Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Potts 2005 Neo-Elamite Problems
Potts 2005 Neo-Elamite Problems
NEO-ELAMITE PROBLEMS
BY
D.T. POTTS
(Sydney University)
One hundred and fifty years ago Austen Henry Layard published Discov-
eries in the ruins of Nineveh & Babylon, a work in which he discussed,
among many other things, the well-known relief fragment from room 33 in
Sennacherib’s palace without rival at Nineveh which depicts Madaktu, one
of many Elamite cities which Sennacherib and later Assurbanipal both
claim to have attacked. In fact, this relief is just one small piece in the
much larger puzzle of understanding the geographical context of Assyria’s
campaigns against Elam, a geographical context with which Layard was
already grappling several years earlier (Layard, 1846). For Layard, like
many of his contemporaries, was acutely aware of the importance of a cor-
rect identification of the rivers mentioned in the Assyrian and Classical
sources on Khuzistan as a necessary first step in understanding the theatre
of war, whether in the Neo-Elamite/Neo-Assyrian case, or in the struggle
between the Diadochoi during the decades following Alexander’s death.
In Western scholarship it has been clear ever since the publication of
works like Billerbeck’s Susa, eine Studie zur alten Geschichte Westasiens
in 1893 (Billerbeck, 1893) and Streck’s Assurbanipal und die letzten
assyrischen Könige in 1916 (Streck, 1916) that the history of Elam’s con-
frontation with Assyria is abundantly documented, at least in Assyrian if
not contemporary Elamite sources (cf. Gerardi, 1987; Fuchs, 1994:
Mayer, 1995; Potts, 1999, pp. 259-308; Waters, 2000). But although we
have moved on since Rawlinson and Layard disputed the location of Susa
(Potts, 1999c, pp. 30-32), there are several points of geography which
have been misunderstood by commentators on Neo-Elamite military his-
tory, and here I shall try to highlight several of the most important fixed
points in this otherwise problematic field. Most of the points I wish to
underscore today have been made in greater detail in two articles (Potts,
1999b, 1999c) but my point in reviewing some of the points made there is
to particularly stress the interdependence of river identifications and the
7149_IranAntiq_40_09 24-12-2004 09:48 Page 166
Fig. 1. Map of southwestern Iran showing main localities discussed in the text
(after Parpola and Porter 2001).
paign. as well as a Greek one, concerned with the wars of the Diadochoi.
The first text, K. 2524, tells us the following: ‘Auf meinem achten
Feldzuge bot ich, auf Befehl Assurs und der Istar, meine Truppen auf.
Gegen Ummanaldasi, den König von Elam, schlug ich die Straße ein. Bit-
Imbî, welches ich (bereits) auf meinem früheren Feldzuge eingenommen
hatte, eroberte ich damals, (desgleichen) Rasi, Hamanu nebst seinem
Bezirke. Er aber, Ummanaldasi, der König von Elam, hörte von der
Eroberung von Rasi (und) Hamanu und die Furcht Assurs und der Istar,
welche an meiner Seite gingen, warf ihn nieder und Madaktu, seine Resi-
denzstadt, verließ er und floh nach Dûr-Undasi. Den (Fluß) Idide über-
schritt er und machte diesen Fluß zu seinem Stützpunkte (Verteidi-
gungslinie), sich rüstend zum Kampfe wider mich. Naditu, die
Königsstadt, eroberte ich samt ihrem Bezirke, die Königsstadt Bît-Bunaku
eroberte ich samt ihrem Bezirke, die Königsstadt Hartabanu eroberte ich
samt ihrem Bezirke, die Königsstadt Tûbu eroberte ich samt ihrem
Bezirke, das gesamte Flußufergebiet, Madaktu, die Residenzstadt nebst
ihrem Bezirke eroberte ich’ (Streck, 1916/II, pp. 47-49).
7149_IranAntiq_40_09 24-12-2004 09:48 Page 169
As the narrative of this episode makes clear, the Coprates must have been
situated between the Eulaeus and the Pasitigris and can, therefore, only be
the Ab-e Diz (Akk. Idide, El. Hithite; cf. Vallat, 1993, p. 339). The Pasit-
igris, on the other hand, must be the Karun, since Pasitigris means ‘little
Tigris’, and this term, in the Arabic form ad-Dugail (the diminutive form
7149_IranAntiq_40_09 24-12-2004 09:48 Page 170
of Digla, the Arabic name for the Tigris) continued to be applied to this
river into the modern era (e.g. Eilers, 1982, p., 32, n. 101 and 36). The
Eulaeus (Gr. Eulaios), as we have seen, is the Greek cognate name for the
river known to the Elamites as Ula and the Assyrians as Ulaya, the mod-
ern Karkheh (Potts, 1999c).
As for Badacê, the French Assyriologist Jules Oppert was the first to
suggest that Elamite Madaktu = Greek Badacê (Oppert, 1882, p. 826) and
for the most part this has been accepted ever since. But in addition to the
phonetic similarity between the two names there is another argument for
their identity which seems to have gone largely unnoticed, namely that
both Madaktu and Badace are associated with the Karkheh river. In the
Assyrian letter ABL 281, Bel-Ibni reports to Assurbanipal that, Ummanal-
dash ‘abandoned Madaktu’ and with his family ‘he crossed the Ulaya to
the south’ (Gerardi, 1987, p. 211), while in Diodorus’ account of
Antigonus’ retreat, as just noted, Badacê is said to be ‘situated on the bank
of the Eulaeus River’ (XIX.19.1). Furthermore, Diodorus’ account sug-
gests that Madaktu was located to the north or northwest of his encamp-
ment on the Coprates, for Antigonus intended taking his troops into Media
(as indeed he did), and it is unlikely therefore that he would have headed
south, or due west to achieve such an aim.
These insights, however, compel us to think again about the identifica-
tion of Madaktu with Tepe Patak, first proposed by Rawlinson (Rawlin-
son, 1839, p. 91) and most notably championed by Pierre de Miroschedji
(de Miroschedji, 1986; cf. de Mecquenem, 1953, p. 10). In 1846, Layard
had already objected to Rawlinson’s suggestion on the grounds that the
Duwarij, with which Tepe Patak is associated, could not be the Eulaios
and therefore did not fit the evidence of Diodorus (Layard, 1846, p. 94).
Other possibilities have been suggested over the years, including Choga
Zanbil (Loftus, 1857, p. 126); Kala-i Risa (Billerbeck, 1893, p. 70-72);
somewhere on the Ab-e Diz to the northeast of Susa (Weissbach, 1896,
col. 2725); Tepe Senjar, some 15 kms north of Susa (attributed to G.
Maspero by de Mecquenem and Michalon, 1953, p. 10); or at Derre-i
Shahr on the Saimarreh plain (Cameron, 1936, p. 165, n. 25). Of these,
only Tepe Senjar, KS-7, can really be considered seriously for only it is
located close to the Kerkhah. In fact, as a map published by Johnson
shows (Johnson, 1973, Fig. 5), Tepe Senjar in fact lies along either a relict
canal or perhaps on an ancient bed of the Karkheh.
In November, 2002, I visited Tepe Senjar (Fig. 2) together with
Kourosh Roustaei of the ICHO, Cameron Petrie and Lloyd Weeks, and it
7149_IranAntiq_40_09 24-12-2004 09:48 Page 171
is clearly a significant site, standing 10-12 m. above the plain, and mea-
suring roughly 300 x 300 m. with prehistoric as well as historic occupation
(Fig. 3) and evidence of ceramic slag and kilns (Fig. 4) as well. Neverthe-
less until it is excavated, we cannot say for certain whether it is ancient
Madaktu.
There is, of course, one further piece of evidence with which I began
this essay and that is the Nineveh slab (Fig. 5). A point which has often
escaped viewers but which was made very clearly by J.J. Finkelstein’s in
1962, is that Madaktu is described in Assurbanipal’s annals (A v 81) using
the phrase ‘birit ÍD’, the equivalent of ‘birit narim’, or ‘peninsular’,
specifically of a riverine peninsula (Finkelstein, 1962, p. 83). This, and the
visual representation of Madaktu in Sennacherib’s palace as being situated
on a prow of land between a larger, i.e. wider, body of water (river? large
canal?) and a smaller body of water (stream? small canal?), will be
important to keep in mind when archaeologists eventually inspect Tepe
Senjar and other sites with a view to verifying the likelihood of their being
ancient Madaktu.
7149_IranAntiq_40_09 24-12-2004 09:48 Page 172
Finally, I would like to briefly turn to the problem of Hidalu, the moun-
tainous place to which the Elamite king fled from Madaktu during Sen-
th
nacherib’s 7 campaign. Recent opinion (e.g. Parpola and Porter, 2001,
Map 17) has tended to locate Hidalu around Behbehan or Arjan. I think,
however, that we should be very sceptical of this suggestion. In 1954
Ghirshman suggested Hidalu was identical with Shushtar (Ghirshman,
1954, p. 73) but I cannot see that Shushtar, by any stretch of the imagina-
tion, qualifies as being ‘in the distant mountains (qereb sadê ruquti)’
(Waters, 2000, p. 31), as described in Sennacherib’s account. Inspired by
Richard Hallock’s lecture at the Congress of Orientalists held in Munich in
1957, Hinz tackled the problem in 1961 article by turning to the Persepo-
lis fortification texts (Hinz, 1961, pp. 250-251). Most of these texts (e.g.
PF 35, 200, 666, 738, 749, 842, 874, 1184, 1251, 1259, 1276, 1597, 1994),
unfortunately, merely mention Hidalu as a place where something
occurred, largely in connection with rations.
A few texts, however, both travel rations (Table 2) and letters (PF 1790,
1848, 1851), mention Hidalu in the context of a journey and although they
don’t spell out the itinerary, these texts make it clear that Hidalu was
located between Susa and Persepolis, undoubtedly somewhere on the
Royal Road. PF 2057, in particular, was discussed by Hallock in his 1957
lecture and seized upon by Hinz because of the fact that the consumption
of 2 sheep in fixed rations by 3 men implied a number of days’ travel
between Dasher — the location of which is unkown, but presumably east
7149_IranAntiq_40_09 24-12-2004 09:48 Page 174
of Susa — and Hidalu. Hinz and Hallock thought the distance would have
been 7 days, but this is certainly wrong and should be 8 days (W. Henkel-
mann, pers. comm.). Be that as it may, since we do not know what the rate
of travel was, or where Dasher was, and it is virtually impossible to esti-
mate how far to the east of Susa Hidalu is likely to have lain. Hinz, who
travelled from Susa to Persepolis via Ahwaz in 1958 (presumably on the
highway), came to the conclusion that Hidalu may have lain where Behbe-
han is today and this was the only basis for Koch’s identification of Hidalu
with Behbehan in her article on the Achaemenid ‘Poststraße’ (cf. Koch,
1986, p. 142; 1990, p. 202).
Other scholars, like J. Hansman, have turned to Assurbanipal’s annals
where (Streck, 1916, p. 50, 115, 219) it is said that Huhnur was located at
the frontier of Hidalu (Vallat, 1993, p. 102; Duchene, 1986, p. 69). Hans-
man rejected Hinz’s identification of Hidalu with Behbehan because, he
said, there were ‘no cultural remains at the site of Behbehan’ — and we
must remember this was long before the discovery of the Arjan tomb —
and then proceeded to identify Hidalu with ‘the mountainous district
extending to the north-east of Behbehan in southeastern Khuzistan and
south-west Fars which is now identified by the name Kuhgiluya’ (Hans-
man, 1972, p. 108, n. 54). Accepting this, and utilising Assurbanipal’s ref-
erence which associates Huhnur and Hidalu, Duchene suggested in the
Perrot Festschrift that Huhnur was located at Behbehan (Duchene, 1986,
7149_IranAntiq_40_09 24-12-2004 09:48 Page 175
Bibliography
BILLERBECK, A., 1893. Susa, eine Studie zur alten Geschichte Westasiens,
Leipzig.
BRIANT, P., 1982. Etat et pasteurs au Moyen Orient ancien, Cambridge and Paris.
BRINKMAN, A., 1968. A political history of post-Kassite Babylonia, Rome.
CAMERON, G.G., 1936. History of early Iran, Chicago and London.
CORDOBA, J.M., 1997. Die Schlacht am Ulaya-Fluß: Ein Beispiel assyrischer
Kriegführung während der letzten Jahre des Reiches. In: Waetzoldt, H. and
Hauptmann, H., eds., Assyrien im Wandel der Zeiten, Heidelberg, pp. 7-18.
DELITZCH, F., 1881. Wo lag das Paradies? Leipzig.
7149_IranAntiq_40_09 24-12-2004 09:48 Page 176
DUCHENE, J., 1986. La localisation de Huhnur. In: de Meyer, L., Gasche, H. and
Vallat, F., eds., Fragmenta Historiae Elamicae. Paris, pp. 65-74.
EILERS, W., 1982. Geographische Namengebung in und um Iran, Munich.
FINKELSTEIN, J.J., 1962. Mesopotamia. JNES 21, pp. 73-92.
FOSTER, B.R., 1993. Before the muses: An anthology of Akkadian literature,
Bethesda.
FUCHS, A., 1994. Die Inschriften Sargons II. aus Khorsabad, Göttingen.
FUCHS, A., 2003. review of Waters, A survey of Neo-Elamite history. ZA 93, pp.
128-137.
GERARDI, P. DeH., 1987. Assurbanipal’s Elamite campaigns: A literary and
political study, Ann Arbor.
GHIRSHMAN, R., 1954. Village perse-achéménide, Paris.
GHIRSHMAN, R., 1968. Tchoga Zanbil (Dur-Untash) II. Temenos, temples, palais,
tombes, Paris.
HANSMAN, J., 1972. Elamites, Achaemenians and Anshan. Iran 10, pp. 101-124.
HINZ, W., 1961. Zu den Persepolis-Täfelchen. ZDMG 110, pp. 236-251.
HINZ, W., 1964. Das Reich Elam, Stuttgart.
HINZ, W. and Koch, H., 1987. Elamisches Wörterbuch, Berlin.
JOHNSON, G.A., 1973. Local exchange and early state development in southwest-
ern Iran, Ann Arbor.
KOCH, H., 1986. Die achämenidische Poststrasse von Persepolis nach Susa. AMI
19, pp. 33-147.
KOCH, H., 1990. Verwaltung und Wirtschaft im persischen Kernland zur Zeit der
Achämeniden, Wiesbaden.
LABAT, R., 1975. Elam and western Persia, c. 1200-1000 B.C. CAH 2/2, pp. 482-
506.
LAYARD, A.H., 1853. Discoveries in the ruins of Nineveh and Babylon, London.
LOFTUS, W.K., 1857. On the determination of the River “Eulæus” of the Greek
historians. JRGS 27, pp. 120-33.
LONG, G., 1842. Professor Long’s remarks. JRGS 12, pp. 104-109.
MAYER, W., 1995. Politik und Kriegskunst der Assyrer, Münster.
MECQUENEM, R. de and MICHALON, J., 1953. Recherches à Tchoga Zembil, Paris.
MIROSCHEDJI, P. de., 1985. La fin du royaume d’Ansan et de Suse et la naissance
de l’Empire perse. ZA 75, pp. 265-306.
MIROSCHEDJI, P. de., 1986. La localisation de Madaktu et l’organisation politique
de l’Élam à l’époque Néo-Élamite. In: de Meyer, L., Gasche, H. and Vallat,
F., eds. Fragmenta Historiae Elamicae, Paris, pp. 209-225.
MORGAN, J. de., 1900. Recherches archéologiques, Paris.
NASHEF, K., 1982. Die Orts- und Gewässernamen der mittelbabylonischen und
mittelassyrischen Zeit, Wiesbaden.
OPPERT, J., 1882. review of F. Delitzsch, Wo lag das Paradies? Göttingische
gelehrte Anzeigen 26-27, pp. 801-831.
PARPOLA, S., 1970. Neo-Assyrian toponyms, Kevelaer.
PARPOLA, S. and PORTER, M., 2001. The Helsinki atlas of the Near East in the
Neo-Assyrian period, Helsinki.
7149_IranAntiq_40_09 24-12-2004 09:48 Page 177
178
BLANCO