Sargon II
Sargon II (died 705 bce) was one of Assyria’s great kings (reigned 721–705 bce) during the last century of its history. He extended and consolidated the conquests of his presumed father, Tiglath-pileser III.
Sargon is the Hebrew rendering (Isaiah 20:1) of Assyrian Sharru-kin, a throne name meaning “the king is legitimate.” The name was undoubtedly chosen in reminiscence of two former kings of Assyria, particularly in commemoration of Sargon of Akkad (flourished 2300 bce).
Although Sargon’s ancestry is partly veiled in mystery, he was probably a younger son of Tiglath-pileser III and consequently a brother of his predecessor Shalmaneser V, who may have died ignominiously or may have been deposed. It was for Sargon to resume the conquests and to improve the administration of the empire his father had begun to assemble.
Upon his accession to the throne, he was faced immediately with three major problems: dealing with the Chaldean and Aramaean chieftainships in the southern parts of Babylonia, with the kingdom of Urartu and the peoples to the north in the Armenian highlands, and with Syria and Palestine. By and large, these were the conquests made by Tiglath-pileser III. Sargon’s problem was not only to maintain the status quo but to make further conquests to prove the might of the god Ashur, the national god of the Assyrian empire.
When Sargon succeeded to the Assyrian throne, Marduk-apal-iddina II (Merodach-baladan of the Bible), a dissident chieftain of the Chaldean tribes in the marshes of southern Babylonia, committed the description of his victory over the invading Assyrian armies (720 bce) to writing on a clay cylinder, which he deposited in the city of Uruk (biblical Erech; modern Tall al-Warkāʾ). The presence of this record obviously did not suit Sargon. After having discharged other commitments, he uncovered Marduk-apal-iddina’s record and removed it to his own residence, then at Kalakh (modern Nimrūd), substituting what has been described as an “improved” version that was more to his liking.
The extant texts reveal little about Sargon himself. With few exceptions, ancient Mesopotamian rulers have left no documents from which to write an actual biography. No personal documents have survived from Sargon’s reign, but it seems fair to assume that phraseologies uncommon in the inscriptions of other Assyrian kings, found in his texts, must have met with his approval, even though it is uncertain whether such phrases—sometimes turning into what is obviously poetry—were in fact conceived by Sargon himself or ascribed to him by his historiographers. The discovery, at Nimrūd, of a series of omens, the texts of which are written in cuneiform on beeswax encased in ivory and walnut boards and marked as being the property of the palace of Sargon, perhaps also throws some light on Sargon the man. Although he may not have introduced the method of recording cuneiform texts on wax, this novel method of committing texts to writing apparently took his fancy. This assumption tallies well with the interest he took in the engineering projects undertaken in cities he conquered. Sargon’s palace at Dur Sharrukin (modern Khorsabad) was dedicated in 706 bce, less than a year before he died.
An unparalleled record of Sargon’s eighth campaign (714 bce)—in the form of a letter to the god Ashur—has been recovered. According to this letter, Sargon in 714 led the Assyrian armies from Kalakh, which at the time was still his residence, into the areas around modern Al-Sulaymāniyyah in Iraqi Kurdistan and into the highlands of the Zagros range beyond. His purpose was to come to the aid of allies of the Assyrian realm who were threatened by Rusa I, a king of Urartu and a bitter enemy of Assyria. During the progress of this campaign, the author of the account visualized, or anticipated, the reactions of his adversary as, from a mountain, he watched the approach of the Assyrian armies. The passage, like many others in this unique text, constitutes an ingenious stylistic device unparalleled in Assyrian historical literature. The phraseology employed by the author is original by Mesopotamian standards as they are known today: inventive, resourceful, testifying to a fertile mind, and clearly deviating from the commonplace platitudes that mostly characterize the standard accounts of Assyrian kings. Whether or not Sargon himself is responsible for the wording of this narrative, it is to his credit that an account of this nature emerged from his chancery, with his approval and endorsement. Sargon is assumed to have died in battle in 705.
