Jamchad

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Jamchad was a state in the Near East that, according to the Middle Chronology, began to exist at the end of the 19th century BC. The source is comprehensible and lasts until at least the second half of the 17th century BC. Existed.

Geography, Economy and Cult

Its capital was Halab, today's Aleppo . Jamchad's immediate rule and his sphere of influence, which cannot be clearly distinguished from one another, were mainly in the northern regions of present-day Syria and in the southeastern parts of present-day Turkey . In addition to the north of the Syrian steppe, they also included large parts of the northern fertile crescent , which was certainly a reason for Jamchad's prosperity and supremacy over a century and a half. In addition, it was located as a link between Mesopotamia and the Mediterranean . The trade routes on which goods such as copper from Cyprus or luxury goods from the Aegean Sea were brought to Mesopotamia ran through Halab . Grain produced in Jamchad was exported to the east and west, and special Jamchad textiles were also in demand abroad.

In addition to the Amorites , which included the Yamchad kings, a large number of Hurrites lived here . As early as the 17th century, the state god Jamchads, the weather god Hadad , was equated with the Hurrian Teššub . The worship of the weather god of Aleppo extended from Nuzi to Ugarit and Asia Minor . He was accompanied by the Hurrian sun goddess Ḫepat , who replaced the sky goddess Šawuška , which was unchallenged in other Hurrian areas , here and in Kizzuwatna , which was cultically influenced by Halab .

Rise and Bloom

It will probably be its position as a central place of worship of the widely revered Weather God and his role as a commercial and trading center was that Halab after the destruction of the ancient trading city of Ebla by Naram-Sin of Akkad helped to a greater importance within its region. This significance first becomes apparent in the sources when, at the end of the 19th century, some Syrian principalities, which King Jaḫdun-Lim of Mari had made tributary during his conquest in the direction of the Mediterranean, opposed the suzerainty of Mari under the leadership of Sumu-epuh of Jamchad .

Sumu-epuh's successor Jarim-Lim I had to defend himself against a coalition that Šamši-Adad I of Assyria had forged with Išhi-Adad of Qatna . The point in time when he and Zimri-Lim succeeded in driving out the Assyrian viceroy residing in Mari after the death of Šamši-Adad around 1775 can certainly be regarded as the point in time from which Jamchad emerged as an established power in the Syrian region. A letter from the official Iturasdu to Zimri-Lim is often quoted in this connection, which identifies Jamchad as the strongest of the then powerful Middle Eastern states of Mari, Babylon , Larsa , Ešnunna and Qatna for the date of around 1770 . Jarim-Lim subsequently provided arms assistance not only to Mari, but also to the king of Der on the other side of the Tigris. He and his successor Hammurabi I were also allied with Hammurabi of Babylon. Under one of these two Yamchad kings, the state extended its rule to the area of ​​the Balich . Abban , the son and successor of Hammurabi of Jamchad, had to put down an uprising in this region after 1750, which ended with the complete destruction of its center, the city of Irrite.

For the reconstruction of the history of Jamchad from the middle of the 18th century to around 1650 we are mainly dependent on the not particularly productive sources from Alalach on the northern Orontes , where a sideline of the ruling house of Halab ruled under its suzerainty. At least from these sources it is clear that the supremacy of Jamchad was never seriously challenged during this period, even if the strengthening of the Hurrian principalities in the east may have brought one or another dispute with it.

The Hittite incursions and the period that followed

The Hittite king Hattušili I undertook a campaign to the west in the second half of the 17th century. In doing so, he also subjugated areas from the Yamchad's sphere of interest and destroyed the Alalach, which was subordinate to Jamchad. When Hattušili made another advance to the west three years later, it was again Jamchad, who was at the head of a northern Syrian coalition, which fought a battle with the Hittite armed forces at Hašuwa (Hašum). The Syrians lost this battle. In addition to images of gods from other Syrian cities, the Hadad and Hepat statues from Halab brought into battle by the Syrians were captured by the Hittites along with their cult implements. The Hadad cult was introduced in Hatti in order to secure the power of the deity, who had made Jamchad a powerful state for a long time - also from the Hittite point of view. Finally, the Hittites granted Jamchad the title of “great kingdom”. In the edict in which Hattušili laid down the succession to the throne of his adopted son Muršili I , the latter was instructed to do what the former had not yet achieved: the submission of Halab. Muršili fulfilled this task. Around this time the name Jamchad appears for the last time in the sources.

However, it is by no means certain that this ended the existence of the state, and for various reasons it is quite doubtful whether the city was "destroyed", as Mursili II writes in a state treaty over 200 years after this event. The Hittite sources suggest that the city was dependent on the Hittite Empire for only a few decades, if at all. With the destruction of Alalach and the Hittite retreat from the region after the fall of the Althittite Empire, the sources that provided information about Jamchad's history of the previous decades have broken away. The archives of the kings of Jamchad are still undiscovered somewhere in the soil of what is now Aleppo. The inscription on the statue of Idrimi , which can be seen today in the British Museum , teaches us that at the end of the 16th century Halab ruled the country Mukish with its city Alalach in addition to the southwestern countries Niya and Ama'u - as it had 150 years earlier . But it also teaches that Mittani incorporated Halab into his sphere of influence at the latest under his king Parattarna (approx. 1470–1450).

Around the 11th century BC In the inscription ALEPPO 6, a king Taitas is documented, who calls himself ruler of the country "Padasatini" or "Palistin". The weather god was worshiped.

Kings of Jamchad

  1. Sumu-epuh
  2. Jarim-Lim I.
  3. Hammurapi I.
  4. Abban
  5. Jarim-Lim II.
  6. Niqmi-epuh
  7. Irkabtum
  8. Jarim-Lim III.
  9. Hammurabi II

literature

  • Erich Ebeling, Bruno Meissner et al. (Hrsg.): Reallexikon der Assyriologie (and Near Eastern archeology) . de Gruyter, Berlin / Leipzig 1932-2006 (previously 11 vols.), ISBN 3-11-019133-4 .
  • Horst Klengel : History and Culture of Old Syria . Kohler & Amelang, Leipzig 1979, Schroll, Munich 1980, ISBN 3-7031-0489-9 .
  • Gernot Wilhelm: Basics of the history and culture of the Hurriter . Darmstadt 1982, ISBN 3-534-08151-X .
  • Horst Klengel: Syria - 3000 to 300 BC A Handbook of Political History . Berlin 1992, ISBN 3-05-001820-8 .
  • Wu Yuhong: A Political History of Eshnunna, Mari and Assyria during the early Old Babylonian Period . Changchun 1994 ( Journal of Ancient Civilizations . Supplement).
  • Michael Roaf: Mesopotamia . Christian, Munich 1991, Bechtermünz, Augsburg 1998, ISBN 3-88472-200-X .
  • Abraham Malamat: Mari and the Bible . Brill, Leiden 1998, ISBN 90-04-10863-7 .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Published in Georges Dossin: Syria 19 . Paris 1938, pp. 117f.
  2. ^ J. David Hawkins: The Inscriptions of the Aleppo Temple , in: Anatolian Studies 61, 2011, pp. 35–54.