Ashurbanipal

Definition

Ashurbanipal (685-627 BCE, also known as Assurbanipal) was the last of the great kings of Assyria. His name means "the god Ashur is creator of an heir" and he was the son of King Esarhaddon of the Neo-Assyrian Empire. In the Hebrew Tanakh (the Christian Old Testament) he is called As(e)nappar or Osnapper (Ezra 4:10) while the Greeks knew him as Sardanapolos and the Romans as Sardanapulus.

Ashurbanipal succeeded his father Esarhaddon in 669 BC. He achieved the greatest territorial expansion of the Assyrian empire which included Babylonia, Persia, Syria, and Egypt (although Egypt was lost as a result of a revolt under the reign of the Egyptian Pharaoh Psammetichus I). Ashurbanipal was a popular king who ruled his citizens fairly but was marked for his cruelty toward those whom he defeated (the best known example being a relief depicting the defeated king with the dog chain through his jaw being forced to live in a kennel after capture). When he sacked and destroyed the city of Susa in 647 BCE he left behind a tablet which recorded his triumph over the Elamites:

Susa, the great holy city, abode of their gods, seat of their mysteries, I conquered. I entered its palaces, I opened their treasuries where silver and gold, goods and wealth were amassed... I destroyed the ziggurat of Susa. I smashed its shining copper horns. I reduced the temples of Elam to naught; their gods and goddesses I scattered to the winds. The tombs of their ancient and recent kings I devastated, I exposed to the sun, and I carried away their bones toward the land of Ashur. I devastated the provinces of Elam and on their lands I sowed salt.

Ashurbanipal was not only a feared warrior in battle and a just administrator but also a great patron of the arts. He established a famous library at his capital Nineveh of over 30,000 clay tablets. Among the works found in the Library of Ashurbanipal were the Enuma Elish (the Babylonian Epic of Creation) and the great epic tale of Gilgamesh, the oldest adventure story extant. Ashurbanipal claimed to be able to read cuneiform script in both Akkadian and Sumerian and the discovery of his library was one of the greatest archaeological finds in history.

After his death, a power struggle ensued between his brother, his leading General and the king of Babylonia which resulted in the fall of the Neo-Assyrian Empire to the Babylonians and Medes and subsequently the Assyrian empire and Ashurbanipal’s magnificent library were lost to history for almost 2,000 years.

Written by Joshua J. Mark, published 02 September 2009.

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Articles

• Enuma Elish - The Babylonian Epic of Creation

  The Enuma Elish (also known as The Seven Tablets of Creation) is the Mesopotamian creation myth whose title is derived from the opening lines of the piece, `When on High'.  All of the tablets containing the myth, found at Ashur, Kish, Ashurbanipal's library at Nineveh, Sultantepe, and other...

• The Myth of Etana

  The Myth of Etana is the story of the Sumerian antediluvian King of Kish who ascends to heaven on an eagle to request the Plant of Birth from the gods so that he might have a son. That the myth is very old is attested to by cylinder seals depicting Etana on the eagle's back which date from the reign...

• Ashurbanipal's Collection of Babylonian Proverbs

  King Ashurbanipal collected over 30,000 clay tablets at Nineveh to establish easily the greatest library of his age. Though not nearly as well known as the sayings collected and preserved in the Biblical Book of Proverbs, the Babylonian proverbs preserved by Ashurbanipal are most likely older works and, possibly...

• History of Assyria

  The foundation of the Assyrian dynasty can be traced to Zulilu, who is said to have lived after Bel-kap-kapu (ca. 1900 BC), the ancestor of Shalmaneser I. The city-state of Ashur rose to prominence in northern Mesopotamia, founding trade colonies in Cappadocia. King Shamshi-Adad I (1813-1791 BC) expanded...

Illustrations

Ashurbanipal Books

• Assyrian Palace Sculptures Paul Collins University of Texas Press (01 October 2009) Price: $29.85

• Letters from Priests to the Kings Esarhaddon and Assurbanipal Anonymous Eisenbrauns (06 April 1998) Currently unavailable

• Southern Mesopotamia in the time of Ashurbanipal Sami Said Ahmed Mouton (06 February 1968) Currently unavailable

• Babylonian liturgies; Sumerian texts from the early period and from the library... Stephen Langdon Nabu Press (24 August 2010) Price: $24.27

• Letters from Assyrian Scholars to the King Esarhaddon and Assurbanipal... Simo Parpola Eisenbrauns (01 November 2009) Currently unavailable