Adad-nīrārī III.

Adad-Nirari's stele in the Kahramanmaraş Museum

Adad-nīrārī III. was king of the Assyrian Empire in the years 810–781 BC. (Alternative dating: 811–783 BC).

swell

Only a few inscriptions are known from his reign. They are usually short and do not indicate a year of government. Schrader calls them overview or pomp inscriptions

• Kalach plate, discovered by William Kennett Loftus in 1854 and only preserved as a cast. It consists of a prologue and the historical part. It tells of the subjugation of Damascus and the Chaldeans of the sea country (802 BC or 795/794 BC).
• Saba'a stele, partly illegible, supposedly from the fifth year of the reign (806 BC according to the Assyrian list of kings from Khorsabad ). According to Tadmor, however, it reports the events of the years 805–796 BC. It consists of a prologue, the historical report, the ina ûmēšūma section and the usual curse. Tadmor puts it after 796 BC. Chr.
• Tell al-Rimah stele, after 796 BC BC, built by Nergal-ereš.
• Fragment of a stele from Tell Schech Hamad am Chabur , BM 131 124, erected by Nergal-ereš ( ^d IGI.DU).
• A boundary stone from the vicinity of Pazarcık in Turkey, the inscription of which reports on the deeds of Adad-nīrārī and on the back of his son Salmānu-ašarēd IV., In the Kahramanmaraş Archaeological Museum

Life

Adad-nīrārī was the son and successor of King Šamši-Adad V , but was still a minor at his death, so that his mother Šammuramat took over the reign. This was probably the historical model of the Semiramis . Šamši-Adad V had already had to deal with ambitious officers and local rulers, and this reign meant a further weakening of royal power. To strengthen this again and also in terms of foreign policy to the successes of his grandfather, Salmānu-ašarēd III. To tie in was the aim of Adad-nīrārī, which he pursued vigorously.

The sources report accordingly of numerous campaigns during his almost 30-year rule. Most of his campaigns went west, the first, according to the eponymous chronicle , 805 BC. According to the Tell al-Rimah stele, Adad-nīrārī marched against the Hittites and the Amorites , subjugated them and made them tributary "in the same year". He moved west and reached the Mediterranean ("the great sea where the sun sets"). In Arwad , "in the middle of the sea" he erected a picture stele. In Lebanon he felled wood, 100 fully grown cedars that he needed for palaces and temples. The most important campaign is likely that against Ben-Hadad III. , the king of Aram , the Adad-nīrārī around 796 BC. Was besieged. This gave the kingdom of Israel under Joash (who paid tribute to the Assyrians) and Jeroboam II the opportunity to recover, as the pressure from the kingdom of Damascus on its northern border was removed. Damascus , 796 BC Subjected to 2000 BC, paid 2000 talents silver, 1000 talents copper, 2000 talents iron, multi-colored and single-colored linen robes as tribute (according to the Rimah stele, the numbers vary). Adad-nīrārī also received the tribute of Joash from Samaria , from Tire , Sidon and from "all the kings of the land of Nairi ".

801 BC BC and 791 BC He moved against Hubuškia , 798 BC. Against Lušia . Tadmor believes that he took the tribute from Na'iri as part of these campaigns .

successor

The death of Adad-nīrārīs in Assyria was followed by a period of weakening of the royal power, in which local powers and the military leaders again gained influence. First Tukulti-apil-Ešarra III. succeeded around forty years later to restore the royal position of power.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ E. Schrader: On the criticism of the inscriptions Tiglath-Pileser II., Asarhaddon and Asurbanipal . Book printing of the Königl. Academy of Sciences, Berlin 1880 ( Treatises of the Royal Academy of Sciences in Berlin . Vol. 8).
2. ↑ Hayim Tadmor: The Historical Inscriptions of Adad-nīrārī III . In: Iraq . Vol. 35/2, 1973, p. 143.

literature

• Dietz-Otto Edzard : History of Mesopotamia . CH Beck Verlag, Munich 2004, ISBN 3-406-51664-5 .
• Helmut Freydank u. a .: Lexicon of the Old Orient. Egypt * India * China * Western Asia . VMA-Verlag, Wiesbaden 1997, ISBN 3-928127-40-3 .
• H. Genge: Steles of the New Assyrian Kings, Part I, The cuneiform inscriptions . Freiburg im Breisgau 1965, p. 14, 117-118 (dissertation).
• E. Schrader: On the criticism of the inscriptions Tiglath-Pileser II., Asarhaddon and Asurbanipal . Book printing of the Königl. Academy of Sciences, Berlin 1880 ( Treatises of the Royal Academy of Sciences in Berlin . Vol. 8).
• Hayim Tadmor: The Historical Inscriptions of Adad-Nirari III . In: Iraq . Vol. 35/2, 1973, pp. 141-150.
• Luis Robert Siddall: The Reign of Adad-nīrārī III . An Historical and Ideological Analysis of An Assyrian King and His Times. Brill, 2013, ISBN 978-90-04-25614-9 , pp. 260 .

predecessor	Office	successor
Samši-Adad V.	Assyrian king 811 to 783 BC Chr.	Salmānu-ašarēd IV. (Shalmaneser IV.)