The history of antiquity vol III

ASSYRIA. CHAPTER I. THE CAMPAIGNS OF TIGLATH PILESAR II. In the course of the ninth century B.C. the power of Assyria had made considerable progress. In addition to the ancient dependencies on the upper Zab and the upper Tigris, in Armenia and Mesopotamia, the principalities and cities on the middle Euphrates had been reduced, the region of the Amanus had been won. Cilicia had been trodden by Assyrian armies, Damascus was humbled, Syria had felt the weight of the arms of Assyria in a number of campaigns; the kingdom of Israel and the cities of the Phenicians had repeatedly brought their tribute to the warlike princes of Nineveh; at length even the cities of the Philistines and the Edomites could not escape a similar payment. Tiglath Pilesar I. had seen the great sea of the West, the Mediterranean; three centuries later Bin-nirar III. received the tribute of all the harbour cities of the Syrian coast, the great centres of trade on this sea. Nor was it to the West only that the power of the Assyrians advanced. Shalmanesar II. and Bin-nirar III. gained the supremacy over Babylon, the ancient mother-country of Assyria. Each offered sacrifices at Babylon, Borsippa, and Kutha;[Pg 2] while to the North-west the power of Assyria extended beyond Media as far as the shores of the Caspian Sea. The successors of Bin-nirar III. were not able to sustain their power at this height. Shalmanesar III. (781-771 B.C.) had again to fight against Damascus and Hadrach (in the neighbourhood of Damascus[1]); in his short reign of ten years he marched six times against the land of Ararat (Urarti). Assur-danil III. (771-753 B.C.), the successor of Shalmanesar III., also fought against Hadrach and Arpad (now Tel Erfad, near Hamath[2]). He had, moreover, to suppress disturbances which had broken out on the upper Zab in Arrapachitis (Arapha), and in the land of Guzan (Gauzanitis) on the Chaboras. In the reign of Assur-nirar II. (753-745 B.C.) there were risings in Assyria, even in Chalah, the metropolis.[3] But the prince who succeeded Assur-nirar II. on the throne of Assyria, Tiglath Pilesar II., was able not merely to raise the kingdom to the position which it had occupied under Shalmanesar II. and Bin-nirar III., but to make it a predominant power over a still wider circuit.