Ancient History - Part 24: The Three Kings

Near the end of 13th century BC, Assyria endured a period of short kingly reigns. We approach the aftermath of Babylonia earning her independence from Assyrian occupation, however, with these two states once in bed together, each held the other in awkward standing, with Assyria spurned, and with Babylonia whose Kassites' affections had since run cold.

1. King Ashur-nadin-apli is succeeded by Ashur-nirari III (1213-1208).

Like his predecessor, we know little of Ashur-nirari III's reign, with one exception: An interaction between he and the Kassites via letters styled similarly to the characters of Hammurabi's day which were icy in tone, alluding to growing hostilities between Assyria and Babylonia since the grand schism of the two kingdoms. The king of Babylonia at this time was Adad-shum-nasir.

2. King Ashur-nirari III is succeeded by Enlil-kudur-usur (1207-1203).

The growing hostilities boil over and into war as the newly crowned king of Assyria, Enlil-kudur-usur, wages war with the Kassites, challenging Babylonia's power. A key battle towards this conflict's finale sees king Adad-shum-nasir meet Enlil-kudur-usur on the field where both kingly commanders are slain.

3. King Enlil-kudur-usur is succeeded by Ninurta-apal-ekur (1202-1176).

Upon the deaths of their respective kings, both nations desperately scrambled for new leadership, and it is here that the Assyrians were granted a longlasting ruler. King Ninurta-apal-ekur may have inherited the conflict against Babylonia but at first struggled quite a bit. Early on, he managed to retreat back to Assyria in order to reinforce his army but was pursued by the new Babylonian king, Meli-Shipak II (1202-1188), who attempted to conquer the Assyria at its heartland.

Ninurta-apal-ekur was able to regroup his forces just in time to successfully defend Assyria's territory and expel Meli Shapak II and his Kassites back home. While both sides engaged in an uneasy peace for a few years, the strong enmity between both civilizations was still too great.

For many more years, Assyria and Babylonia engaged in a series of violent conflicts, passed on from one ruler to the next, unto the subsequent generations of the next day. Assyria's expansion finally met its match in the Kassites who refused to bend their knees to the Assyrians ever again.

[DEPICTION OF MELI SHAPAK II IN RELIGIOUS CEREMONY]

Ancient History - Part 23: Say You Want A Revolution

In the seventh year of Assyria's rule over Babylonia (est. 1233) a revolution took place. This spawned out of the mixed Assyrian-Kassite nobility who were beginning to hold an interest in Ashur-nadin-apli, the son of king Tukulti-Ninurta, rather than the retired king himself. Ironically, the king who'd taken on the mantle of "King of Sumer and Akkad", faced open rebellion that emerged from those very new places he'd forcefully taken. His lack of leadership and failure to select worthy proxies were the key factors of this civil unrest.

Offered the kingship, Ashur-nadin-apli, with a limitless number of violent revolutionaries, joined their cause in surrounding Assyria's new capital city, Kar-Tukulti-Ninurta, laying it to siege, before murdering his own father in order to become the next king. Once news of this royal patricide spread across the Near East, the Kingdom of Elam seized the opportunity, with its king, Kidin-Khutrutash, mustering an army to carry out a second raid.

The Elamites attacked Babylonia at Ishin, among other smaller cities. The foreign raiders carried off many ancestral treasures, treasures that have since been rediscovered and recovered by modern day historians in today's Iran, specifically the ancient ruins of Susa. These relics trace back to the lineage of 16th to 15th century Babylonia.

Unfortunately, history was not kind to Ashur-nadin-apli. History has recorded little in the father-killing king's reign, other than the actual revolution itself, but the events surrounding this act and the aftermath were. In the destruction that Elam's soldiers left behind following their plunder of Babylonia's eastern lands, the Kassites overthrew the Assyrian occupation, reclaiming their country once again as their own.

One could easily conclude that there is an important lesson to take away from king Tukulti-Ninurta's error in judgement in appointing weak governors to rule in his stead in Babylonia. At first glance the lesson might be that if you want something done right you must carry out the duty yourself. That is the simple and most reasonable conclusion, though impractical, and to dig a little further, the true lesson is more akin to: 

If a leader wishes to delegate his power to another individual, he must be very cautious in selecting the rightful person for the job.

[SUSA - The site of the recovered Babylonian relics]

Ancient History - Part 22: Disaster in the Wake of Success

King Tukulti-Ninurta quickly discovered that his triumph over Babylon on the battlefield would prove an easier task than to rule over her lands. Soon, he was plagued by a series of unfortunate happenings that lay with his Assyrian-blooded governors. The first of these, Enlil-nadin-shum, held office largely in name only, collecting payments and doing little else in the ways of delegation or decision-making for his selected region.

Catching the scent of feeble prey, the neighboring nation of Elam interpreted this as an opportunity to launch an invasion upon Enlil-nadin-shum's jurisdiction, whereupon the two cities under his protection, Der and Nippur, were thusly sacked (gold and goods stolen, the cities abandoned). Kidin-Khutrutash, the king of the Elamite people, likely received news from Kassite migrants, in-depth descriptions of the lack of discipline in Babylonia under the new government of these would-be Assyrian conquerors.

In only a year and half (1241), Enlil-nadin-shum effectively removed himself from office, stepping down as Nippur's governor, after this embarrassing defeat. His replacement was none other than Kadashman-Kharbe II (1240-1239), who unlike all of the other initial choices for governors, was a Kassite. One might theorize this as an attempt to win over the local populace by this time choosing from among their own. Or perhaps merit was deemed a necessary requirement for the responsibility of carrying out the duties his predecessor had fallen short of, merit that went beyond the available Assyrian replacements at hand.

Despite the reasons for his selection, Kadashman-Kharbe II only held office for a short tenure as well, and after two years was replaced by yet another governor, Adad-shum-iddin (1238-1233). It soon became clear that the position of a regional governor within this Assyrian-occupied Babylonia was far from a simple exercise. Each must serve oneself upon a mantle of dedicated mind and spirit in order to soothe the Kassite population's begrudging acceptance of their leadership whilst simultaneously expelling perilous invasions from the outside.

Not one of king Tukulti-Ninurta's governors demonstrated such temperance at anytime during Assyria's seven-year rule over Babylonia.

[THE RUINS OF NIPPUR]