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The Assyrians Impressed Their Culture on Israel... The Babylonians Left No Trace
THE ASSYRIANS AND BABYLONIANS BOTH RAVAGED large parts of ancient Israel, yet the archaeological evidence from the aftermath of their respective conquests tells two very different stories. Why?
In 721 B.C.E., the Assyrians brought an end to the northern kingdom of Israel. A little more than a century later, the Assyrians themselves suffered defeat at the hands of the Babylonians, who became the world's new superpower. The Babylonians were no less bent on mayhem and destruction than the Assyrians had been: In 586 B.C.E., they burnt Jerusalem and destroyed the Temple, bringing an end to the southern kingdom of Judah and 400 years of Davidic rule.
As destroyers, the Assyrians and Babylonians had much in common. But the periods that followed their conquests could not be less alike. While the Assyrians left a clear imprint of their presence in Palestine, there is a strange gap after the Babylonian destruction. Call it an archaeological gap, if you wish.
The savage Babylonian destruction of Jerusalem is well documented both in the Bible (in the books of Jeremiah and Lamentations) and in the archaeological record. When Nebuchadnezzar first placed the city under siege in 597 B.C.E., the city quickly capitulated, thereby avoiding a general destruction. But in response to a revolt by Judah's King Zedekiah, Nebuchadnezzar dispatched an army that, after an 18month siege, captured and destroyed the city in 586 B.C.E. (see box, p. 48). The evidence of this destruction is widely confirmed in Jerusalem excavations.*
On his first swing through Judah, Nebuchadnezzar had destroyed much of Philistia-Ekron, Tel Batash, Tell Jemmeh, Ruqeish and Tel Sera`. Particularly devastated was Ashkelon, which the Babylonians sacked in 604 B.C.E.**
Similar evidence of Babylonian destruction can be found throughout the Beersheba Valley, in the Aravah (the valley south of the Dead Sea) and in the Jordan River valley. From south to north, we can trace the effects of Babylonian might-at Tell el-Kheleifeh on the coast of the Red Sea, at Ein Gedi on the shore of the Dead Sea, and further north at Dan, the source of the Jordan River. The same is true in excavations at major northern sites-- Hazor; Megiddo, overlooking the Jezreel Valley-...