Assyria: The Rise and Fall of the World's First Empire

Description

Buy Assyria: The Rise and Fall of the World's First Empire by Frahm, Eckart online on desertcart.ae at best prices. ✓ Fast and free shipping ✓ free returns ✓ cash on delivery available on eligible purchase. Review: Very nice book. Package was satisfactory. I am really delighted to have received the book. Review: Definitely fascinating. It was news to me that "Assyriologist" was a job description, but I'm grateful to Frahm for being one and writing this book. For most people, Assyria is some vague ancient civilization, famous for some rock reliefs in the British Museum and Lord Byron's immortal simile "the Assyrian came down like the wolf on the fold." Frahm touches on both of these. Indeed, at one point he says the job of most Assyriologists has been putting together the pieces of a gigantic jigsaw puzzle that is in the British Museum. And of course it's not a very safe profession these days: the places you need to go are wartorn, scalding hot ruins, and ISIS and others have committed monstrous cultural crimes by blowing up priceless remnants of the Assyrian civilization, just as the Taliban did with those giant Buddhas. Actually, we learn here that Ashur, the capital located north of Babylon, had a comparatively pacific early history which makes its later belligerence startling. It's not easy, apparently, to pinpoint what caused it. Certainly disease was a factor, Frahm says, and here there is an eerie modern ring given what U.S. leaders did with Covid: "As if a large death toll wasn't enough of a blow to these societies, the measures taken to curb the spread of epidemics could have disastrous consequences of its own." There are some false modern notes here. I'm no fan of "CE" for dates, and it's not true, as Frahm claims, that "climate change" toppled the Mayan civilization in the 10th century. I've spent a day in the ruins of Copan with the man who showed it came to a violent end. And I found the "Distorted Perceptions" chapter absurd. Those quibbles aside, however, there is plenty of violence and fascinating history here. It was all so long ago it's incredible Frahm is able to paint such a vivid picture. One reason, we learn, is because inscriptions made on clay cuneiform tablets are "almost indestructible," particularly when compared with information once contained on leather or papyrus. There are some familiar road markings - Xenophon, for instance, is mentioned. And Frahm writes in a straightforward, engaging style: "Homer was hardly an Assyrian eunuch living in Cilicia, despite recent attempts to substantiate such a scenario. That the Assyrians had some influence on the Greek work undoubtedly, for the most part through intermediaries, is nonetheless plausible," he says. The author is also great at providing dates frequently which really helps this reader. Assyria's story hits its stride with Sennacherib, Sargon II's successor, who took the Assyrian throne in 705 BC. His reign was in several regards remarkable. Under Sennacherib, Nineveh became the capital, and it was transformed into a splendid city of its time. We are also at the gates of Jerusalem in 700 BC, and here Frahm works through the threads of the Bible and Assyrian manuscripts (the former says Sennacherib suffered a defeat; the latter claims victory). The sweep here is epic. Later, we will encounter Nebuchadnezzar II who wins a crushing victory over Egypt in 605 BC. There's a nice historical comparison in Chapter 9, "Sennacherib's Babylonian Problem," in which Frahm notes Assyria is to Babylonia as Rome is to Greece. That's a great chapter overall. In 729 BC we get Tiglath-pileser III (what a name!), who dies quickly after capturing Babylon as does his successor, Shalmanasser V. Sargon II then appears, exits the stage violently, and we have Sennacherib. Unfortunately, Sennacherib destroys many of Babylon's temples when he sacks it after a fifteen-month siege in 689 BC. That gives us this great line: "Asher, king of the Gods...who brings devastation like the Deluge to the land that has been treacherous and evil." There is an interesting and lucid account of Ashurbanipal, one of the most famous Assyrian kings (who knew?) and one of the last "great" kings. "Ashurbanipal," Frahm says, was "a scholar, sadist, hunter and king." He launched repeated forays against Egypt and sacks Thebes. Ashur is a similar figure, we learn, as "even if one were to apply the word in the broadest possible sense, Ashur was also no humanist. He was, instead, a spiteful, brutal man who lived in constant need of affirmation." As that chronology shows, "Assyria" is packed with accounts of Assyrian armies looting from Memphis to Susa on the edge of Persia. This history spreads from the eastern edge of the Mediterranean to the western edge of the Zagros Mountains. And Frahm offers a take on why, perhaps, Assyria has become a shadow despite its contemporary successes: "An 'empire' without a mission, except for the accumulation of power and wealth, Assyria had never been particularly good at creating something akin to an Assyrian 'identity' beyond its core territories...It had little symbolic capital to offer the citizens it ruled. Those citizens, in turn, had little reason to support their Assyrian overlords when the latter suddenly found themselves under fatal military pressure. As I hope these notes show, this is a rich, rewarding book. Highly recommended.