In most cases the Assyrians followed the principle of primogeniture, wherein the oldest son inherits. The reasons for this are debated, but it is known that a short time later, Judah was once again paying tribute to the Assyrian Empire. Faced with a massive Assyrian army nearby, many of the Levantine rulers, including Budu-ilu of Ammon, Kamusu-nadbi of Moab, Mitinti of Ashdod and Malik-rammu of Edom, quickly submitted to Sennacherib to avoid retribution. [75], Although Sennacherib destroyed the city, he appears to have still been somewhat fearful of Babylon's ancient gods. [2], Sennacherib had several brothers and at least one sister. The Assyrians had not marched on Babylon immediately, however, as military actions are recorded elsewhere. Although Sennacherib at last got his revenge on Marduk-apla-iddina, his arch-enemy had not lived to see it, having died of natural causes before the Assyrians landed in Elam. Gypsum wall panel relief; carved in low relief; Sennacherib watches the capture of Lachish. Wishing to consolidate his position as king, Nergal-ushezib took advantage of the situation and captured and plundered the city of Nippur. 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. [92][96], As was traditional for Assyrian kings, Sennacherib had a harem of many women. The royal educator, Hunn, would have educated Sennacherib and his siblings. 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. [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. He got ready to attack them. His reliefs show larger scenes, some almost from a bird's-eye point of view. The Assyrian campaign (described as an act of aggression rather than as a response to Hezekiah's rebellious activities) is seen as doomed to fail from the start. [64], The Assyrian army, by now surrounded by the Elamites in southern Babylonia, managed to kill the son of Hallutash-Inshushinak in a skirmish but remained trapped for at least nine months. Sennacherib transferred the capital of Assyria to Nineveh, where he had spent most of his time as crown prince. 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. The identity of Sennacherib's mother is uncertain. 701. After the death of Sargon II, Sennacherib's father, a number of states in the Levant renounced their allegiance to Assyria. According to Brinkman, Sennacherib might have lost the affection he once had for Babylon's gods because they had inspired their people to attack him. Writing in 1978, Reade assessed Sennacherib as a king who stands out among Assyrian rulers as open-minded and far-sighted and that he was a man "who not only coped effectively with ordinary crises but even turned them to advantage as he created, or attempted to create, a stable imperial structure immune from traditional problems". The final step in the palace's construction was the erection of colossal statues depicting bulls and lions, characteristic of Late Assyrian architecture. Except for Esarhaddon, who is known to be Naqi'a's son, which of Sennacherib's wives were his children's mothers is unknown. Historically, the most popular view has been that Sennacherib was the son of Sargon's wife Ataliya, although this is now considered unlikely. Sennacherib recorded his triumphs in his annals, which survive on three nearly identical clay prisms: the Taylor Prism 6, the Oriental Institute Prism 7, and the Jerusalem Prism 8. [7] Marduk-apla-iddina rallied large portions of Babylonia's people to fight for him, both the urban Babylonians and the tribal Chaldeans, and he also enlisted troops from the neighboring civilization of Elam, in modern-day south-western Iran. Sargon is never mentioned in Sennacherib's inscriptions. Arda-Mulissu and Nabu-shar-usur survived this purge, escaping as exiles to the northern kingdom of Urartu. As the name Ashur-ili-muballissu appears in the list of personal names, alongside fragmentary names that could possibly be reconstructed as Ashur-nadin-shumi (or Ashur-shumu-ushabshi) and Esarhaddon, it is also possible that the other personal names were names of further sons of Sennacherib. Sin-a-eriba, "Sin has increased (or replaced) the (lost) brothers."King of Assyria and Babylonia, 705-681 b.c.. 1. The King's face has been deliberately slashed, perhaps by an enemy soldier at the fall of Nineveh in 612 BC. [32], In 701BC, Sennacherib first moved to attack the Syro-Hittite and Phoenician cities in the north. He sits on a throne and watches as prisoners are brought before him and executed. Sennacherib then hunted for Marduk-apla-iddina, a hunt so intense the Chaldean escaped on boats with his people across the Persian Gulf, taking refuge in the Elamite city of Nagitu. The two fleets then combined into one and continued down to the Persian Gulf. According to the biblical account, the Assyrian envoys to Hezekiah returned to Sennacherib to find him engaged in a struggle with the city of Libnah. [52] The battle is considered unlikely to have been an outright Assyrian defeat, especially because contemporary Babylonian chronicles, otherwise eager to mention Assyrian failures, are silent on the matter. 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. [65][66] In Ashur-nadin-shumi's place, a native Babylonian, Nergal-ushezib, became Babylon's king. Accession. [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. Part of Tim's prophetic word was: "There is coming a tsunami generation that will ride the wave of my Spirit. In his annals, Sennacherib claimed that he destroyed 46 fortified cities and towns of Judah and took 200,150 captives, although the number of captives is seen today widely as exaggeration. There, most of their soldiers deserted and joined Esarhaddon, who then marched on Nineveh without opposition, becoming the new king of Assyria. The rooms and courtyards of his Neo-Assyrian Southwest Palace at Nineveh were decorated with a series of detailed carved stone panels. Other events of his reign include his destruction of the city of Babylon in 689 BC and his renovation and expansion of the last great Assyrian capital, Nineveh . [36], In angry response to this disrespect, revolts a month apart in 704[7] or 703BC[32] overthrew Sennacherib's rule in the south. The outcome of the Battle of Halule is unclear since the records of both sides claim a great victory. He thought he could win the battle over them. The son of Sargon II, it's believed Sennacherib became king around 705 when his father was killed in battle. [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. Bel-ibni now faced the open revolts of two tribal leaders: Shuzubu (who later became Babylonian king under the name Mushezib-Marduk) and Marduk-apla-iddina, now an elderly man. Sennacherib, on a magnificent throne, watches as prisoners are brought before him and sometimes executed. [77] This caused consternation in Assyria itself, where Babylon and its gods were held in high esteem. Though the blockade of Jerusalem was not a proper siege, it is clear from all available sources that a massive Assyrian army was encamped in the city's vicinity, probably on its northern side. [122] Sennacherib's own accounts of his building projects and military campaigns, typically referred to as his "annals", were often copied several times and spread throughout the Neo-Assyrian Empire during his reign. Cast of a rock relief of Sennacherib from the foot of, Assyrian siege engine attacking the city wall of, Assyrian soldier about to behead a prisoner from Lachish, Judean people being deported into exile after the fall of Lachish to the Assyrians, Sennacherib (enthroned at the far right) at Lachish, interacting with his officials and reviewing prisoners, Reliefs from Sennacherib's time depicting an Assyrian warship (top) and a number of his soldiers along with their prisoners and war trophies (bottom), 1876 reconstruction of Sennacherib's "Palace without Rival" in Nineveh by, City plan of Nineveh (left) and a close-up of the Kuyunjik mound (right), where Sennacherib's palace was constructed. . [30] His reaction to his father's fate was to distance himself from Sargon. 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. Isaiah 40:31 New King James Version (NKJV) 31 But those who wait on the Lord Shall renew their strength; They shall mount up with wings. Elayi believes Sennacherib's greatest flaw was "his irascible, vindictive and impatient character" and that he, when emotional, could be pushed to make irrational decisions. In the spring of 701 bc, King Senake-eriba of Assyria, better known to history as Sennacherib, embarked on a vigorous campaign to crush a coalition of vassal states that had been raised against him. [38] The city was reprimanded, suffering a minor sack,[38] though its citizens were unharmed. [47] Although the Assyrian account of the operation may lead one to believe that Sennacherib was present in person, this is never explicitly stated and reliefs depicting the campaign show Sennacherib seated on a throne in Lachish instead of overseeing the preparations for an assault on Jerusalem. During Sargon's longer absences from the Assyrian heartland, Sennacherib's residence would have served as the center of government in the Neo-Assyrian Empire, with the crown prince taking on significant administrative and political responsibilities. Female members of the court were more prominent and enjoyed greater privileges under Sennacherib's reign than under the reigns of previous Assyrian kings. However, Sennacherib king of Assyria came and marched into Judah. Sennacherib's own account of the destruction reads:[75], Into my land I carried off alive Muzib-Marduk, king of Babylonia, together with his family and officials. The second king of the Sargonid dynasty, Sennacherib is one of the most famous Assyrian kings for the role he plays in the Hebrew Bible, which describes his campaign in the Levant. According to the narrative, no enemy, not even the powerful king of Assyria, would have been able to triumph over Hezekiah as the Judean king had God on his side. [75] Although Sennacherib had once anxiously considered the implications of Sargon's seizure of Babylon and the role that the city's offended gods may have played in his father's downfall, his attitude towards the city had shifted by 689 BC. The denizens of the Levant and Babylonia celebrated the news and proclaimed the act as divine punishment because of Sennacherib's brutal campaigns against them, while in Assyria the reaction was probably resentment and horror. [60], In the years that followed, Babylonia stayed relatively quiet, with no chronicles recording any significant activity. [107] That his generals led several of the campaigns, rather than Sennacherib himself, shows he was not as interested in campaigning as his predecessors had been. 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. [108], Frahm believes that it is possible that Sennacherib suffered from posttraumatic stress disorder because of the catastrophic fate of his father. [94] He concluded a "treaty of rebellion" with another of his younger brothers, Nabu-shar-usur, and on 20October 681BC, they attacked and killed their father in one of Nineveh's temples,[92] possibly the one dedicated to Sn. [49] [94], Sennacherib forced Arda-Mulissu to swear loyalty to Esarhaddon, but Arda-Mulissu made many appeals to his father to reinstate him as heir. Numerous temples were built and restored, many of them on the Kuyunjik mound (where the Southwest Palace was located), including a temple dedicated to the god Sn (invoked in the king's own name). [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 northern palace depicted on the map was first built during the reign of Sennacherib's grandson. Tashmetu-sharrat is likely to have been the mother of at least some of them. [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. Although Sennacherib was successful in conquering Lachish and many other Judahite cities and towns, he did not conquer Jerusalem. The problems with these claims by Sennacherib are: 1) The Old Testament does not mention this mass deportation of Judean's; 2) The population of Judea exploded during Hezekiah's reign. . Esarhaddon's exile put Arda-Mulissu in a difficult position as he had reached the height of his popularity but was powerless to do anything to his brother. [121], The discovery of Sennacherib's own inscriptions in the 19thcentury, in which brutal and cruel acts such as ordering the throats of his Elamite enemies to be slit, and their hands and lips cut off, amplified his already ferocious reputation. [72] In 1982, Assyriologist Louis D. Levine wrote that the battle was probably an Assyrian victory, though not a decisive one and that though the southerners had been defeated and fled, the Assyrian advance on Babylon itself was temporarily halted. According to Elayi, Sennacherib was "certainly intelligent, skillful, with an ability of adaptation", but "his sense of piety was contradictory, as, on the one hand, he impiously destroyed the statues of gods and temples of Babylon while, on the other hand, he used to consult the gods before acting and prayed to them". The reason for Arda-Mulissu's sudden dismissal is unknown, but it is clear from contemporary inscriptions that he was very disappointed. With the aid of surviving Chaldean troops, Hallutash-Inshushinak took the city of Sippar, where he also managed to capture Ashur-nadin-shumi and take him back to Elam. The foreground scribe uses pen and ink on a leather scroll; the other scribe writes with a stylus on a hinged writing-board coated with wax. After Behnam converts to Christianity, Sinharib orders his execution, but is later struck by a dangerous disease that is cured through being baptized by Saint Matthew in Assur. [30], When Sennacherib became king, he was already an adult and had served as Sargon's crown prince for over 15 years and understood the empire's administration. [4] In 705BC, Hezekiah, the king of Judah, had stopped paying his annual tribute to the Assyrians and began pursuing a markedly aggressive foreign policy, probably inspired by the recent wave of anti-Assyrian rebellions across the empire. The ancient Aramaic story of Ahikar portrays Sennacherib as a benevolent patron of the titular character Ahikar, with Esarhaddon portrayed more negatively. Scenes, some almost from a bird's-eye point of view a magnificent throne watches. Greater privileges under Sennacherib 's grandson outcome of the situation and captured and plundered sennacherib war eagles city reprimanded. 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