Nineveh - the capital of Assyria in the 8th – 7th centuries BC. e. - was located on the territory of modern Iraq, on the left bank of the Tigris River.
According to legend, the name Nineveh comes from the name of the first king of Assyria, Nina, whom the ancient Greeks considered the son of the titan Kronos, the brother of Zeus. Nina was credited with inventing the art of warfare. His power extended over all of Asia. Nina's wife was the famous Queen Semiramis.
The first mention of her is in the inscriptions of Judea; the oldest inscription found here is that of King Dunga, written in Semitic. As an important trading point at the intersection of routes from south to north and from the Mediterranean Sea to the Persian Gulf, Nineveh was soon able to reach the heights of prosperity, and as a strategic point protected from the west by the Tigris, from the east by Zabom and mountains and distant from hostile Babylon, it even in antiquity, it often served as the residence of the Assyrian kings.
During its heyday, Nineveh stretched along the river for 4 km, and the main street was 26 m wide. The capital of Assyria was distinguished by a clear and strict layout, which was strictly forbidden to violate.
The capital of Assyria - the city of Nineveh - was inhabited by 170 thousand people! Its circumference reached 150 km. Within the boundaries of the settlement were located not only royal palaces and temples, but also pastures and gardens. Tsarskaya Street, filled with asphalt, was decorated with skillful statues.
References to Nineveh in the Bible
For a long time, scholars had no other sources of mentioning Nineveh, except the Bible, therefore the very existence of this city was questioned. According to the legend, God told the prophet Jonah to go to Nineveh and announce to its inhabitants that in 40 days the city would be destroyed, and they themselves were destroyed for their sins. But Jonah did not want to go to the city, believing that the inhabitants would not believe him.
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Compelled by God, he nevertheless arrived under the city walls, but decided to hide from God and the commission entrusted to him by the Creator. Jonah boarded a ship to sail away from the doomed city. But a storm arose in the sea, and the sailors decided that it was God who was angry with someone who had boarded the ship. Jonah understood that it was he who incurred the wrath of the Lord and asked to throw him into the sea, where the whale swallowed him. The prophet spent three days in the stomach of a whale, after which he prayed to the Creator, asking him to release him from captivity and promising to do everything that God commands.
God heard Jonah, and when the whale once again opened its mouth, the oncoming waves caught the prophet and threw him ashore. Seeing the city in the distance, Jonah asked what it was called, and heard in response that it was Nineveh. Jonah became scared, because he realized that he could not get away from what God had planned. And Jonah went to Nineveh, and cried out to the inhabitants, saying that with their sins they angered the Lord, for which the city would be destroyed. In fear, people listened to him, as it is written in the book of the prophet Jonah: "And the Ninevites believed the Creator: and declared fasting and put on sackcloth, from the largest of them to the smallest." Seeing their repentance, the Lord forgave the inhabitants of Nineveh and did not destroy the city.
Archaeological research on the ruins of Nineveh
Only in the 19th century, the results of archaeological excavations fully confirmed the authenticity of the biblical story. This event dates back to about 785 BC. e. Several years after Jonah's preaching in Assyria, an attempt was made to religious reform, which was supposed to lead to the establishment of a monotheistic cult. Little information has survived about this reform, it is only known that it was never completed. But the very fact of an attempt to move from polytheism to faith in one God indicates the influence of the monotheists, who were the Jews at that time.
Nineveh (reconstruction of the palace)
Active archaeological research of the ruins of Nineveh was carried out in the 40s of the 19th century - 30s of the 20th century.
An expedition led by the French explorer P. E. Bot in 1840 worked in Khorsabad, an ancient Assyrian city located 50 km north of Mosul (Iraq), and discovered the ruins of ancient walls. Scientists have established that these are the remains of the palace of one of the Assyrian kings, Sargon II (ruled 722–705 BC). A huge structure, consisting of a complex of buildings, was erected in 709 BC. e. after the victory that Sargon won over Babylonia. On the ruins of the royal palace, many statues of gods and ancient kings were found, as well as a sculptural image of King Sargon himself.
Thanks to the excavations in Khorsabad, real evidence of the existence of a great power and King Sargon was obtained, which previously could only be learned from the Bible. Here is what is written in the book of the prophet Isaiah: "In the year when Tartan came to Azot, he was sent from Sargon, king of Assyria, and fought against Azot, and took him." Thanks to the data obtained, the researchers found that it was Sargon who destroyed the kingdom of Northern Israel and took 10 tribes of Israel captive.
Another explorer who continued the excavation of Nineveh was O. G. Layard. 1845 - he began excavations on the hill of Nimrud, where he found the ruins of huge palaces, statues of kings, gods and fantastic creatures, as well as reliefs carved in stone depicting scenes of war and the daily life of the ancient Assyrians.
Excavations of the royal palace
1849 Layard began excavating the Kuyundzhik Hill. A few days later, at a depth of 20 m, the ruins of the palace of the Assyrian king Sinaherib, who ruled in 705-681, were found. BC e. This king is mentioned in the Bible in connection with his campaign against Judea, which ended extremely unsuccessfully for the king of Assyria. His troops fell ill with an unknown disease, from which many soldiers died every day, and were soon defeated by the Israelites.
Confirmation of the biblical story about Sinaherib's campaign against Judea is in the chronicles of those times, which repeatedly indicate a huge number of soldiers who died during the outbreak of the epidemic. It may have been tropical fever.
Book from the Ashurbanipal library
Excavations of the royal palace and numerous finds made it possible to recreate the image of King Sinaherib, whose name alone made the inhabitants of neighboring states fearful. The king of Assyria was an educated person: he was versed in many sciences and arts, showed great interest in sports and technology. But Sinacherib often fell into a rage, losing control over himself and showing monstrous cruelty. So, in 689 BC. BC, capturing Babylon, which dared to raise a rebellion, he almost completely exterminated the population of the rebellious city, destroyed the Esagila temple complex and the famous Tower of Babel, and then flooded what was left of the city.
Wanting to completely destroy the very memory of the rebellious city, the king ordered to scatter in the wind the land taken from the place where Babylon was.
But the tsar's despotic disposition became the cause of his violent death at the hands of his own sons. From the chronicles it became known that the king, wishing to please his mistress Nakia, appointed his youngest son Asargaddon heir to the throne, ignoring the rights of the elders, who killed the king. And yet the throne passed to their younger brother, and the patricides had a chance to flee the country.
Here is how the Bible says about the end of Sinacherib: “And when he was worshiping in the house of Niskhor, his god, Adramelech and Sharezer, his sons, killed him with a sword, and they themselves fled to the land of Ararat. And his son Asardan reigned in their stead. " A similar record is found in the Assyrian chronicle: “On 20 Teber (January), Sinacherib was killed by his rebellious sons. On the 18th of Sivan (June), his son Asardan reigned on the throne of his father."
Nineveh capital of Assyria
It was during the reign of Sinacherib that Nineveh became the capital of Assyria. Prior to that, the royal residences were Ashur and Kalha. In less than a hundred years, from an ordinary province, it turned into a city of contrasts, in which luxury coexisted with extreme poverty. In Nineveh, as in many other ancient states, orgiastic cults of cruel gods flourished, to whom human sacrifices were made.
Even the fun of the Assyrian rulers often turned into a series of executions. There is a legend that the king of Assyria Sardanapalus (Ashurbanipal) (669 - about 633 BC), who was bored with luxury, debauchery and bloodshed, promised to give half of his power to someone who can invent new entertainment for him.
As established by archaeologists, the city consisted of two parts, which can be conventionally called large and small Nineveh. Greater Nineveh was a territory where settlements were located, surrounded by a system of fortified walls and ditches. Little Nineveh was like a fortress inside the fortress, being surrounded by its own system of fortifications. This little Nineveh was the capital of the Assyrian kingdom, since the royal palaces were located on its territory.
Nineveh was besieged in 612 by the united forces of Babylonia and Media. Its inhabitants gave a fitting rebuff, but the forces were unequal. In addition, the attackers went for a trick: they destroyed the dam, as a result of which the Tiger overflowed the banks and eroded part of the fortress walls. The once great capital was plundered by the conquerors, after which it was razed to the ground.
Only in the middle of the 19th century, Nineveh returned from oblivion again thanks to the efforts of archaeologists. During the excavations, many clay tablets with cuneiform texts were found - the library of Ashurbanipal, thanks to which it was possible to confirm the existence of a great power.
L. Antonova