Neo-Assyrian Empire

The Neo-Assyrian Empire, conventionally dated from 911 to 609 BCE, was for much of its existence the largest empire the world had yet seen and a model of imperial administration and military power.

Rising from the Assyrian heartland in northern Mesopotamia around the cities of Ashur, Nineveh, and Nimrud, it expanded under a succession of energetic warrior-kings. Ashurnasirpal II and Shalmaneser III renewed Assyrian conquests, but it was Tiglath-Pileser III in the eighth century BCE who reorganised the state, creating a standing professional army, a system of provinces governed by appointed officials, and the practice of mass deportation to suppress rebellion and resettle populations. At its height the empire dominated the Levant, Babylonia, Elam, and parts of Anatolia and the Arabian frontier, and even conquered Egypt for a time, eclipsing rivals across the region. The Assyrians were famed and feared for their military innovations, including iron weapons, siege engines, and disciplined infantry and cavalry, as well as for the deliberate use of terror as a tool of statecraft, vividly depicted in royal palace reliefs. Yet the empire was also a great patron of culture: King Ashurbanipal assembled at Nineveh one of the ancient world's most important libraries, preserving thousands of cuneiform tablets, including the Epic of Gilgamesh. After Ashurbanipal's death around 627 BCE, the overextended empire was weakened by civil war and succession struggles. A coalition of the resurgent Babylonians under Nabopolassar and the Medes under Cyaxares attacked the Assyrian heartland, sacking Nineveh in 612 BCE. The final Assyrian resistance was crushed at Harran in 609 BCE, ending the empire and dividing its lands among the victors.

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