Lachish Reliefs
A History of the World in 100 Objects
00:00
The Assyrian Empire's Strategy of Mass Deportation
The Bible glosses over the disagreeable fact that Sennacherib responded by brutally seizing the cities of Judah until Hezekiah was crushed and paid up. An Assyrian account of the episode, also here in the British Museum, gives us SennacherIB's view of what happened - allegedly in his own words. From these places I took and carried off 200,156 persons, old and young, male and female, together with horses and mules, asses and camels, oxen and sheep, a countless multitude. These are the people that we see on the relief, the victims of war, who pay the price of their rulers rebellion.
Transcript
Play full episode
