Nabû-li’, we have already seen, sent reports to Sennacherib;
no letters of Ashur-bêl-danân, yet published, seem to refer to these
events. But clearly the king was concerned to hear from other quarters
than Kalaḫ, where Sennacherib evidently was. Ashur-riṣûa is also named
elsewhere on fragments not yet published.
We may now pursue the clew given by the fact that Uesi was the city which
seems to have been the bone of contention. Thus Urzana, whose name recalls
that of the King of Muṣaṣir, who may have been reinstated as a vassal by
Sargon, writes(873) to the _nâgiru_ of the palace:
“What thou didst send me, saying, Has the King of Armenia with his
troops moved away? He has gone. Where is he dwelling? The
commander of Uesi, the commander of the district of the Ukkai,
came, they sacrificed in the temple, they say that the king has
gone, he is dwelling in Uesi; the commanders returned and went
away. In Muṣaṣir they sacrificed. What thou didst send, saying,
Without the king’s order let no one put his hand to the work, when
the king of Assyria shall come, I will serve him, what I have
[always] done I will keep doing, and this according to his hand
(?).”
Evidently Urzana lived in Muṣaṣir and was anxious to be thought a faithful
vassal. An unknown writer(874) tells the king that
“five commanders of Armenia entered the city of Uesi, Sêteni [_of
whom we heard above_] commander of ... teni, Ḳaḳḳadânu of the
writer’s district, or of Ukkai, Sakuatâ of Ḳaniun, Siblia of Alzi,
Ṭutu of Armiraliu, these are their names. With three underlings,
they entered Uesi. Now their forces are weak and weakening (?),
the forces are (?), the king has set out from Ṭurushpîa, he has
come into Kaniun. What the king, my lord, sent me, saying, ‘Send
scouts,’ I have sent a second time. The spies (?) came, these are
the words they say, and the spies as yet have not started.”
The whole tone of the letter and the fact that Ashur-riṣûa above
acknowledges having received an order to send scouts make us think he is
the unknown writer. But, of course, the king may have sent the order to
other commanders as well. In an unpublished text we read that the
commander of Uesi was slain.
The references to Ṭurushpîa are also significant. We know that this city
was once the stronghold of Sardaurri, King of Armenia, and was doubtless
still attached to its old rulers. We have a letter written by Upaḫḫir-Bêl,
doubtless the Eponym of B.C. 706, and governor of Amedi. He writes in the
same style as Sennacherib and Ashur-riṣûa:(875)
Concerning news of Armenia I sent scouts, they have returned; thus
they say: “The commander of that district, and the
deputy-commander with him, in Ḥarda, the district of the
_sukallu_, keep ward from city to city as far as Ṭurushpîa;
weakness is written down, the messenger of Argista has come,”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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