NINEVEH, Heb. ; Arab. ; As syr.
There is an allusion to the kingdom of Asshur in the rhapsodies of Salaam, Num. xxiv. 22, 24, and in Ps. lxxxiii. 9; but the name of the city Nineveh does not meet us till the time of Jonah, when it appears as the scene of his wonderful mission. In the reign of Menahem, eir. 77o, Pul, the king of Assyria, came against Israel, and Tiglath Pileser in that of Pekah. 'The Vision of Nahum the Elkoshite,' (En z. Bible, 713) is wholly occupied with the burden of Nineveh. In Isaiah, Nineveh is mentioned as
the residence of Sennacherib, and it was probabl• the scene of his death. Zephaniah, cir. 630, de votes a few words to Nineveh, and from the way he alludes to it, we may almost imagine that he was an eye-witness of its fall. In the prophecies of Jeremiah, Assyria and Nineveh have ceased to be objects of notice. There is no mention of either in his catalogue of `all the nations,' ch. xxv. The kingdom of the Chaldeans has taken their place, and so also with Habakkuk. It is no longer As syria but Chaldea that is the subject of his threat ened woes. In a sublime chapter of Ezekiel—the 3 1st—the Assyrian' is held up as an example of Divine vengeance already executed ; so that it is easy to discover approximately the corresponding period of Jewish history and prophecy at which the destruction of the empire must have taken place. It occurred in the reign of Josiah, cir. 625.
The fall of Nineveh, like its rise and history, is very much enveloped in obscurity. But the account of Ctesias, preserved in Didorus Siculus,ii. 27, 28, has been thought to be substantially correct. It may, however, be observed that Mr. Rawlinson, in his latest work, The Ancient Monarchies, vol. i., 521, says that it seems undeserving of a place in history.' According to that account, Cyaxares, the Median monarch, aided by the Babylonians under Nabopolassar, laid siege to the city. His first efforts were in vain. He was more than once re pulsed and obliged to take refuge in the mountains of the Zagros range ; but, receiving reinforcements, he succeeded in routing the Assyrian army, and driving them to shut themselves up within the walls. He then attempted to reduce the city by blockade, but was unsuccessful for two years, till his efforts were unexpectedly assisted by an extra ordinary rise of the Tigris, which swept away a part of the walls, and rendered it possible for the Medes to enter. The Assyrian monarch, Saracus, in despair, burnt himself in his palace. With the ruthless barbarity of the times, the conquerors gave the whole city over to the flames, and razed its former magnificence to the ground. The cities de pendent on Nineveh, and in its neighbourhood, appeared to have incurred a like fate, and the ex cavations skewed that the principal agent in their destruction had been fire. Calcined sculptured alabaster, charcoal and charred wood buried in masses of brick and earth, slabs and statues split with heat, were objects continually encountered by Mr. Layard and his fellow-labourers at Khorsabad, Nimrod, and Koyunjik.