8 Hittites, Asyrians and Aramaeans

Hittites, Asyrians and Aramaeans....

From those they overran, the Hittites learned how to make bronze. And sometime after the coming of the Kassites to Mesopotamia, the Hittites acquired horses and chariots. With horses and light chariots, the well trained, highly disciplined Hittites launched a new conquest of neighboring peoples in Asia Minor. A horse pulling a man on a lightweight chariot was faster than a horse carrying a man on its back, and the Hittites were able to move rapidly, sometimes under the cover of darkness, and spring surprise assaults upon their adversaries.

In Mesopotamia the Hurrians weakened themselves with internal conflict. The Hittites warred with and further weakened the Hurrians, and this helped Assyrians in northeastern Mesopotamia free themselves from Hurrian domination.

Having experienced oppression under the Hurrians, the Assyrians were motivated to build a great military machine, led by their horse-breeding and landed nobility. The Assyrian king, Ashur the Great (who ruled from 1365 to 1330), married his daughter to a Babylonian, and he invaded Babylon after Kassite nobles there murdered his grandchild. Ashur's successors continued Assyria's war against the Babylonians and the Hurrians, and by around 1300 the Assyrians controlled all of Mesopotamia.

The Aramaeans

One of the most important civilizations that evolved in the early Middle East was that of the Aramaeans. Known for their brutality and military conquests, the Aramaeans were eventually able to take control over the territories between Egypt and Mesopotamia by around 1200 B.C

Controlling the trade routes between these two wealthy nations allowed the Aramaeans to profit greatly. It also meant that the other peoples of the region had to learn to speak the Aramaean language, which was similar to Hebrew and Arabic. For centuries, many people in the region would continue to speak Aramaean as their main language.

Many portions of the Bible, which were written in these territories, were written in Aramaic.

amaean, one of a confederacy of tribes that spoke a North Semitic language (Aramaic) and, between the 11th and 8th century bc, occupied Aram, a large region in northern Syria. In the same period some of these tribes seized large tracts of Mesopotamia.

In the Old Testament the Aramaeans are represented as being closely akin to the Hebrews and living in northern Syria around Harran from about the 16th century bc. The Aramaeans are also mentioned often inAssyrian records as freebooters. The first mention of the Aramaeans occurs in inscriptions of the Assyrian king Tiglath-pileser I (1115–1077). By the end of the 11th century bc, the Aramaeans had formed the state of Bit-Adini on both sides of theEuphrates River below Carchemish and held areas in Anatolia and northern Syria and in the Anti-Lebanon area, including Damascus. About 1030 bc a coalition of the southern Aramaeans, led by Hadadezer, king of Zobah, in league with the Ammonites, Edomites, and the Aramaeans of Mesopotamia, attacked Israel but was defeated by King David.

To the east, however, the Aramaean tribes spread into Babylonia, where an Aramaean usurper was crowned king of Babylon under the name of Adad-apal-iddin. By the 9th century the whole area from Babylon to the Mediterranean coast was in the hands of the Aramaean tribes known collectively as Kaldu (or Kashdu)—the biblical Chaldeans. Assyria, nearly encircled, took the offensive, and in 853 the Assyrian king Shalmaneser III fought a battle at Karkar against the armies of Hamath, Aram, Phoenicia, and Israel. This battle was indecisive, but in 838 Shalmaneser was able to annex the area held by the tribes on the middle Euphrates.

Between Israel and Damascus, intermittent wars continued until Tiglath-pileser III of Assyria captured Arpad, the centre of Aramaean resistance in northern Syria, in 740 bc. He overthrew Samaria in 734 and Damascus in 732. Finally, the destruction of Hamath by Sargon II of Assyria in 720 marked the end of the Aramaean kingdoms of the west.   Aramaeans along the lower Tigris River maintained their independence longer. In 626 a Chaldean general, Nabopolassar, proclaimed himself king of Babylon and joined with the Medes and Scythians to overthrow Assyria. In the New Babylonian, or Chaldean, empire, Chaldeans, Aramaeans, and Babylonians became largely indistinguishable.

Few specifically Aramaic objects have been uncovered by archaeologists. The Aramaean princes in Syria apparently patronized a provincial form of Syrian art under strongHittite or Mitannian influence.

In religion, though their pantheon included Canaanite, Babylonian, and Assyrian gods, the Aramaeans had deities of their own. Their chief god was Hadad, or Ramman (Old Testament Rimmon), equated with theHurrian storm god, Teshub. Their chief goddess was Atargatis (Atar’ate), a fusion of two deities corresponding to the PhoenicianAstarte and Anath