E'sar-had'don (Heb. Esar' -Iladdon' , 'inrT-'nax, perhaps akin with Pers. Athro-dani, gift of fire; Sept. ' Adoooav [in Ezra ' X(ju[)ac(!iov\ v. r. 'Affnp«^«j', in Tob. i, 21, Sapxr/Covof ; Josephus, Ant. x, 1, 5, ' Aryaa- ()axoC>()ac), the son and successor of Sennacherib (2 Kings xix, 37 ; Isa. xxxvii, 38). The date apparent- \y assigned by these passages is B.C. 712, but, as he seams to be the Asaradinus (^Aaapicavoc) of Ptolein3-'s C inon, whose reign bears date from B. C. 680, we may cither suppose that the death of Sennacherib occurred some years after his defeat before Jerusalem, or that an interregnum occurred before the accession of Esar- haddon. It has generally been thought that he was Sennacherib's eldest son, and this seems to have been the view of Poh'histor, who made Sennacherib place a son, Asordanes, on the throne of Babylon during his own lifetime (ap. Euseb. Chron. Can. i, 5). The con- trarj', however, appears by the inscriptions, which show the Babylonian viceroy — c&\\t(\. Asordanes by Polyhis- tor, but Aparanadius (Assaranadius ?) by Ptolemy — to have been a distinct person from Esar-haddon, who is called in cuneiform (q. v.) Asshur-akh-iddina (Rawlin- son, Herodotus, i, 386 sq.)- Thus nothing is realh' known of Esar-haddon until his succession (B.C. cir. 680; see Col. Rawlinson in the Lond. Athena:um, Aug. 22, 1865), which seems to have followed quieth' and without difficulty on the murder of his father and the flight of his guilty brothers (2 Kings xix, 37 ; Isa. xxxvii, 38). It may, perhaps, be concluded from this that he was at the death of his father the eldest son, Assaranadius, the Babylonian viceroy, having died previoush-. It is impossible to fix the length of Esar- haddon's reign, or the order of the events which oc- curred in it. Little is known to us of his history but from his own records, and they have not come down to us in the shape of annals, but only in the form of a general summary (see them translated bj' H. F. Talbot, in the Jour, of Sac. Lit. April, 1859, p. '68-79). That he reigned thirteen j-ears at Babylon is certain from the Canon of Ptolemy, and he cannot have reigned a shorter time in Assj'ria. He may, however, have reigned longer, for it is not improbable that after a while he felt sufficiently secure of the affections of the Babylonians to re-establish the old SA'stem of vice- regal government in their country. Saosduchinus maj' have been set up as ruler of Babylon In' his au- thority in B.C. 667, and he may luive withdrawn to Nineveh, and continued to reign there for some tima
ESAK-HADDON
284
ESAU
ionger. His many expeditions and his great worlcs seem to indicate, if not even to require, a reign of some considerable duration. It lias lieon conjectured that he died about B.C. 6G0, after occupying the throne for twenty j-ears. He appears to have been succeeded by his son Asshur-bani-pal, or Sardanapalus II, the prince fur whom he had built a palace in his own lifetime. Ko farther mention is made of this monarch in Scrip- ture but that he settled certain colonists in Samaria (Ezra iv, 2). See Asnapper.
Esar-haddon appears bj- his monuments to have been one of the most powerful, if not the most power- ful of all the Assyrian monarchs. He carried his arms over all Asia between the Persian Gulf, the Armenian mountains, and the Mediterranean. Towards the east he engaged in wars with Median tribes "of which his fathers had never heard the name ;" towards the west he extended his influence over Cilicia and Cyprus ; towards the south he claimed authority over Egypt and Ethiopia. In consequence of the disaffection of Balylon, and its frequent revolts from former Assyr- ian kings, Esar-haddon, having subdued the sons of Merodach-Baladan wlio headed the national party, in- troduced the new policj' of substituting for the former government by viceroj-s a direct dependence upon the Assyrian crown. He did not reduce Babjionia to a province, or attempt its actual absorption into the em- pire, but united it to his kingdom in the waj' that Hungary was, until 1848, united to Austria, by hold- ing both crowns himself, and residing now at one and now at the other capital. He is the only Assyrian monarch ■\\hom we find to have actuall}' reigned at Babylon, where he built himself a palace, bricks from which have been recentl}' recovered bearing his name. His Babylonian reign lasted thirteen years, from B.C. 680 to B. C. G67, and it was undoubtedly within this space of time that Manasseh, king of Judah, having been seized \>y his captains at Jerusalem on a charge of rebellion, was brought before the Assyrian monarch at Babylon (2 Chron. xxxiii, 11), and detained for a time as prisoner there. This must therefore have been Esar-haddon, who, persuaded of his innocence, or excusing his guilt, eventual!}^ restored him to his throne (conip. ver. 13), thus giving a proof of clemency not very usual in an Oriental monarch. It seems to have been in a similar spirit that Esar-haddon, accord- ing to the inscriptions, gave a territory upon the Per- sian Gulf to a son of Merodach-Baladan, who sulmiit- ted to his authority and became a refugee at his court. As a builder of great works Esar-haddon is particular- ly distinguished. Besides his palace at Babylon, which has already been mentioned, he built at least three others in different parts of his dominions, cither for himself or his son, while in a single inscription he mentions the erection by his hands of no fewer than thirtij tenijiles in Assyria and Mesopotamia. His works appear to have possessed a peculiar magnificence. He describes his temples as "shining with silver and gold," and boasts of his Nineveh palace that it was " a building such as the kings his fathers who went before him had never made." The south-west palace at Nim- riid is the best preserved of his constructions. This building, which was excavated by Mr. Lavard, is re- markable for the peculiarity of its ])lan as well as for the scale on which it is constructed. It corre- sponds in its general design almost exactly with the palace of Solomon (1 Kings vii, 1-12), but is of larger dimensions, the great hall lieing 22U feet long b}' 100 braid (Layard's Nin. and Bah. p. SoS, Harpers' edit.), and the porch or antechamlier 1(10 feet by 60. It had the usual adornment of winged bulls, colossal sphinxes, and sculptured slabs, but has furnished less to our col- lections than many inferior buildinirs, from the cir- cumstance that it had originally been destroyed hy fire, by which the stones and alabaster were split and calcined. Tiiis is the more to lie regretted as there is reason to believe that Phoenician and Greek artists