Ashur-nirari V
Ashur-nirari V | |
---|---|
King of Assyria | |
King of theNeo-Assyrian Empire | |
Reign | 755–745 BC |
Predecessor | Ashur-dan III |
Successor | Tiglath-Pileser III |
Died | 745 BC |
Issue | Tiglath-Pileser III(?) |
Akkadian | Aššur-nārāri |
Dynasty | Adaside dynasty |
Father | Adad-nirari III |
Ashur-nirari V(Neo-Assyrian cuneiform:Aššur-nārāri,meaning "Ashuris my help ")[1]was the king of theNeo-Assyrian Empirefrom 755 BC to his death in 745 BC. Ashur-nirari was a son ofAdad-nirari III(r. 811–783 BC) and succeeded his brotherAshur-dan IIIas king. He ruled during a period of Assyrian decline from which few sources survive. As such his reign, other than broad political developments, is poorly known.
At this time, the Assyrian officials were becoming increasingly powerful relative to the king, and Assyria's enemies were growing more dangerous. An unusually small share of Ashur-nirari's reign was devoted to campaigns against foreign enemies, perhaps suggesting domestic political instability within Assyria. In 746 or 745 BC, there are records of a revolt inNimrud,the Assyrian capital. Ashur-nirari was succeeded byTiglath-Pileser III,either his son or brother, but it is unclear in what manner. Though it is traditionally assumed that Tiglath-Pileser deposed Ashur-nirari, it is also possible that it was a smooth and legitimate succession, or that for a brief time they were co-rulers.
Reign
[edit]Ashur-nirari V was a son ofAdad-nirari III(r. 811–783 BC). He succeeded his brotherAshur-dan IIIas king of Assyria in 755.[2]Ashur-nirari ruled during an obscure period in Assyrian history, from which little information survives.[3]As a result, his reign is poorly known.[4]During this obscure time, theNeo-Assyrian Empireexperienced a period of decline. In particular, the power of the king himself was being threatened due to the emergence of extraordinarily powerful officials, who, while they accepted the authority of the Assyrian monarch, in practice acted with supreme authority and began to write their owncuneiforminscriptions concerning building and political activities, similar to those of the kings.[5]Such inscriptions by officials are more common from this time than inscriptions from the kings themselves.[3]At the same time, the enemies of Assyria grew stronger and more serious. This period of Assyrian decline, for instance, coincided with the peak of the northern Kingdom ofUrartu.[6]
Inscriptions from after Ashur-nirari's reign that mention him include theAssyrian King List(from which the length of his reign is known) and a later list ofeponyms[4](year names, typically including the name of an official and a significant event)[7]that include the eponyms of his reign.[4]Contemporary inscriptions that mention Ashur-nirari include an inscription bySarduri IIofUrartu,wherein Sarduri claims to have defeated Ashur-nirari in battle. A fragmentary copy of a treaty between Ashur-nirari andMati'ilu,king ofArpad,also survives. Also known is a fragmentary description, the only known inscription written under Ashur-nirari himself, which records the grant of lands and tax exemption to the official Marduk-sarra-usur by Ashur-nirari following Marduk-sarra-usur having distinguished himself in a battle. Marduk-sarra-usur might be the same individual as a man of the same name mentioned in the eponym of 784 BC.[4]Based on the list of eponyms, Ashur-nirari's reign was lackluster from a military perspective. The king is recorded to have stayed "in the land" (i.e. not campaigned) for almost every year of his reign, save for only three years. In 755 BC, the year of his accession, he campaigned against Arpad[8][9]and in 748–747, he campaigned against the city ofNamriin Urartu.[6][8]It is probably from the conclusion of the 755 BC campaign that the treaty with Mati'ilu comes from. Almost all of the surviving portions of this treaty is made up of curses against Mati'ilu.[9]It was customary for an Assyrian king to campaign every year which means that Ashur-nirari staying in Assyria could be a sign of domestic instability. Most Assyrian kings also undertook building projects, but no construction work conducted under Ashur-nirari V is known.[10]
Succession
[edit]Ashur-nirari is generally regarded to have died in 745 BC, as this was the year of his successorTiglath-Pileser III's accession.[2][4][11]The nature of Tiglath-Pileser's rise to the throne is not clear, particularly because ancient sources give conflicting accounts of his lineage. TheAssyrian King Liststates that Tiglath-Pileser was the son of Ashur-nirari V, but in his own inscriptions Tiglath-Pileser claimed to be the son of Adad-nirari III and thus Ashur-nirari's brother.[12]Given that there are records of a revolt inNimrud,the capital of the Assyria, in 746/745 BC,[13][14]and that Tiglath-Pileser in his inscriptions attributes his rise to the throne as a result of divine selection rather than his royal ancestry, he is typically assumed to have usurped the throne from Ashur-nirari.[13]
In her 2016 PhD thesis, the historian Tracy Davenport advanced the hypothesis that Tiglath-Pileser may have succeeded entirely legitimately and had even briefly been co-ruler with Ashur-nirari. Davenport based this idea primarily on oddities in the sequence of eponyms under Tiglath-Pileser, an unusual horizontal line in the list of eponyms after 744 BC (which might mark Ashur-nirari's death) and theAssyrian King Listgiving Ashur-nirari a reign lasting 10 years. Since the Assyrians counted reign lengths from the first full year of a king, Ashur-nirari's first year was reckoned to be 754 BC which means he would have ruled for 10 years only if he died in 744 BC.[15]TheAssyrian King Listis however not without known errors and there are for some earlier kings discrepancies between different versions of the list.[16]
References
[edit]- ^Crouch 2014,p. 102.
- ^abChen 2020,p. 200.
- ^abGrayson 2002,p. 239.
- ^abcdeGrayson 2002,p. 246.
- ^Grayson 2002,p. 200.
- ^abGrayson 1982,p. 276.
- ^Frahm 2016,p. 83.
- ^abCDLI.
- ^abGrayson 1982,p. 277.
- ^Grayson 1982,p. 278.
- ^Davenport 2016,pp. 36–37.
- ^Chen 2020,pp. 200–201.
- ^abDavenport 2016,p. 36.
- ^Radner 2016,p. 47.
- ^Davenport 2016,pp. 37–41.
- ^Hagens 2005,pp. 27–28.
Sources
[edit]- Chen, Fei (2020).Study on the Synchronistic King List from Ashur.Leiden:BRILL.ISBN978-90-04-43091-4.
- Crouch, Carly L. (2014).Israel and the Assyrians: Deuteronomy, the Succession Treaty of Esarhaddon, and the Nature of Subversion.Atlanta:Society of Biblical Literature Press.ISBN978-1-62837-026-3.
- Davenport, Tracy (2016).Situation and Organisation: The Empire Building of Tiglath-Pileser III (745-728 BC)(PDF)(PhD thesis).University of Sydney.
- Frahm, Eckart (2016). "Revolts in the Neo-Assyrian Empire: A Preliminary Discourse Analysis". In Collins, John Joseph & Manning, Joseph Gilbert (eds.).Revolt and Resistance in the Ancient Classical World and the Near East: In the Crucible of Empire.Leiden:BRILL.ISBN978-90-04-33017-7.
- Grayson, Albert Kirk (1982)."Assyria: Ashur-dan II to Ashur-Nirari V (934–745 B.C.)".In Boardman, John;Edwards, I. E. S.;Hammond, N. G. L.&Sollberger, Edmond(eds.).The Cambridge Ancient History: Volume 3, Part 1: The Prehistory of the Balkans, the Middle East and the Aegean World, Tenth to Eighth Centuries BC(2nd ed.). Cambridge:Cambridge University Press.ISBN0-521-22496-9.
- Grayson, Albert Kirk (2002) [1996].Assyrian Rulers of the Early First Millennium BC: II (858–745 BC).Toronto:University of Toronto Press.ISBN0-8020-0886-0.
- Hagens, Graham (2005)."The Assyrian King List and Chronology: a Critique".Orientalia: NOVA Series.74(1): 23–41.JSTOR43076931.
- Radner, Karen(2016)."Revolts in the Assyrian Empire: Succession Wars, Rebellions Against a False King and Independence Movements".In Collins, John Joseph & Manning, Joseph Gilbert (eds.).Revolt and Resistance in the Ancient Classical World and the Near East: In the Crucible of Empire.Leiden:BRILL.ISBN978-90-04-33017-7.
- "The Neo Assyrian Eponyms".Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative.14 October 2015.Retrieved11 December2021.