e granary of Tyre. Tyre furnished the
shipbuilders and mariners; the fruitful plains of Palestine victualled
the fleets, and supplied the manufacturers and merchants of the
Phoenician league with all the necessaries of life.[36]

[Footnote 36: To a late period Tyre and Sidon were mostly dependent on
Palestine for their supply of grain. The inhabitants of these cities
desired peace with Herod (Agrippa) because their country was nourished
by the king's country (Acts xii., 20).]

RISE AND FALL OF ASSYRIA

DESTRUCTION OF NINEVEH

B.C. 789

F. LENORMANT AND E. CHEVALLIER

Mesopotamia for many centuries was the field of battle for the
opposing hosts of Babylonia and Assyria, each striving for mastery
over the other. At first each city had its own prince, but at
length one of these petty kingdoms absorbed the rest, and Nineveh
became the capital of a united Assyria. Babylonia had her own
kings, but they were little more than hereditary satraps receiving
investiture from Nineveh.

From about B.C. 1060 to 1020 Babylon seems to have recovered the
upper hand. Her victories put an end to what is known as the First
Assyrian Empire. After a few generations a new family ascended the
throne and ultimately founded the Second Assyrian Empire.

The first princes whose figured monuments have come down to us
belonged to those days. The oldest of all was Assurnizirpal; the
bas-reliefs with which his palace was decorated are now in the
British Museum and the Louvre; most of them in the former. His son
Shalmaneser III, and later Shalmaneser IV, made many campaigns
against the neighboring peoples, and Assyria became rapidly a great
and powerful nation. The effeminate Sardanapalus was the last of
the dynasty.

The capital of Assyria was Nineveh, one of the most famous of
cities. It was remarkable for extent, wealth, and architectural
grandeur. Diodorus Siculus says its walls were sixty miles around
and one hundred feet high. Three chariots could be driven abreast
around the summit of its walls, which were defended by fifteen
hundred bastions, each of them two hundred feet in height. These
dimensions may be exaggerated, but the Hebrew scriptures and recent
excavations at the ancient site leave no doubt as to the splendor
of the Assyrian palaces and the greatness of the city of Nineveh in