Dawn of Empire

by H A CULLEY

  The arrival of a second army, coupled with the peaceful surrender of Abad with no reprisals, was enough to convince the people of Umma to join the rapidly expanding Babylonian empire. This time they did more than expel the governor, they hung him and his family from the city walls together with the captain of the city watch and his family. As both families included young children this was not something that Hammurabi approved of, but he accepted it for what it was: a token of their change of allegiance that would be difficult for them to reverse.

  ~#~

  Two weeks later the army arrived outside Kutallu. Bad Tibira and Uruk had surrendered without a problem but Kutallu proved more obdurate. Despite warnings that the city would be sacked if they didn’t surrender by the time the sun set, the gates remained firmly closed. The city housed thirty five thousand people of whom six thousand served in the militia. The walls stood fifteen feet high behind a dry ditch some ten feet wide and six feet deep.

  The first task was to fill in the ditch, which was done at night. The spearmen worked in shifts, covered by two thousand archers and a thousand slingers protected behind large shields carried by more spearmen. It took two nights for them to fill in the ditch in four places along the north wall. The defenders did cause some casualties by throwing down rocks and shooting arrows but, as the defenders had to expose themselves to do this, they lost nearly as many men as the attackers.

  Then they poured oil down on a party shovelling earth into the ditch and threw down flaming torches. The acrid smell of burning flesh filled the air and the Babylonians howled in rage.

  ‘I wonder if they realise that they have just doomed themselves to death once our men get into the city?’ Uktannu murmured to Mutu-Namaha. He seemed despondent at the thought.

  ‘And no doubt rape and torture as well. The lucky ones will be those who are taken for selling into slavery,’ he replied, shaking his head. ‘If only they had surrendered they could have continued to live as before, except under a more enlightened ruler.’

  Mutu-Namaha was referring to the fact that Rim-Sim taxed his people more highly that was the case in Babylonia and that justice was a matter of Rim-Sim’s whim rather than the Code of Hammurabi that now prevailed in all cities from Hiritum to the recently conquered cities of Sumeria. As each city submitted stone masons were put to work copying the two hundred and eighty two laws and punishments of the code onto steles for display in each market place.

  The next evening Abi-Maras wheeled his four siege towers into place. Each consisted of a wooden frame with animal skins tacked to the front and sides with copper nails. Inside there were three platforms with ladders connecting them. Around the top platform there was a wooden rail, hanging from which were more animal hides. Each platform could hold fifty men.

  Abi-Maras had chosen the new moon for the attack so that it was difficult to see the lumbering mobile towers on their four sets of wheels until they were close to the walls. The top platform was manned by several archers to sweep the top of the wall clear as dawn broke. Then the archers moved to the back of the platform to be replaced by spearmen armed with shields and bronze swords for close quarter work.

  The men vaulted over the rail, landing on the parapet behind the top of the wall some five feet below. One or two twisted an ankle or broke a leg but most landed safely and were ready when the defenders rushed back to attack them. Initially the two hundred men who landed on the parapet were heavily outnumbered but they were helped by the fact that the parapet was only four feet wide and they were wearing bronze helmets and leather vests sewn with scales of bone or bronze whereas the city militia wore their normal clothes. The superior training of the Babylonians and the advantage of swords over spears in the confines of the crowded parapet also gave them an advantage.

  Soon another two hundred from the second platform joined them and they started to push the city militia back. More and more Babylonians joined the fray as those waiting below climbed up the inside of the towers and leapt down into the space cleared for them by those who had made the initial assault.

  One of those who had led the spearmen onto the parapet was Uktannu. Mutu-Namaha had wanted to join him but his father had expressly forbidden it. As dawn broke and the ten archers on the platform had, with the others on the other platforms, shot volley after volley at those manning the walls, sending them scuttling for cover after two dozen or more had been hit, he pushed through them with his forty men and vaulted over the rail. He landed on the hard parapet with bent knees to absorb the shock but, as he straightened up, two men with spears ran at him.

  He batted away one spear with his shield and chopped at the haft of the other spear with his sword, which cut deeply into the stout wooden shaft and wedged there. He felt the presence of someone behind him but there was nothing he could do, except pray that it was another Babylonian protecting his back. The first spearman thrust at him again and again Uktannu took the point on his shield. This time the bronze point pierced the leather covering and stuck fast in the wood underneath. Uktannu was now vulnerable as both his sword and shield were useless. One of his opponents let go of the spear with the sword trapped in it and drew a dagger. As the spear fell to the ground, taking the sword with it, Uktannu put his foot on it and managed to yank his sword free. He brought it up as the man with the dagger lunged for his neck, cutting into his groin area. The man screamed, dropped his dagger and clutched at his crotch, which was now bleeding copiously. Ignoring him, Uktannu now swept his bloody sword round and chopped into the other man’s neck.

  Breathing heavily, Uktannu quickly looked around him, knocking the spear that had stuck in his shield away. Two of his men were at his back and another stepped in beside him. The rest of his forty were piling over the rail and onto the parapet. He realised with a start that his fight with the two spearmen had only taken around a minute. Now more of the enemy were running toward them and two more men stepped alongside him ready to face them. The next quarter of an hour passed in a blur of blocking spear thrusts and cutting down the enemy with his sword. Two of the men beside him were killed and three more stepped forward so that they filled the width of the narrow parapet. Then some archers appeared behind them, shooting over their shoulders to kill the spearmen before they could reach them.

  Someone from the Kutallu garrison had the sense to call the spearman back and send their own archers forward. Two arrows hit Uktannu’s shield before one of the archers was hit by a stone in the middle of his forehead. The look of horror on his face was frozen there as he toppled over the side of the parapet to the ground twelve feet below. More stones winged their way into the ranks of the Kutallu bowmen, killing some and breaking the bones of others. Uktannu glanced at the top of the siege tower where several boys were whirring their slings and releasing as fast as they could. He nodded his thanks to them and they grinned back.

  The bowmen shot a couple more arrows, this time at the slingers, before they retreated and fled down the steps and away into the city. Uktannu looked along the wall in both directions. Bodies lay everywhere but they were mostly those of the city’s militia. A few wounded groaned in agony but the slingers, who had now jumped down on the parapet, deftly cut their throats with their daggers. In one place the defenders still held a portion of the north wall so Uktannu led his men to help dislodge them. However, by now the men defending the city’s other three walls were rushing to the north wall.

  Whoever had designed the city’s defences had clearly decided that it was better not to join the parapets along one wall to the next directly and so they ended in a tower which could only be entered at ground level. To each side of the tower there were steps up to the parapet but they weren’t directly connected to each other. This meant that defenders from the other walls had to fight their way up these steps to the next parapet. As more and more spearmen, archers and slingers climbed up the siege towers and dropped down onto the north wall parapet; this became more and more difficult for the defenders. It only took a few Babylonians to hold the top of the ste
ps whilst the archers and slingers picked off the men trying to ascend them.

  The one problem was the towers which stood at each corner of the city walls. These were manned by bowmen who could easily pick off the Babylonians one by one on the wall below them. Uktannu took one of the captains of a hundred archers aside and told him to get his men to concentrate on the two towers at either end of the north wall. Meanwhile he sent a messenger to get some siege ladders brought up onto the parapet. Once these arrived, he and fifty men climbed up them onto the top level of one of the towers.

  Once they reached the top of the tower they were pleasantly surprised that there were no guards at the top. Uktannu and his men erupted onto the platform where a dozen archers were crouching behind the parapet and occasionally popping up to fire a quick arrow whilst dodging the ones that came back in reply. The fight was quick and one sided. A minute later Uktannu’s men threw the bodies of the defenders over the parapet onto the ground twenty-two feet below.

  Seeing the fate of their comrades, those in the other tower decided to flee. Uktannu watched them go. ‘Let them run, there is nowhere to hide in this city now,’ he remarked grimly to the captain of a hundred standing by his side.

  An hour later it was all over. The remainder of the city militia had surrendered and were under guard in a stockade built outside the city. Hammurabi had allowed his men a free hand inside the city itself and Uktannu could imagine the scenes of rape, murder and pillage. Families were tortured to reveal where their money and valuables were hidden and then killed. Fires were started and soon spread in the poorer quarters where the houses were built of wood and barusti. This soon spread to the brick-built houses as these were roofed in barusti in the main. Even the governor’s palace was looted and then set on fire.

  The next morning Mutu-Namaha and Uktannu set about restoring order and the various captains started rounding up their men. Even some of the boy slingers had taken part in the orgy of destruction and carnage. Both men were disgusted by the conduct of their army; it was as if they had lost all vestiges of decency and civilisation. When they protested to the king however, all he would say was that now perhaps the remaining cities would see the wisdom of surrendering without a fight.

  When the fires had died down Mutu-Namaha sent Uktannu and a hundred of his most reliable spearmen as escort into the city to see what remained. Most of it was a smouldering mess and the stench of burnt wood and roasted bodies pervaded everywhere. Some of the corpses were Babylonian soldiers, showing that in some cases people had fought back or killed those caught off guard in the act of rape, but thousands of them were women and children. Most of the men had been in the militia and had died in the battle or whilst fighting in the streets later.

  Uktannu felt his stomach churn and leant against the charred remains of a wall whilst he heaved his guts out. He was determined never to take part in the sack of a city ever again. Up to this moment he had respected, even hero worshipped, Hammurabi, much more than he had his own father. But, by allowing this barbarity, as far as Uktannu was concerned the man had shown that he lacked any compassion for those who opposed him.

  Of the thirty thousand people living in the city of Kutallu only four thousand survived. No doubt some had managed to escape, but not many. The captives would be sold into slavery and Hammurabi announced his intention of re-building the city and populating it with settlers from all over Babylonia.

  ‘Who do you intend to appoint as governor of your new city, lord king?’ Uktannu asked him after he had requested a private audience.

  ‘I hadn’t decided; why?’ Hammurabi was well aware that Uktannu had thoroughly disapproved of the sack of Kutallu and had some sympathy with his views. However, no king could afford to be soft and Hammurabi was happy in his own mind that what he had done was necessary in order to bring the rest of Sumeria to heel.

  ‘I would like you to consider me for the post. I think that, by rebuilding the city, I can in some small way atone for my part in what was done here.’

  ‘You didn’t do anything, except fight bravely against the enemy in battle. You need to develop a stronger stomach for what is necessary, young man.’

  ‘I have no intention in allowing myself to become ruthless and depraved, if that’s what you mean.’ Uktannu’s eyes flashed with passion as he spoke. He hadn’t meant to lose his temper and, as soon as the words left his lips, he was fearful of the king’s reaction.

  Instead Hammurabi looked at him sorrowfully.

  ‘You have become like a son to me, Uktannu. I have watched you grow from a fearful and under-confident young boy into a brave and clever young man who has all the makings of a brilliant general. I had it in mind to make you the army commander here, serving Samsu-Iluna when I make him sub-king of Sumeria. You would be wasted as governor of a small city, one of many here.’

  ‘I am honoured by your faith in me, lord king. Nevertheless I have decided that I don’t wish to pursue a military career. I want to build things, not destroy them.’

  ‘I had hoped that you would see that that is exactly that I have devoted my life to. Babylon was a small city state, threatened by all around her, when I came to the throne. By the time I die my ambition is to see a united Mesopotamia, powerful enough to deter its enemies, prosperous through trade and agriculture, ruled fairly and for the benefit of all its peoples.’

  Uktannu realised that Hammurabi had revealed to him more of himself and what drove him than he probably had to anyone else, except Adiar. Despite the revulsion he felt for what had happened in the past twenty four hours, he found that he still admired the king for what he had achieved, if not for his methods; perhaps not in the same unquestioning way he had in the past, but with his eyes open to the real man, faults and all. He considered his position for several moments, then made a decision.

  ‘Very well, lord king. I will continue to serve you as Mutu-Namaha’s deputy for now but, when this campaign is over, I want to build, not destroy. I would like to rebuild this city, as I said, and to settle down here with Sabitum as my wife. If I’m allowed to marry her, I promise that I will treat your nephew and niece in every way as if they were my own children.’

  Hammurabi was taken aback. He recalled that Adiar had mentioned something about such a match but he hadn’t realised that Sabitum and Uktannu even knew each other, let alone had developed an affection for one another. For a moment a black mood returned at the words nephew and niece as he thought of Arishaka, then he nodded.

  ‘I agree. Does Sabitum know of your interest?‘

  ‘Oh, yes. I have admired her from afar for some time but we met at supper as Queen Adiar’s guests just before this campaign and couldn’t stop talking to each other. From the look in her eyes I am confident that she will agree.’

  Hammurabi thought rather grumpily that his wife might have said something about her match-making to him, but he decided that it wasn’t worth having an argument with her about it.

  Chapter Twelve – The Fall of Larsa – 1762 BCE

  It had been five months since the Babylonian army had arrived outside Larsa. It was a formidable city, larger than Babylon and well-defended. Like Babylon, it sat beside the River Euphrates but, unlike Babylon, it didn’t straddle the river; it lay along the north-east bank. The river had been diverted so that effectively the city sat on an island in the middle of the Euphrates. The two bridges that led into the city from the east had both been destroyed.

  This made any attack on Larsa very difficult. It obviously couldn’t be attacked using siege towers and tunnelling to undermine the walls wouldn’t work either. The walls stood three metres back from the river to the south-west and north-east but any attempt to mine under it risked collapse due the weight of water flowing above it. Tunnelling from any other direction was negated by the distance from the wall that the tunnel would have to start; and it would have to go very deep to pass under the river safely. That was something that Abi-Maras didn’t think was feasible with wooden shovels and bronze picks.

  So
, the only option was starvation. Leaving Mutu-Namaha in charge, Hammurabi returned to Babylon. Uktannu had been getting bored with the routine of the siege when Mutu-Namaha decided to detach him with twelve thousand men to obtain the surrender of the four cities in Eastern Sumeria. The plan had been to leave them until Larsa had fallen but reports of raids by Elamites in the region of Urukag, the easternmost city, had worried Mutu-Namaha and he thought it best to take them over now and improve their defences, just in case the Elamites tried to get a foothold on the west bank of the Tigris.

  He was just about to leave when a messenger arrived from Babylon. In amongst the official correspondence were two letters for Uktannu. One was from Hammurabi giving his formal permission for him to marry Sabitum and the other was from her. He had hoped for something personal, perhaps saying how much she was looking forward to their union, but it was just a formal note written by a scribe expressing her formal pleasure at their forthcoming marriage, just as soon as the war in Sumeria was concluded. He was ecstatic at the prospect, but frustrated that he would have to wait until this campaign was over – however long that might take. It did, however, make him determined to resolve matters in the east as quickly as possible.

  The first city he came to was Girsu, thirty miles north east of Larsa and twenty miles from Umma. Girsu was an ancient city dating back well over a thousand years. It had been the centre of a previous kingdom before the capital was moved to Lagash, sixteen miles to the north west. The city had obviously seen better times. The defensive walls had fallen into ruin in places and the earthen ramparts that had been built to fill the gaps wouldn’t deter a determined enemy. However, the setting was idyllic. Girsu was some distance from the Tigris but there were a number of large oases surrounding it, perhaps as many as fifteen. The pasture was green and of good quality on which sheep grazed and there were numerous plantations of dates, olives and figs in addition to fields of barley. There were also several paddocks of onagers and, at one oasis, a fair number of camels.