EGYPT AND BABYLON.
182
retained faithful to his ally, and put his army in motion to (ch. xix. 9). This boldness is quite in accordance with Tirhakah's
meet Sennacherib
He was an enterprising prince, engaged in many character. wars, and a determined opponent of the Assyrians. His name is read on the Egyptian monuments as Tahark or
and his face, which appears on them, is expressive ; The Assyrian inscriptions tell us of strong determination. that, in the later part of his life, he caried on a war for
Tahrak
years with Esar-haddon and his son, Asshur-bani-pal.* If his star ultimately paled before that of the latter, it was not from any lack of courage, or resolution, or good faith on
many
He struggled gallantly against the Assyrian power his part. for above thirty years, was never wanting to his confederates and, if he did not quite deserve the high eulogies of the Greeks, was at any rate, among the most distinguished monarchs of his race and period. " " In his " days of Pharaoh-Nechoh, king of Egypt, (Josiah's) went up against the king of Assyria to the river Euphrates; and King Josiah went against him; and he slew hhu at Megiddo, when he had
And the people of the land took Jehoahaz, the son of . . Josiah, and anointed him, and made him king in his father's stead. . . And Pharaoh-Nechoh put him in bands at Kiblah, in the land of Hamath, that he might not reign in Jerusalem, and put the land to a tribute of an hundred talents of silver and a talent of gold. And Pharaoh-Nechoh made Eliakirn, the son of Josiah, king in the room of Josiah his father, and turned his name to Jehoiakim, and took Jehoahaz away; and he came to Egypt, and died there " (ch. xxiii. seen him.
.
.
An
interval of ninety years separates this notice from the The position of affairs is onec more completely changed. Although the present passage, taken by itself, does not give any indication of what had occurred, it is quite certain that, in the interval between Tirhakah's war with Sennacherib and " Pharaoh-Necho's " invasion of Palestine, the empire of Assyria had come to an end. Necho was on his way " to fight against Carchemish by " " Euphrates (2 Chron. xxxv. 20) with the house wherewith he had war " (ibid.) ; and that house was not the old one of
one
last considered.
the Sargonidte, wherewith Tirhakah had contended, but a new " house " which had recently come into power, and which held its court, not at Nineveh, but at Babylon (Isa,
"*
G. Smith,
"
History of Asshur-bani-pal," pp. 15-47.