* The text of the Annals of the Xth year give thirty instead
of twenty-three; in the course of five or six years the
numbers have already become exaggerated.
** The site of the “Upper Sea” has furnished material for
much discussion. Some believe it to be the Caspian Sea or
the Black Sea, others take it to be Lake Van, while some
think it to be the Mediterranean, and more particularly the
Gulf of Issus between Syria and Cilicia. At the present day
several scholars have returned to the theory which makes it
the Black Sea.
Tiglath-pileser presented some of them in chains to the god Shamash; he extorted an oath of vassalage from them, forced them to give up their children as hostages, and laid a tax upon them en masse of 1200 stallions and 2000 bulls, after which he permitted them to return to their respective towns. He had, however, singled out from among them to grace his own triumph, Sini of Dayana, the only chief among them who had offered him an obstinate resistance; but even he was granted his liberty after he had been carried captive to Assur, and made to kneel before the gods of Assyria.*
* Dayani, which is mentioned in the Annals of Shalmaneser
II., has been placed on the banks of the Murad-su by
Schrader, and more particularly in the neighbourhood of
Melasgerd by Sayce; Delattre has shown that it was the last
and most westerly of twenty-three kingdoms conquered by
Tiglath-pileser I., and that it was consequently enclosed
between the Murad-su and the Euphrates proper.
Before returning to the capital, Tiglath-pileser attacked Khanigalbat, and appeared before Milidia: as the town attempted no defence, he spared it, and contented himself with levying a small contribution upon its inhabitants. This expedition was rather of the nature of a reconnaissance than a conquest, but it helped to convince the king of the difficulty of establishing any permanent suzerainty over the country. The Asiatic peoples were quick to bow before a sudden attack; but no sooner had the conqueror departed, than those who had sworn him eternal fealty sought only how best to break their oaths. The tribes in immediate proximity to those provinces which had been long subject to the Assyrian rule, were intimidated into showing some respect for a power which existed so close to their own borders. But those further removed from the seat of government felt a certain security in their distance from it, and were tempted to revert to the state of independence they had enjoyed before the conquest; so that unless the sovereign, by a fresh campaign, promptly made them realise that their disaffection would not remain unpunished, they soon forgot their feudatory condition and the duties which it entailed.
Three years of merciless conflict with obstinate and warlike mountain tribes had severely tried the Assyrian army, if it had not worn out the sovereign; the survivors of so many battles were in sore need of a well-merited repose, the gaps left by death had to be filled, and both infantry and chariotry needed the re-modelling of their corps. The fourth year of the king’s reign, therefore, was employed almost entirely in this work of reorganisation; we find only the record of a raid of a few weeks against the Akhlamî and other nomadic Aramæans situated beyond the Mesopotamian steppes. The Assyrians spread over the district between the frontiers of Sukhi and the fords of Carchemish for a whole day, killing all who resisted, sacking the villages and laying hands on slaves and cattle. The fugitives escaped over the Euphrates, vainly hoping that they would be secure in the very heart of the Khâti. Tiglath-pileser, however, crossed the river on rafts supported on skins, and gave the provinces of Mount Bishri over to fire and sword:* six walled towns opened their gates to him without having ventured to strike a blow, and he quitted the country laden with spoil before the kings of the surrounding cities had had time to recover from their alarm.
* The country of Bishri was situated, as the Annals point
out, in the immediate neighbourhood of Carchemish. The name
is preserved in that of Tell Basher still borne by the
ruins, and a modern village on the banks of the Sajur. The
Gebel Bishri to which Hommel alludes is too far to the south
to correspond to the description given in the inscription of
Tiglath-pileser.
This expedition was for Tiglath-pileser merely an interlude between two more serious campaigns; and with the beginning of his fifth year he reappeared in the provinces of the Upper Euphrates to complete his conquest of them. He began by attacking and devastating Musri, which lay close to the territory of Milid. While thus occupied he was harassed by bands of Kumani; he turned upon them, overcame them, and imprisoned the remainder of them in the fortress of Arini, at the foot of Mount Aisa, where he forced them to kiss his feet. His victory over them, however, did not disconcert their neighbours. The bulk of the Kumani, whose troops had scarcely suffered in the engagement, fortified themselves on Mount Tala, to the number of twenty thousand; the king carried the heights by assault, and hotly pursued the fugitives as far as the range of Kharusa before Musri, where the fortress of Khunusa afforded them a retreat behind its triple walls of brick. The king, nothing daunted, broke his way through them one after another, demolished the ramparts, razed the houses, and strewed the ruins with salt; he then constructed a chapel of brick as a sort of trophy, and dedicated within it what was known as a copper thunderbolt, being an image of the missile which Eammân, the god of thunder, brandished in the face of his enemies. An inscription engraved on the object recorded the destruction of Khunusa, and threatened with every divine malediction the individual, whether an Assyrian or a stranger, who should dare to rebuild the city. This victory terrified the Kumani, and their capital, Kibshuna, opened its gates to the royal troops at the first summons. Tiglath-pileser completely destroyed the town, but granted the inhabitants their lives on condition of their paying tribute; he chose from among them, however, three hundred families who had shown him the most inveterate hostility, and sent them as exiles into Assyria.*
* The country of the Kumani or Kammanu is really the
district of Comana in Cataonia, and not the Comana Pontica
or the Khammanene on the banks of the Halys. Delattre thinks
that Tiglath-pileser penetrated into this region by the
Jihun, and consequently seeks to identify the names of towns
and mountains, e.g. Mount Ilamuni with Jaur-dagh, the
Kharusa with Shorsh-dagh, and the Tala with the Kermes-dagh;
but it is difficult to believe that, if the king took this
route, he would not mention the town of Marqasi-Marash,
which lay at the very foot of the Jaur-dagh, and would have
stopped his passage. It is more probable that the Assyrians,
starting from Melitene, which they had just subdued, would
have followed the route which skirts the northern slope of
the Taurus by Albistan; the scene of the conflict in this
case would probably have been the mountainous district of
Zeitûn.
With this victory the first half of his reign drew to its close; in five years Tiglath-pileser had subjugated forty-two peoples and their princes within an area extending from the banks of the Lower Zab to the plains of the Khâti, and as far as the shores of the Western Seas. He revisited more than once these western and northern regions in which he had gained his early triumphs. The reconnaissance which he had made around Carchemish had revealed to him the great wealth of the Syrian table-land, and that a second raid in that direction could be made more profitable than ten successful campaigns in Naîri or upon the banks of the Zab. He therefore marched his battalions thither, this time to remain for more than a few days. He made his way through the whole breadth of the country, pushed forward up the valley of the Orontes, crossed the Lebanon, and emerged above the coast of the Mediterranean in the vicinity of Arvad.