Babylonia (/ˌbæbəˈloʊniə/) was an ancient Akkadian-speaking Semitic state and cultural region based in central-southern Mesopotamia (present-day Iraq). A small Amorite-ruled state emerged in 1894 BC, which contained at this time the minor city of Babylon. Babylon greatly expanded during the reign of Hammurabi in the first half of the 18th century BC, becoming a major capital city. During the reign of Hammurabi and afterwards, Babylonia was called Mât Akkadî “the country of Akkad” in Akkadian.[1] It was often involved in rivalry with its older fellow Akkadian state ofAssyria in northern Mesopotamia. Babylonia briefly became the major power in the region after Hammurabi (fl. c. 1792 – 1752 BC middle chronology, or c. 1696 – 1654 BC, short chronology) created a short-lived empire, succeeding the earlier Akkadian Empire, Neo-Sumerian Empire, and Old Assyrian Empire; however, the Babylonian empire rapidly fell apart after the death of Hammurabi.
The Babylonian state retained the written Semitic Akkadian language for official use (the language of its native populace), despite its Amorite founders and Kassite successors not being native Akkadians, and speaking a Northwest Semitic Canaanite language and a Language Isolate respectively. It retained the Sumerian language for religious use (as did Assyria), but by the time Babylon was founded this was no longer a spoken language, having been wholly subsumed by Akkadian. The earlier Akkadian and Sumerian traditions played a major role in Babylonian (and Assyrian) culture, and the region would remain an important cultural center, even under protracted periods of outside rule.
The earliest mention of the city of Babylon can be found in a tablet from the reign of Sargon of Akkad (2334–2279 BC), dating back to the 23rd century BC. Babylon was merely a religious and cultural centre at this point and neither an independent state nor a large city; like the rest of Mesopotamia, it was subject to the Akkadian Empire which united all the Akkadian and Sumerian speakers under one rule. After the collapse of the Akkadian empire, the south Mesopotamian region was dominated by the Gutians for a few decades before the rise of the Neo-Sumerian Empire(third dynasty of Ur), which, apart from northern Assyria, encompassed the whole of Mesopotamia, including the city of Babylon.
eriods[edit]
Pre-Babylonian Sumero-Akkadian period in Mesopotamia[edit]
The extent of the Babylonian Empire at the start and end of Hammurabi’s reign
Mesopotamia had already enjoyed a long history prior to the emergence of Babylon. During the third millennium BC, there had developed an intimate cultural symbiosis between the Sumerians and the Akkadians, which included widespread bilingualism.[2] The influence of Sumerian on Akkadian (and vice versa) is evident in all areas, from lexical borrowing on a massive scale, to syntactic, morphological, and phonological convergence.[2]This has prompted scholars to refer to Sumerian and Akkadian in the third millennium as a sprachbund.[2]
Akkadian gradually replaced Sumerian as the spoken language of Mesopotamia somewhere around the turn of the third and the second millennium BC (the precise timeframe being a matter of debate),[3] but Sumerian continued to be used as a sacred, ceremonial, literary and scientific language in Mesopotamia as late as the 1st century AD.[citation needed]
From c. 3500 BC until the rise of the Akkadian Empire in the 24th century BC, Mesopotamia had been dominated by largely Sumerian city states, such as Ur, Lagash, Uruk, Kish, Isin, Larsa, Adab, Eridu, Nuzi, Awan,Hamazi, Akshak and Umma, although Semitic Akkadian names began to appear on the king lists of some of these states (such as Eshnunna and Assyria) between the 29th and 25th centuries BC. Traditionally, the major religious center of all Mesopotamia was the city of Nippur, and it would remain so until replaced by Babylonduring the reign of Hammurabi in the mid 18th century BC.
The Akkadian Empire (2334–2154 BC) saw the Akkadian Semites and Sumerians of Mesopotamia unite under one rule, and the Akkadians fully attain ascendancy over the Sumerians and indeed come to dominate much of the ancient Near East.
The empire eventually disintegrated due to economic decline, climate change and civil war, followed by attacks by the Gutians from the Zagros Mountains. TheSumerians rose up with the Neo-Sumerian Empire (Third Dynasty of Ur) in the late 22nd century BC, and ejected the Gutians from southern Mesopotamia. They also seem to have gained ascendancy over most of the territory of the Akkadian kings of Assyria in northern Mesopotamia for a time.
Following the collapse of the Sumerian “Ur-III” dynasty at the hands of the Elamites in 2002 BC, the Amorites, a foreign Northwest Semitic people who spoke aCanaanite language, began to migrate into southern Mesopotamia from the northern Levant, gradually gained control over most of southern Mesopotamia, where they formed a series of small kingdoms, while the native Assyrians reasserted their independence in the north. The Sumero-Akkadian states of the south were unable to stem the Amorite advance.
King Ilushuma (ca. 2008–1975 BC) of Assyria in a known inscription describes his exploits to the south as follows: “The freedom[nb 1] of the Akkadians and their children I established. I purified their copper. I established their freedom from the border of the marshes and Ur and Nippur, Awal, and Kish, Der of the goddessIshtar, as far as the City of (Ashur).”[4] Past scholars originally extrapolated from this text that it means he defeated the invading Amorites to the south, but there is no explicit record of that. More recently, the text has been taken to mean that Asshur supplied the south with copper from Anatolia and “established freedom” from tax duties.
These policies were continued by his successors Erishum I and Ikunum.
However, when Sargon I (1920–1881 BC) succeeded as king in Assyria in 1920 BC he eventually withdrew Assyria from the region, preferring to concentrate on continuing to vigorously expand Assyrian colonies in Asia Minor, and eventually southern Mesopotamia fell to the Amorites. During the first centuries of what is called the “Amorite period”, the most powerful city states in the south were Isin, Eshnunna and Larsa, together with Assyria in the north.
First Babylonian Dynasty — Amorite Dynasty 1894–1595 BC[edit]
One of these Canaanite speaking Amorite dynasties founded a small kingdom which included the then still minor town of Babylon circa 1894 BC, which would ultimately take over the others and form the short-lived first Babylonian empire, also called the Old Babylonian Period.
An Amorite chieftain named Sumuabum appropriated a tract of land which included the then relatively small city of Babylon from the neighbouring Amorite ruled Mesopotamian city state of Kazallu, of which it had initially been a territory, turning it into a state in its own right. His reign was concerned with establishing statehood amongst a sea of other minor city states and kingdoms in the region. However Sumuabum appears never to have bothered to give himself the title of King of Babylon, suggesting that Babylon itself was still only a minor town or city, and not worthy of kingship.[5]
He was followed by Sumu-la-El, Sabium, Apil-Sin, who each ruled in the same vague manner as Sumuabum, with no reference to kingship of Babylon being made in any written records of the time. Sin-muballit was the first of these Amorite rulers to be regarded officially as a king of Babylon, and then only on one single clay tablet. Under these kings, the nation in which Babylon lay remained a small nation which controlled very little territory, and was overshadowed by neighbouring kingdoms that were both older, larger, and more powerful, such as; Isin, Larsa, Assyria and Elam. The Elamites in particular, occupied huge swathes of southern Mesopotamia, and the early Amorite rulers were largely held in vassalage to Elam.
The Empire of Hammurabi
Babylon remained a minor territory for a century after it was founded, until the reign of its sixth Amorite ruler, Hammurabi (1792- 1750 BC, or fl. c. 1728 – 1686 BC (short). He conducted major building work in Babylon, expanding it from a minor town into a great city worthy of kingship. He was a very efficient ruler, establishing a bureaucracy, with taxation and centralized government. Hammurabi freed Babylon from Elamite dominance, and indeed drove them from southern Mesopotamia entirely. He then gradually expanded Babylonian dominance over the whole of southern Mesopotamia, conquering the cities and states of the region, such as; Isin,Larsa, Eshnunna, Kish, Lagash, Nippur, Borsippa, Ur, Uruk, Umma, Adab and Eridu. The conquests of Hammurabi gave the region stability after turbulent times and coalesced the patchwork of states of southern and central Mesopotamia into one single nation, and it is only from the time of Hammurabi that southern Mesopotamia came to be known historically as Babylonia.
The armies of Babylonia under Hammurabi were well-disciplined. He turned eastwards and invaded what was a thousand years later to become Persia (Iran), conquering the pre Iranic Elamites, Gutians and Kassites. To the west, the Semitic states of the Levant (modern Syria) including the powerful kingdom of Mari were conquered.
Hammurabi then entered into a protracted war with the Old Assyrian Empire for control of Mesopotamia and the Near East. Assyria had extended control over parts of Asia Minor from the 21st century BC, and from the latter part of the 19th century BC had asserted itself over north east Syria and central Mesopotamia also. After a protracted unresolved struggle over decades with the Assyrian king Ishme-Dagan, Hammurabi forced his successor Mut-Ashkur to pay tribute to Babylon c. 1751 BC, thus giving Babylonia control over Assyria’s centuries old Hattian and Hurrian colonies in Asia Minor.[6]
One of the most important works of this “First Dynasty of Babylon“, as it was called by the native historians, was the compilation of a code of laws which were both influenced by and improved upon the much earlier written laws of Sumer, Akkad and Assyria. This was made by order of Hammurabi after the expulsion of theElamites and the settlement of his kingdom. In 1901, a copy of the Code of Hammurabi was discovered on a stele by J. De Morgan and V. Scheil at Susa, where it had later been taken as plunder. That copy is now in the Louvre.
From before 3000 BC until the reign of Hammurabi, the major cultural and religious center of southern Mesopotamia had been the ancient city of Nippur, where the god Enlil was supreme. However, with the rise of Hammurabi, this honour was transferred to Babylon, and the south Mesopotamian god Marduk rose to supremacy in the pantheon of southern Mesopotamia (with the god Ashur remaining the dominant deity in the northern Mesopotamian state of Assyria). The city of Babylon became known as a “holy city” where any legitimate ruler of southern Mesopotamia had to be crowned. Hammurabi turned what had previously been a minor administrative town into a major city, increasing its size and population dramatically, and conducting a number of impressive architectural works.
The Babylonians, like their predecessor Sumero-Akkadian states, engaged in regular trade with the Amorite and Canaanite city-states to the west; with Babylonian officials or troops sometimes passing to the Levant and Canaan, with Amorite merchants operating freely throughout Mesopotamia. The Babylonian monarchy’s western connections remained strong for quite some time. An Amorite chieftain named Abi-ramu or Abram (possibly the Biblical Abraham) was the father of a witness to a deed dated to the reign of Hammurabi’s grandfather;[citation needed] Ammi-Ditana, great-grandson of Hammurabi, still titled himself “king of the land of the Amorites”. Ammi-Ditana’s father and son also bore Canaanite names: Abi-Eshuh and Ammisaduqa.
Babylonian Decline
However, southern Mesopotamia had no natural, defensible boundaries, making it vulnerable to attack. After the death of Hammurabi, his empire began to disintegrate rapidly. Under his successor Samsu-iluna (1749–1712 BC) the far south of Mesopotamia was lost to a native Akkadian king called Ilum-ma-ili and became the Sealand Dynasty, remaining free of Babylon for the next 272 years.[7]
Both the Babylonians and their Amorite rulers were driven from Assyria to the north by an Assyrian-Akkadian governor named Puzur-Sin c. 1740 BC, who regarded Mut-Ashkur as a foreign Amorite and a former lackey of Babylon. After six years of civil war in Assyria, a native king named Adasi seized power c. 1735 BC, and went on to appropriate former Babylonian and Amorite territory in central Mesopotamia, as did his successor Bel-bani.
Amorite rule survived in a much reduced Babylon, Samshu-iluna’s successor Abi-Eshuh made a vain attempt to recapture the Sealand Dynasty for Babylon, but met defeat at the hands of king Damqi-ilishu II. By the end of his reign Babylonia had shrunk to the small and relatively weak nation it had been upon its foundation, although the city itself was far larger than it had been prior to the rise of Hammurabi..
He was followed by Ammi-Ditana and then Ammisaduqa, both of whom were in too weak a position to make any attempt to regain the many territories lost after the death of Hammurabi, contenting themselves with peaceful building projects in Babylon itself.
Samsu-Ditana was to be the last Amorite ruler of Babylon. Early in his reign he came under pressure from the Kassites, a people originating in the mountains of north west Iran. Babylon was then attacked by the Indo-European speaking and Asia Minor based Hittite Empire in 1595 BC. Shamshu-Ditana was overthrown following the “sack of Babylon” by the Hittite king Mursili I. The Hittites did not remain for long, but the destruction wrought by them finally enabled the Kassites to gain control.
The sack of Babylon and ancient Near East chronology[edit]
The date of the sack of Babylon by the Hittite king Mursili I is considered crucial to the various calculations of the early chronology of the ancient Near East, since both a solar and a lunar eclipse are said to have occurred in the month of Sivan that year, according to ancient records.
The fall of Babylon is taken as a fixed point in the discussion of the chronology of the ancient Near East. Suggestions for its precise date vary by as much as 230 years, corresponding to the uncertainty regarding the length of the “Dark Age” of the ensuing Bronze Age collapse, resulting in the shift of the entire Bronze Age chronology of Mesopotamia with regard to the chronology of Ancient Egypt. Possible dates for the sack of Babylon are:
- ultra-short chronology: 1499 BC
- short chronology: 1531 BC
- middle chronology: 1595 BC
- long chronology: 1651 BC
- ultra-long chronology: 1736 BC[8]
Kassite Dynasty 1595–1155 BC[edit]
The extent of the Babylonian Empire during the Kassite dynasty
The Kassite dynasty was founded by Gandash of Mari. The Kassites, like the Amorite rulers who had preceded them, were not originally native to Mesopotamia. Rather, they had first appeared in the Zagros Mountains of what is today northwestern Iran.
The ethnic affiliation of the Kassites is unclear, though like the Sumerian and Akkadian Mesopotamian peoples and the Amorites, the Kassites were Caucasoid in appearance. However their Kassite language was notSemitic, and is thought to have been either a language isolate or possibly related to the Hurro-Urartian family ofAsia Minor,[9] although the evidence for its genetic affiliation is meager due to the scarcity of extant texts. However, several Kassite leaders bore Indo-European names, and they may have had an Indo-European elite similar to the Mitanni elite that ruled over the Hurrians of central and eastern Asia Minor.[10][11]
The Kassites renamed Babylon “Kar-Duniash”, and their rule lasted for 576 years, the longest dynasty in Babylonian history.
This new foreign dominion offers a striking analogy to the roughly contemporary rule of the Semitic Hyksos inancient Egypt. Most divine attributes ascribed to the Semitic Amorite kings of Babylonia disappeared at this time; the title of God was never given to a Kassite sovereign. However, Babylon continued to be the capital of the kingdom and one of the ‘holy’ cities of western Asia, where the priests of Mesopotamian Religion were all-powerful, and the only place where the right to inheritance of the short lived old Babylonian empire could be conferred.
Babylonia experienced short periods of power, but in general proved to be relatively weak under the long rule of the Kassites, and spent long periods underAssyrian and Elamite domination and interference.
It is not clear precisely when Kassite rule of Babylon began, but the Indo-European Hittites from Asia Minor did not remain in Babylonia for long after the sacking of the city, and it is likely the Kassites moved in soon afterwards. Agum II took the throne for the Kassites in 1595 BC, and ruled a state that extended from Iran to the middle Euphrates; The new king retained peaceful relations with Assyria, but successfully went to war with the Hittite Empire of Asia Minor, and twenty four years after the Hittites took the sacred statue of Marduk, he recovered it and declared the god equal to the Kassite deity Shuqamuna.
Burnaburiash I succeeded him and drew up a peace treaty with the Assyrian king Puzur-Ashur III, and had a largely uneventful reign, as did his successorKashtiliash III.
Southern Mesopotamia (The Sealand Dynasty) remained independent of Babylonia and in native Akkadian hands. However Ulamburiash managed to attack it conquered parts of the land from Ea-gamil, a king with a distinctly Sumerian name, around 1450 BC, whereupon Ea-Gamil fled to Elam. The Sealand Dynasty region remained independent however, and the Kassite king seems to have been unable to finally conquer it. Ulamburiash began making treaties with the Egyptiansthen ruling in the southern Levant, and Assyria to the north. Karaindash built a bas-relief temple in Uruk and Kurigalzu I (1415–1390 BC) built a new capital named after himself. Both of these kings continued to struggle unsuccessfully against The Sealand Dynasty.
Agum II also campaigned against the Sealand Dynasty, finally wholly conquering the far south of Mesopotamia for Babylon, destroying its capital Dur-Enlil in the process. From there Agum III extended further south still, conquering the pre-Arab state of Dilmun (in modern Bahrain).
Karaindash strengthened diplomatic ties with the Assyrian king Ashur-bel-nisheshu and the Egyptian Pharaoh Thutmosis III and protected Babylonian borders with Elam.
Kadašman-Ḫarbe I succeeded Karaindash, and briefly invaded Elam before being eventually ejected by its king Tepti Ahar. He then had to contend with theSuteans, a Semitic people from the western Levant who invaded Babylonia and sacked Uruk. He describes having “annihilated their extensive forces”, then constructed fortresses in a mountain region called Ḫiḫi, in the desert to the west (modern Syria) as security outposts, and “he dug wells and settled people on fertile lands, to strengthen the guard”.[12]
Kurigalzu III succeeded the throne, and soon came into conflict with Elam, to the east. When Ḫur-batila, the successor of Tepti Ahar took the throne of Elam, he began raiding the Babylonia, taunting Kurigalzu to do battle with him at Dūr-Šulgi. Kurigalzu launched a campaign which resulted in the abject defeat and capture of Ḫur-batila, who appears in no other inscriptions. He went on to conquer the eastern lands of Susiana and Elam. This took his army to the Elamite capital, the city ofSusa, which was sacked. After this a puppet ruler was placed on the Elamite throne. Kurigalzu III maintained friendly relations with Assyria, Egypt and the Hittitesthroughout his reign. Kadashman-Enlil I (1374-1360 BC) succeeded him, and continued his diplomatic policies.
Burnaburiash II ascended to the throne in 1359 BC, he retained friendly relations with Egypt, but the resurgent Middle Assyrian Empire to the north was now encroaching into northern Babylonia, and as a symbol of peace, the Babylonian king took the daughter of the powerful Assyrian king Ashur-uballit I in marriage. He also maintained friendly relations with Suppiluliuma I, ruler of the Hittite Empire.
He was succeeded by Kara-hardash (who was half Assyrian, and the grandson of the Assyrian king) in 1333 BC, however a usurper named Nazi-Bugash deposed him, enraging Ashur-uballit I, who invaded and sacked Babylon, slew Nazi-Bugash, annexed Babylonian territory for the Middle Assyrian Empire, and installedKurigalzu II (1345–1324 BC) as his vassal ruler.
Soon after Arik-den-ili succeeded the throne of Assyria in 1327 BC, Kurigalzu III attacked Assyria in an attempt to reassert Babylonian power. After some impressive initial successes he was ultimately defeated, and lost yet more territory to Assyria. Between 1307 BC and 1232 BC his successors, such as Nazi-Maruttash,Kadashman-Turgu, Kadashman-Enlil II, Kudur-Enlil and Shagarakti-Shuriash, allied with the empires of the Hittites and the Mitanni, (who were both also losing swathes of territory to the Assyrians). in a failed attempt to stop Assyrian expansion, which continued unchecked.
Kashtiliash IV‘s (1242–1235 BC) reign ended catastrophically as the Assyrian king Tukulti-Ninurta I routed his armies, sacked and burned Babylon and set himself up as king, ironically becoming the first native Mesopotamian to rule the state, its previous rulers having all been non Mesopotamian Amorites and Kassites.[7]Kashtiliash himself was taken to Ashur as a prisoner of war.
An Assyrian governor/king named Enlil-nadin-shumi was placed on the throne to rule as viceroy to Tukulti-Ninurta I, and Kadashman-Harbe II and Adad-shuma-iddina succeeded as Assyrian governor/kings, subject to Tukulti-Ninurta I until 1216 BC.
Babylon did not begin to recover until late in the reign of Adad-shuma-usur (1216–1189 BC), as he remained a vassal of Assyria until 1193 BC. However, he was able to prevent the Assyrian king Enlil-kudurri-usur from retaking Babylonia, which, apart from its northern reaches, had mostly shrugged off Assyrian domination during a period of civil war in Assyria, in the years after the death of Tukulti-Ninurta.
Meli-Shipak II (1188–1172 BC) seems to have had a peaceful reign. Despite not being able to regain northern Babylonia from Assyria, no further territory was lost, Elam did not threaten, and the Bronze Age Collapse now affecting the Levant, Canaan, Egypt, The Caucasus, Asia Minor, Mediterranean and Balkans seemed to have little impact on Babylonia (or indeed Assyria).
War resumed under subsequent kings such as Marduk-apla-iddina I (1171–1159 BC) and Zababa-shuma-iddin (1158 BC). The Assyrian king Ashur-Dan Iconquered further parts of northern Babylonia from both kings, and the Elamite ruler Shutruk-Nahhunte eventually conquered most of eastern Babylonia. Enlil-nadin-ahhe (1157–1155 BC) was finally overthrown and the Kassite Dynasty ended after Ashur-Dan I conquered yet more of northern and central Babylonia, and the Elamite king Shutruk-Nahhunte pushed deep into the heart of Babylonia itself, sacking the city and slaying the king. Poetical works have been found lamenting this disaster.
Despite the loss of territory, military weakness, and evident reduction in literacy and culture, the Kassite dynasty was the longest-lived dynasty of Babylon, lasting until 1157 BC, when Babylon was conquered by Shutruk-Nahhunte of Elam, and reconquered a few years later by the native Akkadian-Babylonian Nebuchadrezzar I, part of the larger Bronze Age collapse.
Early Iron Age — Native Rule, Second Dynasty of Isin 1155–1026 BC[edit]
The Elamites did not remain in control of Babylonia long, and Marduk-kabit-ahheshu (1155–1139 BC) established the Second Dynasty of Isin. This was the very first native Akkadian speaking south Mesopotamian dynasty to rule Babylon, and was to remain in power for some 125 years. The new king successfully drove out the Elamites and prevented any possible Kassite revival. Later in his reign he went to war with Assyria, and had some initial success, briefly capturing the city ofEkallatum before suffering defeat at the hands of the Assyrian king Ashur-Dan I.
Itti-Marduk-balatu succeeded his father in 1138 BC, and successfully repelled Elamite attacks on Babylonia during his 8-year reign. He too made attempts to attack Assyria, but also met with failure.
Ninurta-nadin-shumi took the throne in 1137 BC, and also attempted an invasion of Assyria, his armies seem to have skirted through eastern Syria and then made an attempt to attack the Assyrian city of Arbela (modern Erbil) from the west. However this bold move met with defeat at the hands of Ashur-resh-ishi I who then forced a treaty in his favour upon Babylon.
Nebuchadnezzar I (1124–1103 BC) was the most famous ruler of this dynasty. He fought and defeated the Elamites and drove them from Babylonian territory, invading Elam itself, sacking the Elamite capital Susa, and recovering the sacred statue of Marduk that had been carried off from Babylon. Shortly afterwards, the king of Elam was assassinated and his kingdom disintegrated into civil war. However, Nebuchadnezzar failed to extend Babylonian territory further, being defeated a number of times by Ashur-resh-ishi I, king of the Assyrians for control of formerly Hittite controlled territories in Aramea (Syria). The Hittite Empire had been largely annexed by Assyria, and its heartland finally overrun by invading Phrygians. In the later years of his reign, he devoted himself to peaceful building projects and securing Babylonia’s borders.
Nebuchadnezzar was succeeded by his two sons, firstly Enlil-nadin-apli (1103–1100), who lost territory to Assyria. The second of them, Marduk-nadin-ahhe (1098–1081 BC) also went to war with Assyria. Some initial success in these conflicts gave way to catastrophic defeat at the hands of Tiglath-pileser I who annexed huge swathes of Babylonian territory, thus further expanding the Assyrian Empire. Following this a terrible famine gripped Babylon, inviting attacks from Semitic Arameantribes from the west.
In 1072 BC Marduk-shapik-zeri signed a peace treaty with Ashur-bel-kala of Assyria, however his successor Kadašman-Buriaš was not so friendly to Assyria, prompting the Assyrian king to invade Babylonia and depose him, placing Adad-apla-iddina on the throne as his vassal. Assyrian domination continued until c. 1050 BC, with Marduk-ahhe-eriba and Marduk-zer-X regarded as vassals of Assyria. After 1050 BC Assyria descended into a period of civil war, followed by constant warfare with the Arameans and Phrygians, allowing Babylonia to once more largely free itself from the Assyrian yoke for a few decades.
However East Semitic Babylonia soon began to suffer repeated incursions from West Semitic nomadic peoples migrating from The Levant, and during the 11th century BC large swathes of Babylonia were appropriated and occupied by these newly arrived Arameans and Suteans, followed in the late 10th or early 9th century BC by the Chaldeans . The Chaldeans (not to be confused with modern Chaldean Catholics who are in fact ethnic Assyrians) settled in the far south east of Babylonia, the Arameans much of the countryside in eastern and central Babylonia and the Suteans in the western deserts.
Period of Chaos 1026–911 BC[edit]
The native dynasty, then ruled by Nabu-shum-libur was deposed by marauding Arameans in 1026 BC, and the heart of Babylonia, including the capital city itself descended into anarchic state, and no king was to rule Babylon for over 20 years.
However, in southern Mesopotamia (a region corresponding with the old Dynasty of the Sealand), Dynasty V (1025–1004 BC) arose, this was ruled by Simbar-shipak, leader of a Kassite clan, and was in effect a separate state from Babylon. The state of anarchy allowed the Assyrian ruler Ashur-nirari IV the opportunity to attack Babylonia in 1018 BC, and he invaded and captured the Babylonian city of Atlila and some northern regions for Assyria.
This dynasty was replaced by another Kassite Dynasty (Dynasty VI; 1003–984 BC) which also seems to have regained control over Babylon. The Elamites deposed this brief Kassite revival, with king Mar-biti-apla-usur founding Dynasty VII (984–977 BC). However, this dynasty too fell, when the Arameans once more ravaged Babylon.
Native rule was restored by Nabu-mukin-apli in 977 BC, ushering in Dynasty VIII. Dynasty IX begins with Ninurta-kudurri-usur II, who ruled from 941 BC. Babylonia remained weak during this period, with whole areas of Babylonia now under firm Aramean and Sutean control, and by 850 BC the migrant Chaldeans had established their own land in the extreme south east. Babylonian rulers were often forced to bow to pressure from Assyria and Elam, both of which had appropriated Babylonian territory.
Assyrian Rule 911–619 BC[edit]
From 911 BC with the founding of the Neo-Assyrian Empire by Adad-nirari II, Babylon found itself under the domination and rule of its fellow Mesopotamian state for the next three centuries. Adad-nirari II twice attacked and defeated Shamash-mudammiq of Babylonia, annexing a large area of land north of the Diyala River and the towns of Hīt and Zanqu in mid Mesopotamia. He made further gains over Babylonia under Nabu-shuma-ukin I later in his reign. Tukulti-Ninurta II andAshurnasirpal II also forced Babylonia into vassalage, and Shalmaneser III sacked Babylon itself, slew king Nabu-apla-iddina, subjugated the Aramean, Sutean and Chaldean tribes settled within Babylonia, and installed Marduk-zakir-shumi I (855–819 BC) followed by Marduk-balassu-iqbi (819–813 BC) as his vassals. It was during the late 850’s BC, in the annals of Shalmaneser III, that the Chaldeans and Arabs are first mentioned in the pages of written recorded history.
Upon the death of Shalmaneser II, Baba-aha-iddina was reduced to vassalage by the Assyrian queen Shammuramat ( known as Semiramis to the Persians and Greeks), acting as regent to his successor Adad-nirari III who was merely a boy. Adad-nirari III eventually killed him and ruled there directly until 800 BC untilNinurta-apla-X was crowned. However he too was subjugated by Adad-Nirari II. The next Assyrian king, Shamshi-Adad V then made a vassal of Marduk-bel-zeri.
Babylonia briefly fell to another foreign ruler when Marduk-apla-usur ascended the throne in 780 BC, taking advantage of a period of civil war in Assyria. He was a member of the Chaldean tribe who had a century or so earlier settled in a small region in the far south eastern corner of Mesopotamia, bordering the Persian Gulfand south western Iran. Shamshi-Adad V attacked him and retook northern Babylonia, forcing a border treaty in Assyria’s favour upon him. However he was allowed to remain on the throne, and successfully stabilised Babylonia. Eriba-Marduk, another Chaldean, succeeded him in 769 BC and his son, Nabu-shuma-ishkun in 761 BC. Babylonia appears to have been in a state of chaos during this time, with the north occupied by Assyria, its throne occupied by foreign Chaldeans, and civil unrest prominent throughout the land.
A native Babylonian king named Nabonassar overthrew the Chaldean usurpers in 748 BC, and successfully stabilised Babylonia, remaining untroubled by Ashur-nirari V of Assyria. However, with the accession of Tiglath-Pileser III (745-727 BC) Babylonia came under renewed attack. Babylon was invaded and sacked and Nabonassar reduced to vassalage. His successors Nabu-nadin-zeri, Nabu-suma-ukin II and Nabu-mukin-zeri were also in servitude to Tiglath-Pileser III, until in 729 BC the Assyrian king decided to rule Babylon directly as its king instead of allowing Babylonian kings to remain as vassals of Assyria as his predecessors had done for two hundred years.
It was during this period that an Akkadian influenced form of Eastern Aramaic was introduced by the Assyrians as the lingua franca of their vast empire, and Mesopotamian Aramaic began to supplant Akkadian as the spoken language of the general populace of both Assyria and Babylonia.
The Assyrian king Shalmaneser V was declared king of Babylon in 727 BC, but died whilst besieging Samaria in 722 BC.
Revolt was then fomented against Assyrian domination by Merodach-Baladan, a Chaldean malka (chieftain) of the far south east of Mesopotamia, with strongElamite support. Merodach-Baladan managed to take the throne of Babylon itself between 721- 710 BC whilst the Assyrian king Sargon II were otherwise occupied in defeating the Scythians and Cimmerians who had attacked Assyria’s Persian and Median vassal colonies in Ancient Iran. Merodach-Baladan was eventually defeated and ejected by Sargon II of Assyria, and fled to his protectors in Elam. Sargon II was then declared king in Babylon.
Sennacherib succeeded Sargon II, and after ruling directly for a while, he placed his son Ashur-nadin-shumi on the throne. However Merodach-Baladan and the Elamites continued to unsuccessfully agitate against Assyrian rule. Nergal-ushezib, an Elamite, murdered the Assyrian prince and briefly took the throne. This led to the infuriated Assyrian king Sennacherib invading and subjugating Elam and sacking Babylon, laying waste to and largely destroying the city. Babylon was regarded as a sacred city by all Mesopotamians, including Assyrians, and this act eventually led Sennacherib to be murdered by his own sons while praying to the godNisroch in Nineveh. A puppet king Marduk-zakir-shumi II was placed on the throne by the new Assyrian king Esarhaddon. However, Merodach-Baladan returned from exile in Elam, and briefly deposed him, forcing Esarhaddon to attack and defeat him, whereupon he once more fled to his masters in Elam, where he died in exile.
Esarhaddon (681–669 BC) ruled Babylon personally, he completely rebuilt the city, bringing rejuvenation and peace to the region. Upon his death, and in an effort to maintain harmony within his vast empire (which stretched from the Caucasus to Nubia and from Cyprus to Persia), he installed his eldest son Shamash-shum-ukinas a subject king in Babylon, and his youngest, Ashurbanipal in the more senior position as king of Assyria and overlord of Shamash-shum-ukin.
Shamash-shum-ukin, after decades peacefully subject to his brother Ashurbanipal, eventually became infused with Babylonian nationalism despite being an Assyrian himself, declaring that the city of Babylon (and not the Assyrian city of Nineveh) should be the seat of the immense empire. He raised a major revolt against his brother, Ashurbanipal. He led a powerful coalition of peoples also resentful of Assyrian subjugation and rule, including; Elam, the Persians, Medes, theBabylonians, Chaldeans and Suteans of southern Mesopotamia, the Arameans of the Levant and southwest Mesopotamia, the Arabs of the Arabian Peninsula and the Canaanites–Phoenicians. After a bitter struggle Babylon was sacked and its allies vanquished, Shamash-shum-ukim being killed in the process. Elam was destroyed once and for all, and the Babylonians, Persians, Chaldeans, Arabs, Medes, Elamites, Arameans, Suteans and Canaanites were violently subjugated, with Assyrian troops exacting savage revenge on the rebelling peoples. An Assyrian governor named Kandalanu was placed on the throne to rule on behalf of the Assyrian king.[7] Upon Ashurbanipal’s death in 627 BC, his son Ashur-etil-ilani became ruler of Babylon and Assyria.
However, Assyria soon descended into a series of brutal internal civil wars which were to cause its downfall. Ashur-etil-ilani was deposed by one of his own generals, named Sin-shumu-lishir in 623 BC, who also set himself up as king in Babylon. After only one year on the throne amidst continual civil, Sin-shar-ishkunousted him as ruler of Assyria and Babylonia in 622 BC. However, he too was beset by constant unremitting civil war in the Assyrian heartland. Babylonia took advantage of this and rebelled under Nabopolassar, a previously unknown malka (chieftain) of the Chaldeans, who had settled in south eastern Mesopotamia c. 950 BC.
It was during the reign of Sin-shar-ishkun that Assyria’s vast empire began to unravel, and many of its former subject peoples ceased to pay tribute, most significantly for the Assyrians; the Babylonians, Chaldeans, Medes, Persians, Scythians, Arameans and Cimmerians.
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