Asarhaddon: Father of Ashurbanipal and King of the New Assyrian Empire

Historically, Asarhaddon is often overshadowed by his son Ashurbanipal, but this New Assyrian king was formidable both as a general and as a politician.

King Asarhaddon ruled the New Assyrian Empire from 681 to 669 BC. He was the third ruler of the Sargonid dynasty, the youngest son of the famous king Sinacherib and father of the infamous king Ashurbanipal.

He became famous not only as a military commander, but also as a successful statesman who used strategy and politics internationally.

Asarhaddon was never the heir of Sinacherib. Sinacherib's heir was Assur-nadin-sumi, who ruled Babylon from 700 BC after Sinacherib conquered the city. This was the case until 694 BC, when the Elamites rebelled against the New Assyrian Empire and kidnapped Assur-nadin-sumi.

He was never heard from again, so it is believed that he was executed. Sinacherib then launched a vengeful attack on Babylonia and the Elamites, which culminated in a nine-month siege and the complete destruction of Babylon.

As a result, chaos ensued in the Assyrian court. Sinacherib appointed Ard-Mulissa as heir, but changed his mind. In 684 BC he named his younger son Asarhaddon as his successor. Angered by his demotion, Arda-Mulissu and another brother assassinated Sinacherib in 681 BC, causing a civil war between the three brothers. However, when they met in battle, many of Arda-Mulissu's army deserted and joined Asarhaddon's forces, so that the younger brother was able to enter Nineveh without much resistance.

As soon as Asarhaddon was officially crowned, he wasted no time in punishing the conspirators. His merciless retribution was expressed in the execution of the families of his brothers (although the brothers themselves fled to Urartu), the entire staff of the guards of the royal palace in Nineveh, and many political prisoners.

After his father's controversial attempts to subdue Babylon, Asarhaddon took a different approach to the relationship between Assyria and Babylon. Shortly after his accession to the throne, Asarhaddon began an intensive reconstruction of the city. This began with the removal of the rubble left by Sinacherib's attack, and continued with the rebuilding of important civic buildings, such as the great temple complex of Esagila, dedicated to the god Marduk.

Asarhaddon also restored individual houses, two inner city walls, and a ziggurat complex called Etemenanki. In addition, he returned to Babylon and other cities of southern Mesopotamia many idols taken as spoils of war.

As part of the restoration, Asarhaddon carved his name on numerous bricks throughout Babylon so that people would remember who brought Babylon back to its former glory. However, Asarhaddon's tactics to ensure his popularity in Babylon did not end there. The king distanced himself from his father and other predecessors who had fought against the city. Throughout the Assyrian Empire, Asarhaddon emphasized his lineage, but in Babylon he was the king chosen by the gods. Moreover, he stated that the destruction of Babylon was because its inhabitants were displeased with their deities.

Similarly, Asarhaddon changed the prophecy concerning Babylon in his favor. The oracles said that Babylon would not be rebuilt for another 70 years, but Asarhaddon reversed the cuneiform to mean 11 years, which is how long he thought his project would take.

Ultimately, Asarhaddon's efforts on several fronts substantiated his position as king of Babylon. Babylonian ideals of kingship emphasized the concept of a "holy builder" who protects and rebuilds, in contrast to the Assyrian notion of a warrior king who conquers, although both ideas were very important to both cultures.

While the rebuilding of Babylon was in full swing, Asarhaddon also initiated reconstruction projects in central Assyria. He probably did not want to show favor to the south of the empire. The temples at Assur, Nineveh, and Arbela were renewed and repaired, and Asarhaddon greatly improved the military and administrative structures, something he had not done in Babylonia.

Asarhaddon's renewed fortifications were almost immediately put to the test when the nomadic Cimmerian people attacked Assyria's western borders. Despite Assyria's distrust of the Scythians (another nomadic tribe), Asarhaddon made a treaty with them to fight the Cimmerians.

By 676 BC, Asarhaddon's troops met the Cimmerians in battle in Cilicia and defeated them. In his inscriptions commemorating this event, Asarhaddon claims to have personally killed the Cimmerian king Teushpa.

At the same time a rebellion broke out in Sidon in the Levant, Asarhaddon marched his army to the city and executed the vassal king. There was another revolt by a vassal king, and Asarhaddon hung the heads of both vassals in gruesome style around the necks of two nobles who made a spectacle of themselves in Nineveh.

Asarhaddon then set his sights on Assyria's old enemy to the north, Urartu, where his two rebellious brothers still resided. Assyrian armies first attacked Urartu's allies and vassal states, such as Mannea and the kingdom of Shupriya, which he sacked heavily.

By 673 BC, Asarhaddon had defeated the Urartian army and sent it back to the northern part of the country. Presumably around 675 BC, skirmishes with the Elamites occurred in Babylonia. The king of the Elamites died quickly after the capture of Sippur, and the new king renounced the conquest and signed a peace treaty with Assyria.

In 673 BC, Asarhaddon targeted Egypt. Egypt had supported the Assyrian rebels for years, and Asarhaddon plotted revenge. However, his first campaign ended in dramatic failure. Few Assyrian sources mention this attempt at all, which hints at how great the Assyrian defeat was. Asarhaddon led his troops with great speed, so by the time they met Pharaoh Taharqa near the city of Ashkelon, the Assyrians were exhausted. Asarhaddon and his army were defeated and then forced to make the long journey back to Assyria empty-handed.

Two years later, Asarhaddon tried again with a different approach: his army was much larger and moved much slower. This method was much more successful. As a result, the Assyrian army captured the capital of Egypt Memphis. Although the pharaoh managed to escape, his entire family, a huge number of Egyptian citizens and booty were taken to Assyria.

Meanwhile he appointed Assyrian statesmen to prominent posts in Egypt, and himself returned home to Nineveh. Asarhaddon commissioned a great victory stele on which he is shown towering over his vassals, one of whom is supposed to be Pharaoh's son, with a rope around his neck.

After the first conquest of Egypt, Asarhaddon's spirits and health declined. Records and letters from the Assyrian court testify to the king's deep sadness after the death of his wife and newborn child around 672 BC. In addition, his physical health deteriorated: Asarhaddon regularly experienced vomiting, nosebleeds, and skin rashes that covered his entire body.

So Asarhaddon, returning from a victorious campaign in Egypt, learned of a plot against him. The oracle in Harran declared a man named Sasi, allegedly a relative of Sargon II, to be the legitimate Assyrian monarch. Asarhaddon pondered the information he received and massacred the conspirators, including Sasi and the oracle. So many officials were killed in the massacre that Asarhaddon restructured the court and its guards so that fewer people could meet with him.

The conspiracy of 670 B.C. intensified the king's already palpable paranoia. Upon learning of the chaos at Asarhaddon's court, Pharaoh Taharka quickly appeared on the Egyptian political scene, ready to rebel against the Assyrian overlords. Some of Asarhaddon's appointed officials joined the Egyptians, and the Assyrian ruler began mobilizing an army for a third campaign against Egypt.

However, Asarhaddon died at Harran before reaching the borders of Egypt, only a year after he quelled a potential civil war. Nevertheless, his succession plan proved successful. Both of his sons moved smoothly into their new roles as king of Assyria and king of Babylonia, respectively.

Paranoia raged in Asarhaddon's mind. Because of his father's betrayal by his brothers and subsequent disorderly ascension to the throne, Asarhaddon was incredibly suspicious of officials, servants, and especially members of his family. This was probably the reason for the carefully organized scheme of his succession to the throne.

Asarhaddon declared his eldest son, Sin-nadin-apli, as his heir. But Sin-nadin-apli died two years afterward, and Asarhaddon made his next son, Shamash-shum-ukin, heir to Babylon, and his younger son, Ashurbanipal, heir to Assyria. By appointing two crown princes, Asarhaddon probably hoped to stabilize the empire and limit the possibility of civil war.

The choice to appoint his eldest son as ruler of Babylon was of strategic importance because his mother was presumably of Babylonian descent, while Ashurbanipal's mother was Assyrian. Accordingly, Asarhaddon's distrust of power-hungry male relatives materialized in the increased power of women at court.

His mother, wife, and daughter enjoyed notable prestige in Assyrian politics. Thus, it was Asarhaddon's mother, Nakia Zakutu, who got all the men associated with the throne to swear allegiance to Ashurbanipal in what came to be known as the "Treaty of Allegiance to Nakia Zakutu", concluded around 669 BC.

Another symptom of Asarhaddon's paranoia was his increased use of rituals, astrology, and oracles. His use of these methods to ensure success as king was unparalleled among previous Assyrian monarchs. Asarhaddon performed the ritual of replacing the king on several occasions, including in Egypt and after learning of Sasi's plot.

In this way he demonstrated his trust in the divine rather than the human. During the replacement ritual, the king would go into hiding for 100 days and a deputy would take his place. The idea was that any evil intended for the king would fall on his replacement, and at the end of 100 days he would die, whether any evil had befallen him or not.