VOL IV VOL II VOL I An Assyrian king, probably Sargon. Source: V. The Neo-Assyrian Empire was constructed over a period of about years from the late 10th to the late 7th centuries BCE by powerful kings.
The number of Neo-Assyrian geographical names is enormous, approximately ! Can these places be localized? How can ancient places be localized in the first place?
Source: A. The Assyrian kings campaigned almost every year in all directions and the accounts of their military achievements were recorded in long and detailed cuneiform inscriptions. These royal inscriptions, in some cases hidden under the foundation of palaces and temples, in other cases visible on the palace walls, mention a great number of cities, countries, rivers and mountains traversed or conquered by the Assyrian army. Furthermore, place, river and mountain names are also attested in a great number of written sources from the daily life, such as royal letters, legal and economic documents, and administrative texts.
In addition, wall reliefs that decorated the Assyrian palaces are the visual version of the royal inscriptions.
They show conquered cities placed in different geographical settings, in some cases with captions identifying them, as well as different landscapes. Historical geography is the discipline dedicated to the study of ancient geographical names. Its main goal is the identification of the ancient toponyms, and, in the best case, to put them on a map.
The method of the historical geographer combines three different approaches: the philological, the archaeological and the geographical approach.
Starting with the information of the original written sources, he must consider the results of archaeological excavations and regional surveys and know the modern physical geography of the involved region.
The roots of the historical geography from the Ancient Near East go back to the very beginnings of Assyriology and even earlier, as scholars and adventurers travelled to the Middle East at the beginning of the 19th century searching for places mentioned in the Hebrew Bible.
The discovery and decipherment of Assyrian royal inscriptions in the middle of the same century boosted even more the interest of scholars. One of the first scientific works concerning the Assyrian and Babylonian place names was published in by one of the founders of Assyriology, the German scholar Friedrich Delitzsch, with the suggestive title Wo lag das Paradies? The kingdom of Assyria emerged as a major regional power in the second millennium BCE; however, it was in the early first millennium BCE that the Assyrians expanded their realm into a huge empire, covering much of the Middle East.
King Ashurbanipal BCE presides over the last great phase of the Assyrian empire, but fails to hold on to Egypt. The ancient kingdom of Assyria was located in present-day northern Iraq.
It bordered eastern Syria and south- eastern Asia Minor. It covered the most northerly portion of the Mesopotamian plain, with the river Tigris flowing through it. The land was flanked to the north and east by the Zagros mountains, to the west and south by desert. The climate of northern Mesopotamia is cooler than in southern Mesopotamia, and the levels of rainfall higher. This means that irrigation is not essential to farming, though, as with agriculture in many parts of the world, it does allow more intensive farming than would otherwise be the case.
Assyria belonged to the world of ancient Mesopotamia. However, whilst steeped in Mesopotamian culture from early times, Assyrian society developed some distinct features of its own. Its exposed position — bordering as it did lands of warlike mountain peoples and desert tribesmen — meant that its people developed a strong military tradition. This enabled them to survive periods of invasion, and then to conquer the largest empire world history had yet seen.
At its height this empire stretched from Egypt to the Persian Gulf, taking in the areas covered by the modern countries of Israel, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, plus parts of Jordan, Turkey, Armenia and Iran on the way. Assyrian was an integral part of the ancient Mesopotamian world, and had come increasingly under the influence of Sumerian civilization from the 4th millennium onwards.
It shrank to a fraction of its former size. However, by the mid-9th century Assyria was on the the offensive again, and little more than a century later had conquered an empire covering all Mesopotamia and Syria , plus parts of Asia Minor , Palestine , Iran, and the Taurus and Zagros regions. For more than a hundred years the Assyrian empire dominated the Middle East , before crashing down to destruction at the end of the 7th century.
Click here for more on the history of the Assyrian empire. As with all Mesopotamian states, Assyria was a monarchy; the king was the divinely-appointed, all-powerful ruler of the Assyrian people. He was the chief lawmaker, the chief administrator, and above all, the commander-in-chief of the Assyrian army.
The king was surrounded by a large court of ministers, officials and servants. His chief ministers included a chief of the army and a chancellor, who probably headed the large administrative staff. There were also palace officials who ran the huge royal household, buildings and grounds. The bulk of royal officials will have been recruited from the Assyrian aristocracy; some, however, came from humble, even slave, origins. A large number of palace officials, as with many Eastern courts, were eunuchs.
The act of castrating a man theoretically freed him to serve the interests of the king alone, not those of his relations. A vast flow of correspondence reached the palace from all over the Assyrian realm, and beyond; an staff of scribes would have been needed to deal with this, and senior officials and ministers would have had the responsibility of deciding which matters required the attention of the king himself.
It is apparent that the great line of kings who ruled Assyria in its pomp dealt with all important matters of state personally, and probably a great deal more besides. The Assyrian monarchy was, again like all Mesopotamian monarchies, hereditary, from father to son. Things did not always work out as smoothly as this suggests, however see below. The area of the Middle East dominated by Assyria was divided into the Assyrian homeland, the kingdom of Assyria, and a much larger area.
In earlier times this was covered by vassal kingdoms, but later much of it was governed directly from the Assyrian court through provincial governors. At the center if not geographically, certainly politically and socially stood the Assyrian homeland. Here was located the Assyrian capital, with its magnificent palaces, parks and temples. The original capital, Ashur, was also the center of the worship of the chief god of the same name, and long after it had ceased to be the center of government was revered as a holy city.
Nineveh was the capital of the Assyrian empire at the time of its heyday, and as such was certainly one of the largest cities in the world at that time. The Assyrians were farmers, like all pre-industrial peoples.
All land theoretically belonged to the king, and in reality the king did indeed own vast estates. A landed aristocracy also controlled much land, however; and through holding local public office these probably dominated many localities. It may well have been to reduce their influence at court that Assyrian kings shifted their capital from time to time. All Assyrians owed duties to the king. All adult males were liable to military service, and the core of the Assyrian army was made up of such men.
When not on campaign they formed a reserve from which soldiers could be recruited. At critical times a large percentage, perhaps even the majority, of the younger men would be called up.
Assyrians could also be summoned to undertake other kinds of service, for example working on the royal estates or on large-scale royal construction projects. Away from the capital, the Assyrian homeland was divided into a number of districts. These districts were in turn divided into sub-districts, under local chiefs probably appointed from a member of a leading local family ; and these were divided into townships.
Assyrian soldier standing with Shields. Up to the mid-8th century the Assyrian homeland was surrounded by an expanding swathe of territory in Mesopotamia, Syria , eastern Anatolia and western Iran — a significant chunk of the Middle East — composed of vassal kingdoms owing obedience to the Assyrian king, sending troops to fight with the Assyrian army, and paying tribute to the Assyrian court.
Most of these vassal kingdoms were small states. The exception to this was southern Mesopotamia, which since the days of Hammurabi had been mostly ruled from Babylon. This key economic region was the core area of Mesopotamian civilization, and was treated with much more respect and consideration then other parts of the Assyrian sphere of influence. Here, the Assyrian king posed as a protector of the king of Babylon, fighting on his behalf against his enemies.
In return, he expected obedience. Up to the mid-8th century the Assyrian homeland and the much larger, and expanding, territory occupied by vassal kingdoms, made up the two zones of Assyrian power. From the time of the reforms of king Tiglathpilisar , a third zone was interposed between these two older ones, as a large part of Assyrian-dominated territory was brought under the more direct control of the Assyrian court.
A depiction of King Tiglathpileser II besieging a town. This zone covered much of Mesopotamia and Syria. In it, the small vassal kingdoms were abolished, their kings being replaced by officials appointed by the Assyrian king. These provincial governors were supported by new garrisons of Assyrian troops, stationed in the provinces on a permanent basis.
Babylonia also was brought under more direct Assyrian control, but in a different way from the smaller vassal kingdoms. The Babylonian throne was no longer occupied by a native dynasty, but by a member of the Assyrian royal family. Initially this was the king of Assyria himself, who thus became king of Assyria and Babylon. He ruled the country through a viceroy a governor with very wide powers.
Later, a younger son or brother of the king of Assyria occupied the throne of Babylon as a subordinate king. An efficient system of communications between royal court and provincial governors was set up, consisting of special couriers who carried messages swiftly between the king wherever he happened to be and his governors. Fire signals were also used. The roads were kept in good repair, wooden bridges were constructed across bridges and paved ways were driven through mountainous country, to facilitate the swift passage of messages.
This system acted as the precursor of later imperial road networks in the Persian, Hellenistic and Roman empires. The Assyrians also ran a state espionage service, to keep themselves informed of potential unrest. From the mid-8th century onwards, therefore, Assyria turned from being the dominant power in the region, lording it over numerous smaller or weaker kingdoms, to being a true empire with a centralized government.
As such, it would have an immense influence on later world history, pioneering the techniques for administering a huge empire which would be passed on to later imperial states.
They were known in history as the 10 lost tribes of Israel. God used them as his instrument for a time but later their capital city Nineveh and their empire was destroyed by a combination of forces by the Medes and the Babylonians in BC. The Land of Assyria. In ancient times the land of Assyria was located along the northern portion of the Tigris River.
The Zagros Mountains were its eastern border, on the other side was Mighty Persia. In the north was the territory of the ancient Armenians, the kingdom of Urartu. The southern and western borders were the Tigris River, and on the other side was Mesopotamia. Assyria was about 18, square miles of hills and mountains in the north, and small rolling hills and plains in the south.
It was believed to be about 60 miles around with a foot wall all around with towers each beeing feet high. The population was over 2 million people, In the Book of Jonah Nineveh was described as "an exceeding great city, of three days' journey.
He also built his great palace with over rooms. King Sargon the great made Khorsabad his capital around BC and made the city marvelous with high walls and towers with 7 gates. He also built a great Ziggurat. The winged bulls guarding his palace weighed over 40 tons of solid limestone.
Asshur was a city along the Tigris and the religious capital of ancient Assyria. Many of the kings were buried in Ashur. As a kingdom Ashur was founded by the son of Shem whose name was Asshur, when he left Shinar he travelled northward and founded Nineveh Genesis The whole territory of ancient Assyria was referred to as the land of Asshur.
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