http://www.gutenberg.org/files/27114/27114-h/27114-h.html#toc19
---------------------------------------------------
OLD babylon CHALDEAN AND ASSYRIAN MONARCHIES
On a great plain, four hundred miles in length and one
hundred miles in width, forming the valley of the
Euphrates, bounded on the north by Mesopotamia,
on the east by the Tigris, on the south by the Persian
Gulf, and on the west by the Syrian Desert, was established,
at a very early period, the Babylonian monarchy.
This plain, or valley, contains about twenty-three thousand
square miles, equal to the Grecian territories. It was destitute
of all striking natural features—furnishing an unbroken
horizon. The only interruptions to the view on this level
plain were sand-hills and the embankments of the river. The
river, like the Nile, is subject to inundations, though less
regular than the Nile, and this, of course, deposits a rich alluvial
soil. The climate in summer is intensely hot, and in
winter mild and genial. Wheat here is indigenous, and the
vine and other fruits abound in rich luxuriance. The land
was as rich as the valley of the Nile, and was favorable to
flocks and herds. The river was stocked with fish, and
every means of an easy subsistence was afforded.
Into this goodly land a migration from Armenia—the
primeval seat of man—came at a period when history
begins. Nimrod and his hunters then gained an ascendency
over the old settlers, and supplanted them—Cushites,
of the family of Ham, and not the descendants of Shem.
The beginning of the kingdom of Nimrod was
Babel, a tower, or temple, modeled after the one
which was left unfinished, or was destroyed. This was
erected, probably, B.C. 2334. It was square, and arose with
[pg 081]
successive stories, each one smaller than the one below,
presenting an analogy to the pyramidical form. The highest
stage supported the sacred ark. The temple was built
of burnt brick. Thus the race of Ham led the way in the
arts in Chaldea as in Egypt, and soon fell into idolatry.
We know nothing, with certainty, of this ancient monarchy,
which lasted, it is supposed, two hundred and fifty-eight
years, from B.C. 2234 to 1976. It was not established until
after the dispersion of the races. The dynasty of which
Nimrod was the founder came to an end during the early
years of Abraham.
The first king of the new dynasty was Chedorlaomer,
though Josephus represents him as a general of
the Chaldean king who extended the Chaldean conquests
to Palestine. His encounters with the kings of
Sodom, Gomorrah, and others in the vale of Siddim,
tributary princes, and his slaughter by Abraham's
servants, are recounted in the fourteenth chapter of
Genesis, and put an end to Chaldean conquests beyond the
Syrian desert. From his alliance, however, with the Tidal,
king of nations; Amrapher, king of Shinar; and Arioch,
king of Ellasar, we infer that other races, besides the Hamite,
composed the population of Chaldea, of which the subjects
of Chedorlaomer were pre-eminent.
His empire was subverted by Arabs from the desert, B.C.
1518; and an Arabian dynasty is supposed to have reigned
for two hundred and forty-five years.
This came to an end in consequence of a grand irruption
of Assyrians—of Semitic origin. “Asshur (Gen.
10, 11), the son of Shem, built Nineveh,” which
was on the Tigris. The name Assyria came to be extended
to the whole of Upper Mesopotamia, from the Euphrates
to the Tagros mountains. This country consisted of undulating
pastures, diversified by woodlands, and watered by
streams running into the Tigris. Its valleys were rich, its
hills were beautiful, and its climate was cooler than the
Chaldean plain.
Nineveh was ruled by a viceroy of
the Babylonian king. This corresponds with the
book of Genesis, which makes the dynasty Chaldean, while
the people were Semitic, since the kingdom of Asshur was
derived from that of Nimrod. “Ninus, the viceroy,” says
Smith, “having revolted from the king of Babylon, overruns
Armenia, Asia Minor, and the shores of the Euxine, as far
as Tanais, subdues the Medes and Persians, and makes war
upon the Bactrians. Semiramis, the wife of one of the chief
nobles, coming to the camp before Bactria, takes the city by
a bold stroke. Her courage wins the love of Ninus, and
she becomes his wife. On his death she succeeds to the
throne, and undertakes the conquest of India, but is
defeated.” These two sovereigns built Nineveh on a grand
scale, as well as added to the edifices of Babylon.
This king was the founder of the northwest palace of
Nineveh, three hundred and sixty feet long and three hundred
wide, standing on a raised platform overlooking the
Tigris, with a grand facade to the north fronting the town,
and another to the west commanding the river. It was built
of hewn stone, and its central hall was one hundred and
twenty feet long and ninety wide. The ceilings were of cedar
brought from Lebanon. The walls were paneled with slabs
of marble ornamented with bas-reliefs. The floors were
paved with stone
Berosus, a priest of Babylon in the third century
before Christ, infer that the dynasty which Belus founded reigned
more than five hundred years, from 1272 to 747 before Christ.
Of these kings, Sardanapalus, the most famous, added
Babylonia to the Assyrian empire, and built vast architectural
works. He employed three hundred and sixty
thousand men in the construction of this palace,
some of whom were employed in making brick, and others in
[pg 083]
cutting timber on Mount Hermon. It covered an area of
eight acres. The palaces of Nineveh were of great splendor,
and the scenes portrayed on the walls, as discovered by Mr.
Layard, lately disinterred from the mounds of earth, represent
the king as of colossal stature, fighting battles, and
clothed with symbolic attributes. He appears as a great
warrior, leading captives, and storming cities, and also in the
chase, piercing the lion, and pursuing the wild ass. This
monarch should not be confounded with the Sardanapalus of
the Greeks, the last of the preceding dynasty. His son,
Shalmanezer, was also a great prince, and added to the
dominion of the Assyrian empire. Distant nations paid
tribute to him, the Phœnicians, the Syrians, the Jews, and
the Medians beyond the Tagros mountains. He defeated
Benhadad and routed Hazael. His reign ended,
it is supposed, B.C. 850. Two other kings succeeded
him, who extended their conquests to the west, the
last of whom is identified by Smith with Pul, the reigning
monarch when Jonah visited Nineveh, B.C. 770.
The next dynasty commences with Tiglath-Pileser II.,
who carried on wars against Babylon and Syria and Israel.
This was in the time of Ahaz, B.C. 729
His son, Shalmanezer, made Hosea, king of Israel, his
vassal, and reduced the country of the ten tribes to a
province of his empire, and carried the people away into
captivity. Hezekiah was also, for a time, his vassal.
He was succeeded by Sargon, B.C. 721, according
to Smith, but 715 B.C., according to others. He
reigned, as Geseneus thinks, but two or three years; but fifteen
according to Rawlinson, and built that splendid palace,
the ruins of which, at Khorsabad, have supplied the Louvre
with its choicest remains of Assyrian antiquity. He was
one of the greatest of the Assyrian conquerors. He invaded
Babylon and drove away its kings; he defeated the Philistines,
took Ashdod and Tyre, received tribute from the
Greeks at Cyprus, invaded even Egypt, whose king paid
him tribute, and conquered Media.
His son, Sennacherib, who came to the throne, B.C. 702, is
an interesting historical personage, and under him
the Assyrian empire reached its culminating point.
He added to the palace of Nineveh, and built one which
exceeded all that had existed before him. No monarch
surpassed this one in the magnificence of his buildings. He
erected no less than thirty temples, shining with silver and
gold. One of the halls of his palace was two hundred and
twenty feet long, and one hundred and one wide. He made
use of Syrian, Greek, and Phœnician artists. It is from the
ruins of this palace at Koyunjik that Mr. Layard made
those valuable discoveries which have enriched the British
Museum. He subdued Babylonia, Upper Mesopotamia,
Syria, Phœnicia, Philistia, Idumaen, and a part of Egypt,
which, with Media, a part of Armenia, and the old Assyrian
territory, formed his vast empire—by far greater than the
Egyptian monarchy at any period. He chastised also the
Jews for encouraging a revolt among the Philistines, and
carried away captive two hundred thousand people, and only
abstained from laying siege to Jerusalem by a present from
Hezekiah of three hundred talents of silver and thirty of
gold. The destruction of his host, as recorded by Scripture,
is thought by some to have occurred in a subsequent
invasion of Judea, when it was in alliance with
Egypt. That “he returned to Nineveh and
dwelt there” is asserted by Scripture, but only to be assassinated
by his sons, B.C. 680.
His son Esar-Haddon succeeded him, a warlike monarch,
who fought the Egyptians, and colonized Samaria with
Babylonian settlers. He also built the palace of Nimrod,
and cultivated art.
The civilization of the Assyrians shows a laborious and
patient people. Its chief glory was in architecture.
Sculpture was imitated from nature, but had
neither the grace nor the ideality of the Greeks. War was
the grand business of kings, and hunting their pleasure.
The people were ground down by the double tyranny of
[pg 085]
kings and priests. There is little of interest in the Assyrian
annals, and what little we know of their life and manners
is chiefly drawn by inductions from the monuments excavated
by Botta and Layard. The learned treatise of Rawlinson
sheds a light on the annals of the monarchy, which,
before the discoveries of Layard, were exceedingly obscure,
and this treatise has been most judiciously abridged, by
Smith, whom I have followed. It would be interesting to
consider the mythology of the Assyrians, but it is too complicated
for a work like this.
Under his successors, the empire rapidly declined.
Though it nominally included the whole of Western
Asia, from the Mediterranean to the desert of
Iran, and from the Caspian Sea and the mountains of
Armenia to the Persian Gulf, it was wanting in unity.
It embraced various kingdoms, and cities, and tribes, which
simply paid tribute, limited by the power of the king to
enforce it. The Assyrian armies, which committed so
great devastations, did not occupy the country they chastised,
as the Romans and Greeks did. Their conquests
were like those of Tamerlane. As the monarchs became
effeminated, new powers sprung up, especially Media, which
ultimately completed the ruin of Assyria, under Cyaxares.
The last of the monarchs was probably the Sardanapalus of
the Greeks.
The decline of this great monarchy was so rapid and
complete, that even Nineveh, the capital city, was blotted out
of existence. No traces of it remained in the
time of Herodotus, and it is only from recent excavations
that its site is known. Still, it must have been
a great city. The eastern wall of it, as it now appears
from the excavations, is fifteen thousand nine hundred feet
(about three miles); but the city probably included vast
suburbs, with fortified towers, so as to have been equal to
four hundred and eighty stadias in circumference, or sixty
miles—the three days' journey of Jonah. It is supposed,
with the suburbs, to have contained five hundred thousand
[pg 086]
people. The palaces of the great were large and magnificent;
but the dwellings of the people were mean, built
of brick dried in the sun. The palaces consisted of a
large number of chambers around a central hall,
open to the sky, since no pillars are found necessary
to support a roof. No traces of windows are found
in the walls, which were lined with slabs of coarse marble,
with cuneiform inscriptions. The façade of the palaces we
know little about, except that the entrances to them were
lined by groups of colossal bulls. These are sculptured with
considerable spirit, but art, in the sense that the Greeks
understood it, did not exist. In the ordinary appliances of
life the Assyrians were probably on a par with the Egyptians;
but they were debased by savage passions and degrading
superstitions. They have left nothing for subsequent
ages to use. Nothing which has contributed to civilization
remains of their existence. They have furnished no models
of literature, art, or government.
While Nineveh was rising to greatness, Babylon was
under an eclipse, and thus lasted six hundred and fifty years.
It was in the year 1273 that this eclipse began. But a great
change took place in the era of Narbonassar, B.C.
747, when Babylon threatened to secure its independence,
and which subsequently compelled Esar-Haddon,
the Assyrian monarch, to assume, in his own person, the
government of Babylon, B.C. 680.
In 625 B.C. the old Chaldeans recovered their political
importance, probably by an alliance with the Medes, and
Nabopolassar obtained undisputed possession of
Babylon, and founded a short but brilliant dynasty.
He obtained a share of the captives of Nineveh, and
increased the population of his capital. His son, Nebuchadnezzar,
was sent as general against the Egyptians, and
defeated their king, Neko, reconquered all the lands bordering
on Egypt, and received the submission of Jehoiakim, of Jerusalem.
The death of Nabopolassar recalled his son to Babylon,
and his great reign began B.C. 604.
It was he who enlarged the capital to so great an extent
that he may almost be said to have built it. It was in the
form of a square, on both banks of the Euphrates,
forty-eight miles in circuit, according to Herodotus,
with an area of two hundred square miles—large enough
to support a considerable population by agriculture alone.
The walls of this city, if we accept the testimony of Herodotus,
were three hundred and fifty feet high, and eighty-seven
feet thick, and were strengthened by two hundred
and fifty towers, and pierced with one hundred gates of
brass. The river was lined by quays, and the two parts of
the city were united by a stone bridge, at each end of
which was a fortified palace. The greatest work of the
royal architect was the new palace, with the adjoining
hanging garden—a series of terraces to
resemble hills, to please his Median queen. This palace,
with the garden, was eight miles in circumference, and
splendidly decorated with statues of men and animals. Here
the mighty monarch, after his great military expeditions,
solaced himself, and dreamed of omnipotence, until a sudden
stroke of madness—that form which causes a man to mistake
himself for a brute animal—sent him from his luxurious halls
into the gardens he had planted. His madness lasted seven
years, and he died, after a reign of forty-three years, B.C.
561, and Evil-Merodach, his son, reigned in his stead.
He was put to death two years after, for lawlessness and
intemperance, and was succeeded by his brother-in-law and
murderer, Neriglissar. So rapid was the decline of the
monarchy, that after a few brief reigns Babylon
was entered by the army of Cyrus, and the last
king, Bil-shar-utzur, or Bilshassar, associated with his father
Nabonadius, was slain, B.C. 538. Thus ended the Chaldean
monarchy, seventeen hundred and ninety-six years after the
building of Babel by Nimrod, according to the chronology
it is most convenient to assume.
Walang komento:
Mag-post ng isang Komento