Babylonia: A Very Short Introduction by Trevor Bryce

Author:Trevor Bryce
Language: eng
Format: azw3, epub
Tags: Ancient, General, Middle East, History
ISBN: 9780191039942
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Published: 2016-09-14T18:37:34.290796+00:00

Environmental factors and new tribal groups

Environmental factors also played an important role in shaping Babylonia’s development in this period. One in particular is worth noting. As the second millennium drew to a close, the Euphrates’ main channel shifted significantly to the west. This may have had little effect in the far south, where the river’s course changed only minimally. But cities and other settlements on Babylonia’s northern alluvial plain probably suffered quite severely, for here the change caused a considerable shrinkage in the amount of land that could be irrigated and an increase in the salinization of the soil. The consequent decline in the region’s economic productivity was accompanied by a rise in the level of impoverishment throughout the land, and a decrease in the populations of both urban centres and rural settlements.

Added to this, the kingdom suffered further serious destabilization from aggressive Aramaean tribal groups who sought constantly to expand their territories within the kingdom’s borders and win control of important trade routes. Speakers of a west Semitic language called Aramaic, the Aramaeans had spread widely through the Near Eastern world from the late second millennium bc onwards. By the end of the millennium, a number of Aramaean states had been formed, particularly in areas of Mesopotamia, Syria, and eastern Anatolia. Some of their leaders were later to play an important role in Babylonia’s history. But in the late tenth century, it was Assyria which once more became Babylonia’s most serious threat, a threat that materialized when the Assyrian king Adad-nirari II (911–891) defeated his Babylonian counterpart Shamash-mudammiq and conquered his entire land.

We should now introduce another group of tribal peoples who were to play an increasingly prominent role in Babylonian history. In Akkadian, they were known by the term kaldu. From the Greek-derived word Chaldaioi, we call them Chaldaeans. Also speaking a west Semitic language, they probably entered Babylonia from the north-west some time in the eleventh or tenth century bc, but subsequently established settlements along the lower Euphrates and in the Sealand marshlands at the head of the Persian Gulf. They seem to have shared a number of features with the Aramaeans, though our ancient sources make a clear distinction between the two groups. These sources identify five Chaldaean tribes, the most important of which were Bit-Dakkuri, Bit-Amukani, and Bit-Yakin (Bit = ‘House of’).

While many of the Chaldaeans probably continued to live a nomadic or semi-nomadic lifestyle after their arrival in Babylonia, others appear to have taken quickly to an urban existence, building their own towns and cities, and becoming closely involved in Babylonian social and political life. Some of them even adopted Babylonian names. They nonetheless maintained their traditional tribal structures and distinct identity. Some became very wealthy, through income derived from large livestock enterprises and because of the excellent strategic location of many of their settlements on major trade routes. A number of their leaders became prominent in the Babylonian political scene, and several of them actually occupied the Babylonian throne for a time, as we shall see.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.