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Records of the Past, 2nd series, Vol. I

By A. H. Sayce

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Coloumn I

1. Asur the great lord, the director of the hosts of the gods,
2. the giver of the sceptre and the crown, the establisher of the kingdom;
3. Bel, the lord (bilu), the king of all the spirits of the earth,
4. the father of the gods, the lord of the world;
5. Sin (the Moon-god), the sentient one, the lord of the crown,
6. the exalted one, the god of the storm; 1
7. Samas (the Sun-god), the judge of heaven and earth, who beholds
8. the plots of the enemy, who feeds the flock;
9. Rimmon (the Air-god), the prince, the inundator of hostile shores,
10. of countries (and) houses; 2
11. Uras, the hero, the destroyer of evil men and foes,
12. who discloses all that is in the heart;
13. Ishtar, the eldest of the gods, the lady of girdles,
14. the strengthener of battles.

_________

15. Ye great gods, guiders of heaven (and) earth,
16. whose onset (is) opposition and combat,
17. who have magnified the kingdom
18. of Tiglath-Pileser, the prince, the chosen

19. of the desire of your hearts, the exalted shepherd,
20. whom you have conjured in the steadfastness of your hearts,
21. with a crown supreme you have clothed him; to rule
22. over the land of Bel mightily you have established him;
23. priority of birth, supremacy (and) heroism
24. have you given him; the destiny of his lordship
25. for his increase and supremacy,
26. to inhabit Bit-kharsag-kurkurra 1
27. for ever have you summoned.

_________

28. Tiglath-Pileser, the powerful king,
29. the king of hosts who has no rival, the king of the four zones,
30. the king of all kinglets, the lord of lords, the shepherd-prince, the king of kings,
31. the exalted prophet, 2 to whom by the proclamation of Samas
32. the illustrious sceptre has been given as a gift, so that the men
33. who are subject to Bel he has ruled
34. in (their) entirety; the faithful shepherd,
35. proclaimed (lord) over kinglets,
36. the supreme governor whose weapons Asur
37. has predestined, and for the government of the four zones
38. has proclaimed his name for ever; the capturer
39. of the distant divisions 3 of the frontiers

40. above and below; the illustrious prince
41. whose glory has overwhelmed (all) regions;
42. the mighty destroyer, 1 who like the rush
43. of a flood is made strong against the hostile land;
44. by the proclamation of Bel he has no rival;
45. he has destroyed the foeman of Asur.

_________

46. May Asur (and) the great gods who have magnified my kingdom,
47. who have given increase and strength to my fetters,
48. (who) have ordered the boundary of their land
49. to be enlarged, cause my hand to hold
50. their mighty weapons, even the deluge of battle.
51. Countries, mountains,
52. fortresses and kinglets, the enemies of Assur,
53. I have conquered, and their territories
54. I have made submit. With sixty kings,
55. I have contended furiously, 2 and
56. power (and) rivalry over them
57. I displayed. A rival in the combat,
58. a confronter in the battle have I not.
59. To the land of Assyria I have added land, to its men
60. (I have added) men; the boundary of my own land
61. I have enlarged, and all their lands I have conquered.

_________

62. At the beginning of my reign twenty thousand men
63. of the Muskâya 3 and their five kings,
64. who for fifty years from the lands of Alzi 4

65. and Purukuzzi had taken the tribute
66. and gifts owing to Asur my lord,—
67. no king at all in battle
68. had subdued their opposition—to their strength
69. trusted and came down; the land of Kummukh 1
70. they seized. Trusting in Asur my lord
71. I assembled my chariots and armies.
72. Thereupon I delayed not. 2 The mountain of Kasi-yara, 3
73. a difficult region, I crossed,
74. with their twenty thousand fighting men
75. and their five kings in the land of Kummukh
76. I contended. A destruction of them
77. I made. The bodies of their warriors
78. in destructive battle like the inundator (Rimmon)
79. I overthrew; their corpses I spread
80. over the valleys and the high places of the mountains.
81. Their heads I cut off; at the sides
82. of their cities I heaped (them) like mounds.
83. Their spoil, their property, their goods,
84. to a countless number I brought forth. Six thousand (men),
85. the relics of their armies, which before
86. my weapons had fled, took
87. my feet. I laid hold upon them and
88. counted them among the men of my own country.

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89. In those days, against Kummukh, the disobedient,
90. which had withheld the tribute and gifts for Asur my lord,
91. I marched. The land of Kummukh
92. I conquered throughout its circuit.

93. Their spoil, their property, their goods
94. I brought forth; their cities with fire

Footnotes
92:1 Identified with Ea in W.A.I., ii. 60, 21.

92:2 Or "hollows."

93:1 "The Temple of the Mountain of the World," the name of an old temple in the city of Assur, which had been restored by Shalmaneser I (B.C. 1300). In early Babylonian mythology "the Mountain of the World" was the Olympos on which the gods dwelt, and which was identified with Mount Rowandiz. It is referred to in Isaiah xiv. 13, where the Babylonian king is made to say: "I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of Elohim: I will sit also on the mount of the assembly (of the gods) in the extremities of the north. I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will be like the most High."

93:2 Isippu, related to asipu, "a diviner," which was borrowed by the Book of Daniel under the form ashshaph, and may have the same origin as the name of Joseph.

93:3 Pulugi, the Hebrew Peleg, in whose days the earth was "divided."

94:1 Naplu, probably the same word as the Nephilim or "giants" of Gen. vi. 4 and Numb. xiii. 33. Sennacherib, in describing the construction of his palace, says: "A railing of three bronze cords and the divine Napallu I erected above it," where "the divine Napallu" probably refers to the image of a protecting deity.

94:2 Literally, "in drunken fashion" (sutkuris).

94:3 The Meshech of the Old Testament, the Moschi of the classical writers, who in Assyrian times occupied the country to the north of Malatiyeh. In the later Assyrian inscriptions they are associated with the Tubal or Tibareni, as in the Old Testament.

94:4 Alzi lay on the southern bank of the Euphrates, between Palu and Khini, and included Enzite, the Anzitênê of classical geography (at the p. 95 sources of the Sebbeneh Su). Alzi was invaded by the Vannic king Menuas, who says that it formed part of the territory of the Khate or Hittites.

95:1 Kummukh, the classical Komagêne, extended in the Assyrian age on either side of the Euphrates, from Malatiyeh in the north to Birejik in the south, Merash probably being one of its cities.

95:2 Literally, "I awaited not the future."

95:3 Mons Masius, the modern Tur Abdin.