Sennacherib's Annals

The prisms contain six paragraphs of cuneiform written in Akkadian. They are hexagonal in shape, made of red baked clay, and stand 38.0 cm high by 14.0 cm wide. They were created during the reign of Sennacherib in 689 BC (Chicago) or 691 BC (London, Jerusalem).

The Taylor prism is thought to have been found by Colonel Robert Taylor (1790–1852) in 1830 at Nineveh, which was the ancient capital of the Assyrian Empire under Sennacherib, before its initial excavation by Botta and Layard more than a decade later. Although the prism remained in Iraq until 1846, in 1835 a paper squeeze was made by the 25-year-old Henry Rawlinson, and a plaster cast was taken by Pierre-Victorien Lottin in c.1845.[3] The original was later thought to have been lost, until it was purchased from Colonel Taylor's widow in 1855 by the British Museum.[4] (Colonel Taylor may have been the father of John George Taylor, who, himself, became a noted Assyrian explorer and archaeologist.)[5]

General view and detail of the Taylor prism, British Museum.

Another version of this text is found on what is known as the Sennacherib Prism, now in the Oriental Institute. It was purchased by James Henry Breasted from a Baghdad antiques dealer in 1919 for the Oriental Institute.[6] The Jerusalem prism was acquired by the Israel Museum at a Sotheby's auction in 1970.[7] It was only published in 1990.[8]

The three known complete examples of this inscription are nearly identical, with only minor variants, although the dates on the prisms show that they were written sixteen months apart (the Taylor and Jerusalem Prisms in 691 BC and the Oriental Institute prism in 689 BC). There are also at least eight other fragmentary prisms preserving parts of this text, all in the British Museum, and most of them containing just a few lines.

The Chicago text was translated by Daniel David Luckenbill and the Akkadian text, along with a translation into English, is available in his book The Annals of Sennacherib (University of Chicago Press, 1924).[9]

Jerusalem as inscribed on the prism

Hezekiah of Judah as inscribed on the prism

It is one of three accounts discovered so far which have been left by Sennacherib of his campaign against the Kingdom of Israel and Kingdom of Judah, giving a different perspective on these events from that of the Book of Kings in the Bible.

Some passages in the Hebrew Bible (2 Kings 18–19) agree with at least a few of the claims made on the prism. The Bible recounts a successful Assyrian attack on Samaria, as a result of which the population was deported, and later recounts that an attack on Lachish was ended by Hezekiah suing for peace, with Sennacherib demanding 300 talents of silver and 30 talents of gold, and Hezekiah giving him all the silver from his palace and from the Temple in Jerusalem, and the gold from doors and doorposts of the temple.[10] Compared to this, the Taylor Prism proclaims that 46 walled cities and innumerable smaller settlements were conquered by the Assyrians, with 200,150 people, and livestock, being deported, and the conquered territory being dispersed among the three kings of the Philistines instead of being given back. Additionally, the Prism says that Sennacherib’s siege resulted in Hezekiah being shut up in Jerusalem "like a caged bird", Hezekiah's mercenaries and 'Arabs' deserting him, and Hezekiah eventually buying off Sennacherib, having to give him antimony, jewels, ivory-inlaid furniture, his own daughters, harem, and musicians. It states that Hezekiah became a tributary ruler.

On Sennacherib's prism, he says this of Hezekiah: "As for the king of Judah, Hezekiah, who had not submitted to my authority, I besieged and captured forty-six of his fortified cities, along with many smaller towns, taken in battle with my battering rams. ... I took as plunder 200,150 people, both small and great, male and female, along with a great number of animals including horses, mules, donkeys, camels, oxen, and sheep. As for Hezekiah, I shut him up like a caged bird in his royal city of Jerusalem. I then constructed a series of fortresses around him, and I did not allow anyone to come out of the city gates. His towns which I captured I gave to the kings of Ashod, Ekron, and Gaza."

The tribute given by Hezekiah is then mentioned but in this account, nothing is said of Sennacherib capturing the city of Jerusalem.

• Dewar, Ben. 2017. "Rebellion, Sargon II’s “Punishment” and the Death of Aššur-Nādin-Šumi in the Inscriptions of Sennacherib." Journal of Ancient Near Eastern History 3, no. 1: 25–38.
• Frame, Grant, ed. 2011–2014. Royal Inscriptions of the Neo-Assyrian Period Project (RINAP). Winona Lake, IL: Eisenbrauns. (Also see http://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/rinap/corpus/)
• Geyer, John B. 1971. "2 Kings XVIII 14–16 and the Annals of Sennacherib." Vetus Testamentum 21, no. 5: 604–6.
• Grabbe, Lester L., ed. 2003. Like a Bird in a Cage: The Invasion of Sennacherib in 701 BCE. Journal for the Study of the Old Testament Supplement Series. 363 Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic Press.
• Ornan, Tally. 2007. “The Godlike Semblance of a King: The Case of Sennacherib’s Rock Reliefs.” In Ancient Near eastern Art in Context: Studies in Honor of Irene J. Winter by her Students. Edited by Jack Cheng and Marian H. Feldman, 161–78. New York: Brill.
• Russell, John Malcolm. 1991. Sennacherib’s Palace Without Rival at Nineveh. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
• Seitz, Christopher R. 1993. "Account A and the Annals of Sennacherib: A Reassessment." Journal for the Study of the Old Testament 18, no. 58: 47–57.
• Ussishkin, David. 1982. The Conquest of Lachish by Sennacherib. Tel Aviv: Tel Aviv University Institute of Archaeology.
• --. 2015. "Sennacherib's Campaign in Judah: The Conquest of Lachish." Journal for Semitics 24, no. 2: 719–58.

• Sennacherib Prism – Luckenbill's translation as adapted by K.C. Hanson