Ashurbanipal
Ashurbanipal (ah-shur-BA-neh-pal),
Assurbanipal or
Sardanapal, in Akkadian
Aššur-bāni-apli, (b.
685 BCE - d.
627 BCE) (reigned
669 -
627 BCE), the son of
Esarhaddon and Naqi'a-Zakutu, was the last great
king of ancient
Assyria. He is famous as one of the few kings in antiquity who could himself read and write. Assyrian sculpture reached its apogee under his rule (Northern palace and south-western palace at
Nineveh,
battle of Ulai). The Greeks knew him as
Sardanapalos;
Latin and other medieval texts refer to him as
Sardanapalus. In the Bible he is called
As(e)nappar or
Osnapper (
Ezra 4:10).
During his rule, Assyrian splendour was not only visible in its military power, but also its culture and art. Ashurbanipal created "the first systematically collected
library" at
Nineveh, where he gathered all
cuneiform literature available by that time. A library was distinct from an
archive: earlier repositories of documents had accumulated passively, in the course of administrative routine.
Ashurbanipal was born toward the end of a fifteen-hundred-year period of Assyrian
ascendancy. His name in Assyrian is Ashur-bani-apli (the god
Ashur has made a[nother] son), affirming that he was not intended to stand in the line of royal accession.
His father,
Esarhaddon, youngest son of
Sennacherib, had become heir when the crown prince,
Ashur-nadin-shumi, was deposed by rebels from his position as vassal for
Babylon. Esarhaddon was not the son of Sennacherib's queen,
Tashmetum-sharrat, but of the West
Semitic "palace woman"
Zakutu, known by her native name,
Naqi'a. The only queen known for Esarhaddon was
Ashur-hamat, who died in
672 BCEAshurbanipal grew up in the small palace called
bit reduti (house of succession), built by Sennacherib when he was crown prince in the northern quadrant of
Nineveh. In
694, Sennacherib had completed the "Palace Without Rival" at the southwest corner of the
acropolis, obliterating most of the older structures. The "House of Succession" had become the palace of Esarhaddon, the crown prince. In this house, Ashurbanipal's grandfather was assassinated by uncles identified only from the biblical account as
Adrammelek and
Sharezer. From this conspiracy, Esarhaddon emerged as
king in
681. He proceeded to rebuild as his residence the
bit masharti (weapons house, or
arsenal). The "House of Succession" was left to his mother and the younger children, including Ashurbanipal.
The names of five brothers and one sister are known.
Sin-iddin-apli, the intended crown prince, died prior to
672. Not having been expected to become heir to the throne, Ashurbanipal was trained in scholarly pursuits as well as the usual
horsemanship,
hunting,
chariotry, soldierliness,
craftsmanship, and royal decorum. In a unique autobiographical statement, Ashurbanipal specified his youthful scholarly pursuits as having included oil divination,
mathematics, and reading and writing. Ashurbanipal was the only Assyrian king who learned how to read and write.
In 672, upon the death of his queen, Esarhaddon reorganized the line of succession at the instigation of his mother. He used the submission of
Median chieftains to draft a treaty. The chieftains swore that if Esarhaddon died while his sons were still minors, they and their descendants would guarantee the succession of Ashurbanipal as king of Assyria and
Shamash-shum-ukin as king of Babylon. A monumental
stela set up two years later in a northwestern province portrays Esarhaddon in high relief upon its face and each of the sons on a side. These portraits, the earliest dated for Ashurbanipal and his brother, show both with the full beard of maturity.
The princes pursued diverse educations thereafter. Extant letters from Shamash-shum-ukin offer his father reports of the situation in Babylon; Ashurbanipal at home received letters as crown prince. The situation came to an immediate crisis in 669, when Esarhaddon, on campaign to
Egypt, died suddenly. Ashurbanipal did not accede to the kingship of Assyria until late in the year. His grandmother required all to support his sole claim to the throne. The official ceremonies of coronation came in the second month of the new year, and within the same year (
668), Ashurbanipal installed his brother as
King of Babylon. The transition took place smoothly, and the dual monarchy of the youthful brothers began. Texts describe their relationship as if they were twins. It was clear, however, that Ashurbanipal, as king of Assyria, like his fathers before him, was also "king of the universe."
Tablets from the library of Nineveh preserve the most complete sources for both the
Sumerian and
Akkadian versions of the
Epic of Gilgamesh. Other sets of tablets offer what is essentially a Sumerian-Akkadian dictionary. There are arcane astronomical/astrological texts. By far, the largest group of tablets (almost all of which are in the
British Museum,
London) are 'omen' texts that taught the scribes how to recognize the significance of portents.
Assurbanipal became crown prince in 672, when Esarhaddon's eldest son Sin-iddina-apla died. Assurbanipal was very unpopular with the court and the priesthood. Contracts were made with leading Assyrians, members of the royal family, and foreign rulers to assure their loyalty to the crown prince. But it was only the energy of his mother Naqi'a-Zakutu that assured his ascent to the throne when
Esarhaddon suddenly died during his Egyptian campaign in 669.
The early part of Ashurbanipal's reign, like that of most Assyrian kings, was marked by incessant warfare. He made war on his brother
Shamash-shum-ukin, who had been installed as king in
Babylon, and who had rebelled against him. The Babylonian king was the leader of a large coalition of peoples from southern Mesopotamia (but including also Egypt). Eventually, Ashurbanipal reconquered Babylon, and the coalition disbanded. Ashurbanipal also crushed a rebellion in
Egypt, and conquered
Elam, destroying its capital city,
Susa. He also conquered a great part of the
Arab territories.
After defeating the Babylonian coalition, in his 22nd year, he appointed
Kandalanu as puppet-king of Babylon. However, some evidence would suggest that Ashurbanipal and Kandalanu are the same person, and that he simply decided to use a fictitious name for the kingship over Babylon.
During the final decade of his rule, Assyria was quite peaceful, but the country apparently faced a serious decline. Documentation from the last years of reign of Ashurbanipal is very scarce, and even the date of his death is not known with certainty. The latest attestations for Ashurbanipal come only to his year 38 (631 BC), but later sources have him reigning for 42 years (to 627 BC). It has been suggested that the last years of Assurbanipal witnessed a struggle between the aged king and two of his rebellious sons.
The death of Ashurbanipal opened the way to catastrophic strife between his sons for the throne of Assyria. The contenders included
Ashur-etil-ilani,
Sin-shar-ishkun and
Sin-shumu-lishir, who were probably his sons, and the eventual new king of Babylon,
Nabopolassar.
Oppenheim's dates (as given here) are drawn from references in the inscription from Harran of the mother of
Nabonidus.
Ashurbanipal is one of the most popular Assyrian kings, as his name is often used for boys within the Assyrian communities today.
*
Death of Sardanapalus, a 1827 painting by
Eugène Delacroix.
*
The Great Ashurbanipal*
The Library of King Ashurbanipal Web Page*
Assurbanipal Coronation Hymn take me back!
