He might have wanted to shift power away from powerful generals and magnates to his own family, having encountered powerful Arab queens who made their own decisions and led armies. Shortly after taking the throne, Esarhaddon executed all of the conspirators and political enemies within his reach, including his brothers' families. Part of Tim's prophetic word was: "There is coming a tsunami generation that will ride the wave of my Spirit. Thankful, Sinharib then converts to Christianity and founds an important monastery near Mosul, called Deir Mar Mattai. In most cases the Assyrians followed the principle of primogeniture, wherein the oldest son inherits. [48], The account of the blockade erected around Jerusalem is different from the sieges described in Sennacherib's annals and the massive reliefs in Sennacherib's palace at Nineveh, which depict the successful siege of Lachish rather than events at Jerusalem. [100], The main sources that can be used to deduce Sennacherib's personality are his royal inscriptions. [65][66] In Ashur-nadin-shumi's place, a native Babylonian, Nergal-ushezib, became Babylon's king. [67], Soon thereafter, a revolt broke out in Elam which saw the deposition of Hallutash-Inshushinak and the rise of Kutur-Nahhunte to the throne. Shortly thereafter, the severe weather forced Sennacherib to retreat and return home. Puzur-Sin Ashur-dugul Ashur-apla-idi Nasir-Sin Sin-namir Ipqi-Ishtar Adad-salulu Adasi Thus, Jerusalem was blockaded in some capacity, though the lack of massive military activities and appropriate equipment meant that it was probably not a full siege. Wishing to consolidate his position as king, Nergal-ushezib took advantage of the situation and captured and plundered the city of Nippur. He expanded the size of the city and constructed great city walls, numerous temples and a royal garden. The murder of the king caused some resentment against him by his own supporters which delayed his potential coronation, and in the meantime, Esarhaddon had raised an army. They took the cities of Ekron and Timnah and Judah stood alone, with Sennacherib setting his sights on Jerusalem. 2 Hezekiah saw that Sennacherib had come . They then besieged and took numerous cities. Though it is clear that the blockade of Jerusalem ended without significant fighting, how it was resolved and what stopped Sennacherib's massive army from overwhelming the city is uncertain. [55] One of Sennacherib's first measures was to remove Bel-ibni from the Babylonian throne, either because of incompetence or complicity,[32] and he was brought back to Assyria, whereafter he is not heard of again in the sources. [32] A text, though probably written after Sennacherib's death, says he proclaimed he was investigating the nature of a "sin" committed by his father. [48] It is possible that the story of the mice infestation is an allusion to some kind of disease striking the Assyrian camp, possibly the septicemic plague. The siege of Lachish, which ended in the city's destruction, was so lengthy that the defenders eventually began using arrowheads made of bone rather than metal, which had run out. Sennacherib described Bel-ibni as "a native of Babylon who grew up in my palace like a young puppy". Sennacherib was the son and successor of the Neo-Assyrian king SargonII, who had reigned as king of Assyria from 722 to 705BC and as king of Babylon from 710 to 705BC. [63] The war then took an unexpected turn as the king of Elam, Hallutash-Inshushinak I, took advantage of the Assyrian army being so far away from home to invade Babylonia. [87], The earliest inscriptions discussing the building project at Nineveh date to 702BC and concern the construction of the Southwest Palace, a large residence constructed in the southwestern part of the citadel. [8] Sargon had ruled Babylonia since 710BC, when he defeated the Chaldean tribal chief Marduk-apla-iddinaII, who had taken control of the south in the aftermath of the death of Sargon's predecessor ShalmaneserV in 722BC. Many of Sennacherib's reliefs are exhibited today at the Vorderasiatisches Museum, the British Museum, the Iraq Museum in Baghdad, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and the Louvre in Paris. [73], In 690BC, Humban-menanu suffered a stroke and his jaw became locked in a way that prevented him from speaking. [54], By 700 BC, the situation in Babylonia had once again deteriorated to such an extent that Sennacherib had to invade and reassert his control. For most of Sennacherib's reign, the queen was Tashmetu-sharrat, whose name literally means "Tashmetum is queen". Rulers with names in italics are considered fictional. Furthermore, he did not "take the hand" of the Statue of Marduk, the physical representation of the deity, and thus did not honor the god by undergoing the traditional Babylonian coronation ritual. Nergal-ushezib was frightened by this development and called on the Elamites for aid. [126], This variant of the titulature is used in an inscription from the Southwest Palace at Nineveh written after Sennacherib's 700 BC Babylonian campaign:[127], Sennacherib, the great king, the mighty king, king of the universe, king of Assyria, king of the four quarters (of the world); favorite of the great gods; the wise and crafty one; strong hero, first among all princes; the flame that consumes the insubmissive, who strikes the wicked with the thunderbolt. The relief bears two cuneiform inscription. Sennacherib , (died January 681 bc), King of Assyria (r. 705/704-681 bc), son and successor of Sargon II.Between 703 and 689 he undertook six campaigns against Elam (southwestern Iran), which was stirring up Chaldean and Aramaean tribes in Babylonia; Babylon was sacked during the last campaign. Sennacherib is presented as akin to a ruthless predator, attacking Judah as a "wolf on the fold" in the famous 1815 poem The Destruction of Sennacherib by Lord Byron:[112]. [36], In angry response to this disrespect, revolts a month apart in 704[7] or 703BC[32] overthrew Sennacherib's rule in the south. Some suggest the famous Hanging Gardens of Babylon, one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, were actually these gardens in Nineveh. Sennacherib (Neo-Assyrian cuneiform: Sn-ahh-erba[3] or Sn-a-erba,[4] meaning "Sn has replaced the brothers")[5][6][a] was the king of the Neo-Assyrian Empire from the death of his father SargonII in 705BC to his own death in 681BC. The overwhelming majority of scholars accept Arad-Mulissu's guilt as a matter of fact. The passage describing the seizure of the property of the gods and the destruction of some of their statues is one of the few where Sennacherib uses "my people" rather than "I". [93] Despite his dismissal, Arda-Mulissu remained a popular figure, and some vassals secretly supported him as the heir to the throne. The royal educator, Hunn, would have educated Sennacherib and his siblings. Sennacherib's palace at Nineveh, two scribes, standing side by side at right, record the number of the enemy slain in a campaign in southern Mesopotamia. [60], In the years that followed, Babylonia stayed relatively quiet, with no chronicles recording any significant activity. [29], Letters associated with Sennacherib are fewer in number than those known from his father and the time of his son Esarhaddon; most of them are from Sennacherib's tenure as crown prince. Ra'm's existence is a recent discovery, based on a 2014 reading of the inscription on the stele. [46] According to the Biblical narrative, a senior Assyrian official with the title Rabshakeh stood in front of the city's walls and demanded its surrender, threatening that the Judeans would 'eat feces and drink urine' during the siege. Shortly after Sennacherib inherited the throne in 705BC, Marduk-apla-iddina retook Babylon and allied with the Elamites. To transform Nineveh into a capital worthy of his empire, he launched one of the most ambitious building projects in ancient history. Though the biblical narrative holds that divine intervention by an angel ended Sennacherib's attack on Jerusalem by destroying the Assyrian army, an outright Assyrian defeat is unlikely as Hezekiah submitted to Sennacherib at the end of the campaign. Sennacherib oversaw domestic affairs and often informed Sargon of the progress being made on building projects throughout the empire. She was referred to as the "queen mother" during Esarhaddon's reign, but as she was Esarhaddon's mother, the title may have been bestowed upon her either late in Sennacherib's reign or by Esarhaddon. Both the blockade of Jerusalem and the siege of Lachish probably prevented further Egyptian aid from reaching Hezekiah, and intimidated the kings of other smaller states in the region. [2], Sennacherib had several brothers and at least one sister. [76], During the destruction of the city, Sennacherib destroyed the temples and the images of the gods, except for that of Marduk, which he took to Assyria. [107] Sennacherib was fully convinced that the gods supported him and saw all his wars as just for this reason. [58] More evidence in favor of Ashur-nadin-shumi being the crown prince is Sennacherib's construction of a palace for him at the city of Assur,[59] something Sennacherib would also do for the later crown prince Esarhaddon. Nineveh was the capital of the powerful ancient Assyrian empire, located in modern-day northern Iraq. [75], Although Sennacherib destroyed the city, he appears to have still been somewhat fearful of Babylon's ancient gods. Sennacherib's ultimate treatment of Babylon, destroying the city and its temples, was sacrilege and the king appears to have neglected the temples in Assyria until he carried out a renovation of the temple of Ashur in Assur late in his reign. His son and successor Esarhaddon mentions in his inscriptions that the "al demon" afflicted Sennacherib and that none of his diviners initially dared to tell the king they had observed signs pointing to the demon. Sennacherib's campaign in Judah was a military conflict in 701 BC between Kingdom of Judah and the Neo-Assyrian Empire, the conflict is part of the greater conflict of Sennacherib's campaigns. Many of Sennacherib's Babylonian troubles stemmed from the Chaldean[7] tribal chief Marduk-apla-iddinaII, who had been Babylon's king until Sennacherib's father defeated him. Part of Tim's prophetic word was: "There is coming a tsunami generation that will ride the wave of my Spirit. The Iraqi Department of Antiquities under the Assyriologist Tariq Madhloom conducted the most recent expeditions from 1965 to 1968. Assur, the great god, has intrusted to me an unrivaled kingship, and has made powerful my weapons above (all) those who dwell in palaces. Raising the level of the courtyard made images that Sargon had created at the temple in Assur invisible. Though Sargon's reliefs usually show the king as close to other members of the Assyrian aristocracy, Sennacherib's art usually depicts the king towering above everyone else in his vicinity due to being mounted in a chariot. About Press Copyright Contact us Creators Advertise Developers Terms Privacy Policy & Safety How YouTube works Test new features Press Copyright Contact us Creators . The first reason for this is Sennacherib's negative portrayal in the Bible as the evil conqueror who attempted to take Jerusalem; the second is his destruction of Babylon, one of the most prominent cities in the ancient world. [57], Ashur-nadin-shumi was also titled mru rt, a title that could be interpreted either as the "pre-eminent son" or the "firstborn son". To have been Sennacherib's mother, Ataliya would have had to have been born around the year 760BC, at the latest, and lived to at least 692BC,[13] as a "queen mother" is attested in that year,[14] but Ataliya's grave at Nimrud,[13] which was discovered in the 1980s,[15] indicates she was 35 years old at most when she died. They also served as intimidating tools for propaganda and psychological warfare. 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