Palaces of Assyria

Assyrian palaces are some of the largest and most important ancient buildings found

in Mesopotamia. They demonstrate the wealth and achievements of the Assyrian

empire in the first millennium B.C.

“Palace Without a Rival”

At the beginning of the eighth century B.C. King Sennacherib ruled Assyria. He decided to build a palace at Nineveh. He wanted it to be the biggest and most elaborate of all Assyrian palaces. He called it the 'Palace

Without a Rival'.

We know about the building of this palace because Sennacherib left many inscriptions

describing the building of the palace in detail.

"At that time Nineveh, the city

beloved of the goddess Ishtar, had

become too small and badly built. But I

Sennacherib, the king of Assyria, decided to

carry out work according to the will

of the gods."

Sennacherib chose a site for the palace close to the Tebiltu river, but there were already

foundations of an older building there which the river had eroded.

Sennacherib wanted his palace to be built on solid ground so he had the course of

the river changed.

"I forced people from many countries who did not respect me to make bricks. The old palace I

pulled down completely.

The river Tebiltu, which had flowed by the palace and during floods had caused much damage, I changed its course to water farm

land instead."

Sennacherib had a platform built above the river's flood level. The platform was the

base for the palace.

"I made the platform of the old palace larger and higher.

To make sure that the platform was not weakened over time or by flooding, I

surrounded the foundations with great stones."

It was time to build the new palace. Mud-brick, stone, and many precious materials such as cedar wood and ivory were

used.

This piece of carved ivory is decorated

with coloured stones and gold. It was found

at Nimrud and was originally part of a piece of furniture.

"Palaces of gold, silver, bronze, alabaster, ivory, cedar, pine for my royal residence I

constructed.

Beams of cedar and cypress, whose scent is pleasant and which come from the snow-capped Amanus Mountain, I placed there.

Doors of cedar, cypress and pine I covered with silver and copper, and I set them up to frame

the doorways. "

The palace was decorated with huge columns of bronze or cedar. The cedar was brought to

Assyria from forests on the mountains of Lebanon.

Stone reliefs of magical spirits decorated walls in the palace. They protected the king from

evil forces.

Large stone statues of human-headed

winged bulls and lions guarded the

doorways. They were there to magically

protect the king and his palace. Similar

smaller statues also supported columns.

"I Sennacherib, the chief of all princes, who has knowledge of all crafts, made great

pillars of bronze and colossal lions, open at the knees, such as no earlier king had

made.

Colossal bronze bulls covered with gold and colossal alabaster bulls I set up to frame the

doorways. "

Huge slabs of alabaster were brought

from quarries to line the walls of the palace.

They were put in place and carved with

scenes of Sennacherib's army, foreigners bringing

tribute and the palace being built.

"With slabs of alabaster I surrounded the palace walls, I caused them to be a wonder to look at. I called it, 'The Palace without a

Rival'."

When the palace was finished, Sennacherib surrounded it with a great park. He filled the park with many different types of

plants and trees from lands across his

empire.

He divided the land into plots which the citizens of Nineveh could use to plant

orchards.

"I planted a great park beside the palace, like that of the Amanus Mountain, with all

kinds of herbs and fruit trees which came from the mountains and from

Babylonia."

Because there wasn't enough water, a canal was built from

the mountains to the orchards.

"To increase the area for

planting, I dug a canal with pickaxes and directed it

through high and low ground ... using irrigation ditches I led the

water among the orchards."

Finally, Sennacherib invited Ashur and other important Assyrian gods

and goddesses to the city of Nineveh. He offered sacrifices to

them and held a banquet to celebrate

finishing the new palace.