In a word, this new historian shows us in every line that the theological instinct has superseded popular enthusiasm, and his work loses unmistakably in literary interest by the change. We feel that he is wanting in feeling and inspiration; his characters no longer palpitate with life; his narrative drags, its interest decreases, and his language is often deficient in force and colour. But while writers, trained in the schools of the prophets, thus sought to bring home to the people the benefits which their God had showered on them, the people themselves showed signs of disaffection towards Him, or were, at any rate, inclined to associate with Him other gods borrowed from neighbouring states, and to overlay the worship they rendered Him with ceremonies and ideas inconsistent with its original purity. The permanent division of the nation into two independent kingdoms had had its effect on their religion as well as on their political life, and had separated the worshippers into two hostile camps. The inhabitants of Judah still continued to build altars on their high places, as they had done in the time before David; there, the devout prostrated themselves before the sacred stones and before the Asherah, or went in unto the kedeshôth in honour of Astarte, and in Jahveh’s own temple at Jerusalem they had set up the image of a brazen serpent to which they paid homage.* The feeling, however, that the patron deity of the chosen people could have but one recognised habitation—the temple built for Him by Solomon—and that the priests of this temple were alone qualified to officiate there in an effective manner, came to prevail more and more strongly in Judaea. The king, indeed, continued to offer sacrifices and prayer there,** but the common people could no longer intercede with their God except through the agency of the priests.

The latter, in their turn, tended to develop into a close corporation of families consecrated for generations past to the priestly office; they came in time to form a tribe by themselves, which took rank among the other tribes of Israel, and claimed Levi, one of the twelve sons of Jacob, as its ancestor. Their head, chosen from among the descendants of Zadok, who had been the first high priest in the reign of Solomon, was by virtue of his office one of the chief ministers of the crown, and we know what an important part was played by Jehoiadah in the revolution which led to the deposition of Athaliah; the high priest was, however, no less subordinate to the supreme power than his fellow-ministers, and the sanctity of his office did not avail to protect him from ill-treatment or death if he incurred the displeasure of his sovereign.* He had control over a treasury continually enriched by the offerings of the faithful, and did not always turn his trust to the best uses; in times of extreme distress the king used to borrow from him as a last resource, in order to bring about the withdrawal of an invader, or purchase the help of a powerful ally.** The capital of Israel was of too recent foundation to allow of its chapel royal becoming the official centre of national worship; the temple and priesthood of Samaria never succeeded in effacing the prestige enjoyed by the ancient oracles, though in the reign of both the first and second Jeroboam, Dan, Bethel, Gilgal, and Mizpah had each its band of chosen worshippers.***

At these centres adoration was rendered to the animal presentment of Jahveh,* and even prophets like Elijah and Elisha did not condemn this as heretical; they had enough to do in hunting down the followers of Baal without entering into open conflict with the worshippers of the golden calf. The priesthood of the northern kingdom was not confined to members of the family of Levi, but was recruited from all the tribes; it levied a tithe on the harvest, reserved to itself the pick of the offerings and victims, and jealously forbade a plurality of sanctuaries,** The Book of the Covenant*** has handed down to us the regulations in force at one of these temples, perhaps that of Bethel, one of the wealthiest of them all.

The directions in regard to ritual are extremely simple, and the moral code is based throughout on the inexorable lex talionis, “Life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burning for burning, wound for wound, stripe for stripe.” * This brief code must have been almost universally applicable to every conjuncture of civil and religious life in Judah no less than in Israel. On one point only do we find a disagreement, and that is in connection with the one and only Holy of Holies to the possession of which the southern kingdom had begun to lay claim: in a passage full of significance Jahveh declares, “An altar of earth thou shalt make unto Me, and shalt sacrifice thereon thy burnt offerings and thy peace offerings, thy sheep and thine oxen: in every place where I record My name I will come unto thee and I will bless thee. And if thou make Me an altar of stone, thou shalt not build it of hewn stones: for if thou lift up thy tool upon it, thou hast polluted it. Neither shalt thou go up by steps unto Mine altar, that thy nakedness be not discovered thereon.” **

The patriarchs and early ancestors of the race had performed their sacrifices in the open air, on rude and low altars, differing widely from lofty and elaborately ornamented erections like those at Jerusalem, which seem to have borne a resemblance to the altars of the Egyptians: the author of the Book of the Covenant advises the faithful to follow the example of those great men rather than that of the Lévites of Judah. Nevertheless this multiplicity of high places was not without its dangers; it led the common people to confuse Jahveh with the idols of Canaan, and encouraged the spread of foreign superstitions. The misfortunes which had come thick and fast upon the Israelites ever since the division of the kingdom had made them only too ready to seek elsewhere that support and consolation which they could no longer find at home. The gods of Damascus and Assur who had caused the downfall of Gath, of Calneh, and of Hamath,* those of Tyre and Sidon who lavished upon the Phoenicians the wealth of the seas, or even the deities of Ammon, Moab, or Edom, might well appear more desirable than a Being Who, in spite of His former promises, seemed powerless to protect His own people. A number of the Israelites transferred their allegiance to these powerful deities, prostrated themselves before the celestial host, flocked round the resting-places of Kevan, the star of El, and carried the tabernacles of the King of heaven;** nor was Judah slow to follow their example. The prophets, however, did not view their persistent ill-fortune in the same light as the common people; far from accepting it as a proof of the power of other divinities, they recognised in it a mark of Jahveh’s superiority.

In their eyes Jahveh was the one God, compared with Whom the pagan deities were no gods at all, and could not even be said to exist. He might, had He so willed it, have bestowed His protection on any one of the numerous races whom He had planted on the earth: but as a special favour, which He was under no obligation to confer, He had chosen Israel to be His own people, and had promised them that they should occupy Canaan so long as they kept free from sin. But Israel had sinned, Israel had followed after idols; its misfortunes were, therefore, but the just penalty of its unfaithfulness. Thus conceived, Jahveh ceased to be merely the god of a nation—He became the God of the whole world; and it is in the guise of a universal Deity that some, at any rate, of the prophets begin to represent Him from the time of Jeroboam II. onwards.

This change of view in regard to the Being of Jahveh coincided with a no less marked alteration in the character of His prophets. At first they had taken an active part in public affairs; they had thrown themselves into the political movements of the time, and had often directed their course,* by persuasion when persuasion sufficed, by violence when violence was the only means that was left to them of enforcing the decrees of the Most High. Not long before this, we find Elisha secretly conspiring against the successors of Ahab, and taking a decisive part in the revolution which set the house of Jehu on the throne in place of that of Omri; but during the half-century which had elapsed since his death, the revival in the fortunes of Israel and its growing prosperity under the rule of an energetic king had furnished the prophets with but few pretexts for interfering in the conduct of state affairs.

They no longer occupied themselves in resisting the king, but addressed themselves to the people, pointed out the heinousness of their sins, and threatened them with the wrath of Jahveh if they persisted in their unfaithfulness: they came to be spiritual advisers rather than political partisans, and orators rather than men of action like their predecessors. Their discourses were carefully prepared beforehand, and were written down either by themselves or by some of their disciples for the benefit of posterity, in the hope that future generations would understand the dangers or witness the catastrophes which their contemporaries might not live to see. About 760 B.C., Amos of Tekôa,* a native of Judaea, suddenly made his appearance at Bethel, in the midst of the festivals which pilgrims had flocked to celebrate in the ancient temple erected to Jahveh in one of His animal forms.

His opening words filled the listening crowd with wonder: “The high places of Isaac shall be desolate,” he proclaimed, “and the sanctuaries of Israel shall be laid waste; and I will rise against the house of Jeroboam with the sword.” *

Yet Jeroboam had by this time gained all his victories, and never before had the King of Samaria appeared to be more firmly seated on the throne: what, then, did this intruder mean by introducing himself as a messenger of wrath in the name of Jahveh, at the very moment when Jahveh was furnishing His worshippers with abundant signs of His favour? Amaziah, the priest of Bethel, interrupted him as he went on to declare that “Jeroboam should die by the sword, and Israel should surely be led away captive out of his land.” The king, informed of what was going on, ordered Amos into exile, and Amaziah undertook to communicate this sentence to him: “O thou seer, go, flee thee away into the land of Judah, and there eat bread, and prophesy there: but prophesy not again any more at Bethel: for it is the king’s sanctuary, and it is a royal house.” And Amos replied, “I was no prophet, neither was I a prophet’s son; but I was a herdman, and a dresser of sycomore trees: and the Lord took me from following the flock, and the Lord said unto me, Go, prophesy unto My people Israel. Now therefore hear thou the word of the Lord: Thou sayest, Prophesy not against Israel, and drop not thy word against the house of Isaac: therefore thus saith the Lord: Thy wife shall be an harlot in the city, and thy sons and thy daughters shall fall by the sword, and thy land shall be divided by line; and thou thyself shalt die in a land that is unclean, and Israel shall surely be led away captive out of his land.” *

This prophecy, first expanded, and then written down with a purity of diction and loftiness of thought which prove Amos to have been a master of literary art,* was widely circulated, and gradually gained authority as portents indicative of the divine wrath began to accumulate, such as an earthquake which occurred two years after the incident at Bethel,* an eclipse of the sun, drought, famine, and pestilence.*** It foretold, in the first place, the downfall of all the surrounding countries—Damascus, Gaza, Tyre, Edom, Ammon, Moab, and Judah; then, denouncing Israel itself, condemned it to the same penalties for the same iniquities. In vain did the latter plead its privileges as the chosen people of Jahveh, and seek to atone for its guilt by endless sacrifices. “I hate, I despise your feasts,” declared Jahveh, “and I will take no delight in your solemn assemblies. Yea, though ye offer Me your burnt offerings and meat offerings, I will not accept them: neither will I regard the peace offerings of your fat beasts. Take thou away from Me the noise of thy songs; for I will not hear the melody of thy viols. But let judgment roll down as waters, and righteousness as a mighty stream.” ****

The unfaithfulness of Israel, the corruption of its cities, the pride of its nobles, had sealed its doom; even at that moment the avenger was at hand on its north-eastern border, the Assyrian appointed to carry out sentence upon it.* Then follow visions, each one of which tends to deepen the effect of the seer’s words—a cloud of locusts,** a devouring fire,*** a plumb-line in the hands of the Lord,**** a basket laden with summer fruits—till at last the whole people of Israel take refuge in their temple, vainly hoping that there they may escape from the vengeance of the Eternal. “There shall not one of them flee away, and there shall not one of them escape. Though they dig into hell, thence shall Mine hand take them; and though they climb up to heaven, thence will I bring them down. And though they hide themselves in the top of Oarmel, I will search and take them out thence; and though they be hid from My sight in the bottom of the sea, thence will I command the serpent, and he shall bite them. And though they go into captivity before their enemies, thence will I command the sword, and it shall slay them; and I will set Mine eyes upon them for evil and not for good.”

For the first time in history a prophet foretold disaster and banishment for a whole people: love of country was already giving place in the heart of Amos to his conviction of the universal jurisdiction of God, and this conviction led him to regard as possible and probable a state of things in which Israel should have no part. Nevertheless, its decadence was to be merely temporary; Jahveh, though prepared to chastise the posterity of Jacob severely, could not bring Himself to destroy it utterly. The kingdom of David was soon to flourish anew: “Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that the plowman shall overtake the reaper, and the treader of grapes him that soweth seed; and the mountains shall drop sweet wine, and all the hills shall melt. And I will bring again the captivity of My people Israel, and they shall build the waste cities, and inhabit them; and they shall plant vineyards, and drink the wine thereof; they shall also make gardens, and eat the fruit of them. And I will plant them upon their land, and they shall no more be plucked up out of their land which I have given them, saith the Lord thy God.” *

The voice of Amos was not the only one raised in warning. From the midst of Ephraim, another seer, this time a priest, Hosea, son of Beeri,** was never weary of reproaching the tribes with their ingratitude, and persisted in his foretelling of the desolation to come.

The halo of grandeur and renown with which Jeroboam had surrounded the kingdom could not hide its wretched and paltry character from the prophet’s eyes; “for yet a little while, and I will avenge the blood of Jezreel upon the house of Jehu, and will cause the kingdom of the house of Israel to cease. And it shall come to pass at that day that I will break the bow of Israel in the valley of Jezreel.” * Like his predecessor, he, too, inveighed against the perversity and unfaithfulness of his people. The abandoned wickedness of Gomer, his wife, had brought him to despair. In the bitterness of his heart, he demands of Jahveh why He should have seen fit to visit such humiliation on His servant, and persuades himself that the faithlessness of which he is a victim is but a feeble type of that which Jahveh had suffered at the hands of His people. Israel had gone a-whoring after strange gods, and the day of retribution for its crimes was not far distant: “The children of Israel shall abide many days without king and without prince, and without sacrifice and without pillar, and without ephod or teraphim; afterward shall the children of Israel return, and seek the Lord their God, and David their king; and shall come with fear unto the Lord and to His goodness in the latter days.” **

Whether the decadence of the Hebrews was or was not due to the purely moral and religious causes indicated by the prophets, it was only too real, and even the least observant among their contemporaries must have suspected that the two kingdoms were quite unfitted, as to their numbers, their military organisation, and monetary reserves, to resist successfully any determined attack that might be made upon them by surrounding nations. An armed force entering Syria by way of the Euphrates could hardly fail to overcome any opposition that might be offered to it, if not at the first onset, at any rate after a very brief struggle; none of the minor states to be met upon its way, such as Damascus or Israel, much less those of Hamath or Hadrach, were any longer capable of barring its progress, as Ben-hadad and Hazael had arrested that of the Assyrians in the time of Shalmaneser III. The efforts then made by the Syrian kings to secure their independence had exhausted their resources and worn out the spirit of their peoples; civil war had prevented them from making good their losses during the breathing-space afforded by the decadence of Assyria, and now that Nature herself had afflicted them with the crowning misfortunes of famine and pestilence, they were reduced to a mere shadow of what they had been during the previous century. If, therefore, Sharduris, after making himself master of the countries of the Taurus and Amanos, had turned his steps towards the valley of the Orontes, he might have secured possession of it without much difficulty, and after that there would have been nothing to prevent his soldiers from pressing on, if need be, to the walls of Samaria or even of Jerusalem itself. Indeed, he seems to have at last made up his mind to embark on this venture, when the revival of Assyrian power put a stop to his ambitious schemes. Tiglath-pileser, hard pressed on every side by daring and restless foes, began by attacking those who were at once the most troublesome and most vulnerable—the Aramæan tribes on the banks of the Tigris. To give these incorrigible banditti, who boldly planted their outposts not a score of leagues from his capital, a free hand on his rear, and brave the fortune of war in Armenia or Syria, without first teaching them a lesson in respect, would have been simply to court serious disaster; an Aramæan raid occurring at a time when he was engaged elsewhere with the bulk of his army, might have made it necessary to break off a successful campaign and fall back in haste to the relief of Nineveh or Calah (Kalakh), just as he was on the eve of gaining some decisive advantage. Moreover, the suzerainty of Assyria over Karduniash entailed on him the duty of safeguarding Babylon from that other horde of Aramæans which harassed it on the east, while the Kaldâ were already threatening its southern frontier. It is not quite clear whether Nabunazîr who then occupied the throne implored his help:* at any rate, he took the field as soon as he felt that his own crown was secure, overthrew the Aramæans at the first encounter, and drove them back from the banks of the Lower Zab to those of the Uknu: all the countries which they had seized to the east of the Tigris at once fell again into the hands of the Assyrians.

This first point gained, Tiglath-pileser crossed the river, and made a demonstration in force before the Babylonian fortresses. He visited, one after another, Sippar, Nipur, Babylon, Borsippa, Kuta, Kîshu, Dilbat, and Uruk, “cities without peer,” and offered in all of them sacrifices to the gods,—to Bel, to Zirbanît, to Nebo, to Tashmît, and to Nirgal. Karduniash bowed down before him, but he abstained from giving any provocation to the Kaldâ, and satisfied with having convinced Nabunazîr that Assyria had lost none of her former vigour, he made his way back to his hereditary kingdom.*

The lightly-won success of this expedition produced the looked-for result. Tiglath-pileser had set out a king de facto; but now that the gods of the ancient sanctuaries had declared themselves satisfied with his homage, and had granted him that religious consecration which had before been lacking, he returned a king de jure as well (745 B.C.). His next campaign completed what the first had begun. The subjugation of the plain would have been of little advantage if the highlands had been left in the power of tribes as yet unconquered, and allowed to pour down with impunity bands of rapacious freebooters on the newly liberated provinces: security between the Zab and the Uknu could only be attained by the pacification of Namri, and it was, therefore, to Namri that the sea of war was transferred in 744 B.C. All the Cossæan and Babylonian races intermingled in the valleys on the frontier were put to ransom one after another.

These included the Bît-Sangibuti, the Bît-Khambân, the Barrua, the Bit-Zualzash, the Bît-Matti, the Umliash, the Parsua, the Bît-Zatti, the Bît-Zabdâdani, the Bît-Ishtar, the city of Zakruti, the Nina, the Bustus, the Arakuttu, by which the conqueror gradually made his way into the heart of Media, reaching districts into which none of his predecessors had ever penetrated. Those least remote he annexed to his own empire, converting them into a province under the rule of an Assyrian governor; he then returned to Calah with a convoy of 60,500 prisoners, and countless herds of oxen, sheep, mules, and dromedaries. Whilst he was thus employed, Assur-dainâni, one of his generals to whom he had entrusted the pick of his army, pressed on still further to the north-east, across the almost waterless deserts of Media. The mountainous district on the shores of the Caspian had for centuries enjoyed a reputation for wealth and fertility among the races settled on the banks of the Euphrates and Tigris. It was from thence that they obtained their lapis-lazuli, and the hills from which it was extracted were popularly supposed to consist almost entirely of one compact mass of this precious mineral. Their highest peak, now known as the Demavend, was then called Bikni,* a name which had come to be applied to the whole district.

To the Assyrians it stood as the utmost boundary mark of the known world, beyond which their imagination pictured little more than a confused mist of almost fabulous regions and peoples. Assur-dainâni caught a distant glimpse of the snow-capped pyramid of Demavend, but approached no nearer than its lower slopes, whence he retraced his steps after having levied tribute from their inhabitants. The fame of this exploit spread far and wide in a marvellously short space of time, and chiefs who till then had vacillated in their decision now crowded the path of the victor, eager to pay him homage on his return: even the King of Illipi thought it wise to avoid the risk of invasion, and hastened of his own accord to meet the conqueror. Here, again, Tiglath-pileser had merely to show himself in order to re-establish the supremacy of Assyria: the races of the plain, for many years familiar with defeat, made no pretence of serious resistance, but bowed their necks beneath a fresh yoke almost without protest.

Having thus secured his rear from attack for some years at any rate, Tiglath-pileser no longer hesitated to try conclusions with Urartu. The struggle in which he now deliberately engaged could not fail to be a decisive one; for Urartu, buoyed up and borne on the wave of some fifty years of prosperity, had almost succeeded in reaching first rank among the Asiatic powers: one more victory over Nineveh, and it would become—for how long none might say—undisputed mistress of the whole of Asia. Assyria, on the other hand, had reached a. point where its whole future hung upon a single issue of defeat or victory. The prestige with which the brilliant campaigns of Assur-nazir-pal and Shalmaneser III. had invested its name, if somewhat diminished, had still survived its recent reverses, and the terror inspired by its arms was so great even among races who had witnessed them from a distance, that the image of Assyria rose involuntarily before the eyes of the Hebrew prophets as that of the avenger destined to punish Israel for its excesses.*

No doubt, during the last few reigns its prosperity had waned and its authority over distant provinces had gradually become relaxed; but now the old dynasty, worn out by its own activity, had given place to a new one, and with this change of rulers the tide of ill-fortune was, perhaps, at last about to turn. At such a juncture, a successful campaign meant full compensation for all past disasters and the attainment of a firmer position than had ever yet been held; whereas another reverse, following on those from which the empire had already suffered, would render their effect tenfold more deadly, and, by letting loose the hatred of those whom fear alone still held in check, complete its overthrow. It was essential, therefore, before entering on the struggle, to weigh well every chance of victory, and to take every precaution by which adverse contingencies might be, as far as possible, eliminated. The army, encouraged by its success in the two preceding campaigns, was in excellent fighting order, and ready to march in any direction without a moment’s hesitation, confident in its ability to defeat the forces of Urartu as it had defeated those of the Medes and Aramæans; but the precise point of attack needed careful consideration. Tiglath-pileser must have been sorely tempted to take the shortest route, challenge the enemy at his most vulnerable point on the shores of Lake Van, and by a well-aimed thrust deal him a blow from which he would never, or only by slow degrees, recover. But this vital region of Urartu, as we have already pointed out, presented the greatest difficulties of access. The rampart of mountain and forest by which it was protected on the Assyrian side could only be traversed by means of a few byways, along which bands of guerrillas could slip down easily enough to the banks of the Tigris, but which were quite impassable to any army in full marching order, hampered by its horses, chariots, and baggage-train: compelled to thread its way, with columns unduly extended, through the woods and passes of an unknown country, which daily use had long made familiar to its adversaries, it would have run the risk of being cut to pieces man by man a dozen times before it could hope to range its disciplined masses on the field of battle. Former Assyrian invasions had, as a general rule, taken an oblique course towards some of the spurs of this formidable chain, and had endeavoured to neutralise its defences by outflanking them, either by proceeding westwards along the basins of the Supnat and the Arzania, or eastwards through the countries bordering on Lake Urumiah; but even this method presented too many difficulties and too little certainty of success to warrant Tiglath-pileser in staking the reviving fortunes of his empire on its adoption. He rightly argued that Sharduris would be most easily vulnerable in those provinces whose allegiance to him was of recent date, and he resolved to seek out his foe in the heart of Northern Syria.

There, if anywhere, every chance was in his favour and against the Armenian. The scene of operations, while it had long been familiar to his own generals and soldiers, was, on the other hand, entirely new ground to those of the enemy; the latter, though unsurpassed in mountain warfare, lost much of their superiority on the plains, and could not, with all their courage, make up for their lack of experience. Moreover, it must not be forgotten that a victory on the banks of the Afrîn or the Orontes would have more important results than a success gained in the neighbourhood of the lakes or of Urartu. Not only would it free the Assyrians from the only one of their enemies whom they had any cause to fear, but it would also bring back the Hittite kings to their allegiance, and restore the Assyrian supremacy over the wealthiest regions of Western Asia: they would thus disable Urartu and reconquer Syria at one and the same time. Tiglath-pileser, therefore, crossed the Euphrates in the spring of 743 B.C., neither Matîlu of Agusi, Kushtashpi of Kummukh, nor their allies daring to interfere with his progress. He thus advanced as far as Arpad, and, in the first moment of surprise, the town threw open its gates before him.*

There, while he was making ready to claim the homage of the surrounding countries, he learnt that Sharduris was hastening up to the rescue. He at once struck his camp and marched out to meet his rival, coming up with him in the centre of Kummukh, not far from the Euphrates, between Kishtân and Khalpi. Sharduris was at the head of his Syrian contingents, including the forces of Agusi, Melitene, Kummukh, and Gurgum—a formidable army, probably superior in point of numbers to that of the Assyrians. The struggle lasted a whole day, and in the course of it the two kings, catching sight of one another on the field of battle, engaged in personal combat: at last, towards evening, the chariots and cavalry of Urartu gave way and the rout began. The victors made their way into the camp at the heels of their flying enemies. Sharduris abandoned his chariot, and could find nothing but a mare to aid him in his flight; he threw himself upon her back, careless of the ridicule at that time attached to the use of such a mount in Eastern countries,* fled at a gallop all through the night, hard pressed by a large body of cavalry, crossed the hills of Sibak, and with much difficulty reached the bridge over the Euphrates.

His pursuers drew rein on the river-bank, and Sharduris re-entered his kingdom in safety. He had lost nearly 73,000 men, killed or taken prisoners, in addition to his chariots, and nearly the whole train of horses, asses, servants, and artisans attached to his army; he left his tent still standing, and those who were first to enter it laid hands on his furniture and effects, his royal ornaments, his bed and portable throne, with its cushions and bearing-poles, none of which had he found time to take with him. Tiglath-pileser burnt them all on the spot as a thank-offering, to the gods who had so signally favoured him; the bed alone he retained, in order that he might dedicate it as a trophy to the goddess Ishtar of Nineveh.

He had covered himself with glory, and might well be proud of his achievement, yet the victory was in no way a decisive one. The damage inflicted on the allies, considerable though it was, had cost him dear: the forces left to him were not sufficient to enable him to finish the campaign, and extort oaths of allegiance from the Syrian princes before they had recovered from the first shock of defeat. He returned to Nineveh, and spent the whole winter in reorganising his troops; while his enemies, on the other hand, made preparations to repel the attack energetically. Sharduris could not yet venture outside his mountain strongholds, but the hope of being reinforced by him, as soon as he had got together another army, encouraged the Syrian kings to remain faithful to him in spite of his reverses.*

Matîlu of Agusi, unable to carry the day against the Assyrians in the open field, distributed his men among his towns, and resisted all attacks with extraordinary persistence, confident that Sharduris would at length come to help him, and with this hope he held out for three years in his town of Arpad. This protracted resistance need no longer astonish us, now that we know, from observations made on the spot, the marvellous skill displayed in the fortification of these Asiatic towns. The ruins of Arpad have yet to be explored, but those of Samalla have been excavated, and show us the methods adopted for the defence of a royal residence about the middle of the century with which we are now concerned. The practice of building citadels on a square or rectangular plan, which prevailed so largely under the Egyptian rule, had gradually gone out of fashion as the knowledge of engineering advanced, and the use of mines and military engines had been more fully developed among the nations of Western Asia. It was found that the heavily fortified angles of the enclosing wall merely presented so many weak points, easy to attack but difficult to defend, no matter how carefully they might be protected by an accumulation of obstacles. In the case of fortresses built on a plain, where the plan was not modified by the nature of the site, the enclosing wall was generally round or oval in shape, and free from useless angles which might detract from its strength. The walls were surmounted by battlements, and flanked at short intervals by round or square towers, the tops of which rose but little, if indeed at all, above the level of the curtain. In front of this main wall was a second lower one, also furnished with towers and battlements, which followed the outline of the first all the way round at an interval of some yards, thus acting as a sort of continuous screen to it. The gates were little less than miniature citadels built into each line of ramparts; the gate of the outer wall was often surrounded by lower outworks, two square bastions and walls enclosing an outer quadrangle which had to be crossed before the real gate was reached.

When a breach had been made in this double enclosure, though the town itself might be taken, the labours of the attacking force were not yet over. In the very centre of the place, on a sort of artificial mound or knoll, stood the royal castle, and resistance on the part of its garrison would make it necessary for the enemy to undertake a second siege no less deadly and protracted than the first. The keep of Zinjirli had only a single gate approached by a narrow causeway.