ath-pile-ser III brought fire and sword into the
country and laid siege to Van in the reign of Sarduris II, he could not
capture the citadel.

[Illustration: 419.jpg PART OF THE ANCIENT FORTIFICATIONS OF THE CITY OF
VAN, BETWEEN THE CITADEL AND THE LAKE.]

It was not difficult for the Assyrian king to assault and capture the
city itself, which lay at the foot of the citadel as it does at the
present day, but the latter, within the fortifications of which Sarduris
and his garrison withdrew, proved itself able to withstand the Assyrian
attack. The expedition of Tiglath-pileser III did not succeed in
crushing the Vannic empire, for Rusas I, the son and successor of
Sarduris II, allied himself to the neighbouring mountain races and gave
considerable trouble to Sargon, the Assyrian king, who was obliged to
undertake an expedition to check their aggressions.

It was probably Rusas I who erected the buildings on Toprak Kala, the
hill to the east of Van, traces of which remain to the present day. He
built a palace and a temple, and around them he constructed a new city
with a reservoir to supply it with water, possibly because the slopes
of Toprak Kala rendered it easier of defence than the city in the
plain (beneath the rock and citadel) which had fallen an easy prey to
Tiglath-pileser III. The site of the temple on Toprak Kala has been
excavated by the trustees of the British Museum, and our knowledge of
Vannic art is derived from the shields and helmets of bronze and small
bronze figures and fittings which were recovered from this building. One
of the shields brought to the British Museum from the Toprak Kala, where
it originally hung with others on the temple walls, bears the name of
Argistis II, who was the son and successor of Rusas I, and who attempted
to give trouble to the Assyrians by stirring the inhabitants of the land
of Kummukh (Kommagene) to revolt against Sargon. His son, Rusas II,
was the contemporary of Esarhaddon, and from some recently discovered
rock-inscriptions we learn that he extended the limits of his kingdom on
the west and secured victories against Mushki (Meshech) to the southeast
of the Halys and against the Hittites in Northern Syria. Rusas III
rebuilt the temple on Toprak Kala, as we know from an inscription of his
on one of the shields from that place in the British Museum. Both he and
Sarduris III were on friendly terms with the Assyrians, for we know that
they both sent embassies to Ashur-ba