The cuneiform inscriptions and the Old Testament - The Search For ...

152 THE CUNEIFOBM INSCRIPTIONS AND THE T
on the Aegyptian capital. Moreover the time when the
latter event took place, and therefore also indirectly the
date of Nahum's oracle , may be determined with fair
precision. It follows from the account of Asurbanipal in
his annals, that the second great campaign, which the
Assyrian conducted against Aegypt, and in which Thebes
suffered her untoward fate, took place soon after Tirhaka's
death. We read in Smith's Assurbanipal 47, 67 : Ur-dama-ni-1
abal a§Sati-§u ina kusst-§u u-§ib-ma
u-ma-'-ir ma-a-tu. 68. I'r Ni-' a-na dan-nu-ti-§u
i§-kun u-pa-hir 11-lat-su, 69. a-na i-bi5 kabla
u tahS,za ill umm§,ni-ja tuklS.ti-§u u-§at-ba-a
is-ba-ta har-ra-na i. e. *67. Urdamani, son of his
(Tirhaka's) wife, set himself upon his throne and summoned
the country. 68. N6-Thebes he prepared for his defence,
marshalled his might. 69. To join battle and combat, he
caused his troops to march out against my host (and)
commenced the journey."—Now Tirhaka, according to the
Apis-stelae, died in the year 664, and the second Aegyptian
expedition of Asurbanipal here spoken -of perhaps took
place in the year following. Moreover the overthrow of
N6-Amon was still fresh in the memory of the prophet and
of his contemporaries. Hence the year 660 might be
regarded as the approximate date when Nahum delivered
his prophetic discourse against Niniveh. It is scarcely
probable that a prophet 'even after several decads' should
have referred to this event as one that was clear to all
and stood vividly before the imagination (Steiner), if we
have here simply a catastrophe befalling a foreign race
453 and not one that immediately concerned the people whom
the prophet was addressing.
17. "^I'lpp^V See note on Jerem. LI. 27.