Sennacherib and the Fall of Lachish (Illustration)

Illustration

by Osama Shukir Muhammed Amin
published on 19 July 2014

This wall relief depicts the Assyrian king Sennacherib after the fall of Lachish (Lakhisha), the second largest city in Judah Kingdom. The king sits on a marvelous throne and watches prisoners. He also greets an Assyrian official who appears to be in very close proximity to him, almost touching the king. This man most likely represents the commander-in-chief of the Assyrian army.

The cuneiform inscriptions read "Sennacherib, the mighty king, king of the country of Assyria, sitting on the throne of judgment, before the city of Lakhisha. I give permission for it's slaughter."

Sennacherib's face appears to be deliberately damaged, most probably by an enemy soldier after the fall of Nineveh in 612 BCE.

From the South-West palace at Nineveh (modern Kuyunjik, Mousil city, Iraq), room XXXVI, panels 11-13. Mesopotamia, Neo-Assyrian era, 700-692 BCE. (The British Museum, London).

About the Author

Associate Professor of Neurology and lover of the Cradle of Civilization, Mesopotamia. I'm very interested in Mesopotamian history and always try to take photos of archaeological sites and artifacts in museums, both in Iraq and around the world.

License

Uploaded by Osama Shukir Muhammed Amin, published on 19 July 2014 under the following license: Creative Commons: Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike. This license lets others remix, tweak, and build upon this content non-commercially, as long as they credit the author and license their new creations under the identical terms. Please note that content linked from this page may have different licensing terms.

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