Not far from Alizir he encountered a fresh army raised by Akhuni and the King of Samalla, with contingents from Carchemish, Kuî, Cilicia, and Iasbuki:* having routed it, he burnt the fortresses of Shapalulme, and after occupying himself by cutting down cedars and cypress trees on the Amanos in the province of Atalur, he left a triumphal stele engraved on the mountain-side.
* The country of Iasbuki is represented by Ishbak, a son of
Abraham and Keturah, mentioned in Genesis (xxv. 2) in
connection with Shuah.
Next turning eastwards, he received the homage offered with alacrity by the towns of Taia, Khazazu, Nulia, and Butamu, and, with a final tribute from Agusi, he returned in triumph to Nineveh. The motley train which accompanied, him showed by its variety the immense extent of country he had traversed during this first campaign. Among the prisoners were representatives of widely different races;—Khâti with long robes and cumbrous head-dresses, following naked mountaineers from Shugunia, who marched with yokes on their necks, and wore those close-fitting helmets with short crests which have such a strangely modern look on the Assyrian bas-reliefs. The actual results of the campaign were, perhaps, hardly commensurate with the energy expended. This expedition from east to west had certainly inflicted considerable losses on the rebels against whom it had been directed; it had cost them dearly in men and cattle, and booty of all kinds, and had extorted from them a considerable amount of tribute, but they remained, notwithstanding, still unsubdued. As soon as the Assyrian troops had quitted their neighbourhood, they flattered themselves they were safe from further attack. No doubt they thought that a show of submission would satisfy the new invader, as it had satisfied his father; but Shalmaneser was not disposed to rest content with this nominal dependence. He intended to exercise effective control over all the states won by his sword, and the proof of their subjection was to be the regular payment of tribute and fulfilment of other obligations to their suzerain. Year by year he unfailingly enforced his rights, till the subject states were obliged to acknowledge their master and resign themselves to servitude.
The narrative of his reiterated efforts is a monotonous one. The king advanced against Adini in the spring of 859 B.C., defeated Akhuni near Tul-barsip, transported his victorious regiments across the Euphrates on rafts of skins, seized Surunu, Paripa, and Dabigu* besides six fortresses and two hundred villages, and then advanced into the territory of Carchemish, which he proceeded to treat with such severity that the other Hittite chiefs hastened to avert a similar fate by tendering their submission.
* Shalmaneser crossed the Euphrates near Tul-barsip, which
would lead him into the country between Birejîk, Rum-kaleh,
and Aintab, and it is in that district that we must look for
the towns subject to Akhuni. Dabigu, I consider, corresponds
to Dehbek on Rey’s map, a little to the north-east of
Aintab; the sites of Paripa and Surunu are unknown.
The very enumeration of their offerings proves not only their wealth, but the terror inspired by the advancing Assyrian host: Shapalulmê of the Patina, for instance, yielded up three talents of gold, a hundred talents of silver, three hundred talents of copper, and three hundred of iron, and paid in addition to this an annual tribute of one talent of silver, two talents of purple, and two hundred great beams of cedar-wood. Samalla, Agusi, and Kummukh were each laid under tribute in proportion to their resources, but their surrender did not necessarily lead to that of Adini. Akhuni realised that, situated as he was on the very borders of Assyrian territory, there was no longer a chance of his preserving his semi-independence, as was the case with his kinsfolk beyond the Euphrates; proximity to the capital would involve a stricter servitude, which would soon reduce him from the condition of a vassal to that of a subject, and make him merely a governor where he had hitherto reigned as king. Abandoned by the Khâti, he sought allies further north, and entered into a league with the tribes of Naîri and Urartu. When, in 858 B.C., Shalmaneser III. forced an entrance into Tul-barsip, and drove back what was left of the garrison on the right bank of the Euphrates, a sudden movement of Aramê obliged him to let the prey escape from his grasp. Rapidly fortifying Tul-barsip, Nappigi, Aligu, Pitru, and Mutkînu, and garrisoning them with loyal troops to command the fords of the river, as his ancestor Shalmaneser I. had done six centuries before,* he then re-entered Naîri by way of Bît-Zamani, devastated Inziti with fire and sword, forced a road through to the banks of the Arzania, pillaged Sukhmi and Dayaîni, and appeared under the walls of Arzashkun.