Scripta Hierosolymitana, Vol. XXXIII, Ah, Assyria...Studies in Assyrian History

175 Pages·1993·14.62 MB·English

by  Mordechai Cogan

SCRIPTA HIEROSOL YMITANA
PUBLICATIONS or THE HEBREW UNIVERSITY OF JERUSALEM
VOLUME XXXIII
AH, ASSYRIA ...
STUDIES IN ASSYRIAN HISTORY
AND ANCIENT NEAR EASTERN HISTORIOGRAPHY
PRESENTED TO HAYIM TADMOR
EDITED BY
MORDECHAI COGAN AND ISRAEL EPH'AL
THE MAGNES PRESS, THE HEBREW UNIVERSITY, JERUSALEM
\( I t \
CONTENTS
Preface 7
Abbreviations 9
PART ONE
NEO-ASSYRIAN HISTORY
I.M. Diakonoff ,,~ "Y: The Cities of the Medes
Moshe Elat Phoenician Overland Trade within the
Mesopotamian Empires
Israel Eph'al "The Samarian(s)" in the Assyrian Sources
Paul Garelli The Achievement of Tiglath-pileser III:
Novelty or Continuity? 46
, Erie Leichty Esarhaddon's "Letter to the Gods" 52
E. Lipinski The Cypriot Vassals of Esarhaddon 58
Mario Liverani The Trade Network of Tyre according to
Ezek.27 65
l' Nadav Na'aman Forced Participation in Alliances in the Course
© of the Assyrian Campaigns to the West 80
The Magnes Press
'Moshe Weinfeld' Semiramis: Her Name and her Origin 99
The Hebrew University
Jerusalem 1991 Ran Zadok Elements of Aramean Pre-history 104
PART TWO
LITERARY AND HISTORIOGRAPHICAL STUDIES
" Mordechai Cogan A Plaidoyer on behalf of the Royal Scribes 121
? Frederick Mario Fales Narrative and Ideological Variations in the
Account of Sargon's Eighth Campaign
William W. Hallo The Death of Kings: Traditional
Historiography in Contextual Perspective
Tomoo Ishida The Succession Narrative and Esarhaddon's
Apology: A Comparison 166
ISSN 0080-8369
Printed in Israel
at Dar-Noy Press, Jerusalem
Sarah Japhet "History" and "Literature" in the Persian
Period: The Restoration of the Temple 174')
, - /
S.N. Kramer Solomon and '§ulgi: A Comparative Portrait 189
Peter Machinist The Question of Distinctiveness in Ancient
Israel: An Essay 196
PREFACE
Alan R. Millard Large Numbers in the Assyrian Royal
Inscriptions 213
Bustanay Oded "The Command of the God" as a Reason for To mark the occasion of the sixty-fifth birthday of Hayim Tadmor (in November
Going to War in the Assyrian Royal 1988), collegues and friends from East and West have joined together in the
~y present collection of essays which reflect the multi-faceted nature of his scholarly
Inscriptions
work.
A major focus of this work has been the investigation of the ideological patterns
PART THREE
in the Assyrian historical inscriptions. In concluding a recent study, Tadmor
TEXTS AND TEXTUAL STUDIES
noted that
Tsvi Abusch The Ritual Tablet and Rubrics of Maq/{J:
... the formulae we have discussed are thus our best, and sometimes our only
Toward the History of the Series 233
available source for tracing the changing self-image of the Assyrian
Pinbas Artzi Assur-uballit and the Sutians 254 monarch, which in itself is indicative of the changes in the royal court and
among the scribes. In that sense, the new reality they created is of no less
Dietz Otto Edzard Sargon's Report on Kish. A Problem in
significance than the often concealed historical reality which they purport
Akkadian Philology 258
to relate (ARINH, 33).
A. Kirk Grayson Old and Middle Assyrian Royal Inscriptions -
He gave expression here, perhaps instinctively, to one of the central pillars and
Marginalia 264
raison d'elre of his distinguished scholarly career.
Moshe Greenberg Nebuchadnezzar and the Parting of the Ways:
Tadmor is first and foremost a historian. During his early studies at the Hebrew
Ezek. 21:26-27 267
University in Jerusalem, he already concentrated in Bible and History
Jonas C. Greenfield Asylum at Aleppo: A Note on Sfire III, 4-7 272 (1943-1949). At the School of Oriental and African Studies at the University of
London (1951-1952), he began a career-long specialization in Assyriology. After
Thorkild Jacobsen Abstruse Sumerian 279
receiving his PhD in Jerusalem (1955), he pursued postgraduate work at the
Jacob Klein The Coronation and Consecration of '§ulgi in Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago (1955-1957) under the tutelage
the Ekur ('§ulgi G) 292 of Benno Landsberger. Tadmor then returned to Jerusalem, to lecture in Near
Eastern studies and to found the Department of Assyriology at the Hebrew
W.G. Lambert An Unknown King in an Unknown City 314
University, with which he has been associated until the present. He has been a
William L. Moran Assurbanipal's Message to the Babylonians
frequent lecturer at universities in the United States, Canada and in Europe. In
(ABL 301), with an Excursus on Figurative
recognition of his scholarly achievements, he was elected to the Israel Academy of
billu 320
Sciences and Humanities in 1985 and the American Oriental Society in 1986.
Benjamin Mazar Autobiographical Reflections of a University Tadmor ranks as one of the leading authorities on the history of Mesopotamia
Teacher 332 during the first millennium B.C.E. In particular, he has developed models for the
study of the major corpus of that history, the Assyrian royal inscriptions, with a
view towards defining their ideological trends and the techniques of literary
List of Contributors 339
transmission; his models have become the accepted norm for the analysis of these
Bibliography of the Works of Hayim Tadmor 341
documents.
Tadmor's work on ancient historiography integrates both Mesopotamian as
well as biblical sources. Early on, Tadmor recognized the significance of
chronology for understanding the affairs of state and so, he has periodically
8 Preface
returned to refine his system of Biblical Chronology with the aid of extra-biblical
records. He has lavished special attention upon the Assyrian monarch Tiglath
pileser III, during whose reign Israel was first brought under direct Assyrian rule;
in dozens of Vorarbeiten, he consulted the excavator's notebooks in order to
restore the order of the surviving fragmentary texts and now has prepared a
definitive edition of the Inscriptions of Tiglath-pileser II/, in press. His studies of
the history of Israel and its land range from the pre-Monarchic period until the ABBREVIATIONS
Restoration, with special emphasis on the history of the Neo-Assyrian and
Achaemenid empires in the West. In addition to their political aspects, Tadmor
paints a lucid picture of social and cultural trends in Israel and Assyria. Assyriological abbreviations used in this volume are those of The Assyrian Dictionary oJthe Oriental
It is the wish of the contributors and editors of this volume that our jubilarian Instilute oj the University oj Chicago (CAD), vol. S.
will find in it material of interest and relevance to advance his own work. As
Daniel and his friends in their day, "proficient in the writings and language of the AB Anchor Bible
AION Annali dell'istitUio orienta Ii di Napoli
Chaldeans," may he enjoy long and happy years "with knowledge and
AlBA Australian lournal oj Biblical Archaeology
intelligence" in the service of God and man.
ANET J .B. Pritchard (ed.), Ancient Near Eastern Texts Relating to the Old Testament, 3rd cd.,
Princeton 1969
ARRIM Annual Review oj the Royal Inscriptions oj Mesopotamia Project
Hanukka 5751 BA The Biblical Archaeologist
December 1990 BCH Bulletin de correspondance hellenique
BKAT Biblischer Kommentar, Altes Testament
CAH Cambridge Ancient History
CBQ Catholic Biblical Quarterly
CIS Corpus Inscriptlonum Semiticarum
CRAIBL Comptes rendus, Academie des inscriptions et belles-Iellres
CTA A. Herdner, Corpus des tablelles en cune/formes alphabetiques decouvertes II Ras
Shamra-Ugarit de 1929 a 1939, I-II, Paris 1963
EAK Einleitung in die assyrlschen Kanigslnschr/ften
Edzard, SRU D.O. Edzard, Sumerlsche Rechtsurkunden des Ill. lahrtausends aus der Zeit vor der III.
Dynastie von Ur, Milnchen 1968
EI Eretz Israel
FADS Freiburger altorientalische Studien
GaMis Gallinger Miszellen
lANES lournal oj the Ancient Near Eastern Society oj Columbia University
IR lournal oj Religion
ISOT lournal Jar the Study oj the Old Testament
JTS lournal oj Theological Studies
KAI H. Donner-W. RClllig, Kanaanliische und Aramllische Inscrlpten, 1-3, Wiesbaden
1962-1964
KAT Kommentar zum Allen Testament
Kramer, S.N. Kramer, Sumerian Literary Texts Jrom Nlppur in the Museum oj the Ancient
SLTNI Orient at Istanbul, New Haven 1944
KTU M. Dietrich, O. Loretz, J. Sanmartin, Die Kel/alphabetlschen Texte aus Ugarlt,
Neukirchen-Vluyn 1976
Luckenbill, D.O. Luckenbill, Ancient Records oj Assyria and Babylonia, I-II, Chicago
ARAB 1926-1927
MEE Materiali eplgrajici dl Ebla
NL Nimrud Letter
NWL J.V. Kinnier Wilson, The Nlmrud Wine Lists, London 1972
OLP Orlentalia Loveniensia Perlodica
OrAnt Oriens Antlquus
OrSuec Orlentalia Suecana
OTS Oudtestamentische Studien
PAAIR Proceedings oj the American Academy oj lewish Research
PEFQS Palestine Exploration Fund, Quarterly Statement
"b '11'
THE CITIES OF THE MEDES
I.M. DlAKONOFF
Then the king of Assyria invaded all the land and came to Samaria, and for three
years he besieged it. In the ninth year of Hoshea, the king of Assyria captured
Samaria and he carried the Israelites away to Assyria, and placed them in l:Iiilal;1, and
on the l:Iab6r, the river of GOzan, and in the cities of Medes .
... And the king of Assyria brought people from Babylon, Cuthah, 'Awwa, Hamath,
and from Sepharwaim and placed them in the cities of Samaria instead of the people
of Israel; and they took possession of Samaria and dwelt in its cities.
(II Kings 17:5-6, 24)
It is well known that the king who besieged Samaria was Shalmaneser V, and that
the king who took Samaria was Sargon II; and the year was 722 B.C.E.'
It is also known that the resettlement of the subjugated population by the
Assyrian conquerors from their native land to some other far-away part of the
empire did not always immediately follow the conquest. Thus the Israelites were
not deported from Samaria earlier than the year 716/5, because before that the
Assyrian king had no "cities of the Medes" in his power.
It is also known that the displaced population in general was mostly resettled
either in the nuclear part of Assyria, or else removed to a border region where they
could be entrusted with arms because, for the sake of their own safety, they had to
defend their townships against the unconquered population, hostile to Assyria.2
Ijalavba was a district in the nuclear part of Assyria, and as such could also be
regarded, at least by the end of the 8th century B.C.E., the valley of the Ijabllrwith
the city of Gu:mna (modern Tell l;IaIM). But the cities of the Medes were
borderland.
The settlers in the towns of conquered Samaria must also have been deported
from countries recently vanquished by Assyria on some opposite frontier. The
Babylonians and Cutheans were the victims of Sargon's first campaign in 722 or
For brevity's sake, we refer to Luckenbill, ARAB, for the Assyrian sources, not to the original
and newer text editions.
2 For the relation between the two destinations of the deportees see J. Zabtocka, Stosunkl agrarne
w panstwle Sargonlddw, Poznan 1971, chart p. 80. Settlement of captives as frontier guards was
also practised by the Urartians. Thus Argi~ti I resettled the people of tJatti (here: Melitenl!) and
Sophene (probably Proto-Armenians in both cases) to the newly built frontier fortress of Erbune
at the site .of modern Erevan, see I.M. Diakonoff, Pre-History of the Armenian People, Delmar
N.Y. 1985, 86. The attestations of this practice in Assyria are quite numerous.
14 I. M. Diakonoff The Cities of the Medes 15
721; the Hamathaeans, in 721120; the identification of 'A wwa and Sepharwaim is Sefid-riid Valley, and in 820 this king undertook a new campaign against the
stiIl a crux, but they must obviously also be sought in the countries conquered in Medes (Madai). After receiving tribute from ljubu~kia (near modern Hakkari)
and the different tribes in the region of Manna (south of Lake Urmia) and in
Sargon's early years.
In the 9th-8th centuries B.C.E., the term Madai was not applied to the whole of Parsua (around Sulaimaniye), ~am~I-Adad crossed the passes of Gizilbunda
the country that was to be called Media after the tribal revolt against Esarhaddon (modern Kafelan-Kiih). Against stubborn resistance, he marched through the
in the 670's, and the creation of the Median kingdom under X~aerita lands of Gizilbunda, Madai (the latter apparently headed by one ljana~iruka,
(= Phraortes), and then of the Median Empire under Huvax~era (= Cyaxares).3 chief of Sagbitu, or BIt-Sagbat) and of Arazia~ (which is probably to be located
The term Amadai (later Madai) first occurs in the days of Shalmaneser III, when near modern Hamadan). Nearly thirty chieftains of the local population in Madai
the Assyrian king led a campaign in 834 into Namar in the Diyala Valley (which and Parsua, as well as in what later was Manna, brought propitiatory gifts to the
was entered from BIt-ljamban in the north-east of Namar), and then into Parsua. conqueror. In this case, as well as in many similar instances, the pre-Iranian
The latter term means "borderland" in Old Iranian,4 and was applied to different proper names and toponyms stiIl prevail, although with time the Iranian element
"marches" of the Iranian-speaking massif. The Parsua which Shalmaneser III became stronger. The land was then stiIl "Qutian," however with a rising
entered in 834 has nothing whatever to do (except the name "borderland" itself) percentage of an Iranian-speaking population.7
with Parsa, modern Fars, the homeland of the Persians; no migration from Parsua Under Adad-nerarI III, no less than nine Assyrian campaigns were directed
to Pars is attested, and Persians, no doubt, already lived in Fars in the 9th century towards the north-east and east between 809 and 788. An inscription, to be dated
B.C.E.s From Parsua, which must have lain somewhere around modern 802, shows that the Assyrians claimed to have conquered Ellipi (south of modern
Sulaimaniye, Shalmaneser crossed a mountain pass into the land of Messi situated Kirman~ah, later Elymais, not to be confused with Elam = Susiana), ljarbar,
apparently in the upper reaches of the Jaghatu river, and from there, across Arazias (around Hamadan), Messi, the land of the Medes, "all" of Gizilbunda,
another pass, he turned eastwards and entered the land of AmadEii, probably Manna ("Mj.lnna"), Parsud, Allabria (on the upper reaches of the Lesser Zab),
situated in the upper reaches of the Sefid-riid (Qizil-uzen) Valley, or to the south Abdadana-unto Andia and apparently the Caspian Sea: all these countries being
of it, and including, among others, the districts of Aranzias and ljarliar.6 summarized as "Nai'ri."8 Note that ljarbar and Arazia~ are here not included in
Under ~am~I-Adad V, the Assyrians may have reached the Caspian along the the territory of the Medes: they were the borderland between the Medes proper
and the aboriginal population of the Zagros, who might have belonged to the
Qutians or Hurrians, or some other non-Iranian tribes.
3 I.M. D'jakonov, Istorla Mldll, Leningrad-Moscow 1956, 88; see also I.M. Diakonoff in
This was the sum total of the Assyrian advance to the east in the second part of
Cambridge History of Iran, II, Cambridge 1984.
4 Along with Median *Parsava-"Parsufi in the Zagros" and *Ptirsa "Ffirs" (also a "Median", not the 9th century. However, all these regions were lost to Assyria when the civil war
«
Persian form), cf. also Persian ParOava *Parsava) "Parthia", the Parsli somewhere north of broke out at the end of the reign of Adad-nerarI III.
Media and, according to G. Morgenstierne, the PaJltJ "Afghans" « *Parsva-). See J. Pokorny,
The first half of the 8th century B.C.E. was a difficult period in the internal
Indogermanlsches Etymologlsches Worterbuch, s.v. *perk'-. Grantovsky's etymology ("those
who have strong sides/ribs") does not seem satisfactory. history of Assyria; Manna and the neighboring countries as far as Namar9 were
5 The first reference to Parsaw/maJ "Ffirs" in cuneiform inscriptions is attested under !;am§r being harassed by the Urartian kings, but the Medes west of the Gizilbunda
Adad Vat the end of the 9th century (KAH 142); cf. ABL 1309; then it is mentioned in the annals
mountains enjoyed a respite. A new Assyrian advance began in 744 under Tiglath
of Sennacherib under 689 (the battle ofljalule), and by A§§urbanipal in 639 (E.F. Weidner, "Die
iilteste Nachricht tiber das persische Kllnigshaus," AfO 7 (1930-1932), 1-7. In all cases the term pileser III when the king invaded Parsud and turned it into an Assyrian province
is used with the typical Elamite -J used for Iranian names and proper names of the -if (also known as Nikur, after its capital). The chronology of Tiglath-pileser's reign
declinations. The context in all cases does not allow an identification with the country (not tribe!)
needs elucidation, but possibly in the same year the Assyrians made a raid farther
of Parsufi in the Zagros near Sulaimaniye. The latter cannot be identified with Paswe in Iranian
to the east, reaching Arazias, and a Median fortress, Zakriiti. Moreover, Tiglath
Azerbaijan (according to V.F. Minorsky): it is localized near Sulail)1aniye because it bordered
upon Namar in the Diyala Valley, and upon Allabria, Messi, Surdira and other districts pileser demanded that in the whole country of the mighty Medes as far as Mt.
gravitating towards Manna. A district and fortress Bu§tu(§) (not to be confused with a namesake Bikni (Demavend), the "lords of townships" (- Iran. vispali, dahyupali) should
much farther to the east) lay in Parsufi according to the Vrartian king Argi§ti I's annals (under
pay him regular tribute of nine metric tons of lapis lazuli and 15 tons of bronze
year 6), but in Manna according to Shalmaneser III, cf. ARAB I, 588, cf.lI, 851. There is no
evidence of a migration of the inhabitants of Parsud in the Zagros to Fdrs; cf. note II below. artifacts, an order which the Medes could not possibly fulfil.
However, the Assyrian texts before Shalmaneser III do not know a country Parsufi at all, and Tiglath-pileser also organized another province in 744, BIt-ljamban (= Iran.
what later belonged to Parsufi seems to have belonged to Outer Zamua (Inner Zamufi belonged
apparently to the later Land of Manna). The use of this Median appellation for this country
("borderland") seems to point to a movement of the Iranian Medes towards this region not later
than the 9th century B.C.E. Incidentally, Genesis 10 knows of the Cimmerians (and their 7 The First Nimrud Slab, ARAB I, 739.
"descendants" the Scythians) and of Media as an important country, but has no idea of 8 This was a vague term for northern, north-western and north-eastern mountainous countries,
Persia-a certain sign of a late 7th-early 6th century date. with no particular ethnic or political connotations.
6 The Monolith Inscription, ARAB I, 718ff. 9 Probably it was actually Namar which is meant by Babllu- in the Urartian inscriptions.
16 I. M. Diakonoff The Cities of the Medes 17
Kampanda[?j, south of the middle reaches of the Diyala). Both Bit-t1amban and officially renamed Kar-Sarrukfn; we have some letters from its governor at the
Parsua continued to be integral parts of the Assyrian Empire until its fall.1O time, Mannu-kf-Ninua (ABL 126-129,645, 1645; cf. also ABL 556).
For the year 738(1) the annals of Tiglath-pileser mention the deportation of Turning the Jjarbar district into an Assyrian province induced the popUlation
"Qutians" (the local aboriginal population of the still not-Iranized valleys of the to immediate revolt; possibly they expected the usual deportation to other
Zagros), and of BH-Sangi,11 and their settlement in northern Syria and northern countries, and settlement of newcomers in Jjarbar. The revolt spread to the
Phoenicia, at that time a frontline zone. These displaced persons were no doubt neighboring provinces of BH-Jjamban and Namar, but was put down by Sargon,
taken captive during the campaign of 744; among the numerous ethnic groups who then exiled many people. The city of Jjarbar was strongly fortified. Both
listed (no less obscure than the 'Awwites and the Sepharwaites of II Kings), there fortresses, Ki~essu and Jjarbar, are depicted on the reliefs of Dur-Sarrukfn and
are also mentioned the Budians, who (if the reading is correct) could be preserved in Botta's and Flandin's reproductions.
inhabitants of Budu on the border between Babylonia and Elam, or Boudioi, one Thus, in the Zagros region and in the Land of Medes, the Assyrians created five
of the Median tribes named by Herodotus. provinces, Zamua, Parsua, Bft-Jjamban, Ki~essu, and Jjarbar. Although deep
Yet another Assyrian campaign to the land of the Medes took place in 737(1), raids into the Iranian Highland continued throughout the reigns of the
but it did not result in any permanent conquest or organization of any new succeeding Assyrian kings, the administrative boundaries of the Assyrian empire
Assyrian provinces, in spite of a statement to the contrary in one of Tiglath were never moved eastwards beyond these five provinces. 13 However, apparently
12
pileser's inscriptions, the most boastful and least dependable of them all. under Sennacherib, the provinces of Ki~essu and Jjarbar were subdivided into
The next Assyrian king was Shalmaneser V, but in his reign there were no raids smaller units (known from the texts of the time ofEsarhaddon and A~urbanipal).
into Media. Ki~essu was subdivided into Ki~essu proper and Madai, and Jjarbar was
Sargon II marched to the east for the first time in 719 in order to give support to subdivided into Jjarbar proper, Saparda, and BH-Kari; the latter being probably
Iranzu, a king of Manna allied to Assyria, and then again in 716. By that time identical with Kar-Ka~~i.14 In these provinces, cut out of the Land of the Medes,
Iranzu was dead, and his son Aza had been killed by his anti-Assyrian vassals. the power of the Assyrian governors outside of the fortified towns was precarious,
Sargon acted immediately, using the most cruel repressions and putting Azii's the countryside paying allegiance to their own "lords of townships." It was the
brother Ullusunu on the throne of Manna; Ullusunu, however, was incited by revolt of these (X~aarita, or Ka~taritu, in Kar-Kam, *Vahmyatar~i, or
anti-Assyrian forces to a fresh rebellion and had to make overtures to Urartu. Mamitiar~u, in Madai, and Dusanni in Saparda) which brought about the fall of
Sargon was still in the field; he crushed the rebels, and Ullusunu, who had acted the Assyrian domination in Media in the late 670's, and the creation of the Median
against his better judgement, was reinstated as king of Manna. The former kingdom by X~aarita, or Phraortes.
Assyrian province Zamua (Outer Zamua), east of Arbela and Arrapbe (Kirkuk), Thus Media proper, "the cities of Medes," corresponded to the provinces of
was now extended to the north-east. Kiir-Kam (Bft-Kari), Madai and Saparda, which, in their turn, had been parts of
After these actions, Sargon continued his march to the east. He took the the original Assyrian provinces of Ki~essu and Jjarbar in the late 8th century.
important fortress ofKi~essu on the upper reaches of the Sefid-rud (its ruler bore a For the year 721, Sargon's annals mention the resettling ofBabylonians "[to the
Babylonian name, which was not quite uncommon in these regions at the time), as land] of Jjatti".ls Now Jjatti in official Assyrian parlance of the 8th century
well as a number of neighboring townships. In the next year, Ki~essu was made the B.C.E. was any country west of the Euphrates; thus, for Sennacherib, his
center of a new Assyrian province. campaign of 701 against Jerusalem, was directed "to Jjatti."16
Some of the Median population, cut off from Urartu and Manna by Sargon's For the year 716/5, the Cyprus Stele of Sargon mentions that after the
conquests, tried to ally themselves with Ellipi, the half-Iranized kingdom near inhabitants of conquered Jjarbar had been deported, men of lands conquered by
modern Kirman~ah; Harhar, which had expelled its former chief(with the archaic this king were settled there.17 The conquests ofSargon's early years were: Samaria
w w
name Kibaba), was taken by Sargon, and in the following year the fortress became 722, Babylonia 721, Hamath 720, Manna 719, ~inubtu in Asia Minor 718, and
the center of yet another new Assyrian province, Jjarbar, which also included Carchemish 717.
Aranze~u (= Arazia~) and a number of other Median districts. The fortress was
13 Of course, there were attempts (e.g., under Esarhaddon) to put certain Median chieftains under
IO Cf. ABL 165; ADD 952:3. Also Ki§essu, as well as Ni[kur] (m Parsuli), still belonged to an oath of allegiance to the Assyrian king, but this did not affect the boundaries of provinces
AUurbanipal; see E. Forrer, Die Provinzeintellung des assyrischen Reiches, Leipzig 1921,52. actually administered by Assyrian governors.
II BTl-Sangi (BIl-Sangibilti, not to be confused with Sangibiltu near Lake Urmia, nor with Sagbitu 14 It is clear that Saparda, Madai and BH-Kiiri (~ Kar-Ka§§i?) were cut out of the provinces of
or Brt-Sagbat in K.i§essu, Media) lay probably near Khanikin. It is a dynastic, not properly a Ki§essu and tJarbar, but it is not certain which of the newer provinces was cut out of which of the
place name. It is first mentioned by Shalmaneser III in connection with the Namar campaign of two older provinces.
834, then by Tiglath-pileser in 744 and 737(7) apparently as a city-state in Parsua; in 715 by 15 ARAB II, 4.
Sargon in the district oftJarbar; in 706, in connection with the revolt ofNib'e in Ellipi (ABL 174). 16 ARAB II, 239-240.
12 The Second Nimrud Slab of Tiglath-pileser, ARAB 1,811. 17 ARAB II, 183.
18 I. M. Diakonoff The Cities of the Medes 19
Now the Babylonians and Hamatheans were settled in Samaria; the inhabitants Deportation of this sort can be seen on several 7th-century reliefs from Kuyunjik,
of the cities conquered in Manna were also settled in Damascus "in the land of and this is the kind of deportation which was, somewhat optimistically, described
Hatti;"18 no deportations seem to have been made in Sinu~tu. Thus, only Samaria by the Rab-shakeh ofSennacherib to Hezekiah's subjects: "Thus says the king of
;nd Carchemish are left; it was either the Israelites or the inhabitants of Assyria: make your agreement of mercy (i1:J,:J) with me, and come out to me; then
Carchemish who were deported to ljar~ar. The testimony of II Kings shows every one of you will eat of his own vine, and everyone of his fig tree, and every
conclusively that the former were meant, but perhaps the latter as well. one of you will drink the water of his own cistern; until I come and take you away
Thus the "~ "Y of the Bible are tIar~ar and its neighboring townships.ljarbar to a land like your own land, a land of grain and wine, a land of bread and
is thought to have been the same as Karatiar, a Hurrian city-state of the third vineyards, a land of olive trees and of honey, that you may live and not die .....
millennium B.C.E., near enough to Mesopotamia to have been included into the (II Kings 18:31-32; Isa. 36: 16-17).
great border district headed by the ruler of Lagas in the latter part of the Ur III The deportation of the Israelites, however, took place a generation earlier, at a
period. In Assyrian times, the neighbors of ljar~ar were, to the east and north, time when Assurna:?irpal's methods were probably not quite forgotten, and the
Kisessu (and later Madai and possibly Kar-Kassl), to the south-east, Ellipi, to the land to which they were brought was not as attractive as all that. First of all, it was
south-west and west, apparently the Assyrian provinces of Bit-ljamban and a front-line country which had to be defended by arms for the benefit of the
Parsua. This places ljar~ar somewhere to the west of the Hamadan-Kirmansah Assyrian king. Moreover, a land populated by the deportees automatically
line. It probably belonged to the districts later called Syromedia (by Ptolemy VI, became royal land, and the new population became royal "settlers" (saknu), Aaot
Vi), surely on account of its population being partly semitized. pacrLAtlw{, to use the Hellenistic expression, and were not proprietors of their
land. People from different countries and of different tongues were intermixed
'"
It is well known that the subsequent history of the "ten tribes" has been the subject here. Thus, in ljar~ar there would surely have been, beside the Israelites, people of
of the wildest conjectures in antiquity, in the Middle Ages, and up to modern Iranian tongue, Aramaeans, "Qutians," Assyrians, and possibly Luwians from
times.19 But it is a safe guess that they merged with the mass of the Aramaic and Carchemish. A cadastre was made of the population and its means of sustenance.
Iranian speaking population of the Assyrian Empire and soon lost their identity. Cf., e.g., in the "ljarran Doomsday Book" the cadastre of the (childless I)
In the history of the early Near Eastern empires, beginning with the first of Aramaic Gambuleans deported there in the 7th century B.C.E. from the lower
them, the Assyrian, we can discern two types of displacement of the captive non reaches of the Tigris.20
combatant population. Under such conditions the only reasonable way to survive was to find a
The first type: Most of the population, and especially those who either were common language with the other settlers (that would obviously have been
responsible for the resistance or were unable to survive the deportation, were Aramaic); to intermarry (a number of Israelite women would probably have been
slaughtered in various ways; the rest were led away taking nothing with them, taken away and sold by the soldiers); to serve the king of Assyria as para-military
often naked, often in shackles, sometimes mutilated or blinded. We see such frontier guards; and to do the forced labor required by the empire. It is most
deportation depicted on Shalmaneser Ill's Gates of Balawat. This type of important to remember that the Israelite exiles to tIar~ar had not listened even to
treatment of non-combatant captives was typical of the reigns of Assurna:?irpal the First Isaiah, let alone the Second Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel. For them,
and Shalmaneser III, but was discontinued after the first campaigns of Tiglath although their God must have been considered the great tribal god of Israel who
pileser III-not, of course, for humanitarian reasons, but because the Assyrians had settled them in the Promised Land, the idea had not yet prevailed, that the
could no longer afford to completely lay waste the lands which were to bring gods of other tribes were not the lords of their particular countries, but were to be
income into their treasury. identified with the stuff of which their images were made; it was but natural to
The second type: The populationi was deported, mostly on foot - though carts worship the deities of the new country where one had been settled. This was just
were also used-but in their own clothes and with a small food supply. what the Babylonians, Cutheans and Hamatheans did in Samaria; they
apparently tried to keep their own deities, too, but the author of II Kings does not
18 Ibid., ARAB II, 56. even know their correct names. The same must have happened to the "ten tribes."
19 One is, of course, reminded of the LaHer Day Saints. One of the aspirants to being descendants of Was not one of the followers of Ezra (2:2; Neh. 7:7) even called Mordecai (=
the "ten tribes" are the Tats, an Iranian speaking group in the USSR, on the border between
Mardukdia)? The cults of Marduk and mar are attested for the Zagros and even
Daghestan and Azerbaijan. The Tats are descendants of the military seUlers brought from Iran
by the Sasanian kings to guard the Derbend Pass from the Khazars and other Turkic peoples and for Transcaucasia in the 8th-6th centuries, and would it not have been deemed
tribes; their language is akin to Persian and certainly a descendant of Middle Persian. Some of misplaced to found a sanctuary to the God of Israel in the midst of an entirely
the Tats are Sunni Moslems, and some are of the Judaic persuasion, but, like many peripheral
different country? The "ten tribes" had no experience of a diaspora, and the
Jewish groups, they lack the Talmudic tradition, and may have been converted by the Qaraite
Khazars; like the Qaraites, they usually do not identify themselves as Jews; they bury their dead synagogue had not yet been invented.
in the same cemeteries as the Moslem Tats. 20 F.M. Fales. Cellsimenli, No. 21 = Johns, Doomsday Book, 63.
20 I. M. Diakonoff
Because of all this, the "ten tribes" were doomed to assimilation among the
Aramaic and Iranian speaking mass of the popUlation ofthe Assyrian empire. The
Israelites of the "ten tribes," described by the patently Judaic Book of Tobit and
other late texts as still prospering in the Median Empire, are phantoms in the
PHOENICIAN OVERLAND TRADE WITH1N THE
author's imagination.
The Babylonian exile of Judah belonged to the second type of deportation; and MESOPOTAMIAN EMPIRES
actually the conditions were more favorable than in the case of the "ten tribes'"
w~re
they very much as described by the Rab-shakeh in II Kings and Isaiah. The
MOSHE ELAT
Judaeans were not deported to a devastated frontline country. Not everybody was
deported: the first to be exiled were "(the king) Jehoiachin ... , and his mother, and
his servants ... and all the princes, and all the mighty men of valor - ten thousand
captives-and all the craftsmen and smiths" (II Kings 24: 12-14). It seems that the
Assyrian rule in Phoenicia began in 738 B.C.E.I It lasted until the Assyrians
Babylonians were not interested in resettling the poor of the Y'Nil ell, who were
withdrew from the countries west of the Euphrates sometime between
many times as numerous. This means that Nebuchadnezzar did not want manual
Assurbanipal's last recorded campaign to the west around 640,2 and his death in
workers, nor men who could serve as privates in the army. It is true that the
629 or 627 B.C.E.3 In contrast with most of the other kingdoms in Syria and
general N~ba-zer-iddin led away also "the rest of the people who were left in the
Palestine which were conquered and eliminated, the Phoenician kingdoms of
city, and the deserters who had deserted to the king of Babylon, with the rest of the
Tyre, Byblos and Arvad continued to exist during Assyrian rule. In fact, their
multitude" (II Kings 25: II), but they were not so much inhabitants of the
survival persisted through the period between the Assyrian retreat and
countryside as they were of the city of Jerusalem.
Nebuchadnezzar's victorious campaigns to Syria and Palestine in 605 and 604
There certainly must have been losses during the deportation, especially among
B.C.E.4 and beyond, even into the period of Babylonian and Persian domination
the children (hence Ps. 137:9). But we know that Jehoiachin was kept as hostage at
of Phoenicia. Only the kingdom of Sidon was destroyed in a late phase of Assyrian
the king's court, and received sustenance from the palace (which was more than
domination (677(7) B.C.E.), but it was re-established in the inter-imperial period
could be said of many a king captured by the Assyrians). Nobody was enslaved,
or early in the reign of Nebuchadnezzar. In an oracle relating to the 4th year of
and it is probable that the "men of valor" and the "craftsmen and smiths" were
Zedekiah (Jer. 28: I; 594 B.C.E.), Jeremiah mentions a "king of Sidon" (Jer.
not being ill treated, at least according to the notions of the time: they had kept
27:2-28: 16), and a king of Sidon is enumerated among the vassal-kings in an
their harps to hang upon the willows by the rivers of Babylon (Ps.137)1 The fate of
inscription of Nebuchadnezzar II (see pp. 29-31).
most deportees in modern times has been considerably worse. Note, too, that
The special status of the Phoenician kingdoms within the Mesopotamian
completely impoverished groups of people could not have undertaken the costly
empires, and in particular within the Assyrian from which we have the bulk of the
return journeys under Zerubbabel and Ezra.
documentary information, becomes obvious when compared with the status of
The book of Ezra states that the edict of Cyrus contained a provision to the
their neighbors. It is also evident in imperial economic policy toward the
following effect: "And let each survivor, in whatever place he sojourns, be assisted
Phoenician kingdoms as opposed to the other vassal states.
by the men of his place with silver and gold, with goods and with beasts, besides
According to inscriptions and documents of the Neo-Assyrian empire, the
the freewill offerings for the house ofYHWH God ofIsrael..." (Ezra 1:4), and that
importation of commodities to Assyria from vassal kingdoms was, in fact, carried
" ... all who were about them aided them ... " (Ezra I :6). In the context, it looks as if
out by the transfer of articles from the vassal lands as tribute (bi/tu, maddatu, and
the local Babylonians were ordered to help the repatriates. But even if that were
bi/tu (u) maddatu) and obligatory presents (ntlmurtu).s The tribute lists in the royal
true, the repatriates could hardly rely on the Babylonians' charity alone (or even
inscriptions usually recorded: precious and basic metals; luxury commodities that
on the charity of their compatriots whom they left behind), especially since the
had been stored in the treasuries of the vassal kings and which were the chief items
exact amount of the help required was apparently not stated.
of international trade in the ancient Near East; horses for the Assyrian cavalry;
But, of course, the whole socio-psychological situation was here quite different
from that of the 8th century, and the repatriation was viewed as a great religious
duty. Note that neither Zerubbabel nor Ezra made any attempt to find the "ten
Rost, Tlgi. III, 26:150-157; H. Tadmor, Serlpla Hlerosolymllana 8 (1961), 232-271; M.
tribes" and to repatriate them, although some of their descendants may have still
Weippert, ZDPfl89 (1973), 26-53.
kept their identity, if not in Media, then perhaps in Ijala~ba or in Guzana. But 2 Streck, Asb., 80 ii 115-128.
most of them must have irrevocably merged with the local population, and 3 R. Borger, WZKM 55 (1959), 69-76; W. von Soden, ZA 58 (1967), 60-70.
anyway may not have been esteemed religiously worth redeeming. 4 Grayson, Chronicles, no. 5: 12-23.
5 For these terms, see W.J. Martin, SIOr 8/1 (1936); Postgate, Taxallon, 111-130, 146-162.
22 Moshe £Iat Phoenician Overland Trade 23
chariot units (the chariots plus their horses); and weapons. In a later period, in the (a) References to international trade activities in Assyrian royal inscriptions
tributes imposed on Arab princes, dromedaries were also included.6 and letters;
This compulsory one-way flow of commodities out of subjugated countries and (b) The Assyrian letter ABL 347 written to an unidentified Assyrian king;
into Assyria was often referred to in the written sources-royal inscriptions, royal (c) Babylonian commercial documents from the fifth and sixth years of
correspondence and administrative tablets. On the other hand, no documents Nabonidus and the seventh year of Cyrus II, sources which, in his opinion, could
referring to overland commercial trade within the empire have been found in any provide retrospective evidence for overland trade in the eighth and seventh
of the archives-royal, temple or private.7 A few AssrJ.!an records testify to centuries, as well;
Babylonian trade with Elam, and the Arabian Peninsula.,!},lnd to Assyrian trade (d) The Northwest Semitic name of the rab tamkiir sarri, "the overseer
with the Anatolian PeninslIla9 and with Arabs inhabiting the deserts along the merchant of the king" in the court of Nebuchadnezzar.
borders of the Fertile Crecent.1O As to point (a), I have discussed thoroughly those references to international
The complete absence of international trade records, in contrast to massive trade in the records of the Assyrian empire, in a study entitled "Assyrian
documentation for the coerced import of commodities from subjugated countries Imperialism and International Trade" which will be published in a forthcoming
has been interpreted by several scholars as reflecting Assyrian economic policy issue of Assur. In that article, I also treated all the personal names of the tamkiiru
toward these countries (see above, note 6). However, the few references to known from documents of this period, 54 in all. It is evident from them that
overland trade appearing in several inscriptions and letters led A.L. Oppenheim Aramean names formed a considerable portion (22 or 23) but not the majority,
to maintain that the one-way enforced flow of commodities into Assyria was and that this probably correctly reflects the percentage of Arameans among the.(
nothing more than a religious expression of the attitude of the god Assur toward population of the major Assyrian cities in general.
countries and peoples conquered by him. But Oppenheim claimed that in reality, A further conclusion of that paper is that overland trade did exist within the
~ overland trade within the Assyrian empire flourished. He explained the lack of empire but the economic relations between Assyria and Phoenicia and other parts
commercial import documents by suggesting that overland trade was conducted of Syria and Palestine were conducted and controlled by the Assyrian state.
~ by Arameans and Phoenicians who wrote in their own languages and not in Imperial commercial activities were concentrated in regions bordering the desert
Akkadian. Moreover, they wrote on papyrus and parchment, both perishable or the sea, open frontiers which the Assyrians were unable to control or to cross by
materials, particularly in the climatic conditions of Mesopotamia and the Levant. themselves. In order to have commodities pass through there, they were (.
Support for his hypotheses, expounded in several of his studies, I I is as follows: dependent on the Arabs or the Phoenicians and the Philistines.
Points (c) and (d) will be discussed further on in this paper (see pp. 30-35).
I shall comment on point (b) now. Oppenheim called this letter "commercial,"
6 I.M. Diakonoff in The Third International Cotiference ofe conomic History, Bayerlsche Akademle
der Wlssenschaften (Munich 1965), Paris 1969,24-28; N.B. Jankowska in I.M. Diakonoff(ed.), and further claimed that "its background is clearly commercial. "12 There is no
Ancient Mesopotamia, Moscow 1969, 13-32; M. Elat, economic Relations Between the Lands of proof for such a statement. The letter indeed includes a list of Phoenician and L
the Bible, c. 1000-539 B.C., Jerusalem 1977 (henceforth Elat, economic Relations), 29-97 Egyptian commodities (rev. 5-10), but there is no hint that these commodities
(Hebrew); idem, RAI 28 (1982), 144-151.
7 For economic documents in Neo-Assyrian archives, see R. Borger, HKL III, 50. See also S. were imported into Assyria by purchase, as presumed by Oppenheim. Th~y co~ld
Dalley and J.N. Postgate, The Tabletsfrom Fort Shalmaneser, London 1984; J.N. Postgate, NA have been IlC,qllired as booty, tribute and obligatory presents from vassal
Leg Docs.; F.M. Fales, ZA 69 (1979), 192-216; idem, 73 (1983), 232-254; P. Garelli, RAI 30 kingdoms in Philistia and Phoenicia who themselves traded with Egypt, as is
Yes (1986), 223-236; O. Pedersen, Archives and Libraries In the City of Assur, II, Uppsala 1986. known from other sources.1J
Documents discussed in my article to be published in Assur 5, 5-9 (in press).
9 Commercial import of slaves by tamkt1rus: ABL 602 rrom Tabal, and slaves rrom Kummub
according to an unpublished document rrom Nimrud, J .N. Postgate, Mesopotamia 7 (1978),206;
Phoenicia and Assyria
rrom the same country, ,l'allu-Ieather was also imported, K 954 ADD 812: 13-15. A transcription
g
and translation or the text may be round in JESHD 30( 1987), 240. Five business letters, written
The main sectors of the Phoenician economy were industry and applied art, which
on lead strips in Luwian hierogliphic, may also point to commercial relations with Asia Minor.
These letters were found in a private house in Assur in a Late-Assyrian context; cr. P. Merrigi, were based partly on imported raw materials and exported finished products, the
AfD 10 (1935-1936), 133ff., 25Iff.; O. Pedersen, op. cit. (above, note 7), 98r. sale of wood from Lebanon, and the transit trade of metals and luxury items that
cr.
10 ABL 262:7-14; C.J. Gadd, Iraq 16 (1954), 42-49. Assur 5,9-10 (in press). arrived from faraway countries. A greater part of that trade was carried out by sea
II A.L. Oppenheim, JNES 19 (1960), 146; idem, Ancient Mesopotamia, Chicago 1964,93-95; idem,
in The Third International COliference of Economic History (Munich 1965), Paris 1969, 36ff.; transport. The best description of the extent ofTyrian trade is given in Ezekiel 27
idem, JCS 21 (1969),236-254; idem in H.D. Lasswell, D. Lerner, H. Speier (cds.), Propaganda
and Communication In World History, I, Honolulu 1979, 123-124. His view was accepted by 12 JCS 21 (1969),246 and 248, note 64.
many scholars, cr. W.F. Leemans, RLA 4, 87-88; idem, Iraq 39 (1977), 6; J.N. Postgate, 13 cr. ABL 568 Postgate, Taxatloll, 283r.; ND 2672: 1-31; Ibid., 387fr. For the Egyptian origin or
Mesopotamia 7 (1978), 205-206; S. Frankenstein, Ibid., 269-273; J. Pe(!(rkovl1, in H. Klengel commoditiesg in these documents, see A.L. Oppenheim, JCS 21 (1969),245-246; M. Elat, JADS
(ed.), Gesellschqft und Kultur 1m alten Vorderaslen, Berlin 1982,206-207. 98 (1978), 30-32.