Cyrus II, Liberator or Conqueror. Ancient Historiography Concerning Cyrus in Babylon (2006)

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351

Cyrus II, Liberator or Conqueror?

Ancient Historiography concerning

Cyrus in Babylon

David Vanderhooft

Boston College

Cuneiform and archaeological evidence has led scholars to concludethat the transfer of power from Nabonidus to Cyrus the Great did noteffect massive or immediate disruptions within the society or economyof Babylonia (Oppenheim 1985; Kuhrt 1988; Dandamayev 1989: 55;Bongenaar 1997; Briant 2002: 70–71). Nevertheless, from a historio-graphic perspective it is noteworthy how much attention was paid inthe ancient world to analysis of this power transfer, its causes, and itssignficance. Ancient writers expended considerable effort discussingCyrus’s accession to the throne of Babylon and the reasons for Baby-lon’s fall, not only in the Babylonian cuneiform tradition, but also in

biblical and Greek sources. Moreover, a near consensus of opinioncharacterizes those sources: in them, Cyrus is understood as a libera-

tor, as an exemplar of the highest aspirations for kingship in each of thetraditions that reflects on his rise to power in Babylon. The HebrewBible is no exception, and traditions within it invariably reckon Cyrus’srise and Babylon’s fall as elements in God’s overall plan for the restora-tion of his people.

This essay offers a comparative evaluation of a particular problem:the mechanics and historiography of the Persian takeover of Babylonin the autumn of 539. Its purpose is to investigate the historiographiclogic that informs the cuneiform, Greek, and select biblical traditionsconcerning Cyrus’s accession to the throne of Babylon and to explain

Author’s note

: Assyriological abbreviations follow those in CAD R. This essay expands on

an analysis of the question presented in Vanderhooft 1999: 193–202. I am grateful to nu-merous scholars who have discussed the issues presented here with me, including Paul-Alain Beaulieu, Baruch Halpern, Reinhard Kratz, Oded Lipschits, Peter Machinist,Daniel Master, Mark Munn, David Schloen, and Larry Stager. None of these individuals

bears responsibility for the views expressed.



David Vanderhooft

352

his portrait as a liberator (for another recent attempt in this mode, seeKratz 2003).Documentary evidence proves that in 539 b.c

. Babylon passed rap-idly from the control of Nabonidus to Cyrus. The Babylonian Chroniclereports that Ugbaru, governor of Gutium, together with the army ofCyrus, entered Babylon without a battle. This occurred on the 16th dayof Ta

s

r

i

tu

, in the 17th year of Nabonidus (Grayson 1975: 109–10 iii 15–16; the Julian date is Oct. 12, 539, on which see Parker and Dubberstein1956: 29; Beaulieu 1989: 230). The Chronicle reports that 17 days later,on the 3rd of Ara

h

samnu (Oct. 29, 539), Cyrus entered Babylon. In theinterval between these two events, the Chronicle notes that armed Gu-tians surrounded the gates of Esagil but that cult practices were notinterrupted.

Meanwhile, administrative tablets dated by regnal years of the kingof Babylon confirm that rule was transferred. The first known cunei-form text dated to the accession year of Cyrus, “king of Babylon, kingof lands,” comes from Sippar and dates to the 19th day of Ta

s

r

i

tu

(Oct.15, 539; CT 57, 717). This was 5 days after the Persians captured Sippar,3 days after Ugbaru entered Babylon, and 16 days before Cyrus’s re-ported arrival in the capital on Oct. 29.

1

On the other hand, scribes else-where did not immediately recognize the change of ruler. On the dayafter Ugbaru entered Babylon, a tablet from Uruk dates to the reign ofNabonidus (GCCI 1.390; Parker and Dubberstein 1956: 13). Strassmeierassigned another contract to an even later date, the 10th of Ara

h

samnuin Nabonidus’s 17th year (Nov. 5, 539; Nbn. 1054: 8–9).

2

Even allowing

for a slight delay in diffusion of the news about the transfer of powerfrom Nabonidus to Cyrus, that transfer is a fact, the chronology rela-tively straightforward, and there is no room for skepticism.

1. For a survey of the administrative texts associated with the change of rulers, seeParker and Dubberstein 1956: 13–14; Petschow 1987. The mechanisms in place for legit-imating Cyrus’s status as king are not known. Note that the preferred titulary for Persiankings in Babylon, lugal tin.tir.ki

u

kur.kur

‘king of Babylon and the lands’ comes intouse almost immediately (Petschow 1987: 45), even though lugal kur.kur

was largely inabeyance during the Neo-Babylonian era, even for Nabonidus (Vanderhooft 1999: 16–23;on Cyrus’s titulary, see Schaudig 2001: 26–27).

2. The month name is shaded in Strassmeier’s copy, and Parker and Dubbersteintherefore concluded that “this date cannot be accepted” (1956: 13). But the beginning ofthe sign is not shaded (Nbn. 1054: 8), and the two horizontals strongly argue in favor of

the apin

sign. Strassmeier even dated another tablet (Nbn. 1055) to Kislev, the 9thmonth of Nabonidus’s 17th year. However, the text refers only to disbursements fromthe ma

ss

artum

(staples for assignment to craftsmen) allotted for Kislev, which may wellhave been laid up earlier and cannot serve as a reliable indicator of the terminal date ofNabonidus’s reign (CAD M/1 389 s.v. ma

ss

artu

, c 2’; Parker and Dubberstein 1956: 14).

spread is 6 points long




353

We can be certain about the outlines of the power transfer becauseof the cuneiform sources. Discussion of the same event in differentsources—including Greek and biblical texts—muddies the waters ofhistorical reconstruction, and questions remain. Did Babylon capitu-late, or was the city captured or conquered? Was power simply trans-ferred from Nabonidus to Cyrus? Why and how did it happen? Asecond set of questions is also relevant. What significance did variousancient writers assign to the event and why? Why did ancient writerschoose to emphasize one or another element in their reconstructions?These historiographical questions should be just as much a part of themodern historian’s goals in analyzing the different accounts as are theproblems of what happened.

The Babylonian Chronicle and the Cyrus Cylinder relate that Per-sian forces entered Babylon without a battle. The Babylonian Chroniclereads: ud

16 m

ª

Ug

º

-ba-ru lú

nam

kur

Gu-ti-um u erín.me

s

m

Ku-ra

s

ba-la

ß

al-tum ana e

ki

ku

4

‘On the sixteenth day (of Ta

s

r

i

tu

), Ugbaru,

3

gover-nor of Gutium, and the army of Cyrus entered

4

Babylon without battle’(Grayson 1975: 109–10 iii 15–16).

5

The Cyrus Cylinder reads: ba-lu qab-li ù ta-

h

a-zi ú-

s

e-ri-ba-á

s

qé-reb ßu.an.na

ki

uru

-

s

u ká.dingir.meß

ki

i-

†

e-er i-na s

ap-

s

a-qí ‘Without a battle or attack, he (Marduk) made him(Cyrus) enter S

uanna, his city; he saved Babylon from hardship’(Schaudig 2001: 552, 17). The so-called Persian Verse Account of Nabo-nidus preserves no specific description of the entry into Babylon, al-though both the Verse Account and the cylinder claim that Cyrus waswelcomed as a liberator (Schaudig 2001: 563–78). Scholars long ago rec-

ognized the anti-Nabonidus sentiment in all of these texts (see, e.g.,Oppenheim 1985: 540–41; Machinist and Tadmor 1993; Beaulieu 1989;1995; Sack 1997; now Schaudig 2001: 25–26; 563 with literature). Theexistence of such an animus, however, hardly seemed reason enoughfor modern historians to propose that there was a military encounter,even if the texts do not clarify why or how Cyrus’s forces were able toenter the city without a battle. As Pierre Briant has recently stated,

3. The identity of Ugbaru and his relationship to Gubaru, the p

iha

t b

a

bili

(Grayson1975: 110 iii 20) remains uncertain. The effort to link him to the Greek

Gobryas has beendisproved (Grayson 1975: 109 note).

4. The semantic range of er

e

bu

‘to enter’ includes the notion of the ‘penetration’ or

‘invasion’ into a city, foreign country, and so forth in military contexts (CAD E s.v. er

e

bu

1 f 1

u

).5. Note the slightly different wording for Sippar, which ‘was captured without a

battle’ (

ba-la ß

al-tum ß

a-bit

, Grayson 1975: 109 iii 14). Did the scribe’s choice of differentverbs reflect different processes for taking the cities?



David Vanderhooft

354

however, it is reasonable to wonder if Babylon would have fallen en-tirely without resistance (2002: 41–43).The historian may consider the following evidence. The Babylonian

Chronicle relates that the Persians conquered Upê (Opis) on the east bank of the Tigris several days before Ugbaru entered Babylon. The battle at Upê involved a defeat of Babylonian field forces and plunderand slaughter of the people (Grayson 1975: 109 iii 12–14). The battle atUpê was followed by the capture (

ß

ab

a

tu

) of Sippar without a battle twodays before Ugbaru’s entry into Babylon. The Chronicle also reportsthat after the Persian capture of Sippar, Nabonidus fled (

i

h

liq

), whichimplies that the author of the chronicle assumed that Nabonidus par-ticipated in the encounter at Sippar. Nabonidus was later seized (

ß

abit

)in Babylon, apparently after Ugbaru’s entry (Briant 2002: 51). We knowtoo that Nabonidus had already prepared Babylon for attack. TheChronicle reports that Nabonidus began transferring the gods of Baby-lonia into the capital late in his 16th year, or early in his 17th, and con-tinued right up through Elul (Aug.–Sept. 539; Grayson 1975: 109 iii 10).Beaulieu has illuminated the scope of this program by an analysis ofadministrative documents showing the movement of numbers ofpeople, boats, and materiel into Babylon; the goal, evidently, was tokeep the cult statues safe in the fortified capital (Beaulieu 1993). All ofthis information points to the expectation and the reality of militaryengagement, as Briant has likewise remarked (2002: 43).

The laconic Chronicle text, not to mention the Cyrus Cylinder orVerse Account, says little in detail about how the city of Babylon came

under Ugbaru’s and then Cyrus’s control. Did the population or at leastthe elite in Babylon hate Nabonidus so much that they would havewelcomed Cyrus as a liberator, as the cylinder states (Schaudig 2001:556, 36) and the Verse Account implies? Why were Nabonidus’s prep-arations for the Persian assault so spectacularly ineffective and Baby-lon’s prodigious defences overcome so swiftly? I will return to thecuneiform accounts with these questions in mind after review of theGreek traditions, especially Herodotus.

Greek traditions preserved by Herodotus and others suggest thatthe Greek writers knew or invented traditions about Babylon’s fall thatwere different from the cuneiform traditions.

6

Herodotus (

Hist.

1.188–

6. For discussions of the relationship between the cuneiform and Greek texts concern-ing the event, see Smith 1924: 102–6; Dougherty 1929: 167–85; Barnett 1963: 12–13; Wohl1969: 28–38; MacGinnis 1986: 79; Black 1987: 15–25; Kuhrt 1987: 20–55; Beaulieu 1989: 225–26; Cole 1994: 95; Rollinger 1993: passim; Dalley 1996: 525–32; and Kratz 2003: 143–56.




355

91) and, later, Xenophon (

Cyr

. 7.5.7–15) relate an elaborate stratagem ofCyrus: he captured Babylon by diverting the flow of the Euphrates andinfiltrating the city by its channel. The Greek accounts rest on severalassumptions. First, both Herodotus (

Hist. 1.178–81, 190) and Xenophon(

Cyr

. 7.5.7) assume that Babylon’s defenses were impregnable.

7

Second,they agree that the city had been provisioned to hold out in a siege.Third, the plan to divert the river’s flow and infiltrate the city throughits empty or lowered channel is credited to Cyrus’s brilliance. Finally,the diversion of the river’s flow coincided with a festival in Babylonthat diminished its defenders’ vigilance (

Hist

. 1.191; Cyr

. 7.5.15).Particular evidence appears to undergird these assumptions. As

Sack and others have shown, one of the Neo-Babylonian kings’ prin-cipal claims to fame in Greek historiography was their monumental

building achievements, including their defensive works around Baby-lon (Sack 1991: 115 n. 1; more generally Ravn 1942; and MacGinnis1986). This affinity for grandeur notwithstanding, the Greek writerswere aware of the massive fortification of Babylon conducted by Nebu-chadrezzar and his successors, and possessed numerous details aboutthe nature and scope of these defenses.

8

Their assumption that a con-ventional assault or siege would fail at Babylon followed from evi-dence that they possessed concerning Babylon’s immense fortifications;in this sense, their reconstruction is at least well founded.

Second, the assumption that Babylon had been provisioned to with-stand a Persian siege depends on a sound assessment of the evidence:Nabonidus’s preparation for a Persian assault began considerably ear-

lier. Transport of Babylonian gods and their retinues to Babylon beganmany months before the Persian campaign in October. Such activity inand around Babylon, recorded by the Chronicle in terms of the trans-port of the gods, could certainly support the later reconstruction of theGreeks. Herodotus, in any case, concluded that the Babylonians mustalready have been well aware of Cyrus’s “expansionist ambitions,” andthey thus provisioned the city for siege (1.190).

Third, Herodotus and Xenophon agree that Cyrus conceived andexecuted a plan to manipulate the Euphrates to conquer Babylon, al-though they diverge in their descriptions. Herodotus’s narrative has

7. A ground plan of the city can be had in George 1992: 24, fig. 4; and for a plan in-

cluding the defenses and moats, p. 141, fig. 7.8. For a survey of the debate concerning whether or not Herodotus in particular evervisited Babylon, see Ravn 1942; MacGinnis 1986; George 1992; Rollinger 1993 (negative);Dalley 1996 (possible). On the fortifications at Babylon, see Wetzel 1930; Koldewey 1990;and the synthetic work of George 1992.



David Vanderhooft

356

long attracted interest in terms of its reliability. No doubt elements offolklore infuse the narrative, and the modern historian should retain ahealthy skepticism about its details. On the other hand, Herodotusshows a frequent interest in military tactics designed to exploit orovercome river and water barriers and can dismiss those that seemimprobable to him (e.g., 1.75). In fact, Herodotus states that Darius Iattempted Cyrus’s strategy of lowering the Euphrates to capture Baby-lon, but Babylonian vigilance prevented the success of such an assaulton the city (3.152). In any case, the historian should ask whether He-rodotus’s reconstruction represents merely a colorful tale. He wasfairly well informed about defenses and building techniques at Baby-lon and connects them plausibly to Cyrus’s strategy. He offers a de-tailed description of the construction of the quay walls along the riverin his description of the reign of Queen Nitocris. His description restson precise knowledge about Babylonian building techniques (e.g.,1.186). We know from the inscriptions of Nabopolassar, Nebuchadrez-zar, and Nabonidus that the Neo-Babylonian kings exerted massiveenergies in constructing quay walls of baked bricks set in bitumen,particularly along the east bank of the Euphrates (Cole 1994: 93–95).

9

The main reason for these construction projects was the high watertable at Babylon and the danger that the Euphrates, which bisected thecity, would shift out of its channel or erode the fortifications (Ber-gamini 1977: 111–52; Koldewey 1990; Cole 1994). Herodotus also accu-rately notes the existence of a bridge over the Euphrates, which theGerman excavations at the city uncovered (Koldewey 1990: 155–57).

Herodotus knew that the builders in Babylon had the ability to reducethe water level of the river to construct the quay walls. This too is con-firmed by excavations, which reveal that Nabonidus’s quay wall “was

built almost entirely in the river bed” (Bergamini 1977: 128).Herodotus then explicitly states that Cyrus adopted the procedure

of lowering the river as a prelude to investing Babylon:

he posted his army at the place where the river enters the city, and an-other part of it where the stream issues from the city, and bade his menenter the city by the channel of the Euphrates when they should see it to

be fordable. . . . He himself marched away . . . and when he came to the

9. Herodutus had exact knowledge of the Neo-Babylonians’ use of bitumen and reedmeshing in the baked brick walls: “using hot bitumen for cement and interposing layersof wattled reeds at every thirtieth course of bricks, they built first the border of the fosseand then the wall itself in the same fashion” (1.179). MacGinnis notes that the reeds gen-erally were interposed at smaller intervals (1986: 75).




357

lake, Cyrus dealt with it and with the river just as had the Babylonianqueen: drawing off the river by a canal into the lake, which was till nowa marsh, he made the stream to sink till its former channel could beforded. When this happened, the Persians who were posted with this in-tent made their way into Babylon by the channel of the Euphrates, whichhad now sunk about to the height of the middle of a man’s thigh (1.191).

It should be added that the Persian tactic, as described by Herodotus,would have been undertaken, if we adopt the Chronicle’s date, in Oc-tober (

Ta

s

r

i

tu

), when the Euphrates is at its lowest level (Charles 1988:38, table 5). Barnett already argued some decades ago that the Greekhistorians probably did not conclude that Cyrus flooded the area northof the cross-country wall near the Aqar-Quf depression but, rather,that he “sent a detachment on to Falluja to switch the Euphrates into

the course of the Pallakattu channel” (1963: 13). Cole has shown thatthe marsh area around Borsippa, fed by the Pallakattu, was referred toin the sixth century simply as tamtu

‘sea’; he tentatively suggests thatthis may have been the outlet that accomodated increased water andreduced the flow through Babylon (1994: 95). Herodotus also narratesthat Cyrus personally supervised the diversion of the river after in-stalling his troops near Babylon (1.191).

10

Other Greek writers knew that Babylon was vulnerable to penetra-tion via the Euphrates. Berossus, in his Babyloniaca

, says of Nebucha-drezzar’s fortification of Babylon: “in order to prevent the possibility inany future siege of access being gained to the city by a diversion of thecourse of the river, he enclosed both the inner and the outer city with

three lines of ramparts, those of the inner city being of baked brick and bitumen, those of the outer city of rough brick” (in Josephus, Ag. Ap.

1.139).

11

Berossus here seems to explain the purpose of Nebucha-drezzar’s defensive installations under the influence of the Greek tra-ditions about invaders having diverted the Euphrates. It is thus unclearwhether Berossus provides independent evidence for a military threatfrom the Euphrates or whether the Cyrus tradition informs hiscomments. Still, he is cognizant of the military mechanism of divertingthe river.

10. Xenophon’s reconstruction is derivative of Herodotus’s and apparently rests onless intimate knowledge of the city’s defenses (

Cyr.

7.5.10, 15–16).

11. The passage is also quoted in Ant. 10.220–26, where the defensive purpose of for-tifying the river walls is described slightly differently: “in order that besiegers might nolonger be able to divert the course of the river and direct it against the city, he sur-rounded the inner city with three walls and the outer one with three.” On the Babyloni-aca

, see Burstein 1978.



David Vanderhooft

358

In practical terms, it is not clear how lowering the river would havefacilitated infiltration into the city. In Herodutus’s view, if the Babylo-nians had been aware of the ruse, then “they would have shut all thegates that open on the river and themselves mounted up on to thewalls that ran along the river banks, and so caught their enemies as ina trap” (1.191). Herodotus concluded that the Persian forces gained ac-cess to the city by the gates that opened on the river. But why did theriver need to be lowered for this strategy to work? The gates gave ac-cess to the river even in high water periods (Bergamini 1977). What-ever the answer, Wetzel noted that gates were built into the defensivetowers that lined Nabonidus’s quay wall along the east bank; he spec-ulated that they might have been the pylidas

that Herodotus linked tothe Persian infiltration (1930: 53 and pl. 49).

The Greek reconstruction of Cyrus’s infiltration may also have beeninfluenced by native Babylonian concerns about penetrating the cityfrom the Euphrates. One of Nebuchadrezzar’s royal inscriptions men-tions the possibility of infiltration through canals that flowed eastwardthrough the river quay wall into Babylon’s eastern quadrant. The textdescribes Nebuchadrezzar’s fortification of a canal outlet. The text isnot without difficulties, but it reads as follows:

a

s

-

s

um in íd

mu-

ß

e-e me-e-

s

a h

a-ab-ba-a-tim mu-ut-ta-

h

a-li-lum la e-ri-bi in pa-ar-zi-il-lum e-lu-tim à

ß

-ba-at mu-

ß

a-a-s a in hu-qu gu-ul-la-tim pa-ar-zi-il-lum ú-us -s i-im-ma ú-us -s i-i† ri-ki-is-sa

so that robbers and thieves do not enter the canal’s water outlet, I se-cured its outlet with pure iron. In crossbars I installed iron discs??, and I

reinforced its (the outlet’s) joint(s).12

Archaeological evidence for reinforcement of canal outlets appearsnear what is designated “Turm 1” in Wetzel’s reconstruction (1938:pl. 49). Bergamini also described grates in the canal mouths in hisanalysis of the water levels of the Neo-Babylonian city and noticedtheir possible relationship to Nebuchadrezzar’s inscription, althoughBergamini preferred to interpret the grate as a filter for river water(1977: 122 n. 41 and fig. 72). These grates served no architectural pur-pose: they were designed for defense or for water regulation, or both.Might such native Babylonian concerns and defenses or, at least, theknowledge of the existence of such defenses have contributed to a re-construction of the Persian infiltration such as the one presented inHerodotus?

12. VAB 4 84 (Nbk. 5 = Zyl II, 5) ii 1–10; H. Winckler, ZA 2 (1887) 126.



Cyrus II, Liberator or Conqueror? 359

Another, quite different theory linking water diversion to the Per-sian infiltration has been suggested by Dalley (1996). We know that theso-called “Median Wall,” built by Nebuchadrezzar, ran between Opisand Sippar and permitted defensive flooding of regions to the north(the ºAqar Quf depression). Some have suggested that Cyrus’s actionsagainst Upê and Sippar, mentioned in the chronicle, may have permit-ted the switching of the Euphrates out of its channel and penetrationinto the area south of the Median Wall. Information about actions at the“Median Wall” may have been conflated by the classical writers withaction at the inner walls of Babylon. On this view, the Persian entry intothe vicinity of Babylon from Opis and Sippar was instead construed byHerodotus as entry directly into the city (e.g., Burn 1984: 54–56). Henaturally concluded that the wall in question was the Imgur-Enlil.Rollinger has vociferously criticized such views, arguing that they rep-resent a desparate attempt to salvage something from Herodotus(1993). On the other hand, Rollinger never really engages the questionof why Herodotus offers the reconstruction he does, and thus he fails torespond to the historiographical question.

The tradition that the people of Babylon were celebrating a festivalat the time of the Persian assault—the fourth assumption of the Greeks( Hist. 1.191; Cyr. 7.5.15)—has been widely dismissed as another folk-loristic element. Certainly the motif “Nero plays while Rome burns”should not be accepted uncritically. In fact, however, Babylon did cele-

brate a “mid-year” Akitu-festival in the seventh month, tas ri tu.13 Whilethis hardly means that the Greek narratives are strictly accurate, it once

again shows that Herodotus in particular may have based his recon-struction on better information than scholars formerly suspected.14

13. Cohen writes:

As at Uruk, Babyon celebrated an ak i tu-festival in the seventh month as well. Al-though the tablets do not mention the festival by name, the ritual informationcontained clearly refers to an ak i tu-celebration. This kinship with the ak i tu inNisannu is noted in a letter to the Assyrian king: ‘[The king, my lo]rd, knows thatthe god Bel is dressed (for the festival) [on the 3]rd day of Tasritu; on the 6th daythe gate (of the temple) is kept open, (and the procession of Bel sets out like in themonth Nisa[nnu]. [The cere]monies of the city of Der are conducted in the sameway.’ (Cohen 1993: 451; the text is ABL 956, the translation by S. Parpola)

14. Such a tradition may also be reflected indirectly in Jer 51:39: “When they are

heated, I will put out their drink, and I will make them drunk, that they may become hi-larious. They will sleep the eternal sleep, and will not waken, says Yhwh.” See also Jer51:7; Isa 21:5; and, in the later tradition connected to Belshazzar, Dan 5:1–4 (Collins 1993:243–46). None of these texts preserves specific information about the nature or timing ofthe festival, and certainly they are not primary witnesses. There is no direct connection



David Vanderhooft360

Even if celebration of the Akitu in the month Tas ritu was not the causeof the Persian success, it would be reasonable for a writer, if he pos-

sessed such information, to conclude that the contemporaneity of thetwo events was not mere happenstance.

The Greek narratives about Cyrus’s ruse for penetrating Babylonshould not simply be read as a description of the Persian entry. Theassumptions that inform the reconstruction, however, are at least expli-cable in view of the physical geography, seasonal timing, defensive ar-chitecture and installations around Babylon, and even the timing of theliturgical calendar. It turns out that defensive flooding around Babylonwas widely used during the Neo-Babylonian Period and that this de-pended on the ability to divert or lower the Euphrates. Such diversiontook place upstream, probably near Falluja, and the Babylonian Chron-icle reports that the Persians captured Sippar, in that vicinity, days

before they entered Babylon. Defensive flooding of the approach tocities in Babylonia was a longstanding military procedure, especiallydesigned to prevent assault by chariotry (Powell 1982; Scurlock 1997).According to Herodotus, Cyrus pursued exactly the opposite strategy(lowering the river rather than flooding the city’s approaches), but itwas dependence on hydrological engineering in Babylonia that made itpossible to switch the main flow of the Euphrates out of its channel.

On the whole, the Greek accounts provide a different historiograph-ical perspective on Babylon’s submission to Cyrus than the cuneiformaccounts. Herodotus’s narrative is largely shorn of theological consid-erations and avoids commentary on the competing religious claims for

royal legitimacy that animate the cuneiform tradition. Herodotus fo-cuses on Babylon’s grandeur and Cyrus’s genius. In this respect, he pro-vides what might cautiously be called a rationalization for the morereligiopolitical perspectives in the cuneiform tradition. 15

The cuneiform accounts, meanwhile, comprise a series of indict-ments against Nabonidus. The Cyrus Cylinder and the Verse Accountargue that Nabonidus was impious and, through his devotion to themoon god, Sîn, destructive of Babylonian mores. Very likely Cyrus’sBabylonian apologists were drawing attention away from his role incapturing the city to portray him as a peaceful liberator. In any event,

15. I am grateful to Mark Munn of the Pennsylvania State University for discussionof this point.

between these traditions and the notice in the Babylonian Chronicle of “a libation ofwine” in Nabonidus’s 17th year (Grayson 1975: 109 iii 7).

spread is 6 points short




as Kuhrt noted, these texts provide a ceremonial and, I would add,theological perspective that emphasizes that the coronation of Cyrus, aforeigner, need not be an impediment to legitimate rule, “on conditionthat the new king pledged himself to and showed himself active inmaintaining traditional order” (Kuhrt 1987: 48). The texts are, in thatrespect, not merely propagandistic; they conform to a particular pietycharacteristic of the Babylonian viewpoint. Harmonization of the de-tails of the cuneiform and Greek traditions is not required. As Kratzhas also suggested, to discern the logic in the reconstructions is to en-ter into analysis of the history of ideas in the ancient world (Kratz2003: 145). To dismiss Herodotus as inaccurate or as a liar does not fur-ther historiographical research.

This leads to a last set of observations about historiography in theBabylonian Chronicle. It is possible to reinterpret the report of Ugbaru’speaceful entry into Babylon, followed by Cyrus over two weeks later.The implication of the Chronicle, of course, is that Cyrus was absent atthe initial entry into Babylon, even though he is said to have led hisforces in the battle at Opis days earlier (see also Oppenheim 1985: 542–43). Rather, Ugbaru led the troops to enter the city, and he is designated“governor of Gutium.” As Stephanie Dalley has noted, by the Neo-Babylonian Period, “Gutium is an archaic designation” that “refers tothe barbarian from the eastern mountains who leaves nothing undam-aged.” In the Babylonian literary tradition, “Gutians are the archetypalsackers of cities” (Dalley 1996: 528; so also, earlier, Oppenheim 1985: 547n. 2).16 Although Ugbaru is not described as having sacked Babylon, the

Chronicle does carefully report that armed Gutians “surrounded thegates of Esagil” but without interfering with temple rites. The purposeof this statement may well have been to rule out the conclusion that alearned, ancient audience would naturally have drawn: Cyrus let loosethe brutal and uncivilized Gutians on the holy city, a religiopolitical actunworthy of the liberator (Oppenheim 1985: 542–43).

On the other hand, the Chronicle also reports that Ugbaru diedeight days after Cyrus entered the city (Grayson 1975: 110 iii 22). Thedeath of the Gutian may well have been interpreted as divine punish-ment for actions in or against Babylon (Dalley 1996: 528). To pose the

16. Beaulieu notes that there are other references to Gutians in Neo-Babylonian

documents, including two in the Cyrus Cylinder and one in VAB 4, Nbn. 8. The last is aclear case in which Gutians are described as “archetypical barbarians and enemies ofBabylonia”; the other two may be as well, even if the cylinder implies that Gutium is anactual region in the east (Beaulieu 1989: 228–29).




historiographical question: why should Cyrus’s Gutian governor, whowas active according to the Chronicle for a total of only a few weeks,have merited mention at all? Why should the entry into Babylon have

been credited to Ugbaru rather than to Cyrus? After all, Cyrus is re-ported in the Chronicle and other cuneiform accounts to have been so-licitous of the cults of Marduk and the other Babylonian deities whenhe did finally arrive. Would the statement that he presided over thepeaceful liberation of the city not be a feather in his cap? A plausiblecase can be made that the Chronicle sought to emphasize that Cyruswas not involved with the initial entry into the city. Instead, as Dalleysupposes, the author of the Chronicle identifies Ugbaru as the one im-mediately responsible for entering Babylon under Persian arms. (Notethat the Chronicle takes no such pains with respect to the capture ofSippar.) Now one could argue that this is simply because the Chroniclegives just the facts: Ugbaru did it. But such an argument fits ill with theoverwhelming tendency to identify the accomplishments of the king’sdeputees with those of the king himself. What is more, Zawadski hasnoted that proper names of nonroyal individuals appear very infre-quently in the Babylonian Chronicles series (1988: 118–19). Ugbaru, inshort, sticks out like a sore thumb in this notice.

Perhaps he appears prominently for the simple reason that he diedimmediately after the seizure of Babylon, and such a portentous cir-cumstance both required comment and contributed to an agenda. 17

The strategy of the chronicler seems to be to encourage the reader toconclude that Ugbaru was a scapegoat, noting his death almost imme-

diately after Cyrus the liberator arrives in Babylon. The implication isthat Ugbaru absorbed the divine judgment that otherwise might have

been meted out to Cyrus (Dalley 1996: 528). The careful presentation ofthe Chronicle permits the author fully to insulate Cyrus from activitiesassociated with conquest. Cyrus is not Sennacherib.

We have compared the cuneiform accounts of Cyrus’s takeover ofBabylon with a Western, Greek perspective. Biblical traditions offer stillanother perspective. Where they touch directly on Cyrus (such as in theSecond Isaiah and Ezra–Nehemiah), they are thoroughly positive. Cy-rus normally appears as the liberator of the Judeans. On the other hand,

biblical texts rarely bring Cyrus’s rise and Babylon’s fall together in anexplicit way.18 Several groups of prophetic oracles, however, do dwell

17. No indication is given for the cause of death, and the text certainly does not statethat it was a result of a wound received in conflict.

18. An exception may be Isa 48:14–15, where God designates an unnamed individualwho will wkrd jylxhw wytaybh wytarqAπa ytrbd yna yna µydck w[rzw lbbb wxpj hc[y ‘carry out




extensively on the issue of Babylon’s demise, whether hoped for or al-ready accomplished. The most extensive group of oracles dealing withthe topic appears in Jeremiah 50–51, and these chapters deserve inves-tigation in the present context. The oracles in Jeremiah express the con-viction that Babylon will fall (or has fallen) in a military calamity andthat the fortunes of the Judean exiles to Babylonia, the Golah, will bereversed (e.g., Jer 50:4–5, 8). Cyrus is personally absent from these or-acles,19 but it will be worthwhile to investigate what they say aboutBabylon’s fall.

Jeremiah 50–51 frequently states that God will arrange a military as-sault against Babylon. In many texts, this is something that is impend-ing, while others describe it as a fait accompli. Numerous examples ofthe latter could be cited. The opening lines state: tj lb vybh†lbb hdkln˚drm ‘Babylon is captured, Bel is shamed, Merodach is dismayed’ (Jer50:2). In 50:23 we read: lbb hmvl htyh ˚ya ≈rahAlk vyfp rbvyw [dgn ˚ya µywgb ‘How the Hammer of the whole earth has been hewn down andshattered; how Babylon has become a desolation among the nations’. Atthe end of chap. 50, the text has, ≈rah hv[rn lbb hcptn lwqm ‘at thesound of Babylon’s capture, the earth quakes’ (50:46). Or this: µatprbvtw lbb hlpn ‘suddenly Babylon fell and was shattered’ (51:8). Again, µyqjvAd[ acnw hfpvm µymvhAla [gnAyk ‘For her judgment has reachedthe heavens, has been raised as high as the skies’ (51:9). Or again: ˚ya≈rahAlk tlht cpttw ˚vv hdkln ‘How has Sheshach20 been captured,the praise of the whole earth been seized?’ (51:41). Jer 51:44 reads, Aµghlpn lbb tmwj ‘moreover, the wall of Babylon has fallen’. These state-

ments all include verbs that are morphologically in the past tense(although the problem of verbal tense in prophetic oracles remains avexing one). Given the clearly heterogenous nature of the oracles in

19. Numerous references to the enemy from the north who will attack Babylon (just

as Babylon attacked Judah as the enemy from the north) may have the Persians in view(e.g., Jer 50:2); this is possible too for the reference to “the king[s] of the Medes” (Jer51:11, 28). Even so, Cyrus remains unnamed.

20. Sheshach is an atbash cipher: b = s (second = second last); k = l (eleventh from be-ginning = eleventh from the end; i.e., adjacent middle letters).

his [God’s] intent in Babylon, and his might against Chaldea. I, I myself spoke, evencalled him; I have brought him and his way will prosper’. The prophet refers here to theindividual whom God raises to carry out his intent in Babylon. The passage is consistentwith the more explicit references to Cyrus as God’s agent of restoration for his people inthe Second Isaiah and justifies the identification, but it does not definitively name thePersian. Baltzer wonders whether the verb wytaybh ‘I have brought him (in)’ might “in-dicate that the fall of Babylon is already presupposed” (Baltzer 1999: 291 n. 164). This isan intriguing possibility, but the reference in this context need not mean more than thatGod has “brought him” to the verge of success.




Jeremiah 50–51, we may ask whether any of them reconstructs or com-ments on Babylon’s fall to the Persians as a past event or whether theyrepresent wishful thinking from before the period of Persian ascen-dancy. There is no decisive evidence, after all, demanding the conclu-sion that the oracles derive from before 539 (Reimer 1993; Albertz 2003:194–96; Kessler 2003; differently, Holladay 1989: 391–431).

If the author or compiler of these oracles possessed concrete infor-mation about Babylon, then that might inspire confidence that the com-ments about Babylon’s demise rest upon an informed reconstruction.Where Babylon’s topography and defensive architecture are concerned,the writer does know some details. One example of this appears in Jer50:15: hytwmwj wsrhn hytywva wlpn hdy hntn bybs hyl[ w[yrh ‘Raise a shoutover her all around, she has surrendered; her turrets have fallen, herwalls are thrown down’. The term 21hytwyva ‘its (Babylon’s) turrets’, ahapax legomenon, is a loan of the Akkadian cognate asi tu, a defensiveturret or tower attached to a city wall.22 The use of such a term evi-dently reflects more than a casual familiarity with Babylon. Elsewhere,the writer mentions that military officers, cavalry, and archers were to

be arrayed against Babylon, and in one instance he uses an Akkadianloanword for the military officer, rspf, Akk. †ups arru (Jer 51:27).23 Jer51:57 lists a series of terms encompassing Babylon’s officialdom. Amongthem are µyngsw twjp ‘governors and prefects’. The terms accurately re-flect the Babylonian official titles pihatu and s aknu. It remains unclearhow much precise knowledge of Babylonian administration such usagereflects, because the terms came into usage in Hebrew during the sixth

century and are also assigned to Babylon’s Median foes in the presentoracles (51:23, 28; for a survey of the Hebrew usage of the terms, seePetit 1988). Still, the words are not misused and seem to underscore theeffort in these oracles to achieve verisimilitude.

The writer of these oracles also puns on geographical terms associ-ated with names for Babylon and its edifices, refers to ethnic groups

21. Thus the Qere; Kethiv h:yt<Yowiv‘a" is a simple transposition of letters.22. The Akkadian parallel was recognized already by Zimmern (1917: 14); see also

AHw 74 and CAD A/2 332–33, s.v. asi tu; also Kaufman 1974: 37; Cohen 1978: 46–47; andMankowski 2000: 52–53, who notes that the term may have been loaned into Akkadianfrom Northwest Semitic. It was earlier thought to be an exclusively Assyrian term, but

in fact it describes architectural elements of Babylon’s defenses known from Nebucha-drezzar’s royal inscriptions (see Vanderhooft 1999: 190–91 n. 256).23. The Hebrew word appears also in Nah 3:17; see the discussion of Machinist 1983:

732 n. 79; and Mankowski 2000: 60–61. The realization of s with s suggests it was a Neo-Assyrian loan into Hebrew.




within Babylonia, and mentions its contempoary foes. Twice the oraclesuse cryptograms: Sheshach for Babylon (51:44; see above, n. 20) and blymq ‘Leb-qamai’, an atbash cipher for µydck (51:1). These are possiblyintended to communicate a kind of insider knowledge, an ironic rever-sal of Babylon’s own pretensions to learning, which will be discredited(cf. Isaiah 47). The reference to hprc rh ‘a burned mountain’ or ‘moun-tain of fired (bricks)’ has also been understood by some scholars as akind of pejorative reference to the ziggurat of Marduk—Etemenanki.The tale of the lwdgm built in Babylon in Genesis 11 includes a referenceto the builders’ construction techniques: hprcl hprcnw µynbl hnbln ‘letus form bricks and fire them into burnt [bricks]’ (Gen 11:3).

As for Babylon’s foes, the oracles twice state that ydm yklm ‘theking[s] of the Medes’ will attack Babylon (Jer 51:11, 28).24 Also, thekingdoms of znkvaw ynm frra ‘Ararat, Minni, and Ashkenaz’ are sum-moned by God to attack Babylon (Jer 51:27). The first of these threeshould be identified with Urartu, the second with the Manneans ofnorthwestern Iran (southeast of Lake Urmia), and the third with theScythians of central Asia. Hebrew znkva, therefore, is to be identifiedwith the As kuza ya, Scythians, mentioned in Neo-Assyrian cuneiformsources. In the so-called Table of Nations in Genesis, znkva is the off-spring of Gomer, identified with the Cimmerians, also of central Asia(Gen 10:3). The three kingdoms named in the Jeremiah oracle had beensubsumed into the territory of the Medes by the end of the seventh or

beginning of the sixth century. The Medes, in turn, were conquered byCyrus the Great before his campaign into Babylonia. What significance

might the prophetic reference to these kingdoms have for our discus-sion? In the first place, their mention brings to mind the designation ofCyrus’s general Ugbaru, who was “governor of the Gutians” and whowas the first to enter Babylon, according to the Chronicle. The archaicethnicon Guti shares several important characteristics in common withthe biblical references to Manneans, Urartu, and the Scythians: thesewere all located in or adjacent to the Zagros Mountains to the eastand north of Mesopotamia and were all subsumed within Medianterritory by the early sixth century (Diakanoff 1985: 124–25; Young1988: 20–22). Is there a similar interpretive intention in the Jeremiah

24. The LXX and Syriac both read, possibly correctly, a singular for the MT plural

construct. On the other hand, the notion that a centralized Median empire developed inthe mid-seventh century and was then ruled by a singular “king of the Medes” remainsan unproved model in any case (Young 1988: 6–23; Briant 2002: 24–27). The author ofthese oracles may have understood the “Medes” to be a loose coalition of distinct peopleswith more than one king.




oracle to that found in the Babylonian Chronicle? The typological barbarians are summoned to the gates of Babylon. For the Chronicle, theissue is to show that this did not precipitate calamity and that Cyruswas indeed a liberator and Marduk’s chosen. For the biblical oracle, theissue is the sovereignty of the God of Israel, not the efficacy of the con-quering king or the power of Marduk. In this view, wicked Babylonwill receive its comeuppance from traditional enemies from the north,directed now by the deity of a small, exiled population.

Do particular references to Babylon’s fall from after the fact appearin Jeremiah? I have argued that one particular text describing Baby-lon’s capture, Jer 51:30–32, resembles some elements in the Classicalaccounts. It reads as follows:

twdxmb wbvy µjlhl lbb yrwbg wldj 30:hyhyrb wrbvn hytnkvm wtyxh µyvnl wyh µtrwbg htvn

dygm tarql dygmw ≈wry ≈rAtarql ≈r 31:hxqm wry[ hdklnAyk lbb ˚lml dyghl

vab wprc µymgahAtaw wcptn twrb[mhw 32:wlhbn hmjlmh yvnaw

30. The warriors of Babylon have ceased fighting, they remain in thestrongholds. Their strength has dried up, they have become women! Itsdwellings are burned; its bars are smashed.25

31. Runner runs to meet runner, messenger to meet messenger,to report to the king of Babylon that his city is taken from the outskirts:32. “the fords are seized and they have burned the reed marshes, the sol-diers are terrified.”

This passage may well reflect ex eventu Judean traditions about Baby-lon’s fall. The two Hebrew terms twrb[mh and µymgah evidently refer totopographical elements around Babylon. The Akkadian cognate of thefirst is ne beru ‘crossings, fords’; these appear commonly in Akkadiantexts that describe the capture of such fords as a military strategy.26 TheHebrew term µynga can mean ‘pools’ but here probably refers to the reedmarshes around Babylon.27 The Akkadian cognate agammu ‘swamp,

25. Compare Isa 43:14 and 45:1–2 on the destruction of the doors and bars of Baby-lon. It would be incautious, however, to suggest a direct link between these referencesand the Greek tradition of infiltration into Babylon as it appears in Herodotus, not least

because the smashing of bars is a common metonymic device in the Hebrew Bible formilitary destruction of a fortified city (e.g., Judg 16:3; Amos 1:5; Lam 2:9).

26. See CAD N/2 s.v. 1 a. On the physical characteristics of such fords, see Cole 1994:93 and n. 62.

27. This was noted by Holladay (1989: 427); see also Isa 14:23, where an editorial ad-dition brings the older poem in vv. 4b–21 into connection with the fall of Babylon andlikewise mentions that the city will be turned into “marshes.”

spread is 3 points long




marsh’ refers to a topographical item well known in the vicinity ofBabylon. The term is in fact an Akkadian loan into Hebrew.28 Akkadiantexts, much like the report in Jeremiah, also refer to the burning of suchmarshes, usually in connection with curse formulas or as a military tac-tic for flushing out fugitives (Vanderhooft 1999: 201).

What prompted the use of such language in this oracle? Is it possiblethat the military tactics alluded to by the Babylonian messengers in Jer51:31–32, seizing of fords and burning of reed marshes, were influ-enced by the Persian penetration into Babylonia in the autumn of 539?Perhaps the fords referred to in Jer 51:32 were crossing points or keypoints along the Euphrates where the river’s flow could be diverted outof the main channel. Whether or not the author has in mind the manip-ulation of the river’s water level through such diversion, as does He-rodotus, remains unclear. The tactics described, however, are clearly athome in the Mesopotamian heartland. Seizure of fords and burning ofmarshes are practices well known in Mesopotamian military tactics,much less so in the Levant. The notice in Jer 51:31 that the messengersreport to the king that the city was captured miqqaßeh, from the out-skirts, finds a parallel earlier in the anti-Babylon oracles, when the in-

junction is given to Babylon’s enemies: ≈qm hlAwab ‘enter her (Babylon)from the extremity’ (50:26). These may be general statements about in-vading the city, of course, but are rare, and one wonders about their to-pographical referents. Rare too is the comment that Babylon’s attackersshould hyrpAlk wbrj ‘destroy all her bulls’ (50:27). The verb in the MT(from brj III [BDB] or II [HALAT]), is rare, and the noun rp ‘bull-calf’ is

not used elsewhere in Jeremiah. Human leaders could certainly be inview. One might even speculate that this is a reference to the famedProcessional Street of Babylon, the Ay-Ibur-sabu, lined as it was withimages of bulls, lions, and composite beasts in glazed tile. Such a hy-pothesis is clearly speculative, but these oracles provide numerous in-dications of an effort to achieve verisimilitude, even if, as Beaulieusuggests, these indications are not overwhelming.29 Given the tradi-tions preserved by the Greek historians and the reticence of the Babylo-nian accounts, however, it is worth investigating whether these oraclessimply express a proleptic hope for the destruction of Babylon orwhether they reflect traditions about its fall that had reached the Judean

28. The date of the loan cannot be precisely established, given its distribution in He- brew (e.g., Exod 7:19; 8:1; Isa 41:18; 42:15; Ps 107:35; 114:8). See the discussion of Man-kowski (2000: 25–26).

29. In private communication.




community in the mid-sixth century. If so, they may augment the na-tive cuneiform sources, which, as argued above, were not intended asstraightforward military accounts of the events of Autumn 539.

In the aggregate, the Greek and Biblical traditions caution the histo-rian that cuneiform sources can be flawed sources for historical recon-struction notwithstanding their proximity or formulation in Akkadian.

Each of the historiographical perspectives discussed so far is basi-cally transparent. There were reasons why Cyrus’s Babylonian apolo-gists might have hesitated to describe his military capture of the city:he was a liberator, not a conqueror. The Chronicle and the Cyrus Cylin-der also assert that Cyrus showed proper respect for the Babyloniancultic establishment. Could such a king—designated by Marduk—haveorchestrated a ruse to penetrate the holy city? The cuneiform sourcescontinually emphasize that the transfer of power from Nabonidus toCyrus deserved comment precisely because the theological stakes ininterpreting its significance were so high. The Greek accounts—andthat of Herodotus in particular—on the other hand, emphasize theglory and impressive might of Babylon, a typical motif in Greek histo-riography, and couple this with an account of the brilliance of Cyrus,whom they honor to show his extraordinary gifts. Here the theologi-cal component recedes altogether. The prophetic oracles in Jeremiah,meanwhile, likely date to the end of the Babylonian imperial era orearly Persian Period and assume that Babylon is no longer a force withwhich to reckon. Now it stands under Yahweh’s judgment and will fi-nally be destroyed because of crimes against his people. The descrip-

tions of the city’s fall are not specific enough in every detail to allow fora reconstruction of that event, but there are some intriguing indica-tions, most notably Jer 51:32, that the writer had already witnessed thefall of Babylon to the Persians. If this is correct, then these oracles andthe more explicit Classical accounts (their historiographical assump-tions notwithstanding) provide an interesting alternative tradition tothe cuneiform accounts about the fall of the great imperial city, and in-deed of the Babylonian imperial state. Utlimately, however, it was thePersian-inspired propaganda about Cyrus that carried the day and de-cisively influenced the Western historiography of Cyrus as liberator.

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Cyrus II, Liberator or Conqueror. Ancient Historiography Concerning Cyrus in Babylon (2006)

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