Evidence of Assyrians' conquest of Holy Land discovered in Jerusalem

News
By published

The discovery of a building that the Assyrians likely tore down in the eighth century B.C. reveals the political dynamics of that age in Jerusalem.

A large excavation site in the desert near a city
An aerial view of the excavation at Mordot Arnona in Jerusalem, which shows the remains of an administrative building. (Image credit: Assaf Peretz, Israel Antiquities Authority)

Archaeologists have found evidence of an Assyrian military campaign against Judaea that resulted in the siege of Jerusalem.

The campaign was launched in 701 B.C., when Sennacherib was king of Assyria and Hezekiah was king of Judaea. Sennacherib launched the campaign because he considered Hezekiah a vassal king who should obey the Assyrians, but Hezekiah refused and rebelled against him.

New evidence

In the Mordot Arnona neighborhood of Jerusalem, archaeologists discovered an administrative building that was used for taxation in ancient times. The building went through a number of changes during the eighth and seventh centuries B.C.

Related: Jerusalem's Second Temple was built with gigantic stone blocks — now we think we know where they came from

Archaeologists found that during the eighth century B.C., the building was used as a center that processed taxes to Hezekiah and contained jars with inscriptions saying the taxes were the property of the king. "What we see here is the economic generator of the Judaean kingdom," Neria Sapir, an excavation director of the site, said in a translated video released by the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA).

Sapir explained that the jars would have gone out to the countryside, where people, possibly landlords or government officials, would have collected taxes and paid them in agricultural products, possibly olive oil. Some of the jar handles contain the names of people, possibly those who ensured the taxes were collected and paid to the king.

Image 1 of 3
A black table with many small ceramic pieces laid out
Archaeologists have unearthed about 180 stamp impressions of the Judahite administration at Mordot Arnona.(Image credit: Yoli Schwartz, Israel Antiquities Authority)

When Sennacherib invaded Judaea, his forces destroyed this building and reduced it to a pile of rubble. Large stones from the building's foundation were placed on top of the rubble, making it more visible to those in the surrounding countryside. The timing of the destruction and the fact that the foundation stones were placed on top means that the destruction was likely intentional.

"We interpret these dramatic changes as a statement by the Assyrian imperial government, intended to convey a political-diplomatic message to the surrounding region and make it clear 'who is really in charge,'" excavation directors Sapir, Nathan Ben-Ari and Benyamin Storchan said in an IAA statement.

The archaeologists found that during the seventh century B.C., the building was rebuilt and jars were once again used to collect taxes. But this time, the inscriptions on the jars were different, indicating that people were not paying taxes to Hezekiah but rather to the king of Assyria.

This indicates that while Hezekiah was allowed to remain king of Judaea, the Assyrians had begun extracting taxes from the area surrounding Jerusalem.

Owen Jarus
Owen Jarus
Live Science Contributor

Owen Jarus is a regular contributor to Live Science who writes about archaeology and humans' past. He has also written for The Independent (UK), The Canadian Press (CP) and The Associated Press (AP), among others. Owen has a bachelor of arts degree from the University of Toronto and a journalism degree from Ryerson University.