest wall-sculp-
tures, occupying several slabs in a hall of Sennach-
erib's palace, excavated by Layard at Koyunjik.
We give the concluding scene : On a highly orna-
THE SARGONIDES. SENNACHERIB. ^ Q y
merited throne, the back of which is hung with some
costly drapery, his attendants with their huge fly-
flappers behind him. Sennacherib is seated before
his tent, on a knoll, among grape-laden vines and
fruit-trees, while at the foot of the knoll his chariot
stands with its driver; two grooms holding the
heads of the horses, the royal parasol-bearer at the
wheel, and the royal steed held by a soldier behind.
The slaughter has not yet ceased, but a high officer,
followed by soldiers, stands at the king's foot-stool
reporting, probably introducing the file of captives,
who wait at a little distance, under escort, some
prostrated, others standing, all with hands extended
in supplication. An inscription overhead interprets
the scene in these express words : " Sennacherib,
king of nations, king of Assyria, seated on an ex-
alted throne, receives the spoils of the city of Lakhish. ' '
ii. The capture of this important bulwark was no
sooner accomplished than news came of the advance
of the Egyptian forces, an advance which, tardy at
first, had been so unexpectedly rapid at the last,
that Sennacherib had but just time to retrace his
steps and encounter the enemy in the neighborhood
of Ekron. Under the circumstances, it was most un-
desirable for him to have in his rear a strong royal
city held by a doubtful ally, and he sent to demand
of Hezekiah the surrender into his hands of Jerusa-
lem. To make the demand -doubly impressive he
commissioned with it his highest dignitaries, the
Turtan (commander-in-chief), the Rabshakeh (a
general, not cup-bearer) and the Rabsaris (a high
officer of the royal household). The description of
308 THE STORY OF ASSYRIA.
this embassy, as given in the Bible books, is an in-
valuable piece of reality and local coloring, and
brings before us the manner in which such half mil-
itary, half diplomatic transactions were conducted.
12. The messengers came up to Jerusalem and
stood before the walls. They " called to the king,"
and three officers of the household " came out to
them." The Rabshakeh was spokesman. He
warned the king against trusting to that " bruised
reed, Egypt, whereon, if a man lean it will go into
his hand, and pierce it ; " then insidiously bade him
not to put his reliance in the Lord his God, saying,
" Am I now come up without the Lord against this
place to destroy it ? The Lord said unto me, Go
up against this land and destroy it." This was a tell-
ing argument, and one that could disastrously in-
fluence the people, who were intently watching and
listening from the top of the wall. Therefore the
Jewish negotiators hastily interrupted the orator
with the request that he would speak Aramaic to
them, not Hebrew, " in the ears of the people on
the wall." This admission opened to the Assyrian
an advantage which he immediately pursued. He
pretended to be sent, not so much to the king as to
the Jewish people, to whom he forthwith addressed
his speech :
" Hear ye the word of the great king, the king of Assyria. Thus
saith the king : Let not Hezekiah deceive you, for he shall not be
able to deliver you out of my hand ; neither let Hezekiah make
you trust in the Lord, saying, The Lord will surely deliver us, and
this city shall not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria.
Hearken not to Hezekiah ; for thus saith the king of Assyria : Make
your peace with me, and come out to me ; and eat ye every one of
THE SARGONTDES. SENNACHERIB.
309
his vine and every one of his fig-tree, and drink ye every one the
waters of his own cistern ; until I come and take you away to a land
like your own land, a land of corn and wine, a land of bread and vine-
yards, a land of oil, olive and honey, that ye may live and not die.
And hearken not to Hezekiah when he persuadcth you, saying,
The Lord will deliver us. Hath any of the gods of the nations ever
delivered his land out of the hand of the king of Assyria ? Where
are the gods of Hamath, and of Arpad ? . . . Who are they
among all the gods of the countries that have delivered their
country out of my hand, that the Lord should deliver Jerusalem out
of my hand ? But the people held their peace, and answered him
not a word ; for the king's commandment was, saying, Answer him
not."
13. The Assyrian envoys, according to one ac-
count, delivered a letter from their master to the
king of Judah, which when Hezekiah received, " he
rent his clothes, and covered himself with sack-
cloth, and went into the house of the Lord ; " also
he sent to the prophet Isaiah in his sore distress.
And the letter, after he had read it, " he spread out
before the Lord " and prayed aloud. " Incline
thine ear, O Lord, and hear ! Open thine eyes, O
Lord, and see ! and hear the words of Sennacherib,
wherewith he hath sent him to reproach the living
God !...." But Isaiah sent an encouraging mes-
sage to the king. This was not a time for reproof
but for help, and with all the indignation of the
patriot and the priest, he uttered, in the name of
Yahveh, a long and withering prophecy against the
invader, which is summed up in this passage : " Be-
cause of thy raging against me, and for that thine
arrogancy is come up into mine ears, therefore will
I put my hook in thy nose and my bridle in thy
3io
THE STORY OF ASSYRIA.
lips,* and will turn thee back the way thou earnest."
So the king took comfort, even though a large de-
tachment of the Assyrian army now came and en-
camped under Jerusalem.
14. The Assyrian and Egyptian forces, mean-
while, for the second time stood face to face (see p.
258, battle of Raphia). There was a great battle near
a place called ELTEKEH (Assyrian, Altaku) and
Sennacherib claims to have won the victory ; but
his account is brief, feeble and somewhat confused.
He speaks of capturing Altaku and another city,
and carrying off their spoil, but without the usual
details and precision. At all events, there is no
question of tribute, of submission, of advancing into
the defeated enemy's land. On the contrary, he
passes on to the affairs of Judah, and then inform-
ing us that Hezekiah gathered a great treasure of
every kind, his own daughters and many women
from his palace and sent them after him to Nine-
veh. Of how he happened to return to Nineveh,
not a word.
15. The fact is that his military operations for
that year were summarily cut short independently
of human agency. A plague broke out, and in a
short time carried away such numbers of his sol-
diers that he was fain to recall the detachment that
lay before Jerusalem, and beat a hasty retreat.
The Bible historians describe the catastrophe in
truly Oriental poetic style : " The Angel of Yahveh
* This would seem to have been a treatment commonly awarded to
criminals. See illustration No. 46.
THE SARG0N1DES. SENNA CHE RIB, 3 1 1
went forth " and smote the Assyrians in their camp,
" and when men arose in the morning, behold, they
were all dead corpses." This account is curiously
corroborated by a tradition preserved in Egypt,
and heard there by the Greek traveller and historian,
Herodotus, 250 years later, of how Sennacherib, king
of the Arabs and Assyrians, had advanced towards
Egypt to invade it, and how the pious Egyptian
king prayed for divine aid, and that same night a
swarm of mice was sent into the Assyrian's camp,
and destroyed the leathern quivers, shield-straps and
the bowstrings, so that they were virtually disarmed,
and a great slaughter was made of them. Now the
mouse was, in the East, the emblem of the plague-
boil,* while there are other examples in Scripture of
the destroying angel, or " Angel of Yahveh," as the
bearer of pestilence.f
16. During the next year another scene of the
great Babylonian drama was enacted. The old
champion, Merodach-Baladan, had not thought fit to
reappear as candidate for the throne. He left it to a
* B. Stade, " Geschichte des Volkes Israel," p. 203 and p. 621, and
First Samuel, v. and vi., where the Philistines, smitten with plague-
boils tor detaining the Ark in their midst, send it back with a guilt-
offering. according to the word of their priests and diviners: " Five
golden tumors and five golden mice .... ye shall make images of
your tumors and images of your mice that mar the land."
t See Second Samuel, xxiv. 15-17, where a pestilence is sent upon
Israel, and 70,000 people die. " And when the angel stretched out
his hand towards Jerusalem to destroy it the Lord repented him of
the evil, and said to the angel that destroyed the people, It is
enough ; now stay thy hand. . . . And David spake unto the Lord
wh*n.' he saw the angel that smote the people, and said, Lo, I have
sirn^d. . . ."
3 1 2 THE STOR Y OF ASSYRIA.
younger competitor, Suzub, also a Chaldean prince,
" dwelling within the marshes." The great Taylor-
Cylinder gives the result of this campaign, begin-
ning with the rout of Suzub :
" He himself lost heart and like a bird fled away alone, and his trace
could not be found. I turned round and took the road to Bit-Yakin.
Merodach-Baladan, whom in the course of my first campaign I had
defeated, and whose power I had destroyed, now shunned the shock
of my fiery battle. The gods, the protection of his country, in their
arks he collected, and in ships he transported them, and to the city
of Nagitu in the midst of the sea, like a bird he flew."
This city seems to have been built on small islets
something like Venice in her lagunes by the
opposite, the Elamite, shore of the Gulf, at the
mouth of the River Ulai (classical EULAEOS),
which then flowed into the Gulf, at a great dis-
tance from the mouths of the Tigris and the Eu-
phrates, while now it joins the Shatt-el-arab, still
many miles inside of the coast line. (See map.)
" His brothers, the seed of his father's house, whom he had left on
the sea-shore, and the rest of the people of his land, from Bit-Yakin
within the marshes and reeds, I brought away, and counted them as
spoil. Once more his cities I destroyed, overthrew them and made
them even with the ground. Upon his ally, the king of Elam, \^P
poured the torrent of my arms. On my return, Asshur-nadin-sum,
my eldest son, I seated upon the throne of his kingdom ; all the
land of Shumir and Accad I made subject to him."
This is the last we hear of Merodach-Baladan,
The time and manner of his death are unknown.
His vital energies consumed in a struggle of over
thirty years, he wandered into obscurity, a broken-
hearted exile, giving up the cause of the reconstruc-
tion of an independent Chaldean empire which he
THE SARGONIDES. SENNACHERIB. 317
had made his mission and that of his race. Yet
this mission was to be carried on, but by other
hands, and the cause was to triumph even yet, but
in another century : for with the disparition of the
old Chaldean " sea-king " ends the record of the
year 700, and the seventh century B.C. begins.
Assyria, as an empire, was not to see the end of it.
17. The new century was not ushered in by any
very brilliant achievement. The campaign which
opened it into the NlPUR Mountains (a portion of
the Nairi range) might be passed over, wene it
not that the account given of it on the great
cylinder is an admirable piece of description :
" In my fifth campaign, the people of . ..." (a string of names
of tribes), " who, like the nests of eagles, on the highest summits and
wild crags of the Nipur Mountains had fixed their dwellings, refused
to bow down to my yoke. At the foot of Mount Nipur I pitched
my camp. With my followers, the world-renowned, and with my
warriors, the inexorable, I, like the fleet gazelle, took the lead.
Through defiles, over rushing torrents, by mountain paths, I trav-
elled in my litter ; but in places which for my litter were too steep, I
climbed on my feet, and like a mountain goat among the lofty cliffs, I
clambered. My knees were my place of rest ; upon the rocks I sat
me down, and water of the precipitous mountain side to assuage my
thirst I drank. To the peaks of the wooded highlands I pursued
them and completely defeated them. Their cities I captured ; I
carried off their spoils ; I ravaged, I destroyed, I burned them with
fire."
18. It was probably during Sennacherib's absence
in the North that Suzub " the Babylonian," as he is
now called, emerged from his retreat and succeeded
in re-assuming the royal title and power. But the
Assyrian, before swooping down on him, deter-
mined to pluck out the new nest of conspiracy and
3H
THE STORY OF ASSYRIA.
rebellion which the emigrants from Bit-Yakin had
founded on the shore of Elam, and conceived the
bold and original design of attacking it from the
sea. He ordered captive shipwrights " of the land
Khatti " (Phoenicians of the sea-coast, no doubt), to
construct in Nineveh "tall ships, after the manner
of their country," manned them with mariners from
Tyre and Sidon, and let them sail some distance
down the Tigris, when they were transferred by
land, with the help of wooden .... (the inscrip-
tion here is unfortunately mutilated ; probably
sledges and rollers) all the way down to the
great Arakhtu Canal, one of Babylonia's prin-
cipal thoroughfares and fertilizers. Then the sol-
diers were put on board and the fleet sailed down
the Arakhtu into the Euphrates, where it was joined
by some more ships, built at a city on the upper
Euphrates, and onwards to a station by the Gulf.
The king's camp was pitched so near the coast that
the waters, at high tide, encompassed it all round
and swamped the tents, so that the king, with his
attendants, was forced to remain five days and
nights on board the ships. At last, the fleet, with
all the troops on board, wound its way through the
marshes and emerged into the Gulf from the mouth
of the Euphrates. A maritime expedition was a
great novelty to the Assyrians, an essentially conti-
nental people, and the occasion was deemed an
unusually momentous one. It was duly honored
with much solemnity and ceremony. Sacrifices
were offered, and little golden models of ships and * v
fishes made of gold were sunk into the sea as a
THE SA R GONIDES. SENNA CHE RIB. 3 Y 5
propitiatory offering to a, the lord of the deep.
The expedition was only too successful.
" The men of Bit-Yakin, and their gods, and the men of Elam "
(several districts having been ravaged and their cities captured) " I
carried away ; not one of the evil doers I left behind. In ships I
embarked them, to the other side I made them cross, and I made
them take the road to Assyria. ... On my return, Suzub the
Babylonian, who to the sovereignty of Phumir and Akkad had
restored himself, in a great battle I defeated ; I captured him alive
with my own hand, in bonds and chains of iron I laid him, and to
Assyria I carried him away. The king of Elam, who had supported
him, I defeated; I laid low his might and annihilated his hosts."
19. Victory was followed up by invasion ; the
smoke of burning towns, " as driven by a violent
storm-wind, obscured the wide face of heaven," and
Khudur-Nankhundi had already betaken himself to
the highlands for safety, abandoning his royal city,
when Sennacherib, for the second time in his ex-
perience, was compelled to retreat before a power
greater than that of human arms. In his ardor to
advance he had been unmindful of the season ; it was
the month of December, never a favorable one for
mountain warfare. But this particular year the ele-
ments were even more boisterous than usual. There
was an earthquake, and " the heavens poured down
rains upon rains, and snow, which swelled the tor-
rents." So he " turned round and took the road of
Nineveh," as he admits with charming simplicity.
20. In those same days it came to pass that
Khudur-Nankhundi, king of Elam, died, and was
succeeded by his brother, UMMAN-MlNAN, " a man
without understanding or insight," he is called, be-
cause of his readiness to join in revolts and conspir-
3 1 6 THE STOR Y OF ASSYRIA.
acies, notwithstanding the many severe lessons his
predecessors had received. True, the temptation
was great. For Sennacherib dwelt in his own land
unusually long, probably absorbed in his buildings
and restorations ; at least, so it would appear from
the long interval no less than six years between
his seventh campaign and his eighth. In this inter-
val the irrepressible Suzub turned up again at Baby-
lon, having apparently escaped from captivity,
rTjn
M4 PIC
it
6l. DETAIL OF CHALDEAN MARSHES: WILD SOW WITH YOUNG.
(PALACE OF SENNACHERIB, KOYUNJIK.)
though we are not told either when or how he con-
trived the difficult feat. He seems at first to have
led the adventurous life of an outlaw, as he is said
to have collected about him a band of desperadoes
"wicked, bloodthirsty, fugitive rabble," with
whom he hid among the marshes, then passed into
Elam to collect more men, and rapidly return-
ing, entered Babylon, where the people " seated
him who deserved it not on the throne, and be-
stowed on him the crown of Shumir and Accad."
THE SARGON/DES. SENNACHERIB, ^j
He at once cast about him for allies. But alliances
were not to be had for nothing and the royal treas-
ury was exhausted. So, with the consent of the
Babylonians, he opened that of the great temples,
brought out the gold and silver that was there
found and offered it to Umman-Minan, proposing
to him a treaty : " Collect thy army ! Strike thy
camp! Hasten to Babylon! Stand by us!"
" Then," writes Sennacherib, who, from the tone of
this entire passage, seems thoroughly disgusted and
out of patience,
"Then he, the Elamite, whose cities I had captured and made
even with the ground, showed that he had no sense : he was unmind-
ful of it. He assembled his army ; his chariots and wagons he
collected ; horses and asses he harnessed to their yokes. ... A vast
host of a M .ies he led along with him .... and the road to Babylonia
they took. . . . The Babylonians, wicked devils, the gates of their
city barred strongly and hardened their hearts for resistance."