Assur

CHALDEA Mesopotamia. Land of the native Chaldeans

Aššur (Akkadian) (English | Ashur/Chaldea, Chaldean / Aššur; Chaldean Neo-Aramaic / Chaldean ; Hebrew: אַשּׁוּר‎ / Aššûr; Arabic: آشور‎ / ALA-LC: Āshūr; Kurdish: Asûr), also known as Ashur, Qal'at Sherqat and Kalah Shergat, is a remnant city of the last Chaldean Empire. The remains of the city are situated on the western bank of the river Tigris, north of the confluence with the tributary Little Zab river, in modern-day Iraq, more precisely in the Al-Shirqat District (a small panhandle of the Salah al-Din Governorate).

The city was occupied from the mid-3rd millennium BC (Circa 2600–2500 BC) to the 14th Century AD, when Tamurlane conducted a massacre of its population.

Aššur is also the name of the chief deity of the city. He was considered the highest god in the Assyrian pantheon and the protector of the Assur city. In the Mesopotamian mythology he was the equivalent of Babylonian Marduk.

The site of Assur is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, but was placed on the list of World Heritage Sites in danger in 2003, in part due to the conflict in that area, and also due to a proposed dam, that would flood part of the site. It is about 40 miles south of the former Nimrud and 60 miles south of Nineveh.

Archaeology

Exploration of the site of Assur began in 1898 by German archaeologists. Excavations began in 1900 by Friedrich Delitzsch, and were continued in 1903–1913 by a team from the German Oriental Society led initially by Robert Koldewey and later by Walter Andrae. More than 16,000 tablets with cuneiform texts were discovered. Many of the objects found made their way to the Pergamon Museum in Berlin.

More recently, Ashur was excavated by B. Hrouda for the University of Munich and the Bavarian Ministry of Culture in 1990. During the same period, in 1988 and 1989, the site was being worked by R. Dittmann on behalf of the German Research Foundation.

Name

Further information: Syria (name)

Aššur is the name of the city, of the land ruled by the city, and of its tutelary deity. At a late date it appears in Mesopotamia literature in the forms An-sar, An-sar (ki), which form was presumably read Assur. The name of the deity is written A-šur or Aš-sùr, and in Neo-Babylonian often shortened to Aš.

In the Creation tablet, the heavens personified collectively were indicated by this term An-sar, "host of heaven," in contradistinction to the earth, Ki-sar, "host of earth."

In view of this fact, it seems highly probable that the late writing An-sar for Assur was a more or less conscious attempt on the part of the Chaldean scribes to identify the peculiarly Assyrian deity Asur with the Creation deity An-sar. On the other hand, there is an epithet Asir or Ashir ("overseer") applied to several gods and particularly to the deity Asur, a fact which introduced a third element of confusion into the discussion of the name Assur. It is probable then that there is a triple popular etymology in the various forms of writing the name Assur; viz. A-usar, An-sar and the stem asdru.

Early Bronze Age

Archaeology reveals the site of the city was occupied by the middle of the third millennium BC. This was still the Sumerian period, before the Assyrian kingdom emerged in the 23rd to 21st century BC. The oldest remains of the city were discovered in the foundations of the Ishtar temple, as well as at the Old Palace. In the following Old Akkadian period, the city was ruled by kings from Akkad or Proto-Chaldean. During the "Sumerian Renaissance", the city was ruled by a Sumerian governor.

Old and Middle Assyria

Mesopotamia in 2nd millennium BC

By the time the Neo-Sumerian Ur-III dynasty collapsed at the hands of the Elamites in ca. the 21st century BC, the local Akkadian kings, including those in Assur, had shaken off the Sumerian yoke. An Assyrian king named Ushpia who reigned in ca. the 21st century BC is credited with dedicating the first temple of the god Assur in his home city. In around 2000 BC, Puzur-Ashur I founded a new dynasty, and his successors such as Ilushuma, Erishum I and Sargon I left inscriptions regarding the building of temples to Ashur, Adad and Ishtar in the city. Assur developed rapidly into a centre for trade, and trade routes led from the city to Anatolia, where merchants from Assur established trading colonies. These Assyrian colonies in Asia Minor were called karum, and traded mostly with tin and wool (see Kültepe). In the city of Assur, the first great temples to the city god Assur and the weather god Adad were erected. The first fortifications were also began in this period.

Assur was the capital of the empire of Shamshi-Adad I (1813–1781 BC). He expanded the city's power and influence beyond the Tigris river valley, creating what some regard as the first Assyrian Empire. In this period, the Great Royal Palace was built, and the temple of Assur was expanded and enlarged with a ziggurat. This empire came to end when Hammurabi, the Amorite king of Babylon incorporated the city into his short lived empire following the death of Ishme-Dagan I circa 1756 BC, and the next three Assyrian kings were regarded as vassals. A native king named Adasi drove the Babylonians and Amorites from Assur and Assyria as a whole circa 1720 BC, however little is known of his successors. Renewed building activity is known a few centuries later, during the reign of a native king Puzur-Ashur III, when the city was refortified and the southern quarters incorporated into the main city defenses. Temples to the moon god Sin (Nanna) and the sun god Shamash were erected in the 15th century BC. The city was then subjugated by the king of Mitanni, Shaushtatar in the mid 15th Century, who removed the gold and silver doors of the temple to his capital, Washukani, as plunder.

Ashur-uballit I overthrew the Mitanni empire in 1365 BC, and the Assyrians benefited from this development by taking control of the eastern portion of the Mitanni Empire, and later also annexing Hittite, Babylonian, Amorite and Hurrian territory. In the following centuries the old temples and palaces of Assur were restored, and the city once more became the seat of a powerful empire from 1365 BC to 1076 BC. Tukulti-Ninurta I (1244–1208 BC) also started a new temple to the goddess Ishtar. The Anu-Adad temple was constructed during the reign of Tiglath-Pileser I (1115–1075 BC). The walled area of the city in the Middle Assyrian period made up some 1.2 square kilometres (300 acres).

Neo-Assyrian Empire

Parthian temple in Assur.

In the Neo-Assyrian Empire (912–608 BC), the royal residence was transferred to other Assyrian cities. Ashur-nasir-pal II (884–859 BC) moved the capital from Assur to Kalhu (Calah/Nimrud). Yet the city of Assur remained the religious center of the empire, due to its temple of the national god Ashur. In the reign of Sennacherib (705–682 BC), the House of the New Year, akitu, was built, and the festivities celebrated in the city. Several Assyrian rulers were also buried beneath the Old Palace. The city was sacked and largely destroyed during the conquest of Assyria by the Medes, Babylonians and Persians in 612 BC.

Persian Empire

The city was fully reoccupied by Assyrians some centuries later. In the Parthian period, between 100 BC and 270 AD, the city became an important administrative centre of Parthian ruled Assyria (Assuristan), and some Assyriologists such as Simo Parpola have suggested it may have had some degree of autonomy or outright independence. New administrative buildings were erected to the north of the old city, and a palace to the south. The old temple dedicated to the national god of the Assyrians Assur (Ashur) was also rebuilt, indicating the continued occupation by ethnic Assyrians[1]. However, the city was largely destroyed again by the Sassanid king Shapur I (241–272 AD). However, the city remained occupied, and some settlement at the site is known right up to the 14th century.

Assur seems to have been reoccupied by Assyrians once again, and remained so well into the Parthian and Sassanid periods. It was occupied during the Islamic period until the 14th century when Tamurlane conducted a massacre of indigenous Assyrian Christians. After that there are no traces of a settlement in the archaeological and numismatic record. [2].

Threats to Assur

The site was put on UNESCO's List of World Heritage in Danger in 2003, at which time the site was threatened by a looming large-scale dam project that would have submerged the ancient archaeological site. The dam project was put on hold shortly after the 2003 invasion of Iraq.

As of march 7 2015, the city is in ISIL held territory. The very recent destruction of other ancient cities in ISIL territory such as Hatra, Khorsabad, and Nimrud shows that the city is at extremely high risk of unprecedented destruction. The city may have hope though, as it is on the border of ISIS held territory, and could potentially be saved if borders fluctuate or skirmishes continue with the Peshmerga.

See also

• Ashurism
• Ashur (god)
• Assyria
• Kings of Assyria
• Chronology of the ancient Near East
• Short chronology timeline
• Cities of the ancient Near East
• Assyrian People
• World Heritage Sites in Danger

References

• Walter Andrae: Babylon. Die versunkene Weltstadt und ihr Ausgräber Robert Koldewey. de Gruyter, Berlin 1952.
• Stefan Heidemann: Al-'Aqr, das islamische Assur. Ein Beitrag zur historischen Topographie Nordmesopotamiens. In: Karin Bartl and Stefan hauser et al. (eds.): Berliner Beiträge zum Vorderen Orient. Seminar fur Altorientalische Philologie und Seminar für Vorderasiatische Altertumskunde der Freien Universität Berlin, Fachbereich Altertumswissenschaften. Dietrich Reimer Verlag, Berlin 1996, pp. 259–285
• Eva Cancik-Kirschbaum: Die Assyrer. Geschichte, Gesellschaft, Kultur. C.H.Beck Wissen, München 2003. ISBN 3-406-50828-6
• Olaf Matthes: Zur Vorgeschichte der Ausgrabungen in Assur 1898-1903/05. MDOG Berlin 129, 1997, 9-27. ISSN 0342-118X
• Peter A. Miglus: Das Wohngebiet von Assur, Stratigraphie und Architektur. Berlin 1996. ISBN 3-7861-1731-4
• Susan L. Marchand: Down from Olympus. Archaeology and Philhellenism in Germany 1750-1970. Princeton University Press, Princeton 1996. ISBN 0-691-04393-0
• Conrad Preusser: Die Paläste in Assur. Gebr. Mann, Berlin 1955, 1996. ISBN 3-7861-2004-8
• Friedhelm Pedde, The Assur-Project. An old excavation newly analyzed, in: J.M. Córdoba et al. (Ed.), Proceedings of the 5th International Congress on the Archaeology of the Ancient Near East, Madrid, April 3-8 2006. Universidad Autónoma de Madrid Ediciones, Madrid 2008, Vol. II, 743-752.
• Steven Lundström, From six to seven Royal Tombs. The documentation of the Deutsche Orient-Gesellschaft excavation at Assur (1903-1914) – Possibilities and limits of its reexamination, in: J.M. Córdoba et al. (Ed.), Proceedings of the 5th International Congress on the Archaeology of the Ancient Near East, Madrid, April 3-8 2006. Universidad Autónoma de Madrid Ediciones, Madrid 2008, Vol. II, 445-463.
• Friedhelm Pedde, The Assur-Project: A new Analysis of the Middle- and Neo-Assyrian Graves and Tombs, in: P. Matthiae – F. Pinnock – L. Nigro – N. Marchetti (Ed.), Proceedings of the 6th International Congress on the Archaeology of the Ancient Near East, May, 5th-10th 2008, “Sapienza” – Università di Roma. Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden 2010, Vol. 1, 913-923.
• Barbara Feller, Seal Images and Social Status: Sealings on Middle Assyrian Tablets from Ashur, in: P. Matthiae – F. Pinnock – L. Nigro – N. Marchetti (Ed.), Proceedings of the 6th International Congress on the Archaeology of the Ancient Near East, May, 5th-10th 2008, “Sapienza” – Università di Roma. Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden 2010, Vol. 1, 721-729.
• Friedhelm Pedde, The Assur Project: The Middle and Neo-Assyrian Graves and Tombs, in: R. Matthews – J. Curtis (Ed.), Proceedings of the 7th International Congress on the Archaeology of the Ancient Near East, London 2010. Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden 2012, Vol. 1, 93-108.
• Friedhelm Pedde, The Assyrian heartland, in: D.T. Potts (Ed.), A Companion to the Archaeology of the Ancient Near East. Wiley-Blackwell, Chichester 2012, Vol. II, 851-866.

External links

• Assyrian origins: discoveries at Ashur on the Tigris: antiquities in the Vorderasiatisches Museum, Berlin, an exhibition catalog from The Metropolitan Museum of Art Libraries (fully available online as PDF), which contains material on Assur
• Friedhelm Pedde, Recovering Assur. From the German Excavations of 1903-1914 to today’s Assur Project in Berlin[3]

Template:World Heritage Sites in Iraq