Babylon Had It Coming

Babylon had survived five destructions before Sennacherib tried to erase it for good. Why did Assyria's most bookish king — a man who loved Babylonian scholarship — finally flood the city and smash its temples in 689 BCE?

This is Oldest Stories, a biweekly deep dive into ancient Mesopotamia. Online at oldeststories.net

In this episode we trace Babylon's strange immortality: a city founded around 1894 BCE that claimed six thousand years of history by borrowing it from Eridu, the first city of the gods. We walk through each of Babylon's "deaths":

Death 1: the ritual transfer from dying Eridu to Babylon under Hammurabi's successors, making Babylon the heir to pre-Flood kingship

Death 2: the Hittite sack of 1595 BCE and decades of abandonment

The Kassite revival, when Babylon became the world's university town, exporting doctors and diviners instead of armies

The humiliations under Tukulti-Ninurta I, the Elamite sack that stole Marduk, and Nebuchadnezzar I's brief martial comeback

The long grind with Assyria: Merodach-Baladan's revolts, Sennacherib's first campaign at Cutha and Kish in 703 BCE, the puppet kings Bel-ibni and Assur-nadin-shumi, the 694 BCE boat raid on Elam, the Elamite counterstroke in 693, and the bloodbath at Halule in 691

We end with the two-year siege of Babylon, Sennacherib's decision to dig a canal through the city, and what the destruction meant for cuneiform civilization. If Babylon had stayed dead, would Mesopotamian culture have lasted longer?

This episode continues our Sennacherib series. For the rise of Sargon II, Tiglath-Pileser III, and the earlier Assyrian-Babylonian wars, see the playlist.

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