Morandi Bonacossi (eds) Petit &

NINEVEH, THE GREAT CITY

‘Well, as for Nineveh, skipper, it was wiped out long ago. There’s not a trace of it left, and one can’t even guess where it was’ (Lucian, 2nd century AD).

Nineveh, the once-flourishing capital of the Assyrian Empire, has fascinated writers, travellers and historians alike since its complete annihilation by allied forces in 612 BC. It was said to have been a great and populous city with 90-km walls, stunning palaces and colossal statues of pure gold. Since 1842 archaeologists have been investigating NINEVEH, THE GREAT CITY the ruins of Nineveh, which are located on the eastern banks of the river Tigris, near the modern Iraqi city of Mosul. The hundreds of thousands of objects that have been collected tell an intriguing story of life and death in a remarkable Mesopotamian city.

The edited volume Nineveh, the Great City contains more than 65 articles by international specialists, providing the reader with a detailed and thorough study of the site of Nineveh. It describes the history of the city, the excavations and the dispersed material culture that can today be appreciated in more than 100 museums and institutes around the world. Special attention is paid to the endangered heritage of Nineveh, which recently faced destruction for the second time in its history. This lavishly illustrated volume is intended to appeal to readers interested NINEVEH in culture and heritage, as well as to students and professional academics. THE GREAT CITY Symbol of Beauty and Power

edited by L.P. Petit & D. Morandi Bonacossi

13

ISBNSidestone 978-90-8890-496-7 Press Sidestone ISBN: 978-90-8890-496-7

PAPERS ON ARCHAEOLOGY OF THE LEIDEN MUSEUM OF ANTIQUITIES 9 789088 904967 PALMA 13 Source reference: Petit, Lucas P. & Morandi Bonacossi, Daniele (eds) 2017: Nineveh, the Great City. Symbol of Beauty and Power, Papers on Archaeology of the Leiden Museum of Antiquities 13, Leiden (Sidestone Press). SIDESTONE PRESS

This is a free offprint – as with all our publications the entire book is freely accessible on our website, where you can also buy a printed copy or pdf E-book.

WWW.SIDESTONE.COM © 2017 Rijksmuseum van Oudheden; the individual authors

PALMA: Papers on Archaeology of the Leiden Museum of Antiquities (volume 13)

Published by Sidestone Press, Leiden www.sidestone.com

Imprint: Sidestone Press

Lay-out & cover design: Sidestone Press Photograph cover: Detail of a relief showing King Ashurbanipal on a horse. Nineveh, Iraq; N Palace, Room S; 645–635 BC; gypsum; H 165.1 cm, W 116.8 cm; British Museum, London (1856,0909.48/BM 124874). © The Trustees of the British Museum.

ISBN 978-90-8890-496-7 (softcover) ISBN 978-90-8890-497-4 (hardcover) ISBN 978-90-8890-498-1 (PDF e-book) Contents

Contributors 11 Nineveh, the Great City. Symbol of Beauty and Power 15 Lucas P. Petit and Daniele Morandi Bonacossi

Part I: Nineveh, Famous but Lost 1. Nineveh, Famous but Lost 27 Daniele Morandi Bonacossi

2. Nineveh in the Cuneiform Sources 29 John MacGinnis

3. Nineveh in Biblical, Ancient Jewish and the Earliest Christian Traditions 32 Jürgen K. Zangenberg

4. Nineveh in Classical Literature 39 Menko Vlaardingerbroek

5. Nineveh in Western Art 44 Jan de Hond

6. Early Travellers and Nineveh 50 Paolo Matthiae

Part II: Investigating Nineveh: a Great Adventure 7. Investigating Nineveh: a Great Adventure 57 Lucas P. Petit

8. The Topography of Nineveh 58 Jason Ur

9. French Research at Nineveh 63 Ariane Thomas

10. The British Museum Excavations at Nineveh 69 John Curtis

11. Austen Henry Layard 74 Frederick Mario Fales 12. The Curse of the Tigris River 78 Lucas P. Petit

13. Archaeology, Politics and Espionage 80 Frederick Mario Fales

14. Max Mallowan and Agatha Christie Mallowan in Nineveh 84 David Stronach

15. Gertrude Bell and the Monuments of Nineveh 87 Lisa Cooper

16. Iraqi Excavations at Nineveh 91 John MacGinnis

17. The Nergal Gate: a Calamitous History 94 Layla Salih

18. Italian Research in the Nineveh Region: Archaeological Investigation and Cultural Heritage Protection and Management 98 Daniele Morandi Bonacossi

Part III: From Prehistory to the Arrival of the Neo-Assyrian Kings 19. From Prehistory to the Arrival of the Neo-Assyrian Kings 107 Daniele Morandi Bonacossi

20. The Prehistoric Roots of Nineveh 109 Marco Iamoni

21. The Ninevite 5 Culture at Nineveh 113 Elena Rova

22. Nineveh in the Second Millennium BC: the Birth of an Assyrian City 118 Aline Tenu

Part IV: Neo-Assyrian Nineveh: the Largest City in the World 23. Neo-Assyrian Nineveh: the Largest City in the World 125 Lucas P. Petit and Daniele Morandi Bonacossi

24. Neo-Assyrian Town Planning 127 Mirko Novák

25. Water for Assyria: Irrigation and Water Management in the Assyrian Empire 132 Daniele Morandi Bonacossi

26. The Rural Landscape of Nineveh 137 Daniele Morandi Bonacossi

27. The Neo-Assyrian Kings in Nineveh 142 Bradley J. Parker 28. The Palaces of Nineveh 147 David Kertai

29. The Production and Use of Reliefs 153 Paolo Matthiae

30. Sennacherib’s Quarries and the Stones of the Southwest Palace Decoration 158 Pier Luigi Bianchetti

31. (De)colouring Ancient Nineveh using Portable XRF Equipment 160 Dennis Braekmans

32. Nineveh in the Assyrian Reliefs 167 Davide Nadali

33. Nineveh and Neo-Assyrian Trade: an Active Hub with Far-Flung Contacts 170 Diederik J.W. Meijer

34. Nineveh and Foreign Politics 174 Giovanni-Battista Lanfranchi

35. Sennacherib 179 Carlo Lippolis

36. Sennacherib’s Nineveh and the Staging of Atmosphere 184 Stephen Lumsden

37. Sennacherib’s Palace Garden at Nineveh, a World Wonder 188 Stephanie Dalley

38. The Lachish Reliefs 192 David Ussishkin

39. Ashurbanipal and the Lion Hunt Reliefs 198 Pauline Albenda

40. Language and Writing in Nineveh 201 Jan Gerrit Dercksen

41. Intellectual Life in Nineveh 205 Eckart Frahm

42. The Library of Ashurbanipal 208 Jeanette C. Fincke

43. Aramaic Epigraphs in Nineveh 212 Frederick Mario Fales

44. Demons, Deities and Religion 213 Barbara N. Porter

45. Ištar of Nineveh 217 John MacGinnis

46. Apotropaic Figures in Nineveh 219 Carolyn Nakamura 47. Music in Nineveh 224 Theo J.H. Krispijn

48. The Last Days of Assyrian Nineveh: a View from the Halzi Gate 228 David Stronach

49. The Sack of Nineveh in 612 BC 243 Marc Van De Mieroop

Part V: Nineveh after the Destruction in 612 BC 50. Nineveh after the Destruction in 612 BC 251 Daniele Morandi Bonacossi

51. Nineveh in the Achaemenid Period 253 John Curtis

52. Graeco-Parthian Nineveh 256 Rocco Palermo

53. Nineveh and the City of Mosul 260 Hikmat Basheer Al-Aswad

54. Monitoring Damage to Iraqi Archaeological and Cultural Heritage: the Case of Nineveh 265 A. Bianchi, S. Berlioz, S. Campana, E. Dalla Longa, D. Vicenzutto and M. Vidale

55. Deir Mar Behnam: the Destruction of Iraq’s Christian Heritage 270 Bas Lafleur

56. Rekrei: Crowdsourcing Lost Heritage 275 Matthew Vincent and Chance Coughenour

57. Building a 3D Reproduction of the Southwest Palace of Sennacherib 278 Boris Lenseigne and Naphur van Apeldoorn

Part VI: The Material Culture of Nineveh 58. The Material Culture of Nineveh 285 Lucas P. Petit

59. The Material Culture of Nineveh in France 287 Ariane Thomas

60. The Material Culture of Nineveh in Italian Collections 293 Daniele Morandi Bonacossi

61. Nineveh in the United Kingdom 298 Paul Collins

62. Nineveh in Berlin 303 Lutz Martin 63. The Material Culture of Nineveh in Belgium and the Netherlands 309 Lucas P. Petit and Bruno Overlaet

64. The Material Culture of Nineveh in Collections in the United States 313 Michael Seymour

65. Nineveh, Lady Charlotte Guest and The Metropolitan Museum of Art 317 Yelena Rakic

66. The Iraq Museum in Baghdad 321 Carlo Lippolis

67. The Material Culture of Nineveh in Turkish Collections 324 Ayşe Tuba Ökse, with contributions from Zeynep Kızıltan and Gülcay Yağcı

Abbreviations 331 References 333 Concordance of Museums and registration numbers 349 Index 353

35. Sennacherib

Carlo Lippolis

Long before the palaces of Nineveh were brought back to light and their inscriptions deciphered, Sennacherib (reigned 705/704-681 BC; fig. 35.1) was already well known, due to a passage from Herodotus (II, 141) and, even more so, from the tale of the siege of Jerusalem told in the Bible (2 Kings 19-20; Isaiah 36-39). At that time, the Assyrian Empire had already reached its apex and Sennacherib found himself, as the heir to the throne, carrying out heavy institutional and coordi- nating duties in Nimrud (ancient Kalhu), Nineveh and, in particular, in his father’s capital, Khorsabad (ancient Dur-Šarrukin). Of the skills the young Sennacherib was to acquire, it was his technical legacy that would draw the highest praise in successive royal inscriptions. Ascending the throne after the sudden demise of his father, Sargon II (reigned 721-705 BC, fig. 27.1), while fighting in Anatolia in 705 BC, Sennacherib immediately took distance from his predecessor’s policies. His father’s unheard-of fate (his body was never retrieved, meaning that he was not buried in his homeland, a serious issue according to Mesopotamian beliefs) was felt to be a divine punishment and a negative omen: hence not only the decision to avoid all mention of Sargon’s name in his own royal inscriptions, but also to move the capital from Khorsabad to Nineveh, an ancient religious, political and economic centre, not to mention a crossroads between two important communica- tion axes, those between Northern and Southern Mesopotamia, and between the Zagros mountains and the Syrian Euphrates. It was here that he had his new residence erected, named the ‘palace without a rival’, with the phases of its construction duly noted in royal texts (fig. 35.2; Kertai, this volume). The palace was adorned with cycles of panels carved in bas-relief illustrating Sennacherib’s military enterprises, for a total length of more than 3 km. The scenes were set in an omnipresent and realistic landscape, the outcome of a new, original ‘far away’ point of view elaborated by Nineveh’s artists. His enterprises as a builder were also celebrated, however, such as the extraction of a monolith from a quarry and the transportation of one of the man-headed bull colossi (weighing several tons) to Nineveh (fig. 35.3). The city’s rebuilding under Sennacherib had not only planned for its edifices to be taller, bigger and with deeper foundations than the previous ones (a widespread stereotype in all royal inscriptions), but also for its roads to be straight, its squares wider, all buildings to be artistically finished, their materials to be polished and shiny: here, the idea of a cosmic, ordered town affirming itself over the preceding chaos is manifest. The whole city was thus enormously expanded, to the point of reaching 750 ha; eighteen monumental city gates now opened in the new double walls (Ur, this volume). The fortifications, surrounded by a moat, consisted of external walls in blocks of limestone, and inner, taller (reaching 25 m) walls of sun-dried brick, rising on stone foundations (fig. 35.4). The internal citadel itself, Kuyunjik, where the palace and the main temples stood, was protected by walls with a main east entrance (the so called ‘entrance for the inspection of the people’). Not just the defensive system, but also the street grid, the whole building plan of the lower city (not very well known from an archaeological point of view), the water

part iv: neo-assyrian nineveh: the largest city in the world 179 Figure 35.1 Relief showing king Sennacherib under a sunshade. Nineveh, Iraq; Gallery XLIX (O), SW Palace; 7th century BC; gypsum; H 53 cm, W 55.8 cm; Ashmolean Museum, Oxford (AN 1933.1669). © Ashmolean Museum. supply and the irrigation system of the city were completely reorganized. Sennacherib transformed Nineveh in a splendid metropolis, whose reflection we can still perceive today from its archaeological remains, from the magnificent palace bas-reliefs and the royal inscriptions. If the Assur monarchs had previously constructed hydraulic structures and canals, Sennacherib’s hydraulic engineering feats remain marvels to this day (Morandi Bonacossi, this volume). Huge quantities of water were required to satisfy the needs of the new great capitals: for the agricultural hinterland, for gardens and parks, and for their in- habitants. In Nineveh, the water from the mountains to the north and northeast of the city was regimented and channelled via canal systems, underground tunnels, sluices and aqueducts, while artificial embankments and alluvial plains were created to protect the capital against sudden floods or overflows (fig. 35.5). As regards his military campaigns, the siege of Jerusalem in 701 BC (celebrated in texts but actually a failure) and the siege of Lachish (depicted on the entirety of the walls of Hall XXXVI of the palace; Ussishkin, this volume) are famous. Many campaigns were conducted in Babylonia, relations with which had long been problematic. Babylon was the main religious and cultural centre of the whole of Mesopotamia, and thus could not be treated as a normal province of the empire. The picture was further complicated by the complex social and ethnic puzzle that was the southern region of the Land of Two Rivers. Sennacherib conducted many military campaigns against the then Babylonian sovereign Marduk-apla-iddina II (reigned 722-710 BC and 703-702 BC), who sought refuge in nearby Elam, an ally at that time, from which he would continue to carry out an anti-Assyrian policy. In any case, the Babylonian political situation remained

180 nineveh, the great city Figure 35.2 Clay cylinder containing a foundation record of Sennacherib’s palace. Nineveh, Iraq; 704-681 BC; clay; H 23.5 cm, W 13.5 cm; British Museum, London (1915,0410.1/BM 113203). © The Trustees of the British Museum.

Figure 35.3 A relief depicting the transportation of a winged bull. Nineveh, Iraq; Court VI, SW Palace; gypsum; H 205.7 cm, W 223.5 cm; British Museum, London (1851,0902.4/BM124822). © The Trustees of the British Museum.

part iv: neo-assyrian nineveh: the largest city in the world 181 Figure 35.4 The Nergal Gate and reconstructed walls of Nineveh, November 2008. Photograph by JoAnn S. Makinano/ Wikimedia Commons. uncertain and tense, climaxing in the murder of Sennacherib’s son, Ashur-nadin-šumi, who had been placed by the former on the throne of Babylon. The Assyrian response did not enjoy immediate success, and it was only in 689 BC that Sennacherib managed to capture Babylon, this time treating the city particularly harshly. According to what he himself reported in his inscriptions, the city was destroyed and partially dissolved in the diverted waters of the Euphrates, and the statues of the main city divinities were deported to Assyria. An act of wilful and total destruction that, perpetrated against an ancient religious centre such as Babylon, was felt to be ungodly and sacrilegious by con- temporaries. An act that was certainly not instinctive, but that was probably a deliberate political and religious strategy on Sennacherib’s part, since he was also trying to transfer to Assyria the cultural and religious primacy for central Southern Mesopotamia. Sen- nacherib was to die in 681 BC in a court conspiracy in one of the temples in Nineveh, having designated his youngest son Esarhaddon (reigned 681-669 BC) as his successor.

182 nineveh, the great city Figure 35.5 Four different technical components of the Assyrian hydraulic system: canal stretch chiselled through natural bedrock in Khinis (A), tunnel at Shiru Maliktha (B), canal stretch dug into the earth at Bandawai (C) and aqueduct in Jerwan (D). Courtesy of Daniele Morandi Bonacossi, Land of Nineveh Archaeological Project.

Figure 35.6 Relief depicting an Assyrian soldier holding a mace. Nineveh, Iraq; 7th century BC; limestone; H 18 cm, W 18 cm; Ashmolean Museum, Oxford (AN 1940.202). © Ashmolean Museum.

part iv: neo-assyrian nineveh: the largest city in the world 183