in order that he might distribute them throughout
the cities of Syria: a colony of 600 prisoners from the town of Amlati
was established in the territory of Damaunu, 5400 from Dur were sent to
the fortresses of Unki, Kunalia, Khuzarra, Tai, Tarmanazi, Kulmadara,
Khatatirra, and Sagillu, while another 10,000 or so were scattered along
the Phoenician seaboard and among the adjacent mountains. The revolt
had meanwhile spread to the nations of Media, where it was, perhaps,
fomented by the agents of Urartu; and for the second time within seven
years (737 B.C.) Tiglath-pileser trampled underfoot the countries over
which he had ridden in triumph at the beginning of his career--the
Bit-Kapsi, the Bit-Sangibuti, the Bit-Tazzakki, the Bit-Zulazash,
the Bit-Matti, and Umliash. The people of Upash, among the Bit-Kapsi,
entrenched themselves on the slopes of Mount Abirus; but he carried
their entrenchments by storm. Ushuru of Taddiruta and Burdadda of
Nirutakta were seized with alarm, and hid themselves in their mountain
gorges; but he climbed up in pursuit of them, drove them out of their
hiding-places, seized their possessions, and made them prisoners.
Similar treatment was meted out to all those who proved refractory; some
he despoiled, others he led captive, and "bursting upon the remainder
like the downpour of Bamman," permitted none of them to escape. He
raised trophies all along his line of march: in Bau, a dependency of
Bit-Ishtar, he set up a pointed javelin dedicated to Ninip, on which
he had engraved a panegyric of the virtues of his master Assur; near
Shilkhazi, a town founded, in bygone days, by the Babylonians, he
erected a statue of himself, and a pillar consecrated to Marduk in
Til-ashshur. In the following year he again attacked Urartu and occupied
the mountain province of Nal, which formed one of its outlying defences
(736). The year after he entered on the final struggle with Sharduris,
and led the flower of his forces right under the walls of Dhuspas,* the
enemy's capital.

* The name is written Turuspas in the inscriptions of
Tiglath-pileser III.

Dhuspas really consisted of two towns joined together. One of these,
extending over the plain by the banks of the Alais and in the direction
of the lake, was surrounded by fertile gardens and villas, in which
the inhabitants spent the summer at their ease. It was protected by
an isolated mass of white and red nummulitic chalk, the steep sides of
which are