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Idol-quickening instructions, Babylonia, 6th century BCE. The “mouth-washing” ritual was a ceremony for transforming a newly manufactured idol into a living deity. The instructions include these…
This relief, from Sennacherib’s palace in Nineveh, shows Sennacherib’s army attacking Lachish (an event alluded to in 2 Kings 18:14 and 17). Sennacherib is sitting on his throne outside the city…
Year 7. The month Kislev. The king of Akkad mobilized his troops and marched to Hatti.
He encamped against the city of Judah and in the month Adar, day 2, he captured the city; he seized the king. He…
I besieged and captured Samaria. I took as spoil 27,290 people who live there; I organized (a contingent of) fifty of their chariots and I instructed the rest of them in correct conduct. I appointed…
Lot (puru), Assyria, 8th century BCE. The inscription identifies this as a lot (puru—the Akkadian form of Hebrew pur, the word used in Esther 3:7) that belonged to an Assyrian official named Yahalu…
Instead of their seals, they placed their fingernails.
Fingernail of Zakuri, fingernail of Dukur-ili, owners of the man being sold.
Mannu-ki-Arba’il, son of Ahiyau—Bahianu contracted from Zakuri and…
On the day that Tabat-Ishar, daughter of Yashe-Yama, is seen with Kulu, son of Kalba, or he takes her away by deceit, if she does not put up resistance and does not say to the head of the family:…
Tsidki-Yama, son of Shillimu (Shillem), voluntarily placed Puhulla, his slave, at the disposal of Shikin-Yama, son of Hinnamu, for his wages of six shekels of silver from the first day of Abu (Ab)…
The Samarians, who had come to an agreement with a [hostile (?)] king not to do service or to render tribute to me, did battle. In the strength of the great gods, my lords, I fought with them; I…
Soldier slaying captive, Khorsabad, late eighth century BCE. The captive is probably a Samarian seized during Sargon’s conquest of the city. From a relief in the palace of Sargon at Dur-Sharrukin…
