877-635)
The first contact of Phoenicia with Assyria took place, as above observed, in the reign of Asshur-nazir-pal, about the year B.C. 877. The principal cities, on the approach of the great conquering monarch, with his multitudinous array of chariots, his clouds of horse, and his innumerable host of foot soldiers, made haste to submit themselves, sought to propitiate the invader by rich gifts, and accepted what they hoped might prove a nominal subjection. Arvad, which, as the most northern, was the most directly threatened, Gebal, Sidon, and even the comparatively remote Tyre, sent their several embassies, made their offerings, and became, in name at any rate, Assyrian dependencies. But the real subjection of this country was not effected at this time, nor without a struggle. Asshur-nazir-pal’s yoke lay lightly upon his vassals, and during the remainder of his long reign—from B.C. 877 to B.C. 860—he seems to have desisted from military expeditions,14123 and to have exerted no pressure on the countries situated west of the Euphrates. It was not until the reign of his son and successor, Shalmaneser II., that the real conquest of Syria and Phoenicia was taken in hand, and pressed to a successful issue by a long series of hard-fought campaigns and bloody battles. From his sixth to his twenty-first year Shamaneser carried on an almost continuous war in Syria,14124 where his adversaries were the monarchs of Damascus and Hamath, and “the twelve kings beside the sea, above and below,"14125 one of whom is expressly declared to have been “Mattan-Baal of Arvad."14126 It was not until the year B.C. 839 that this struggle was terminated by the submission of the monarchs engaged in it to their great adversary, and the firm establishment of a system of “tribute and taxes."14127 The Phoenician towns agreed to pay annually to the Assyrian monarch a certain fixed sum in the precious metals, and further to make him presents from time to time of the best products of their country. Among these are mentioned “skins of buffaloes, horns of buffaloes, clothing of wool and linen, violet wool, purple wool, strong wood, wood for weapons, skins of sheep, fleeces of shining purple, and birds of heaven."14128
The relations of Phoenicia towards the Assyrian monarchy continued to be absolutely peaceful for above a century. The cities retained their native monarchs, their laws and institutions, their religion, and their entire internal administration. So long as they paid the fixed tribute, they appear not to have been interfered with in any way. It would seem that their trade prospered. Assyria had under her control the greater portion of those commercial routes across the continent of Asia,14129 which it was of the highest importance to Phoenicia to have open and free from peril. Her caravans could traverse them with increased security, now that they were safeguarded by a power whereof she was a dependency. She may even have obtained through Assyria access to regions which had been previously closed to her, as Media, and perhaps Persia. At any rate Tyre seems to have been as flourishing in the later times of the Assyrian dominion as at almost any other period. Isaiah, in denouncing woe upon her, towards the close of the dominion, shows us what she had been under it:—
A change in the friendly feelings of the Phoenician cities towards Assyria first began after the rise of the Second or Lower Assyrian Empire, which was founded, about B.C. 745, by Tiglath-pileser II.14131 Tiglath-pileser, after a time of quiescence and decay, raised up Assyria to be once more a great conquering power, and energetically applied himself to the consolidation and unification of the empire. It was the Assyrian system, as it was the Roman, to absorb nations by slow degrees—to begin by offering protection and asking in return a moderate tribute; then to draw the bonds more close, to make fresh demands and enforce them; finally, to pick a quarrel, effect a conquest, and absorb the country, leaving it no vestige of independence. Tiglath-pileser began this process of absorption in Northern Syria about the year B.C. 740. He rearranged the population in the various towns, taking from some and giving to others,14132 adding also in most cases an Assyrian element, appointing Assyrian governors,14133 and requiring of the inhabitants “the performance of service like the Assyrians."14134 Among the places thus treated between the years B.C. 740 and B.C. 738, we find the Phoenician cities of Zimirra, or Simyra, and Arqa, or Arka. Zimirra was in the plain between the sea and Mount Bargylus, not very far from the island of Aradus, whereof it was a dependency. Arqa was further to the south, beyond the Eleutherus, and belonged properly to Tripolis, if Tripolis had as yet been founded, or else to Botrys. Both of them were readily accessible from the Orontes valley along the course of the Eleutherus, and, being weak, could offer no resistance. Tiglath-pileser carried out his plans, rearranged the populations, and placed the cities under Assyrian governors responsible to himself. There was no immediate outbreak; but the injury rankled. Within twenty years Zimirra joined a revolt, to which Hamath, Arpad, Damascus, and Samaria were likewise parties, and made a desperate attempt to shake off the Assyrian yoke.14135 The attempt failed, the revolt was crushed, and Zimirra is heard of no more in history.
But this was not the worst. The harsh treatment of Simyra and Arka, without complaint made or offence given, after a full century of patient and quiet submission, aroused a feeling of alarm and indignation among the Phoenician cities generally, which could not fail to see in what had befallen their sisters a foreshadowing of the fate that they had to expect one day themselves. Beginning with the weakest cities, Assyria would naturally go on to absorb those which were stronger, and Tyre herself, the “anointed cherub,"14136 could look for no greater favour than, like Ulysses in the cave of Polyphemus, to be devoured last. Luliya, or Elulæus, the king of Tyre at the time,14137 endeavoured to escape this calamity by gathering to himself a strength which would enable him to defy attack. He contrived to establish his dominion over almost the whole of Southern Phoenicia—over Sidon, Accho, Ecdippa, Sarepta, Hosah, Bitsette, Mahalliba, &c.14138—and at the same time over the distant Cyprus,14139 where the Cittæans, or people of Citium, held command of the island. After a time the Cittæans revolted from him, probably stirred up by the Assyrians. But Elulæus, without delay, led an expedition into Cyprus, and speedily put down the rebellion. Hereupon the Assyrian king of the time, Shalmaneser IV., the successor and probably the son of Tiglath-pileser II., led a great expedition into the west about B.C. 727, and “overran all Syria and Phoenicia."14140 But he was unable to make any considerable impression. Tyre and Aradus were safe upon their islands; Sidon and the other cities upon the mainland, were protected by strong and lofty walls. After a single campaign, the Great King found it necessary to offer terms of peace, which proved acceptable, and the belligerents parted towards the close of the year, without any serious loss or gain on either side.14141
It seemed necessary to adopt some different course of action. Shalmaneser had discovered during his abortive campaign that there were discords and jealousies among the various Phoenician cities; that none of them submitted without repugnance to the authority of Tyre, and that Sidon especially had an ancient ground of quarrel with her more powerful sister, and always cherished the hope of recovering her original supremacy. He had seen also that the greater number of the Phoenician towns, if he chose to press upon them with the full force of his immense military organisation, lay at his mercy. He had only to invest each city on the land side, to occupy its territory, to burn its villas, to destroy its irrigation works, to cut down its fruit trees, to interfere with its water-supply, and in the last instance to press upon it, to batter down its walls, to enter its streets, slaughter its population, or drive it to take refuge in its ships,14142 and he could become absolute master of the whole Phoenician mainland. Only Tyre and Aradus could escape him. But might not they also be brought into subjection by the naval forces which their sister cities, once occupied, might be compelled to furnish, and to man, or, at any rate, to assist in manning? Might not the whole of Phoenicia be in this way absorbed into the empire? The prospect was pleasing, and Shalmaneser set to work to convert the vision into a reality. By his emissaries he stirred up the spirit of disaffection among the Tyrian subject towns, and succeeded in separating from Tyre, and drawing over to his own side, not only Sidon and Acre and their dependencies, but even the city of Palæ-Tyrus itself,14143 or the great town which had grown up opposite the island Tyre upon the mainland. The island Tyre seems to have been left without support or ally, to fight her own battle singly. Shalmaneser called upon his new friends to furnish him with a fleet, and they readily responded to the call, placing their ships at his disposal to the number of sixty, and supplying him further with eight hundred skilled oarsmen, not a sufficient number to dispense with Assyrian aid, but enough to furnish a nucleus of able seamen for each vessel. The attack was then made. The Assyro-Phoenician fleet sailed in a body from some port on the continent, and made a demonstration against the Island City, which they may perhaps have expected to frighten into a surrender. But the Tyrians were in no way alarmed. They knew, probably, that their own countrymen would not fight with very much zeal for their foreign masters, and they despised, undoubtedly, the mixed crews, half skilled seamen, half tiros and bunglers, which had been brought against them. Accordingly they thought it sufficient to put to sea with just a dozen ships—one to each five of the enemy, and making a sudden attack with these upon the adverse fleet, they defeated it, dispersed it, and took five hundred prisoners. Shalmaneser saw that he had again miscalculated; and, despairing of any immediate success, drew off his ships and his troops, and retired to his own country. He left behind him, however, on the mainland opposite the island Tyre, a certain number of his soldiers, with orders to prevent the Tyrians from obtaining, according to their ordinary practice, supplies of water from the continent. Some were stationed at the mouth of the river Leontes (the Litany), a little to the north of Tyre, a perennial stream bringing down a large quantity of water from Coele-Syria and Lebanon; others held possession of the aqueducts on the south, built to convey the precious fluid across the plain from the copious springs of Ras el Ain14144 to the nearest point of the coast opposite the city. The continental water supply was thus effectually cut off; but the Tyrians were resolute, and made no overtures to the enemy. For five years, we are told,14145 they were content to drink such water only as could be obtained in their own island from wells sunk in the soil, which must have been brackish, unwholesome, and disagreeable. At the end of that time a revolution occurred at Nineveh. Shalmaneser lost his throne (B.C. 722), and a new dynasty succeeding, amid troubles of various kinds, attention was drawn away from Tyre to other quarters; and Elulæus was left in undisturbed possession of his island city for nearly a quarter of a century.
It appears that, during this interval, Elulæus rebuilt the power which Shalmaneser had shattered and brought low, repossessing himself of Cyprus, or, at any rate, of some portion of it,14146 and re-establishing his authority over all those cities of the mainland which had previously acknowledged subjection to him. These included Sidon, Bit-sette, Sarepta, Mahalliba, Hosah, Achzib or Ecdippa, and Accho (Acre). There is some ground for thinking that he transferred his own residence to Sidon,14147 perhaps for the purpose of keeping closer watch upon the town which he most suspected of disaffection. The policy of Sargon seems to have been to leave Phoenicia alone, and content himself with drawing the tribute which the cities were quite willing to pay in return for Assyrian protection. His reign lasted from B.C. 722 to B.C. 705, and it was not until Sennacherib, his son and successor, had been seated for four years upon the throne that a reversal of this policy took place, and war à outrance was declared against the Phoenician king, who had ventured to brave, and had succeeded in baffling, Assyria more than twenty years previously. Sennacherib entertained grand designs of conquest in this quarter, and could not allow the example of an unpunished and triumphant rebellion to be flaunted in the eyes of a dozen other subject states, tempting them to throw off their allegiance. He therefore, as soon as affairs in Babylonia ceased to occupy him, marched the full force of the empire towards the west, and proclaimed his intention of crushing the Phoenician revolt, and punishing the audacious rebel who had so long defied the might of Assyria. The army which he set in motion must have numbered more than 200,000 men;14148 its chariots were numerous,14149 its siege-train ample and well provided.14150 Such terror did it inspire among those against whom it was directed that Elulæus was afraid even to await attack, and, while Sennacherib was still on his march, took ship and removed himself to the distant island of Cyprus,14151 where alone he could feel safe from pursuit and capture. But, though deserted by their sovereign, his towns seem to have declined to submit themselves. No great battle was fought; but severally they took arms and defended their walls. Sennacherib tells us that he took one after another—“by the might of the soldiers of Asshur his lord"14152—Great Sidon, Lesser Sidon, Bit-sette, Zarephath or Sarepta, Mahalliba, Hosah, Achzib or Ecdippa, and Accho—“strong cities, fortresses, walled and enclosed, Luliya’s castles."14153 He does not claim, however, to have taken Tyre, and we may conclude that the Island City escaped him. But he made himself master of the entire tract upon the continent which had constituted Luliya’s kingdom, and secured its obedience by placing over it a new king, in whom he had confidence, a certain Tubaal14154 (Tob-Baal), probably a Phoenician. At the same time he rearranged the yearly tribute which the cities had to pay to Assyria,14155 probably augmenting it, as a punishment for the long rebellion.
We hear nothing more of Phoenicia during the reign of Sennacherib, except that, shortly after his conquest of the tract about Sidon, he received tribute, not only from the king whom he had just set over that town, but also from Uru-melek, king of Gebal (Byblus), and Abd-ilihit, king of Arvad.14156 The three towns represent, probably, the whole of Phoenicia, Aradus at this time exercising dominion over the northern tract, or that extending from Mount Casius to the Eleutherus, Gebal or Byblus over the central tract from the Eleutherus to the Tamyras, and Sidon, in the temporary eclipse of Tyre, ruling the southern tract from the Tamyrus to Mount Carmel. It appears further,14157 that at some date between this tribute-giving (B.C. 701) and the death of Sennacherib (B.C. 681) Tubaal must have been succeeded in the government of Sidon by Abdi-Milkut, or Abd-Melkarth14158 ({...}), but whether this change was caused by a revolt, or took place in the ordinary course, Tubaal dying and being succeeded by his son, is wholly uncertain.
All that we know is that Esarhaddon, on his accession, found Abd-Melkarth in revolt against his authority. He had formed an alliance with a certain Sanduarri, king of Kundi and Sizu,14159 a prince of the Lebanon, and had set up as independent monarch, probably during the time of the civil way which was waged between Esarhaddon and two of his brothers who disputed his succession after they had murdered his father.14160 As soon as this struggle was over, and the Assyrian monarch found himself free to take his own course, he proceeded at once (B.C. 680) against these two rebels. Both of them tried to escape him. Abd-Melkarth, quitting his capital, fled away by sea, steering probably either for Aradus or for Cyprus. Sanduarri took refuge in his mountain fastnesses. But Esarhaddon was not to be baffled. He caused both chiefs to be pursued and taken. “Abd-Melkarth,” he says,14161 “who from the face of my solders into the middle of the sea had fled, like a fish from out of the sea, I caught, and cut off his head . . . Sanduarri, who took Abd-Melkarth for his ally, and to his difficult mountains trusted, like a bird from the midst of the mountains, I caught and cut off his head.” Sidon was very severely punished. Esarhaddon boasts that he swept away all its subject cities, uprooted its citadel and palace, and cast the materials into the sea, at the same time destroying all its habitations. The town was plundered, the treasures of the palace carried off, and the greater portion of the population deported to Assyria. The blank was filled up with “natives of the lands and seas of the East”—prisoners taken in Esarhaddon’s war with Babylon and Elam, who, like the Phoenicians themselves at a remote time, exchanged a residence on the shores of the Persian Gulf for one on the distant Mediterranean. An Assyrian general was placed as governor over the city, and its name changed from Sidon to “Ir-Esarhaddon.”
It seems to have been in the course of the same year that Esarhaddon held one of those courts, or durbars, in Syria, which all subject monarchs were expected to attend, and whereat it was the custom that they should pay homage to their suzerain. Hither flocked almost all the neighbouring monarchs14162—Manasseh, king of Judah, Qavus-gabri, king of Ammon, Zilli-bel, king of Gaza, Mitinti of Askelon, Ikasamsu of Ekron, Ahimelek of Ashdod, together with twelve kings of the Cyprians, and three Phoenician monarchs, Baal, king of Tyre, Milki-asaph, king of Gebal, and Mattan-baal, king of Arvad. Tribute was paid, home rendered, and after a short sojourn at the court, the subject-monarchs were dismissed. The foremost position in Esarhaddon’s list is occupied by “Baal, king of Tyre;” and this monarch appears to have been received into exceptional favour. He had perhaps been selected by Esarhaddon to rule Southern Phoenicia on the execution of Abd-Melkarth. At any rate, he enjoyed for some time the absolute confidence and high esteem of his suzerain. If we may venture to interpret a mutilated inscription,14163 he furnished Esarhaddon with a fleet, and manned it with his own sailors. Certainly, he received from Esarhaddon a considerable extension of his dominions. Not only was his authority over Accho recognised and affirmed, but the coast tract south of Carmel, as far as Dor, the important city Gebal, and the entire region of Lebanon, were placed under his sovereignty.14164 The date assigned to these events is between B.C. 680 and B.C. 673. It was in this latter year that the Assyrian monarch resolved on an invasion of Egypt. For fifty years the two countries had been watching each other, counteracting each other’s policy, lending support to each other’s enemies, coming into occasional collision the one with the other, not, however, as principals, but as partakers in other persons’ quarrels. Now, at length there was to be an end of subterfuge and pretences. Esarhaddon, about B.C. 673, resolved to attempt the conquest of Egypt. He “set his face to go to the country of Magan and Milukha."14165 He let his intention be generally known. No doubt he called on his subject allies for contingents of men, if not for supplies of money. To Tyre he must naturally have looked for no niggard or grudging support. What then must have been his disgust and rage at finding that, at the critical moment, Tyre had gone over to the enemy? Notwithstanding the favours heaped on him by his suzerain, “Baal, king of Tyre, to Tirhakah, king of Ethiopia, his country entrusted, and the yoke of Asshur threw off and made defiance."14166 Esarhaddon was too strongly bent on his Egyptian expedition to be diverted from it by this defection; but in the year B.C. 672, as he marched through Syria and Palestine on his way to attack Tirhakah, he sent a detachment against Tyre, with orders to his officers to repeat the tactics of Shalmaneser, by occupying points of the coast opposite to the island Tyre, and “cutting off the supplies of food and water."14167 Baal was by this means greatly distressed, and it would seem that within a year or two he made his submission, surrendering either to Esarhaddon or to his son Asshur-bani-pal, in about the year of the latter’s accession (B.C. 668). It is surprising to find that he was not deposed from his throne; but as the circumstances seem to have been such as made it imperative on the Assyrian king to condone minor offences in order to accomplish a great enterprise—the restoration of the Assyrian dominion over the Nile valley. Esarhaddon had effected the conquest of Egypt in about the year B.C. 670, and had divided the country into twenty petty principalities;14168 but within a year his yoke had been thrown off, his petty princes expelled, and Tirhakah reinstated as sole monarch over the “Two Regions."14169 It was the determination of Asshur-bani-pal, on becoming king, to strain every nerve and devote his utmost energy to the re-conquest of the ancient kingdom, so lightly won and so lightly lost by his father. Baal’s perfidy was thus forgiven or overlooked. A great expedition was prepared. The kings of Phoenicia, Palestine, and Cyprus were bidden once more to assemble, to bring their tribute, and pay homage to their suzerain as he passed on his way at the head of his forces towards the land of the Pharaohs. Baal came, and again holds the post of honour;14170 with him were the king of Judah—doubtless Manasseh, but the name is lost—the kings of Edom, Moab, Gaza, Askelon, Ekron, Gebal, Arvad, Paphos, Soli, Curium, Tamassus, Ammochosta, Lidini, and Aphrodisias, with probably those also of Ammon, Ashdod, Idalium, Citium, and Salamis.14171 Each in turn prostrated himself at the foot of the Great Monarch, paid homage, and made profession of fidelity. Asshur-bani-pal then proceeded on his way, and the kings returned to their several governments.
It is about four years after this, B.C. 664, that we find Baal attacked and punished by the Assyrian monarch. The subjugation of Egypt had been in the meantime, though not without difficulty, completed. Asshur-bani-pal’s power extended from the range of Niphates to the First Cataract. Whether during the course of the four years’ struggle, by which the reconquest of Egypt was effected, the Tyrian prince had given fresh offence to his suzerain, or whether it was the old offence, condoned for a time but never forgiven, that was now avenged, is not made clear by the Assyrian Inscriptions. Asshur-bani-pal simply tells us that, in his third expedition, he proceeded against Baal, king of Tyre, dwelling in the midst of the sea, who his royal will disregarded, and did not listen to the words of his lips. “Towers round him,” he says, “I raised, and over his people I strengthened the watch; on sea and land his forts I took; his going out I stopped. Water and sea-water, to preserve their lives, their mouths drank. By a strong blockade, which removed not, I besieged them; their works I checked and opposed; to my yoke I made them submissive. The daughter proceeding from his body, and the daughters of his brothers, for concubines he brought to my presence. Yahi-milki, his son, the glory of the country, of unsurpassed renown, at once he sent forward, to make obeisance to me. His daughter, and the daughters of his brothers, with their great dowries, I received. Favour I granted him, and the son proceeding from his body, I restored, and gave him back."14172 Thus Baal once more escaped the fate he must have expected. Asshur-bani-pal, who was far from being of a clement disposition, suffered himself to be appeased by the submission made, restored Baal to his favour, and allowed him to retain possession of his sovereignty.
Another Phoenician monarch also was, about the same time, threatened and pardoned. This was Yakinlu, the king of Arvad, probably the son and successor of Mattan-Baal, the contemporary of Esarhaddon.14173 He is accused of having been wanting in submission to Asshur-bani-pal’s fathers;14174 but we may regard it as probable that his real offence was some failure in his duties towards Asshur-bani-pal himself. Either he had openly rebelled, and declared himself independent, or he had neglected to pay his tribute, or he had given recent offence in some other way. The Phoenician island kings were always more neglectful of their duties than others, since it was more difficult to punish them. Assyria did not even now possess any regular fleet, and could only punish a recalcitrant king of Arvad or Tyre by impressing into her service the ships of some of the Phoenician coast-towns, as Sidon, or Gebal, or Accho. These towns were not very zealous in such a service, and probably did not maintain strong navies, having little use for them. Thus Yakinlu may have expected that his neglect, whatever it was, would be overlooked. But Asshur-bani-pal was jealous of his rights, and careful not to allow any of them to lapse by disuse. He let his displeasure be known at the court of Yakinlu, and very shortly received an embassy of submission. Like Baal, Yakinlu sent a daughter to take her place among the great king’s secondary wives, and with her he sent a large sum of money, in the disguise of a dowry.14175 The tokens of subjection were accepted, and Yakinlu was allowed to continue king of Arvad. When, not long afterwards, he died,14176 and his ten sons sought the court of Nineveh to prefer their claims to the succession, they were received with favour. Azi-Baal, the eldest, was appointed to the vacant kingdom, while his nine brothers were presented by Asshur-bani-pal with “costly clothing, and rings."14177
Two other revolts of two other Phoenician towns belong to a somewhat later period. On his return from an expedition against Arabia, about B.C. 645, Asshur-bani-pal found that Hosah, a small place in the vicinity of Tyre,14178 and Accho, famous as Acre in later times, had risen in revolt against their Assyrian governors, refused their tribute, and asserted independence.14179 He at once besieged, and soon captured, Hosah. The leaders of the rebellion he put to death; the plunder of the town, including the images of its gods, and the bulk of its population, he carried off into Assyria. The people of Accho, he says, he “quieted.” It is a common practice of conquerors “to make a solitude and call it peace.” Asshur-bani-pal appears to have punished Accho, first by a wholesale massacre, and then by the deportation of all its remaining inhabitants.
It is evident from this continual series of revolts and rebellions that, however mild had been the sway of Assyria over her Phoenician subjects in the earlier times, it had by degrees become a hateful and a grinding tyranny. Commercial states, bent upon the accumulation of wealth, do not without grave cause take up arms and affront the perils of war, much less do so when their common sense must tell them that success is almost absolutely hopeless, and that failure will bring about their destruction. The Assyrians were a hard race. Such tenderness as they ever showed to any subject people was, we may be sure, in every case dictated by policy. While their power was unsettled, while they feared revolts, and were uncertain as to their consequences, their attitude towards their dependents was conciliating. When they became fully conscious of the immense preponderance of power which they wielded, and of the inability of the petty states of Asia to combine against them in any firm league, they grew careless and confident, reckless of giving offence, ruder in their behaviour, more grasping in their exactions, more domineering, more oppressive. Prudence should perhaps have counselled the Phoenician cities to submit, to be yielding and pliant, to cultivate the arts of the parasite and the flatterer; but the people had still a rough honesty about them. It was against the grain to flatter or submit themselves; constant voyages over wild seas in fragile vessels kept up their manhood; constant encounters with pirates, cannibals, and the rudest possible savages made them brave and daring; exposure to storm, and cold, and heat braced their frames; the nautical life developed and intensified in them a love of freedom. The Phoenician of Assyrian times was not to be coaxed into accepting patiently the lot of a slave. Suffer as he might by his revolts, they won him a certain respect; it is likely that they warded off many an indignity, many an outrage. The Assyrians knew that his endurance could not be reckoned on beyond a certain point, and they knew that in his death-throes he was dangerous. The Phoenicians probably suffered considerably less than the other subject nations under Assyrian rule; and the maritime population, which was the salt of the people, suffered least of all, since it was scarcely ever brought into contact with its nominal rulers.
635-527)
It is impossible to fix the year in which Phoenicia became independent of Assyria. The last trace of Assyrian interference, in the way of compulsion, with any of the towns belongs to B.C. 645, when she severely punished Hosah and Accho. The latest sign of her continued domination is found in B.C. 636, when the Assyrian governor of a Phoenician town, Zimirra, appears in the list of Eponyms.14180 It must have been very soon after this that the empire became involved in those troubles and difficulties which led on to its dissolution. According to Herodotus,14181 Cyaxares, king of Media, laid siege to Nineveh in B.C. 633, or very soon afterwards. His attack did not at once succeed; but it was almost immediately followed by the irruption into South-western Asia of Scythic hordes from beyond the Caucasus, which overran country after country, destroying and ravaging at their pleasure.14182 The reality of this invasion is now generally admitted. “It was the earliest recorded,” says a modern historian, “of those movements of the northern populations, hid behind the long mountain barrier, which, under the name of Himalaya, Caucasus, Taurus, Hæmus, and the Alps, has been reared by nature between the civilised and uncivilised races of the old world. Suddenly, above this boundary, appeared those strange, uncouth, fur-clad forms, hardly to be distinguished from their horses and their waggons, fierce as their own wolves or bears, sweeping towards the southern regions, which seemed to them their natural prey. The successive invasions of Parthians, Turks, Mongols in Asia, of Gauls, Goths, Vandals, Huns in Europe, have, it is well said, ‘illustrated the law, and made us familiar with its operations. But there was a time in history before it had come into force, and when its very existence must have been unsuspected. Even since it began to operate, it has so often undergone prolonged suspension that the wisest may be excused if they cease to bear it in mind, and are as much startled when a fresh illustration of it occurs, as if the like had never happened before.‘14183 No wonder that now, when the veil was for the first time rent asunder, all the ancient monarchies of the South—Assyria, Babylon, Media, Egypt, even Greece and Asia Minor—stood aghast at the spectacle of these savage hordes rushing down on the seats of luxury and power."14184 Assyria seems to have suffered from the attack almost as much as any other country. The hordes probably swarmed down from Media through the Zagros passes into the most fruitful portion of the empire—the flat country between the mountains and the Tigris. Many of the old cities, rich with the accumulated stores of ages, were besieged, and perhaps taken, and their palaces wantonly burnt by the barbarous invaders. The tide then swept on. Wandering from district to district, plundering everywhere, settling nowhere, the clouds of horse passed over Mesopotamia, the force of the invasion becoming weaker as it spread itself, until in Syria it reached its term through the policy of the Egyptian king, Psamatik I. That monarch bribed the nomads to advance no further,14185 and from this time their power began to wane. Their numbers must have been greatly thinned in the long course of battles, sieges, and skirmishes wherein they were engaged year after year; they suffered also through their excesses;14186 and perhaps through intestine dissensions. At last they recognised that their power was broken. Many bands probably returned across the Caucasus into the Steppe country. Others submitted and took service under the native rulers of Asia.14187 Great numbers were slain, and, except in a province of Armenia, which thenceforward became known as Sacasêné,14188 and perhaps in one Syrian town, which acquired the name of Scythopolis,14189 the invaders left no permanent trace of their brief but terrible inroad.
The shock of the Scythian irruption cannot but have greatly injured and weakened Assyria. The whole country had been ravaged and depopulated; the provinces had been plundered, many of the towns had been taken and sacked, the palaces of the old kings had been burnt,14190 and all the riches that had not been hid away had been lost. Assyria, when the Scythian wave had passed, was but the shadow of her former self. Her prestige was gone, her armed force must have been greatly diminished, her hold upon the provinces, especially the more distant ones, greatly weakened. Phoenicia is likely to have detached herself from Assyria at latest during the time that the Scyths were dominant, which was probably from about B.C. 630 to B.C. 610. When Assyrian protection was withdrawn from Syria, as it must have been during this period, and when every state and town had to look solely to itself for deliverance from a barbarous and cruel enemy, the fiction of a nominal dependence on a distant power could scarcely be maintained. Without any actual revolt, the Phoenician cities became their own masters, and the speedy fall of Assyria before the combined attack of the Medes and Babylonians,14191 after the Scythians had withdrawn, prevented for some time any interference with their recovered independence.
A double danger, however, impended. On the one side Egypt, on the other Babylon, might be confidently expected to lay claim to the debatable land which nature had placed between the seats of the great Asiatic and the great African power, and which in the past had almost always been possessed by the one or the other of them. Egypt was the nearer of the two, and probably seemed the most to be feared. She had recently fallen under the power of an enterprising native monarch, who had already, before the fall of Assyria, shown that he entertained ambitious designs against the Palestinian towns, having begun attacks upon Ashdod soon after he ascended the throne.14192 Babylon was, comparatively speaking, remote and had troublesome neighbours, who might be expected to prevent her from undertaking distant expeditions. It was clearly the true policy for Phoenicia to temporise, to enter into no engagements with either Babylon or Egypt, to strengthen her defences, to bide her time, and, so far as possible, to consolidate herself. Something like a desire for consolidation would seem to have come over the people; and Tyre, the leading city in all but the earliest times, appears to have been recognised as the centre towards which other states must gravitate, and to have risen to the occasion. If there ever was such a thing as a confederation of all the Phoenician cities, it would seem to have been at this period. Sidon forgot her ancient rivalry, and consented to furnish the Tyrian fleet with mariners.14193 Arvad gave not only rowers to man the ships, but also men-at-arms to help in guarding the walls.14194 The “ancients of Gebal” lent their aid in the Tyrian dockyards.14195 The minor cities cannot have ventured to hold aloof. Tyre, as the time approached for the contest which was to decide whether Egypt or Babylon should be the great power of the East, appears to have reached the height of her strength, wealth, and prosperity. It is now that Ezekial says of her—“O Tyrus, thy heart is lifted up, and thou hast said, I am a God, I sit in the seat of God in the midst of the seas—Behold, thou art wiser than Daniel, there is no secret that they can hide from thee: from thy wisdom and with thine understanding hast thou gotten thee riches, and hast gotten gold and silver into thy treasures: by thy great wisdom and by thy traffick thou hast increased thy riches, and thy heart is lifted up because of thy riches"14196; and again, “O thou that are situated at the entry of the sea, which art the merchant of the peoples unto many isles, thus saith the Lord God, Thou, O Tyre, hast said, I am perfect in beauty. Thy borders are in the heart of the sea; thy builders have perfected thy beauty. They have made all thy planks of fir-trees from Senir; they have taken from Lebanon cedars to make masts for thee; of the oaks of Bashan have they made thine oars; they have made thy benches of ivory, inlaid in boxwood, from the isles of Kittim . . . The ships of Tarshish were thy caravans for thy merchandise; and thou wast replenished, and made very glorious in the heart of the sea."14197
The first to strike of the two great antagonists was Egypt. Psamatik I., who was advanced in years at the time of Assyria’s downfall,14198 died about B.C. 610, and was succeeded by a son still in the full vigour of life, the brave and enterprising Neco. Neco, in B.C. 608, having made all due preparations, led a great expedition into Palestine,14199 with the object of bringing under his dominion the entire tract between the River of Egypt (Wady el Arish) and the Middle Euphrates. Already possessed of Ashdod14200 and perhaps also of Gaza14201 and Askelon,14202 he held the keys of Syria, and could have no difficulty in penetrating along the coast route, through the rich plain of Sharon, to the first of the mountain barriers which are interposed between the Nile and the Mesopotamian region. His famous fleet14203 would support him along the shore, at any rate as far Carmel; and Dor and Accho would probably be seized, and made into depôts for his stores and provisions. The powerful Egyptian monarch marching northward with his numerous and well-disciplined army, partly composed of native troops, partly of mercenaries from Asia Minor, Greeks and Carians, probably did not look to meet with any opposition, till, somewhere in Northern Syria, he should encounter the forces of Babylonia, which would of course be moved westward to meet him. What then must have been his surprise when he found the ridge connecting Carmel with the highland of Samaria occupied by a strong body of troops, and his further progress barred by a foe who had appeared to him too insignificant to be taken into account? Josiah, the Jewish monarch of the time, grandson of Manasseh and great-grandson of Hezekiah, who, in the unsettled state of Western Asia, had united under his dominion the entire country of the twelve tribes,14204 had quitted Jerusalem, and thrown himself across the would-be conqueror’s path in the strong and well-known position of Megiddo. Here, in remote times, had the great Thothmes met and defeated the whole force of Syria and Mesopotamia under the king of Kadesh;14205 here had Deborah and Barak, the son of Abinoam, utterly destroyed the mighty army of Jabin, king of Canaan, under Sisera.14206 Here now the gallant, if rash, Judæan king elected to take his stand, moved either by a sense of duty, because he regarded himself as a Babylonian feudatory, or simply determined to defend the Holy Land against any heathen army that, without permission, trespassed on it. In vain did Neco seek to induce Josiah to retire and leave the way open, by assuring him that he had no hostile intentions against Judæa, but was marching on Carchemish by the Euphrates, there to contend with the Babylonians.14207 The Jewish king persisted in his rash enterprise, and Neco was forced to brush him from his path. His seasoned and disciplined troops easily overcame the hasty levies of Josiah; and Josiah himself fell in the battle.
We have no details with respect to the remainder of the expedition. Neco, no doubt, pressed forward through Galilee and Coele-Syria towards the Euphrates. Whether he had to fight any further battles we are not informed. It is certain that he occupied Carchemish,14208 and made it his headquarters, but whether it submitted to him, or was besieged and taken, is unknown. All Syria, Phoenicia, and Palestine were overrun, and became temporarily Egyptian possessions.14209 But Phoenicia does not appear to have been subdued by force. Tyrian prosperity continued, and the terms on which Phoenicia stood towards Egypt during the remainder of Neco’s reign were friendly. Phoenicians at Neco’s request accomplished the circumnavigation of Africa;14210 and we may suspect that it was Neco who granted to Tyre the extraordinary favour of settling a colony in the Egyptian capital, Memphis.14211 Probably Phoenicia accepted at the hands of Neco the same sort of position which she had at first occupied under Assyria, a position, as already explained, satisfactory to both parties.
But the glory and prosperity which Egypt had thus acquired were very short-lived. Within three years Babylonia asserted herself. In B.C. 605, the crown prince, Nebuchadnezzar, acting on behalf of his father, Nabopolassar, who was aged and infirm,14212 led the forces of Babylon against the audacious Pharaoh, who had dared to affront the “King of kings,” “the Lord of Sumir and Accad,” had taken him off his guard, and deprived him of some of his fairest provinces. Babylonia, under Nabopolassar and Nebuchadnezzar, was no unworthy successor of the mighty power which for seven hundred years had held the supremacy of Western Asia. Her citizens were as brave; her armies as well disciplined; her rulers as bold, as sagacious, and as unsparing. Habakkuk’s description of a Babylonian army belongs to about this date, and is probably drawn from the life—“Lo, I raise up the Chaldæans, that bitter and hasty nation, which shall march through the breadth of the land, to possess the dwelling-places that are not theirs. They are terrible and dreadful; from them shall proceed judgment and captivity; their horses are swifter than leopards, and are more fierce than the evening wolves; and their horsemen shall spread themselves, and their horsemen shall come from far; they shall fly as the eagle that hasteth to eat. They shall come all for violence; their faces shall sup as the east wind, and they shall gather the captivity as the sand. And they shall scoff at kings, and princes shall be a scorn unto them; they shall derive every stronghold; for they shall heap dust, and take it."14213 Early in the year B.C. 605 the host of Nebuchadnezzar appeared on the right bank of the Euphrates, moving steadily along its reaches, and day by day approaching nearer and nearer to the great fortress in and behind which lay the army of Neco, well ordered with shield and buckler, its horses harnessed, and its horsemen armed with spears that had been just furbished, and protected by helmets and brigandines.14214 One of the “decisive battles of the world” was impending. If Egypt conquered, Oriental civilisation would take the heavy immovable Egyptian type; change, advance, progress would be hindered; sacerdotalism in religion, conventionalism in art, pure unmitigated despotism in government would generally prevail; all the throbbing life of Asia would receive a sudden and violent check; Semitism would be thrust back; Aryanism, just pushing itself to the front, would shrink away; the monotonous Egyptian tone of thought and life would spread, like a lava stream, over the manifold and varied forms of Asiatic culture; crushing them out, concealing them, making them as though they had never been. The victory of Babylon, on the other hand, would mean room for Semitism to develop itself, and for Aryanism to follow in its wake; fresh stirs of population and of thought in Asia; further advances in the arts; variety, freshness, growth; the continuance of the varied lines of Oriental study and investigation until such time as would enable Grecian intellect to take hold of them, sift them, and assimilate whatever in them was true, valuable, and capable of expansion.
We have no historical account of the great battle of Carchemish. Jeremiah, however, beholds it in vision. He sees the Egyptians “dismayed and turned away back—their mighty ones are beaten down, and are fled apace, and look not back, since fear is round about them."14215 He sees the “swift flee away,” and the “mighty men” attempting to “escape;” but they “stumble and fall toward the north by the river Euphrates."14216 “For this is the day of the Lord God of hosts, a day of vengeance, that He may avenge Him of His adversaries; and the sword devours, and it is satiate and made drunk with their blood, for the Lord God of hosts hath a sacrifice in the north country by the river Euphrates."14217 The “valiant men” are “swept away”—“many fall—yea, one falls upon another, and they say, Arise and let us go again to our own people, and to the land of our nativity from the oppressing sword."14218 Nor do the mercenaries escape. “Her hired men are in the midst of her, like fatted bullocks; for they also are turned back, and are fled away together; they did not stand because the day of their calamity was come upon them, and the time of their visitation."14219 The defeat was, beyond a doubt, complete, overwhelming. The shock of it was felt all over the Delta, at Memphis, and even at distant Thebes.14220 The hasty flight of the entire Egyptian host left the whole country open to the invading army. “Like a whirlwind, like a torrent, it swept on. The terrified inhabitants retired into the fortified cities,"14221 where for the time they were safe. Nebuchadnezzar did not stop to commence any siege. He pursued Neco up to the very frontier of Egypt, and would have continued his victorious career into the Nile valley, had not important intelligence arrested his steps. His aged father had died at Babylon while he was engaged in his conquests, and his immediate return to the capital was necessary, if he would avoid a disputed succession.14222 Thus matters in Syria had to be left in a confused and unsettled state, until such time as the Great King could revisit the scene of his conquests, and place them upon some definite and satisfactory footing.
On the whole, the campaign had, apparently, the effect of drawing closer the links which united Phoenicia with Egypt.14223 Babylon had shown herself a fierce and formidable enemy, but had disgusted men more than she had terrified them. It was clear enough that she would be a hard mistress, a second and crueller Assyria. There was thus, on Nebuchadnezzar’s departure, a general gravitation of the Syrian and Palestinian states towards Egypt, since they saw in her the only possible protector against Babylon, and dreaded her less than they did the “bitter and hasty nation."14224 Neco, no doubt, encouraged the movement which tended at once to strengthen himself and weaken his antagonist; and the result was that, in the course of a few years, both Judæa and Phoenicia revolted from Nebuchadnezzar, and declared themselves independent. Phoenicia was still under the hegemony of Tyre, and Tyre had at its head an enterprising prince, a second Ithobal,14225 who had developed its resources to the uttermost, and was warmly supported by the other cities.14226 His revolt appears to have taken place in the year B.C. 598, the seventh year of Nebuchadnezzar.14227 Nebuchadnezzar at once marched against him in person. The sieges of Tyre, Sidon, and Jerusalem were formed. Jerusalem submitted almost immediately.14228 Sidon was taken after losing half her defenders by pestilence;14229 but Tyre continued to resist for the long space of thirteen years.14230 The continental city was probably taken first. Against this Nebuchadnezzar could freely employ his whole force—his “horses, his chariots, his companies, and his much people”—he could bring moveable forts close up to the walls, and cast up banks against them, and batter them with his engines, or undermine them with spade and mattock. When a breach was effected, he could pour his horse into the streets, and ride down all opposition. It is the capture of the continental city which Ezekiel describes when he says:14231 “Thus saith the Lord God: Behold, I will bring upon Tyrus Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, a king of kings, from the north, with horses and with chariots, and with horsemen, and companies, and much people. He shall slay with the sword thy daughters in the field; and he shall make a fort against thee, and cast a mount against thee, and lift up the buckler against thee. And he shall set engines of war against thy walls, and with his axes he shall break down thy towers. By reason of the abundance of his horses, their dust shall cover thee; thy walls shall shake at the noise of the horseman, and of the wheels and of the chariots, when he shall enter into thy gates, as men enter into a city wherein is made a breach. With the hoofs of his horses shall he tread down all thy streets: he shall slay thy people by the sword, and thy strong garrisons shall go down to the ground. And they shall make a spoil of thy riches, and make a prey of thy merchandise; and they shall break down thy walls, and destroy thy pleasant houses: and they shall lay thy stones and thy timber and thy dust in the midst of the water.” But the island city did not escape. When continental Phoenicia was reduced, it was easy to impress a fleet from maritime towns; to man it, in part with Phoenicians, in part with Babylonians, no mean sailors,14232 and then to establish a blockade of the isle. Tyre may more than once have crippled and dispersed the blockading squadron; but by a moderate expenditure fresh fleets could be supplied, while Tyre, cut off from Lebanon, would find it difficult to increase or renew her navy. There has been much question whether the island city was ultimately captured by Nebuchadnezzar or no; but even writers who take the negative view14233 admit that it must have submitted and owned the suzerainty of its assailant. The date of the submission was B.C. 585.
Thus Tyre, in B.C. 585, “fell from her high estate.” Ezekiel’s prophecies were fulfilled. Ithobal II., the “prince of Tyrus” of those prophecies,14234 whose “head had been lifted up,” and who had said in his heart, “I am a God, I sit in the seat of God, in the midst of the waters,” who deemed himself “wiser than Daniel,” and thought that no secret was hid from him, was “brought down to the pit,” “cast to the ground,” “brought to ashes upon the earth in the sight of all them that beheld him."14235 Tyre herself was “broken in the midst of the seas."14236 A blight fell upon her. For many years, Sidon, rather than Tyre, became once more the leading city of Phoenicia, was regarded as pre-eminent in naval skill,14237 and is placed before Tyre when the two are mentioned together.14238 Internal convulsion, moreover, followed upon external decline. Within ten years of the death of Ithobal, the monarchy came to an end by a revolution,14239 which substituted for Kings Suffetes or Shophetim, “judges,” officers of an inferior status, whose tenure of office was not very assured. Ecnibal, the son of Baslach, the first judge, held the position for no more than two months; Chelbes, the son of Abdæus, who followed him, ruled for ten months; Abbarus, a high priest, probably of Melkarth, for three months. Then, apparently to weaken the office, it was shared between two, as at Carthage, and Mytgon (perhaps Mattan), together with Ger-ashtoreth, the son of Abd-elim, judged Tyre for six years. But the partisans of monarchy were now recovering strength; and the reign of a king, Balator, was intruded at some point in the course of the six years’ judgeship. Judges were then abolished by a popular movement, and kings of the old stock restored. The Tyrians sent to Babylon for a certain Merbal, who must have been either a refugee or a hostage at the court of Neriglissar. He was allowed to return to Tyre, and, being confirmed in the sovereignty, reigned four years. His brother, Eirom, or Hiram, succeeded him, and was still upon the throne when the Empire of Babylon came to an end by the victory of Cyrus over Nabonidus (B.C. 538).
Phoenicia under the Babylonian rule was exceptionally weak. She had to submit to attacks from Egypt under Apries, which fell probably in the reign of Baal over Tyre, about B.C. 565. She had also to submit to the loss of Cyprus under Amasis,14240 probably about B.C. 540, or a little earlier, when the power of Babylon was rapidly declining. She had been, from first to last, an unwilling tributary of the Great Empire on the Lower Euphrates, and was perhaps not sorry to see that empire go down before the rising power of Persia. Under the circumstances she would view any chance as likely to advance her interests, and times of disturbance and unsettlement gave her the best chance of obtaining a temporary independence. From B.C. 538 to B.C. 528 or 527 she seems to have enjoyed one of these rare intervals of autonomy. Egypt, content with having annexed Cyprus, did not trouble her; Persia, engaged in wars in the far East,14241 made as yet no claim to her allegiance. In peace and tranquillity she pursued her commercial career, covered the seas with her merchant vessels, and the land-routes of trade with her caravans, repaired the damages inflicted by Nebuchadnezzar on her cities; maintained, if she did not even increase, her naval strength, and waited patiently to see what course events would take now that Babylon was destroyed, and a new and hitherto unknown power was about to assume the first position among the nations of the earth.